It turns out all of those old, white “Republicans” really were full of it … and what the GOP needed all along was a Hispanic with a pair of cojones.
Unfortunately this testicular fortitude – embodied by the heroic, anti-Obamacare filibuster of U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) – came too late for the GOP. In fact the party clearly would have preferred that it not come at all.
Even as Cruz’s dramatic filibuster rolled on, the Texas conservative was drawing stern rebukes from the Republican establishment – which wants to be seen as opposing Barack Obama’s increasingly unpopular socialized medicine law while simultaneously funding it in the budget.
Same old GOP games …
Cruz has taken a principled stand against this hypocrisy. How principled? He stood for hours on end at a podium in the well of the U.S. Senate in an effort to convince Republicans (and moderate Democrats) to join him in stripping funding for Obamacare from a two-month spending bill.
His basic appeal? Screw your party leaders: Do what’s right.
Cruz’s speech began at 2:41 p.m. EDT on September 24, 2013. He yielded for questions but never left the podium and was still speaking as of 10:30 a.m. EDT September 25. That’s the fourth-longest floor speech in U.S. Senate history – easily outdistancing U.S. Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster against the Obama administration’s drone policy back in March.
During his filibuster Cruz invoked Darth Vader. And Austin Kutcher. And Duck Dynasty.
He read from Atlas Shrugged – and Dr. Seuss.
He talked about job losses in swing states.
He quoted emails and tweets from constituents fearful of the impact of Obamacare – and a read a letter from the president of the far left Teamsters’ Union decrying its disastrous impact.
But more than any of that, Cruz delivered a compelling rebuke of the spineless Republican establishment which continues to say one thing and do another – and continues to lose elections as a result of its ideological bankruptcy.
“Bucking your party provokes a reaction,” Cruz said at one point during his marathon speech. “As difficult as it is to cross one’s party leaders, I say — with perhaps a little familiarity to the consequences — that it’s survivable, and ultimately it’s liberating.”
He’s right …
Cruz called out his party leaders repeatedly during his filibuster. More to the point – he called out “any Republican who votes to give Harry Reid the ability to fund Obamacare on a 51-vote majority.”
Because that’s what this fight was ultimately about – forcing Democrats to get sixty votes if they want to reinsert funding for Obamacare into the two-month spending plan.
Sadly GOP “leaders” like Mitch McConnell (RINO-Kentucky), John McCain (RINO-Arizona), John Cornyn (RINO-Texas), Roy Blunt (RINO-Missouri) and Lindsey Graham (RINO-S.C.) were having none of it – stabbing Cruz in the back and bending over once again to take what the Obama administration gave them.
Astounding …
At least the GOP leadership in the U.S. House was shamed into doing the right thing – apparently “Republican” Senators have no shame.
Ted Cruz has proven once and for all that the Republican Party no longer stands for freedom and free markets. Or American workers and taxpayers. With one speech, he has exposed the GOP for exactly what it is – an equivocating heap of special interest-fed politicians who are more interested in “going along to get along” than doing what is right.
A party with no cojones …
We previously referred to the battle to defund Obamacare as the “last line in the sand” for the GOP. Cruz has officially planted a flag on the right side of that line – joined by his stalwart ally U.S. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who stayed by Cruz’s side during his all-night filibuster.
It’s now up to every GOP Senator – and Republican elected officials at all levels of government – to decide whether they also stand on the side of right.
75 comments
LOL! Nancy Mace should kiss your ass for that bit of unbridled bullshit.
Nooooo waaaaay, Jose — I don’t have the cojones!
The Repubs should stop being blindly loyal to their party system and do what is right for our country and our people.
You mean the Demlicans and the Repuklicrats.
I am a conservative vote for the person not the party and will NEVER vote for Joe Wilson, Alan Wilson, Nikki Haley, Barak Obama!
I could easily vote for Cruz and will vote for Sheheen.
The Country and the State are in a Hell of a mess and desperately needs change!
I’m voting change, at all levels.
Can anyone explain this to me???
Ted Cruz and his family participate in the federal government sponsored health care plan that is paid for mostly by taxpayer dollars. This healthcare plan benefits federal employees like Congressmen and allows them to buy subsidized healthcare at TAXPAYER EXPENSE. Interestingly, this plan is NOT available to those of us who PAY HIS HEALTHCARE EXPENSES.
If Government intrusion into healthcare is so bad…why don’t Republicans pass a law making exempting federal employees like themselves from participating in the federal government healthcare plan for federal workers?
They could easily do it .
But they never have.
Why?
Why do They continue to buy discounted government subsidized healthcare for themselves and their family….all the while insisting that government involvement in healthcare is BAD.
Please, someone explain this to me!!!
I will explain it to you in a moment, but it is absolutely hilarious that you are so stupendously wrong on the facts. Cruz just answered that he is eligible BUT NOT ENROLLED in the Congressional plan. I would go on about how funny the faux seriousness of your post in light of its complete lack of factual basis, but Senator Durbin just made the same mistaken assumption. If the Democratic party could not even bother to fact check that before trying to call him out on TV, then I guess I should not expect an internet troll to do any better.
And even if he were enrolled, there is no hypocrisy. Most have insurance through their employer. The federal government is Cruz’s employer, and the employer of every other Republican in the House and Senate. Ergo, many of them elect insurance through their employer. What you are really claiming is that conservatives cannot work for the government without being called hypocrites by the Left. While I am sure liberals would appreciate unfettered and unopposed control of the levers of power, that argument is so stupid it should not even require a response. Yet here we are.
