If you want to get this assemblage to make a LOT of noise all at the same time, just mention Hillary Clinton’s name, the boos will be resounding. This week in the arena, the most popular chants aren’t about Trump or the need to ‘Make America Great Again, ‘ but rather on how Clinton should be in jail. No mention, no kind words, no endorsement. Cruz spent the entire second half of 2015 obsequiously hyping Trump’s candidacy because he assumed it would collapse and all those Trump supporters would migrate to Team Cruz.
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“My opponent has called for a radical 550% increase in Syrian refugees on top of existing massive refugee flows coming into our country under President Obama”, Trump will say, referring to Hillary Clinton, who is set to accept the Democratic nomination for president at the party’s convention next week. He compared his own courageous decision to speak to a less-than-friendly room to Trump’s attitude toward critics: “Can anyone imagine our nominee standing in front of voters answering questions like this?” “And that a very left-leaning Ginsburg clone is put on the Supreme Court next spring because I couldn’t bring myself to support Donald Trump”. “I think what is important is where we are today and where he’s gonna take us”. Ted Cruz had his chance to be a hero or commit suicide. Think about it. We’ve seen an invited guest speaker tell the assembled delegates to vote their consciences, without bothering to go through the formality of endorsing the party’s candidate for President.
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said his actions were “awful” and New York Congressman Peter King called the speech “disgraceful”.
In a statement issued by the campaign, Meredith McIver took the blame but made it clear that Mrs. Trump knew the passages were from the first lady’s speech. Trump, meanwhile, had unexpected success winning voter groups that Cruz had assumed would be his base of support: evangelicals, southerners, and hardline conservatives. Trump had nasty comments about Cruz’s wife Heidi’s appearance and tried to link Cruz’s Cuban-born dad Rafael to the JFK murder. And it only got more combative from there.
“Other than a small group of people who have suffered massive and embarrassing losses, the party is VERY united”. Writing in the liberal NY magazine, Andrew Sullivan, the biggest snob who ever blogged, said he was “proud” of Cruz for having “stared the bully down”. It’s just as true for Democrats, if not more so. And he would be well served not to follow Cruz’s lead, at least in this respect: You can’t unify people unless you’re willing to move toward middle ground.
The unrest on the convention floor escalated when Trump, near the end of the Cruz speech, joined his family in their VIP section, attracting attention.
Cruz’s speech reignited old battle wounds between the two from the campaign trail. Math is on his side. “The standard that I apply is, which candidate do I trust to defend the Constitution?” said Cruz.
“We’re writing his political obituary-he’s dead”, Stephen Bannon, executive chairman of Breitbart News, the influential right-wing website that was an early fan of Cruz, said about the Texas senator. Mike Crane, who’s running in the hotly contested July 26 runoff to replace U.S. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland in the 3rd congressional District. To marry whom you love? Does that sound like Trump to you?
That’s a man putting his principles – regardless of whether you agree with them – over politics.
And yes, there could be an ulterior political motive.
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He can strike back at Cruz another day.
