Ted Cruz Isn't The Problem With The Republican Party, He's The Solution

Liberals have the Democrat Party, Establishment Republicans have the GOP and conservatives have no party that represents them in Washington.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of Republicans who say they’re conservative. There are even plenty of Republicans who will vote like conservatives when it doesn’t matter. But, how many conservatives are actually willing to fight for conservative principles the way Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi fight for liberal principles? In the House and Senate combined, there are a few dozen, tops and the establishment Republicans are incessantly bemoaning the fact that anyone stands up for conservatism.

So when Ted Cruz and Mike Lee pushed to defund Obamacare, grassroots conservatives embraced the idea. Most of them did so knowing full well that getting Obama to defund the Affordable Care Act was the longest of longshots. However, they also knew that there were and are plenty of other opportunities to be grasped.

Obama has been telling the world he won’t negotiate while he punitively shuts down national parks, kicks old people out of their homes and blocks off veterans from memorials. Conservatives are energized by the fight. Every Democrat in the Senate has now gone on record as being in favor of Obamacare, saying it doesn’t need to be delayed and saying that they deserve an exemption from Obamacare that the rest of the public doesn’t get.

If this isn’t a winnable fight for the Republican Party, you have to wonder what a winnable fight would look like? If Obama publicly sacrificed a baby a Satan on Ted Kennedy’s birthday, would the public believe that the GOP was waging a war on children after listening to John Boehner and Mitch McConnell for 10 minutes?

Moreover, the one heavily skewed Wall Street poll that’s freaking squishy Republicans out isn’t telling the whole story. Barack Obama’s approval rating has dropped to 37% and his approval rate with independents is down to 16%. Barack Obama is the face of the Democrat Party and those are the kind of numbers that lead to political bloodbaths while dislike for Congress has sadly become the rule, not the exception. Moreover, there are still great opportunities to be had. How about funding the entire government, but insisting on removing the exemption for members of Congress and their staffs? Let the Democrats tell the world that they’re willing to shut down the government to make sure that the American public supplements the cost of their Obamacare coverage. That’s a very winnable fight, but sadly, you have to suspect that a lot of Republicans would rather lose the political fight than lose the exemption they’re getting from the law. They might vote for it when they know the Democrats won’t agree, but actually winning on the issue? They’d prefer a half-hearted loss than a go for the throat win.

But instead, after some smart early maneuvers from the House, the GOP leadership team there has largely fallen silent. Meanwhile, Republicans in the Senate have been actively working with the Democrats to undermine the House. In addition, establishment mediocrities like John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Haley Barbour, Devin Nunes, Grover Norquist, John Sununu, Bob Corker and the loathsome Peter King have been fighting tooth and nail against their real enemy: Grassroots champions like Ted Cruz who actually want to stand up for conservatives instead of corporations, fatcat donors and country club Republicans.

The problem with the Republican Party isn’t politicians like Ted Cruz and Mike Lee who actually believe in representing the people who sent them to DC, it’s the establishment Republicans who fight harder against conservatives than they’ll fight against the Democrats along with a GOP “leadership” that can’t talk, strategize or do much of anything except flounder around haplessly while they get their brains beaten in by the Democrats.

It’s all well and good to say, “The most important thing is to win more seats and then we’ll fight later.” The problem with that is we’ve already gone down that road during the Bush years and we found that the same people who don’t want to fight now, didn’t want to fight when we had the House, the Senate and the White House either. In fact, a big part of the reason why the GOP lost the House, the Senate and the White House was because Medicare Part D and more funding for the National Endowment for the Arts was their idea of what the GOP should be doing when it was in charge.

People hate the Republican Party right now — and they should. It doesn’t communicate well, it doesn’t do much outreach to groups that don’t vote for us, it doesn’t stand up for the values it supposedly believes in, it betrays its supporters on a regular basic and although it claims to be the adult party of small government, reduced spending and law and order, it doesn’t consistently stand up for those principles even in the minority. Liberals never have to question where the Democrats are on abortion, raising taxes or expanding government, so why should we never know if we can count on the GOP on gun control, illegal immigration and spending?

The road to recovery for the Republican Party starts with proving that it will fight aggressively for the principles it claims to believe in as opposed to being talking big and never backing it up. Ted Cruz and Mike Lee get that. If more Republicans in DC understood that, the GOP wouldn’t have lost the last presidential election because a few million members of its base stayed home.

Cruz running on a third party ticket would never have won. But now that the Tea Party candidates are in office they should leave the GOP and start their own party. Then let’s see if the elites will caucus with the democrats.

I’ve always thought the republicans taking over the house only postponed what’s eventually going to happen if the GoP doesn’t grow some balls. If they hadn’t taken control in 2010 I believe the democrats would have taken a bath in 2012.

"The road to recovery for the Republican Party starts with proving that it will fight aggressively for the principles it claims to believe in as opposed to being talking big and never backing it up.

Ted Cruz and Mike Lee get that. If more Republicans in DC understood that, the GOP wouldn’t have lost the last presidential election because a few million members of its base stayed home."

