If you want to talk about intellectual honesty then everyone should watch the video which you reference and also read carefully the articles linked at the blog (not the spin but the actual articles)
What Cruz says there is what we who support him have been saying for months very time this is brought up.
First the careful reader of the blog itself will note that buried in there is the fact that Cruz ended up NOT voting for TPA, and yet this is still not good enough because he “supported” it before. Fine.
As he said in that video and as he was quoted as saying in the blog, the reason he supporTED, not supportS, but USED to support TPA, (or “fast track”) was because it (and still does) give the president the ability to negotiate trade deals.
First off, don’t we want the president to be able to do that? Even Trump? Don’t you think it would be a good idea for Trump to have the ability to negotiate deals?
That’s the point he (Cruz) addresses in the video the reason for his support at the time: because in his mind (and he’s right about this) it’s the NEXT president; not Obama now, who will be negotiating such deals!! So it’s not like he supported the notion of “giving Obama more power”, again as he explains in the video. It’s under the presumption that the next president will need to negotiate deals an ability, by the way as is again pointed out in the video, that the president has had for the last 80 years! It’s nothing new here folks! And the reason the majority requirement has ALWAYS been lowered from 2/3 to a simple majority was indeed to “fast track” such deals.
Again, for the last 80 years. Again, NOTHING new.
The reason Cruz eventually voted AGAINST TPA was because of the back room deal that was indeed put in there, despite McConnels promises, about renewing the Im-Ex bank! Something every conservative should be opposed to!! THATS why Cruz called him a “liar” on the Senate floor, something we applauded him for just a YEAR ago here on FR but now has masterfully been turned around on him to paint him as a liar.
His entire actions through the whole affair have been nothing BUT conservative and yet in the last year, through some masterful flim-flam from sites like the “conservative tree house” and it’s author, that “paragon” of conservatism “Sundance”, these same acts we on FR just a YEAR AGO RIGHTFULLY APPLAUDED have been TWISTED into “proof” of the “Lyin Ted” moniker.
Josef Goebels would be pleased.
“Conservative tree house”’calling for “intellectual honesy”. What a crock!
I do not think the president should have the authority to form agreements with nations. I consider that to be foreign entanglements, and they should be subject to the treaty provisions of the US Constitution.
So, no. Trump should not be able to forego the Constitution.
At the same time, I also believe that the filibuster is a covert amending of the Constitution by virtue of abusing the provision that the Senate can make their own rules to guide their processes.