Since Ted Cruz raised the topic, I guess we should talk about “Values.”
Cruz says that Donald Trump has “New York values,” which he defines as “socially liberal, pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage, focus around money and the media.” He doubled down on that appraisal the following day with his faux apology.
So, since we’re talking about “values,” let’s talk about what Cruz represents.
Ted Cruz is unabashedly anti-immigrant.
Despite his self-proclaimed stirring narrative about being the product of an immigrant marriage and being born in Canada, he has rushed to proclaim the need to tighten the borders and has applauded Donald Trump’s advocacy of building a wall on the southern border of the nation.
When Trump proclaimed that Mexican and Central-American immigrants were “rapists” and criminals, his lack of criticism and silence, despite also being Hispanic, was deafening. Trump’s call to bar all Muslims from entering the United States was greeted with the tepid response that it wasn’t his idea.
Cruz would turn back the clock on marriage equality and every other right sought or obtained by our fellow gay Americans, including the right to be treated equally in public accommodations and other businesses serving the public.
Cruz would like to outlaw a woman’s right to choose and supported stripping the requirement that contraception be provided under the Affordable Care Act. He would defund Planned Parenthood. He is opposed to equal pay for women and voted against the Violence Against Women Act.
Cruz opposes affirmative action and supports abolishing the Departments of Education, Commerce, Energy and the Internal Revenue Service.
His pronouncements on the campaign trail stop just short of substituting a theocracy for democracy. I suspect that a proposal to replace the Department of Justice with a Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice isn’t too long in coming from Cruz.
The Republican Party appears to be panicked at the prospect of a potential Trump or Cruz candidacy for President. If I were them, I wouldn’t be too alarmed. All they need to do is find a Vice-Presidential nominee that is more moderate than either of them.
I’m sure Mullah Omar is out there somewhere.
4 thoughts on “The American Taliban”
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A brief comment from certainly one of those people not so surreptitiously labeled as having “New York Values”. Along with purely political ramifications, the front-running Republican candidates, and thus, we must believe the Party itself, has shown an alarming yellow streak in its staunch rebellion against immigration and tolerance. Along with so many other social actions and values that seem to be streaming out the window daily in this country, is that competition, rising to it, and raising the bar because of it, is what made this country great. The greatness (and yes perhaps fear-driven) accomplishments of a country which had to compete to be great, is what led to the very survival and greatness of this country’s accomplishments.
Are we now no longer willing to be great at the expense of those that are at least the theoretical descendants of our constitutional mandate “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” for all.
That internal eco-political structures must be upgraded to accommodate such a current form of greatness, should not deter us, nor should it be tolerated for even a moment in the guise of “protecting what we have”. History serves up too many ugly reminders of where that thinking leads.
Joe, as usual you are right on. However, there is, I think, a simpler and more obvious analysis at hand, one we will ignore to our everlasting peril: “New York values” is Cruz’s dog whistle speak for “Jews”. It’s bad enough that this smarmy A-hole is gathering momentum, money, and support from the evangelical “base” mainly out of people’s legitimate fears of an unstable future; but his cynical expounding of “New York values” puts him in the mainstream of the anti-Semitism of Father Coughlin and George Lincoln Rockwell tradition of singling out the Tribe as an easy explanation for the simple minded. This guy is not just offensive; he is a danger to America.
The Republicans are reaping what they have sowed. The Party has turned so far to the right that they left the door open for someone like Cruz (who I believe is the AntiChrist) or Trump ( who has hijacked the Party). They should have seen Trump coming, since he has made noises about running for years. Once again, the positions taken during the primaries, where red meat is thrown to the far right, dooms them for the general election. You cannot win the Presidency by pissing off women and Hispanics, just to name a few groups. I was amused to learn that El Chapos lawyers have made their initial motion against extradition on the basis that he can’t get a fair trial in the States because of Trump’s remarks.
A blogger on a political site:
‘Trump is the candidate that the Republican Party has been building towards for decades. Now that he’s goddamned Darth Vadering all the establishment Jedi they wanna cry about it. They built this house now they gotta deal with its construction.’
Brilliant.