Ted Cruz has officially had his hat in the ring for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination for less than three weeks, and no, his campaign has not ended yet. But perhaps it should, given that the Texas senator seems to think he can get elected by unflinchingly demonizing the LGBT community. It’s an interesting strategy. At a presidential candidate forum in Iowa on Thursday, Cruz doubled down on his support for controversial “religious freedom” laws in states such as Indiana and Arkansas, from which other potential GOP nominees Jeb Bush and Rand Paul have already attempted to distance themselves. The laws are widely considered to sanction discrimination, particularly against LGBT individuals, but Cruz seems to think that’s just fine — because the gay community has launched a “jihad” against christians.
I do have to admire Cruz’ chutzpah in thinking that the way to bring people together was to get them to coalesce around discrimination. The strategy is to convince fellow members of the American Taliban that the LGBT community is so thoroughly evil and anti-Christian that they’d destroy those who profess to worship Jesus Christ. Cruz has determined that his path to the White House rests on demonizing an LGBT community that mostly just wants to be left alone to live and love as they choose. Wise to their obvious and cravenly devious nature, Cruz is having none of it, declaring
“the jihad that is being waged right now in Indiana and Arkansas, going after people of faith who respect the biblical teaching that marriage is the union of one man and one woman.”
“We need to bring people together,” Cruz said, adding that Republicans and Democrats used to be in agreement about religious liberty and, he implies, condoning discrimination. “This election needs to be about bringing together that consensus again, and that’s got to come from the people.”
Jihad? Right here in ‘Merica?? Where are my guns??? Man, the next thing you know, the Homosexual Mafia will be trying to force the Homosexual Agenda and Sharia down our throats (ironic metaphor alert).
As silly and counterintuituive as it may seem, Cruz is trying to bring people together by driving a wedge between them. Instead of trying to bring people together by acknowledging that we’re all in this together and that we all have a stake in our future, Cruz is claiming we need to consider a minority class to be “less than” because of their lifestyle and sexuality. Christians need to elevate themselves above those who are “less than” and destroy them…for Jesus. I can’t speak for anyone else’s faith, but I don’t remember my Sunday Schools lessons being about anything but love, tolerance, and inclusion. There’s nothing about Cruz’ theology I find even remotely redolent of the Gospel…and the idea that good Christians have the right to discriminate against gays should be abhorrent to anyone committed to leading a Christ-like life.
Then again, if Ted Cruz is about leading a Christ-like life, I’m Wonder Woman.
The good news is that Cruz’ tactics, while they may play well at a breakfast meeting full of evangelical Christians in Iowa, have little chance of being successful in the larger scheme of things. The GOP has created a political landscape in which only the candidates who hew to the Far Right have any hope of surviving the primaries and becoming the party’s standard bearer in the general election. The problem with this scenario is that while they may cater to the hyper-Conservative sorts who vote in Republican primaries, the vast majority of the electorate is more moderate and generally put off by American Taliban-endorsed candidates. Republicans have created a monster. To win the primaries, a candidate must alienate the vast majority of voters. The candidate then gets to spend the general election campaign explaining to voters how (and why) he (or she) didn’t really mean what they said during the primaries.
Cruz’ strategy is so self-righteous and divisive that it’s difficult to see him experiencing long-term success and actually representing the GOP in the 2016 Presidential election. He’s decided that divide and conquer is what will get him to the White House. That may well win him an early primary or two, but hatred and divisiveness is difficult to maintain over the long haul, and it seems unlikely Cruz can generate sufficient heat to sustain his campaign over the long haul.
In the meantime, America gets to see what hatred and a spirit of exclusion will buy them. As cynical as I can be at times, it doesn’t begin to compare to the craven, hate-soaked nature of Cruz’ revival/campaign. His campaign speeches may at times sound like tent meetings, completely with everything but an altar call…but he can fall back on his father for that.
When I listen to Ted Cruz, I don’t hear the teachings of Jesus Christ. I don’t feel the love and charity taught in the Gospel. What I hear is evil shrouded in the flowery language of piety and hyper-religiosity. The good news is that the likelihood of Cruz becoming the GOP standard bearer in 2016 is about the same as me winning the 2016 NBA Slam Dunk Contest.
