Besides I understand Cruz’s point somewhat- with the dumbing down of our education system, our students are not majoring in the hard sciences. ie, the majority of masters in engineering are going to foreign students.
The real solution is to fix the schools - but that will take another generation to come to fruition.
Walker touting amnesty - I will never understand. I passed on voting for McCain for the same reason.
The thing is this - and we have the same debate every four years here on FR: I work with many millennials in a skilled professional context. They are young and dumb. They tacitly assume matters as they stand now are the norm because they don't remember the Reagan years. They might remember Clinton as generally positive. They know, because of an incessant media drumbeat, that "Bush is evil", right up there with Hitler and Mao (Michael Medved even alluded to a recent poll suggesting as much). They don't relish working the long hours, but they don't tie their high effort-to-pay ratio to Obama. It's never Obama's fault in their minds...
On ultimate questions, they will frequently say things like, "I don't know what I believe." They were raised by "helicopter parents" in many cases, and have little sense of propriety as traditionally understood (earning one's stripes before opining, respecting authority figures, etc.) This indicates a lack of grounding and, given America's long spiritual decline, should not surprise us.
We all are paying for the millennials' lack of experience and groundedness, since they voted in huge numbers for the hip, young candidate in 2008 who advertised on World of Warcraft and myriads of other online venues untouched by more traditional campaigns. This guy, they felt, "got" them.
My worry with Cruz, as a straight-laced conservative, will not resonate with the group that is replacing the Greatest and early-stagest Boomer generation citizens that are dying off. They lack the life experience to appreciate him.
They can, however, relate to economic issues. Someone like Walker would be able to bring them along and at the same time introduce them to a president with traditional American values, showing these folks how good it can be for them. Like Cruz, he's a younger man (mid-Xer) not so far removed as to be unrelatable, yet with additional experience of America's more recent golden years and the policies to give the younger generation a taste of that.
Walker is not perceived as "out there" (could win younger votes) and has name recognition. He could help pave the way for a brighter future. He has broad appeal and the executive experience to govern effectively.
Cruz, after two terms as Walker's VP, would have that executive experience and by then the younger generation now will have grown up a bit and be able to appreciate the contrasts between a conservative administration and what we have today.
This is the clearest path to victory I see, with America's current demographics, for a conservative presidency. Sans Walker, I fear we're saddled with Bush and very possibly a 2016 loss because of the tragedy of the Bush name.