This is the real reason that Romney lost, and is the key thing that a great many Freepers still need to analytically process to move forward to real victory.

...now that the Tea Party candidates are in office they should leave the GOP and start their own party.

I think it's still too early for elected members of Congress to break out and join a newly formed third party. There just aren't enough of them in place to form a winning coalition at this point.

On the other hand, if a new patriotic national party forms at the grass roots level, and builds up to a credible level of membership, it could begin sending new members to Congress while attracting many previously elected members to switch over.

Or something like that. The precise sequence of events required to make a success of it aren't boldly visible at this time.

One thing's certain though, and that is, the Republican party is split into opposing factions right now, and the new guard has the winning momentum over the old guard. If we on the true right simply maintain focus and discipline, we will eventually replace all of the quisling RINOs in office with solid TEApublicans.

A third party won’t fix the problem and if the tea party is not capable of taking over the GOP standing for the same language that is in the GOP platform, what makes you think it would be any more successful as a third party when the RINO’s would march with the rats?

As I said above in post 19, we are the minority and it is unlikely to change anytime soon. It’s not popular to say around here, but our view of America and the political preferences of our people do not reflect reality. The majority can now vote to steal from the minority and the majority is growing as the minority shrinks.

The Affordable Care Act (a massive new tax on working people) is now law. On top of that, the ACA is likely to suppress health care - a huge portion of our economy further reducing tax revenues. The rats are talking more about new taxes rather than cutting government spending and they continue to hand out more entitlements every day. Our monetary policy of borrowing from the Federal Reserve is growing and few understand the “tax” this represents to working people and future generations.

We are a nation held hostage by our poor via entitlements and the middle class even bought into the Ponzi scheme with social security. Amnesty will make this even worse. We now have schools providing free breakfast and lunch to poor students (almost all of them) in Texas!!!!!! Do you think they are going to readjust the families SNAP allowance every month to reflect 20 fewer meals? I don’t.

Sorry FRiend, but we are losing..... badly. I want Cruz and Company to succeed, but they can only thwart the will of the majority for so long - a majority of the GOP also by the way. Thinking that Cruz or any other conservative has the powers of persuasion to overcome our demographics is wishful thinking. Thinking they are somehow going to start a successful third party when the growing number of freeloaders work once every two years (vote) is not realistic.

I wish it were not so.

Thinking that Cruz or any other conservative has the powers of persuasion to overcome our demographics is wishful thinking. Thinking they are somehow going to start a successful third party when the growing number of freeloaders work once every two years (vote) is not realistic.

I don't think I've ever suggested that Ted Cruz could whup the Democrat left and the RINO establishment single handedly. But - it's a fact that he has terrified them all so badly, they're having a collective meltdown. That's power, and it's being wielded by a lone Senator.

Put half a dozen more like him in office, and the whole left will collapse.

Now, you can choose to wring your hands and give up the battle just as we're beginning to take back ground from the enemy, but I and most others here won't. I also won't agree to your assertion that "our view of America and the political preferences of our people do not reflect reality."

Just because the Dems have better field advantage at the moment, and there aren't tens of millions of us surrounding DC, doesn't mean that we're in the minority, or that the war is lost.

I don't, and I won't buy that. The day I do, is the day I hand in my Freeper card and quit posting here. It would be pointless to sit among these good patriots if I weren't with them in mind, body, and spirit. Should I ever lose the will to fight, I will remove myself from their honorable company.

As should any person who's resigned themselves to our defeat.

I don’t know the answers. I am not a pessimist by nature and I am not a quitter - I try to do my part. We face difficult times and as my tagline says - we (being all Americans) have to suffer some pain to provide our children a brighter future and likely save our nation as it has existed. I am very frustrated that more Americans don’t understand the mess we are in and how we got here and what is required to get out of it. There seems to be little interest in doing the right thing.

What I said about taking back the GOP stands. If right minded Americans can’t control the GOP despite controlling the platform we need to primary the RINO’s and regain control - it’s difficult, but it has been done. If we can’t force the GOP to abide by it’s platform we don’t have the power and voice necessary to wake up our nation and a third party won’t do anything but insure control by the rats.

I appreciate your enthusiasm and desire to do the right thing and please know I intended no criticism - I will keep fighting for what is right, but I am also preparing for the hard times that appear to be coming and others would be well served to do the same. I don’t feel good about it.

I think that's all any of us can ask of each other.

I hope my earlier response didn't come across as a personal criticism. I can appreciate anyone's weariness and pessimism after five years of relentless battering by the forces of 'fundamental transformation'. At the same time, I think it's important for us to recognize that together we are a far greater force than Zero and his minions could ever dream of being.

We stand for all that is good, decent, worthy, and honorable in our nation. We love this country, it's history, its contributions to humanity, and the precepts which underlie its founding.

All of those excellent qualities are a part of us. They're what animate us, as we would have our children and their children share in the good and right which has been the nature and character of this wonderful country.

I suppose I'd simply ask that others look long and hard at who and what we really are as a people, when they're feeling down, defeated, or pessimistic about our future.

Thanks.

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