Posted on 03/04/2016 1:33:29 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
In theory, Ted Cruz's best states are behind him. But at the Detroit debate, Cruz was clearly the class of the field and it's clear that no one should count him out as the delegate race moves into its next phase.
The delegate math is complicated, but the basic gist goes something like this: Donald Trump has a commanding lead at the moment, but it is not a given that he will reach the 1,237 threshold he needs to clinch a majority. Simply put, Trump has failed to break through the ceiling of support he's held since New Hampshire even as the field has consolidated. While he will be helped by winner-take-all states, where he can sweep full slates of delegates even with his plurality, he may be hurt by closed-primary states, where only Republicans vote. So his path is more challenging than it appears.
Cruz's path is more challenging still. But tonight's strong performance can only help Cruz--both with voters and with the party regulars who would play a big role in deciding the nominee should there be a brokered convention.
What Cruz did at the debate was make three parallel cases:
1.) Trump is a fraud who can't be trusted to keep his word.
2.) Trump is not either conservative or Republican in any meaningful way.
3.) Trump actually is the corruption that he decries.
He advanced these arguments not one at a time, but by interweaving them with specific attacks:
* He positively crushed Trump on the use of foreign labor at Mar-a-Lago. He didn't just bring up the fact that hundreds of applicants applied for these jobs but that Trump prefers to hire foreigners instead, but included Trump's line from the last post-debate interview where he claimed that these were jobs American workers couldn't and wouldn't do.
* He thoroughly prosecuted Trump on the question of Trump's off-the-record New York Times interview, which Trump steadfastly refuses to release.
* At the end of the segment on Trump University--where Trump's best defense was telling voters that they should "wait a few years" to see whether or not he committed fraud, Cruz flashed in with a rapier: "Megyn, let me ask the voters at home, is this the debate you want playing out in the general election?" It was brutal.
* When Trump went to his poll numbers--as he always does--Cruz was ready. Trump touted a terrible CNN poll showing him at 49 percent support. Cruz waited for Trump to double down and defend the integrity of the poll. And then he noted that this same poll also showed Trump losing to Clinton and Cruz beating her.
* When the Second Amendment came up, Trump made a gauzy statement of general support. Cruz then dropped the hammer:
It is easy for political candidates to have rhetoric and say, "I support the Second Amendment." But you cannot say that and at the same time say what Donald just said, which is that on the question of Supreme Court nominees he wants to compromise and reach a middle ground with Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer. That's what he said in the last debate. . . . And I would point out, Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer are both Democrats that Mr. Trump has written checks to repeatedly. Any justice that those two sign off on is going to be a left-wing judicial activist who will undermine religious liberty, and we are one vote away from the Heller decision being overturned, which would effectively erase the Second Amendment from the Bill of Rights. Amendment rights, but when you say you'd compromise with Harry Reid, you put that in jeopardy.
* Cruz's most devastating line was probably this summation:
I understand the folks who are supporting Donald right now. You're angry. You're angry at Washington, and he uses angry rhetoric. But for 40 years, Donald has been part of the corruption in Washington that you're angry about. And you're not going to stop the corruption in Washington by supporting someone who has supported liberal Democrats for four decades, from Jimmy Carter to John Kerry to Hillary Clinton. You're not going to stop the corruption and the cronyism by supporting someone who has used government power for private gain.
I'll look it up and watch it again if you say that the ad is false.
Well said ted.
Wake up trumpsters.
Go ted!
There are already photos and video all over the web this morning.
I have gravitated towards Trump of late, but I am horrified for Ted this morning.
Ted was the only adult on stage.
Trump and Rubio were 3rd graders on the playground .
It is sad that trump defenders always go for substantive attacks... As playground bullies often do
Why does @tedcruz keeping lying about @realDonaldTrump supporting Carter when Trump was on the Reagan 80 finance committee?— Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) March 4, 2016
.@marcorubio & @tedcruz are smarmy establishment liars. Funded by billionaire puppet masters. #FOXDebate— Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) March 4, 2016
Former @GeorgeHWBush WH counsel Boyden Gray joins Cruz national finance team.— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 3, 2016
Yes, there is no reasoning with the American people, who are too ill-informed to discern.
And we haven’t yer seen an actual debate
Only an inquisition with Ted and Rubio being fed lines of attack on Trump
Here’s the part that is ignored...
“for the most it’s going to be a private plan
and people are going to be able to go out and negotiate great plans
with lots of different competition with lots of competitors with great companies
and they can have their doctors, they can have plans, they can have everything.”
We can argue the merits but when Trump referred to be people being taken care of
he was speaking of the impoverished or destitute.
I don’t know but some folks says that’s what is now in place with Medicaid and Medicare.
Again you snobby Cruz supporters and your snarky BS posts.
“Cruz crushed a breath mint. Partially, at first, but eventually, he got around to crushing the entire mint. :)”
Cruz did that by claiming that Trump, by giving a few thousand dollars to Reid, Pelosi, and Cruz, funded Obamacare? Saddled the entire nation with Obamacare?
According to Cruz, Trump, not George Soros, has been running the government for decades.
Correction to title: LYING TED !
Only democrats want to win elections. Everyone else wants to play with themselves.
Pointing out the obvious, even to otherwise well meaning conservative minded freepers, has no impact. The delusions run deep and infects all.
The “right” side of the establishment will do all in its power to throw the election to the criminal hag. Whether for Cruz or Rubio, such supporters will willing seek defeat. It is in their genes, it is their destiny, and no amount of truth or logic can alter their politically destructive ways.
Like spoiled children, if they can’t have their way, they want no one else to succeed.
Unfortunately, this will allow evil to continue its course in destroying America.
Seriously, Trump was for the mandate last week and now against it, was for obamacare but now against it, was pro abortion now against it, was for gun control now against it. Was for homos in the military, oh wait, he's still for that.
Those are his own words before being spun by his advisors and reexplained.
“85% of the voters DON’T WANT TED CRUZ”
Outsider Ted not so outside.
“The record seems to be clear that Ted Cruz is a top notch debater.”
After watching all these debates, I just don’t see Cruz as a top notch debater.
He evades questions, avoids questions, twists comments and actions beyond anything that is logical, as in “Trump funded Obamacare.”
“I would have come back with the fact that, in most polls, 80-85% have rejected Rubio and all he could win was MN and finish third.”
Trump pointed that out about twice, about both of them.
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