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Ted Cruz, The Lone Stranger
The Huffington Post's The Blog ^ | September 28, 2015 | Richard North Patterson, Author and political commentator

Posted on 09/28/2015 2:22:52 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

Armchair psychoanalysis of political figures can be a dubious and even disreputable business. But one presidential candidate presents the following symptoms: feral aggression, reflexive demagoguery, self absorption, paranoia, grandiosity, disdain for social norms and an inability to cooperate with others. When such a person habitually imagines himself as Winston Churchill, the effect is truly destabilizing. So let us add to the DSM a newly discovered malady: Ted Cruz Syndrome.

For the historic figure Cruz most evokes is not Churchill, but a nascent Joseph McCarthy. It is not his fault that he resembles the young McCarthy (though he does), but that his words and actions bring the vulpine loner from Wisconsin to eerie recall. Like McCarthy, Cruz is capable of a casual cruelty which is startlingly gratuitous. Hard upon the death of Beau Biden, Cruz chortled to an audience, "Joe Biden. You know what the nice thing is? ... [J]ust walk up to someone and say,' Vice-President Joe Biden,' and just close your mouth. They will crack up laughing."

Shortly after Jimmy Carter revealed his grim diagnosis with admirable grace, Cruz ridiculed Barack Obama and Carter as having identical failed presidencies, as if merely attacking Obama was not pleasure enough. Sometimes, it seems, all one has to do is cross the senator's radar screen, no matter how tragic the circumstances. For with Cruz, like McCarthy, merely calling his endless array of self-selected opponents wrong does not suffice to slake his psychic need to demean and disparage.

The targets of these rhetorical drive-by shootings are often his fellow Republicans. During Chuck Hagel's confirmation hearings, Cruz implied that Hagel had received money from North Korea. In the skirmishing over the Export-Import Bank, Cruz accused his own Majority Leader of telling a "flat-out lie."(continued)

(Excerpt) Read more at huffingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Campaign News; Issues; Parties; U.S. Senate
KEYWORDS: atlanticcouncil; cruz; tedcruz
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To: Busko
All the RINOs that hated Reagan in the 70s and 80s, that would be the Bushes, Ford, McConnell and the Rockefellers and the rest of the establishment. Cruz would win a landside if he is not taken out by them!!!

Marvellous fantasy, but Reagan wouldn't have won without votes from people like that.

You may be thinking of Goldwater. He didn't win.

21 posted on 09/28/2015 2:48:19 PM PDT by x
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

McCarthy was right.


22 posted on 09/28/2015 2:49:50 PM PDT by SeaHawkFan
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
For the historic figure Cruz most evokes is not Churchill, but a nascent Joseph McCarthy.

Ok, but McCarthy was right... What now?

23 posted on 09/28/2015 2:52:41 PM PDT by roamer_1 (Globalism is just Socialism in a business suit.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

FU Richard Patterson. You are a left wing whore.


24 posted on 09/28/2015 2:53:31 PM PDT by Fledermaus (To hell with the Republican Party. I'm done with them. If I want a Lib Dem I'd vote for one.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Armchair psychoanalysis of political figures can be a dubious and even disreputable business.

True. So why do it?

Why attack Ted Cruz if he's only polling in the middle of the pack? Or is he? Show me the plethora of attack articles about Mike Huckabee, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio or Rick Santorum. Hint: You can't.

Cruz is the target that gets their juices flowing. He also gets their donation money flowing.

If he weren't around, somebody else would be their target. But it would be less satisfying for them.

25 posted on 09/28/2015 2:53:53 PM PDT by x
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“But one presidential candidate presents the following symptoms: feral aggression, reflexive demagoguery, self absorption, paranoia, grandiosity, disdain for social norms and an inability to cooperate with others.”

Wait, are they talking about Hillary or Obama?


26 posted on 09/28/2015 2:58:10 PM PDT by Boogieman
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The hyperbole just makes me laugh. I dearly hope they’re really terrified of Ted Cruz.


27 posted on 09/28/2015 3:02:42 PM PDT by Twotone (Truth is hate to those who hate truth.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Maybe I’m wrong, but I have a sneaky feeling that Cruz is precisely where he wants to be at this stage of the election cycle. Being the frontrunner is dangerous. Middle of the pack, with stamina and strategy in mind, is much safer. Let Trump take the slings and arrows for now.

Cruz is smart. Smarter than me, smarter than a lot of other people. He has a plan and he’s working it. I think that there are a lot of people on the other side of the fence who are thinking the same thing and know he is the real threat that must be dealt with.


28 posted on 09/28/2015 3:14:07 PM PDT by Ronin (Blackface or bolt-ons, it's the same fraud. - Norm Lenhart)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
I smell fear ... and the aroma is delicious.


29 posted on 09/28/2015 3:16:30 PM PDT by katana (Just my opinions)
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To: cripplecreek

Darn it! Where’s that Retweet button? Or even a “like??”


30 posted on 09/28/2015 3:26:12 PM PDT by redhead (NO GROUND TO THE DEVIL! Remember BENGHAZI!! Use Weaponized Pr ayer)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"...feral aggression, reflexive demagoguery, self absorption, paranoia, grandiosity, disdain for social norms and an inability to cooperate with others."

Gee, sounds a lot like Obama and his crew.

31 posted on 09/28/2015 3:31:36 PM PDT by Liberty Valance (Keep a Simple Manner for a Happy Life :o)
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To: Ronin

32 posted on 09/28/2015 3:45:27 PM PDT by cripplecreek (Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.)
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To: chajin

“I seem to be the only person I know who thinks Cruz looks like a 21st century version of young LBJ”

Pleased to meet you!

http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/3333148/posts?page=22#22


33 posted on 09/28/2015 4:07:31 PM PDT by Buttons12
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To: Buttons12

Great mind see alike!


34 posted on 09/28/2015 4:13:53 PM PDT by chajin ("There is no other name under heaven given among people by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12)
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To: x

I’m talking about when the leadership was trying to get him out of the race.


35 posted on 09/28/2015 4:24:54 PM PDT by Busko (The only thing that is certain is that nothing is certain.)
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To: x

Imagine if Sarah Palin had run...


36 posted on 09/28/2015 5:12:56 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet (TED CRUZ. You can help: https://donate.tedcruz.org/c/FBTX0095/)
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To: DesertRhino

What is Hillary’s diagnosis?


37 posted on 09/28/2015 6:28:42 PM PDT by ballplayer (hvexx NKK c bmytit II iyijjhihhiyyiyiyi it iyiiy II i hi jiihi ty yhiiyihiijhijjyjiyjiiijyuiiijihyii)
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