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| The Ted Cruz purity test: A Cruz nomination could be apocalyptic for the right; Conservatives always insist that a "true conservative" candidate will win, but what happens if Ted Cruz loses? | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Apr 7 2016, 02:47 PM (339 Views) | |
| Cruzula | Apr 7 2016, 02:47 PM Post #1 |
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There’s a popular strain of thought weaving through the American right that treats conservatism as an infallible good, a sort of deity to be faithfully served. If, as a politician, you are true to conservatism in the purest way possible, then you will know nothing but policy success and electoral triumph. But if your policy goes sour or you lose an election, it’s not because conservatism was rejected – it was because you failed conservatism. In situations like these, the thinking goes, victory would have been attainable if only a true spokesperson for the conservative cause had been put before the people. It’s a comforting rationalization that conservatives deploy whenever they’re confronted with electoral setbacks. After the Democrats took control of Congress in the 2006 elections, Rush Limbaugh went on the radio and declared: “Conservatism did not lose; Republicans lost.” After John McCain went down in the 2008 presidential election, Ann Coulter wrote: “How many times do we have to run this experiment before Republican primary voters learn that ‘moderate,’ ‘independent,’ ‘maverick’ Republicans never win, and right-wing Republicans never lose?” And the day after Mitt Romney got thumped by Barack Obama in 2012, Limbaugh once again took to the airwaves to announce: “Conservatism, in my humble opinion, did not lose last night.” This line of thinking has taken root as the Republican Party has lurched further and further rightward and convinced itself that the only way to win is to distill one’s conservatism down to the purest essence. Arguably there’s no stronger believer in this theory than Ted Cruz, whose political identity and presidential campaign are shaped by the quest for conservative purity. “If you look at the last 40 years, a constant pattern emerges,” Cruz told ABC News in 2013. “Any time Republicans nominate a candidate for president who runs as a strong conservative, we win. And when we nominate a moderate who doesn’t run as a conservative, we lose.” There are problems with this theory – specifically, it isn’t true. It’s a shaky premise to begin with, given that terms like “moderate” and “strong conservative” are variable and change with time. George W. Bush was very conservative, but he also had moderate tendencies that found expression in his domestic agenda. George H.W. Bush was nobody’s idea of a conservative ideologue and considerably more moderate than Ronald Reagan, and he won a crushing victory over Michael Dukakis. If you expand Cruz’s timeline slightly beyond the 40-year window, you can even rope Richard Nixon into the mix. But the operating theory is that only true conservatives stand a chance at victory, and Cruz would represent the ultimate test of this deeply flawed theory. http://www.salon.com/2016/04/07/the_ted_cruz_purity_test_a_cruz_nomination_could_be_apocalyptic_for_the_right/ |
| "Merkel is a worse Chancellor than Hitler" ~ American Identitarian | |
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| Cruzula | Apr 7 2016, 02:48 PM Post #2 |
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And of course a Cruz Nomination would be the only thing that could get me to vote for the HillMachine in the November General, instead of opting for the Green Party. |
| "Merkel is a worse Chancellor than Hitler" ~ American Identitarian | |
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| Arlette | Apr 10 2016, 06:01 AM Post #3 |
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I wouldn't worry about the obstructionist. there ain't enough religious yahoos in this country to put him over the top |
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8:26 PM Jul 10