Tag: Ted Cruz

Does the Liberty University Wing of the GOP Appeal to the Masses?

While asking a political question, Jonathan Merritt’s latest column in The Week provides insight into how group leaders keep in-group members in line. Merritt was slated to speak at a Liberty University function (his alma mater), but was disinvited by the president of the school, Jerry Falwell, Jr. because “We’re just uncomfortable with some of the things you’ve been writing.”
Using the stick is a part of the tactics, promising a return to good graces if one comes around is the carrot. According to Merritt, Falwell, Jr. then said:

“You don’t seem to remember who your friends are,” Falwell lamented. “So we’ll continue to keep an eye on you and if things change on your end, we’ll reevaluate.”

I have had several of those kind of conversations over the years. The power players have been both liberals and conservatives. Group dynamics don’t seem to know party loyalties.
In this case, Merritt uses this story to pursue what promises to be a significant story line of the 2016 election. Can the cluster of religious right positions held by Ted Cruz and featured by Liberty University earlier this week appeal to the rest of the country?
Merritt seems skeptical and I agree with him.
Merritt frames the matter this way:

The question that is yet to be answered is whether their kind of conservatism — the Liberty University kind — is too rigid, radical, and Tea Party-friendly for most Americans, including moderate conservatives and centrists like me.

I am aware that not all people who teach at Liberty University are as far right as the administration appears to be. Liberty is often known for the work of the Liberty Counsel and the law school once headed by Mat Staver. As I just pointed out, Liberty law school associate dean Matt Barber wants the Christian right candidates to cut a back room deal to choose the Christian candidate for president.
In any case, I am not excited about a theocrat as a representative of the GOP, and I suspect most of the electorate won’t buy it either.
Correction: The original post identified Mat Staver as current head of the Liberty University School of Law and implied that Matt Barber was with the Liberty Counsel. Staver completed his tenure as Dean of the law school in 2014 and Barber is not with Liberty Counsel. I regret the errors and thank Mat Staver for pointing them out.

Ted Cruz Launches Presidential Bid; Can You Say Secretary of Education David Barton?

Early Monday morning Ted Cruz announced his bid for the GOP presidential nomination.
This has delighted tea party and religious right conservatives; Richard Viguerie thinks Cruz can unite the party and compares him to Reagan. Cruz made his formal announcement at Liberty University.
Another lower profile conservative who hoped a year ago that Cruz would run is New Zealander Trevor Loudon. Speaking at the Western Conservative Conference in Denver CO, Loudon called on Cruz to run and offered advice about the coalition Cruz could put together to energize the party.
His list of advisers and Cabinet members is frightening:

Vice president: Allen West
Secretary of Treasury: Rand Paul
Secretary of Energy: Sarah Palin
Secretary of Labor: Scott Walker
Secy. of Commerce: Herman Cain
Secy. of State: John Bolton
Ambassador to the U.N.: No one
Secy. of Health and Human Services: Dr. Ben Carson
Attorney General: Mark Levin
Secretary of Education: David Barton

Give a listen:
[youtube]https://youtu.be/P-rX5w7WJw4[/youtube]
Cruz has defended Barton’s history, headlined Barton’s state legislators‘ conference and Barton has endorsed Cruz for various public offices. Cruz’s father Rafael proclaims many of the same historical errors that Barton pushes. Today, at Liberty University, Cruz sounded themes Barton is known for – abolishing “common core,” American exceptionalism, etc.
While Cruz has not talked that far ahead, I don’t think it is out of the question to imagine that Cruz would select Barton for some high level position in a Cruz administration.
 
 
 

Ted Cruz Wins Values Voter Straw Poll

Ted Cruz has won the 2014 Values Voters Presidential Straw Poll.
Cruz is attractive to religious right culture warriors who make up the Values Voter campaigners but, in my opinion, he is unlikely to resonate with the GOP mainstream or independents.  To illustrate, Cruz had this to say about David Barton in 2013:

David’s historical research has helped millions rediscover the founding principles of our nation and the incredible sacrifices that men and women of faith made to bequeath to us the freest and most prosperous nation in the world.

If this is his view of Barton’s historical revisionism, then, in my view, Cruz’s grasp of the founding principles has been skewed. Mitt Romney won the straw poll in 2007 and then went on to get the GOP nomination in 2012. Other than that, no winner has captured the GOP nomination. I doubt Cruz will change that trend.
Probably the award for Most Tasteless Hyperbole has to go to second place finisher Ben Carson who said:

Dr. Ben Carson, a conservative commentator and neurosurgeon, on Friday likened the health care law to slavery.

“Obamacare is really, I think, the worst thing to happen to the nation since slavery,” Carson said, speaking at the Values Voter Summit. “And it is slavery, in a way.”

While I recognize problems with Obamacare, I would much rather pay a little higher premium than be enslaved. I admire Ben Carson for his medical accomplishments and I used to think of him as a reasonable person. In my opinion, he is tarnishing his reputation with this move into politics.