Too many people today have decided that when it comes to picking presidential candidates, we need to find one nicer than God.
And so it is that up until now they have cast their lot with Marco Rubio, the senate wunderkind who is certain to the point of debilitating repetition that Barack Obama knows exactly what he is doing and is trying to change America.
Remarkable. Even though Rubio is completely correct on that front, rarely has a presidential candidate been more wrong while trying to breathe life into that message than he was during the New Hampshire debate.
Instead of Rubio the Righteous, we got Rubio the Robot.
That’s what happens, I guess, when a third-place finish in Iowa is viewed as license to begin running a too-smart-by-half general election campaign. Rubio basically started playing prevent defense in the first quarter. But at least he’s nice, right?
Just super, super, cheek-pinching nice.
What consolation that must have been as RINO superstar and ’abortion is self-defense’ philosopher Chris Christie disemboweled Rubio on live television. And how convicted some of his supporters must have felt when Rubio advocated for sending their daughters to war via the draft.
They shouldn’t have been surprised, though. This is the same Rubio of ’Gang of 8’ fame, as well as the Rubio who went wobbly on marriage in the wake of the Supreme Court’s usurpation of that issue last summer.
This is who and what Rubio is. When push comes to shove, his Achilles Heel is to give some warm “conservative” hugs and hope a charm offensive can win the day.
Meanwhile, Ted Cruz – so the meme goes – isn’t very nice.
This is a game we need to stop playing.
While the apologists for Rubio are nowhere near as intellectually vapid and dishonest as the Cult of Obama…err…Trump, in both cases there exists a willingness to discard conservative principles in favor of the archetype from central casting who best tickles our fancy.
When it comes to political truths, there are few more certain than this: when elections are about personalities the Democrats win, and when elections are about issues the Republicans win. The Democrats want to run on shiny objects, contrived memes, and anything but substantive issues. We cannot defeat them at their own game, but require someone who is capable of making them play ours by winning the following debate—is this really the future you want for your children?
While a robust defense of principle along the lines Cruz has consistently shown is no guarantee he will win on every issue as president, it is the only guarantee that he will win on any of them. Whether it be dismantling Obamacare, defending religious freedom, or dumping the U.S. Department of Education, any of those would be among the biggest victories we’ve ever had. But none of them will occur without somebody getting bloody. It just isn’t going to happen. So we better make our peace with that fact and elect someone who knows how important it is not to bring a knife to a gunfight, or just dimples to a debate.
Allow me to be blunt – in order to undo any of the damage done by the Marxist ideologue currently residing in the White House, we need an ideologue of our own. Yes, I know that concept has been given a bad name of late, but only for the most politically correct of reasons. Ideology, properly understood, is the very thing that can and will protect politicians from waffling under pressure when the going gets tough.
It serves as a north star for remaining resolute to a cause, and it is the secret sauce for overcoming divisions of race, gender, age, and class because its only bias is toward – say it with me now – the truth.
Now doesn’t that sound “nice”? Isn’t that what so many of us claim to have wanted as we watched Republican majorities in Congress amount to less than nothing while President Obama mocked us with his pen and his phone? You know what’s the biggest warm fuzzy, or the nicest thing of all?
Winning, when it comes to both elections and public policy.
I thought we wanted to win. For real. On the issues.
Well, what about Rubio impresses you in terms of being the field general who can bring about such a state of affairs? The only political capital he’s ever spent was on behalf of Chuck Schumer and amnesty. Rubio may one day turnout to be our Kobe Bryant, but today is not yet that day. He’s simply not ready to carry a team, and we know it every time we see the glaring inconsistencies as well as the shallow, repetitive talking points. And neither was Kobe, who in his first playoff series let the Lakers down by shooting four air balls in a decisive game.
No one worries about that with Cruz, though. Only that he won’t make us feel warm and fuzzy while we make a last ditch effort to rescue American Exceptionalism from oblivion. But you know who also doesn’t hand out warm fuzzies? Tim Duncan, the less flamboyant star who by the end of his second season had won Rookie of the Year, been named All-NBA first team twice, and MVP of the NBA Finals while leading the Spurs to their first championship in history.
Get real, folks. This is going to be hard. This is going to be messy. The other side wants to undo our civilization and cease our way of life. Thus, this is often going to require the rhetorical and tactical equivalent of a balled-up fist.
The time is now for warriors, not whisperers. Rubio is the latter. Cruz is not.
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