Posted on 04/24/2015 5:33:57 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Elizabeth Warren versus Ted Cruz? Not likely. Only the most extraordinary circumstances could produce this improbable contest for the presidency in 2016.
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz was the first to declare his candidacy for the Republican nomination, but his hardcore ideology and abrasive manner make him unlikely to be chosen by calmer heads closer to the center of the party.
And despite persistent efforts by left-wing Democrats to change her mind, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren is emphatic in her refusal to run for the office.
Still, consideration of the remote possibility that these two could face off for the presidency brings this question into sharp relief: What kind of country are we?
Filmmaker Michael Moore has an opinion. In a chapter entitled “A Liberal Paradise,” from his book “Dude, Where’s My Country?” he argues that the United States is a “land of liberal-lefty peacenik tree-huggers.”
Of course, Moore is easy to dismiss. His politics reside at the far-left, semi-socialist end of the Democratic spectrum, and his style is often brash and abrasive. So consider the source.
But Moore builds his case on polls taken by organizations such as Harris, Gallup, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Harvard and even Fox News.
Moore argues that on a wide variety of issues — from abortion to gun control to the environment to health care — Americans lean much more to the left than to the right.
Moore’s book was published in 2003, so his statistics are a decade out of date, but many of the attitudes they reflect are probably durable, and on some issues, they may now trend even further to the left.
For example, Moore cites polls from Gallup, the Los Angeles Times, the Kaiser Family Foundation and Newsweek, among others, to describe an America in which 68 percent of its citizens favor laws against discrimination against homosexual employees, and half say that gay and lesbian couples should be entitled to the same benefits that opposite-sex married couples receive.
Last month, the Washington Post reported that 59 percent of Americans support same-sex marriage, and half believe that the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection gives gays and lesbians the right to marry. We’re trending left on this issue.
In fact, I suspect that many Americans are currently as concerned about other issues ordinarily associated with the left — marijuana legalization and the environment, for example — as they were in 2003, if not more so.
But statistics take us only so far. Although the word “liberal” has been demonized by the right, on many issues Americans’ attitudes tend to the political left, even if they often conflict with what Americans say and how they vote.
Big government versus small government? Small government, of course. But we like the security, stability and benefits that result from the collective energy of a government that provides services beyond the capacity of private enterprise. We like having police officers and firefighters, good schools and the most powerful military in the world. We like good highways, and we like being able to drink water out of any tap in the U.S. without having to worry about contracting cholera.
High taxes versus low? Low, of course. But even if we don’t always realize it (“Keep your government hands off of my Medicare!”), we also like the social safety net — as porous as it is — that makes us different from many other countries, where the poor and the ill are left to suffer and die on their own.
Generalizing a little, conservatism hopes to restore a fondly remembered past; liberalism imagines that public policy can be wielded to improve the future. Maybe the best we can do lies somewhere in between.
Which may explain why we’ll probably be treated to a conventional Clinton-versus-Bush battle that, no matter how it turns out, won’t provide much chance for real change.
Too bad. The improbable Warren-versus-Cruz contest would tell us a lot more about who we really are.
Sic’em Ted!
The problem isn’t so much the amount of her experience as the content of her experience.
This is going to sound like I am a teenager, but the thing I hate most about her (and I do not normally use the term “hate”) is her voice.
She speaks as if she is my tenth grade English teacher. She has that intonation that one has with a six year old. Every word out of her mouth sounds condescending.
Oh, that’s her.
Next up: The Ipecac Ribeye Face-Off!
It is both!
Coolidge considered himself a Vermonter and is buried in the community cemetery where he grew up. It is a touching little place.
I’ve been through Plymouth about a thousand times. It is a beautiful place.
This author is a dilusional fool! That said, a Cruz v Warren ticket would likely be the best thing that could happen to this Republic.
“We like having police officers...”
Do you? If so, then the left’s treatment of police officers leaves a lot to be desired.
“good schools”
Yet the left’s policies are making them worse and worse.
“and the most powerful military in the world.”
Then why on earth do your policies ALWAYS weaken the military?
“We like good highways,”
Then why are they continuing to “crumble” after almost constant harping about it?
“and we like being able to drink water out of any tap in the U.S. without having to worry about contracting cholera.”
Yet, the EPA tells us that everything is too dirty to consume!
You lefties (author) would be comical if you weren’t so dangerous.....
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.