Cruz Out of Control

Rafael Edward Cruz - call him Ted - just announced his candidacy for the Presidency of the United States.  But, given the chosen location of his announcement to seek the Republican presidential nomination - the late Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in Virginia - the U.S. Senator from Texas sounded like he was announcing a crusade.  The Canadian-born Cruz spoke of imagining an America that sounded like a country founded on the values of Christian faith - specifically, self-reliance, the sanctity of marriage, and a small government that leaves people alone.  Funny that Cruz didn't talk about helping other people, healing the environment, or damning multi-million-dollar corporations that value profits over people . . . because that's what Christ would have said!

Oh, and Cruz wants to get rid of Obamacare, too.

The good news is that Cruz won't be our next President.  He's too extreme, he can't sell his reactionary politics to mainstream America (though Scott WalKKKer can sell his), and he's so abrasive and obnoxious, even Republicans can't stand him.  Cruz always gets in people's ways in the Senate and makes it even more difficult than usual to get things done.  Then there's what passes for his charisma.   His air-headed, platitudinous rhetoric is so slick, it oozes out of his every pore.  His hair is not only slick, so is his face.  His smile is just plain greasy.   

I mean, look at this guy!

In many ways, Cruz is the anti-Obama.  While Obama speaks of hope and change for all Americans, Cruz, narrows his message to an overwhelmingly white and conservative electoral base.  While Obama talks about community and honoring individuality, Cruz speaks of a sense of rugged individualism that endorses communal conformity.  And while Obama talks about the promise of America in specific, clear terms, Cruz speaks of it in meaningless generalities. This is all very ironic, for Cruz has a background not unlike Obama's - an immigrant father, an American mother, a law career, a boy-wonder politician in his adopted home state, a breakout election to the U.S. Senate, and pursuit for the Presidency more than three years into his first Senate term.  They were both even brought up in foreign countries - Obama in Indonesia, Cruz in Canada.

Oh yeah, there's one particular difference I should mention: Cruz was actually born in Canada. Obama was born in Hawaii, after it became a state.

Given the phony "birther" insinuations against Obama, the suggestions that he was born in a foreign country, it's little wonder Cruz doesn't talk about being a native-born Canadian.  Of  course the locations of Obama's and Cruz's births don't matter, as their mothers were both American citizens.  Nevertheless. Cruz has gone ahead and renounced his Canadian citizenship, bestowed upon him by virtue of being born on Canadian soil (Calgary, where his Cuban father worked at the time).  Which is another irony, since a Cruz Presidency would cause many Americans to renounce their citizenship and move to Canada.