If anyone is hypocritical, it is Dems trying to force Obamacare down the country’s throat while exempting themselves and their staffs. If Obamacare is so great, why do so many liberals want waivers? Please, someone explain this to me!!!
So you are saying government healthcare is good for Congressmen….but not good enough for the rest of us
Government subsidized healthcare is wrong for Americans…but not for Republican congressmen
Government subsidized healthcare is fundamentally bad for Americans…but not for Republicans congressmen
If something like government run healthcare is bad…it is bad for EVERYONE
If taxpayer subsided healthcare works for Congressmen…it can work for private citizens too.
Republicans should put their money where their mouth is and reject all forms of government subsidies.
The reason they haven’t done it…is because they love their government subsidized healthcare.
Do you really think it is cute to try to conflate a universal entitlement with an employment benefit provided to employees? The government pays President Obama $400,000 a year. That is government subsidized, and he has never tried to give every American $400,000. Hypocrite!
And again, since you ignored it the first time, is is okay for Democrats to force Obamacare on us while exempting themselves?
I get it that they are federal workers and entitled to
government subsidized healthcare plans…but if the PRINCIPLE of
government providing healthcare is so wrong, so bad, so
ineffective….why don’t they refuse to participate in a bad system.
It’s like the doctor telling patients that smoking is
fundamentally wrong, but who smokes himself because “working for the
government entitles him to low cost cigarettes.”
If Government intrusion into healthcare is so bad…why don’t
Republican congressmen just pass a law removing federal workers like
themselves from the federal government’s insurance program. Then they
can just buy insurance on the free market without federal subsidies.
But for some reason ,they seem to prefer a government
run system where the government pays for the bulk of their healthcare
costs and they can choose a private healthcare plan…a far more
socialistic plan than Obamacare.
Perhaps we need to find out what is WORKING so well in their
government provided healthcare system that keeps them clinging on to
government subsidized healthcare…and replicate it for the rest of us
As far as I’m concerned, health care is just another form of national defense.
BBBWww;wayayaayaahahahhahahahaahahah
He already told you. It’s not the same system. Blue cross and Aetna are two different companies with different plans.
Frank Pytel as usual you are wrong. Blue Cross and Blue Shield are one and the same company. Unless you did a leverage buyout and bought it yourself???? Typical republican/teabagger who doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
Bbbwwwaaaahhahahahahhaahahahhaha
You can keep playing dumb, but there is nothing about the government subsidizing insurance for its employees, who provide services in exchange for their wages and benefits, that is at all relevant to the discussion of the government taking over the healthcare industry. Only an anarchist would claim there should be no government (and thus no governmental employees*).
And for the record, our model of employer subsidized healthcare (whether the employer is private or governmental) is a huge part of the reason why costs are skyrocketing. It insulates the consumer of the services from the cost. As you are seeing with the tuition bubble caused by the flood of cheap, government backed student loans, this model makes the market less competitive and unable to regulate costs. Co-pays and high deductible plans help some, but they cannot fix the structural problem. And, like most of the other causes of the cost curve going up (e.g. EMTALA), it is government created. There is no natural law that provides that health insurance should be an employment benefit. It is a remnant of WWII wage controls. Since employers could not raise wages to keep employees in a tight labor market (with the war and all), they increased collateral benefits.
By the way, you are still avoiding my question about whether it is okay that Democrats and liberal special interests are exempting themselves from Obamacare. Or are you only concerned about Republican (make believe) hypocrisy?
* and only the most juvenile of liberal trolls would argue there should be no conservatives in government.
CL you are the one way off base, as you have the facts all long, typical republic, tea bagger, neocon bullshitter. Firstly ACA, aka “Obamacare” is going to work and is needed for the uninsured. An idiot like you is either retired and on medicare or your healthcare insurance is paid fully or partially by your employer, at for now. I get a BIG laugh from guys like you who claim to be such good “christians” yet don’t give a rat’s ass about your neighbor. Nice guy and one BIG HYPOCRITE to boot.
Fred,
I get a kick out of angry liberals who can’t string a sentence together, let alone a coherent argument, and are reduced to insults and ad hominem attacks. Amazing how it is the self-proclaimed compassionate liberals, rather than the supposed crazy tea baggers, that end up foaming at the mouth in these threads. The reality is that there are daily stories about new problems with Obamacare (skyrocketing premiums, employers dropping coverage, employers reducing hours or not hiring due to uncertainty, exchanges not being ready, illegal mandate delays, etc.), and it was one of the bill’s authors, Max Baucus, that called it a train wreck. There is nothing compassionate about this law or what it is doing to millions of Americans. Obama is making people poorer to preserve his signature “achievement.”
Fred – May I offer you a piece of advice? You will never, ever win an argument with CL as he is never honest in his posts or his recollections of previous posts – hence the “CL” – “Compulsive Liar”. And I have seen him nailed as BIG HYPOCRITE often on this site – just like you did – word have never rang truer!
CL is a government employee. He receives the best of health insurance and doesn’t have to worry about huge deductibles, pre-existing conditions, getting his policy cancelled when he most requires it, enormous premiums, and other nightmares that the average self-employed Joe has been struggling with for decades.
He gets sick leave and can take time off from his all important job as a federal pontoon inspector if he gets the sniffles. He gets guaranteed vacations and secure retirement.
Sounds like CL is enjoying all of the benefits that any average citizen of Sweden or Norway or Denmark or any number of “socialist” countries have.
He is not “conservative” in the real sense of the word…just another self-serving bureaucrat who doesn’t remotely understand the term “public servant.”
He is the epitome of the concept of “I’ve got mine!”
What are you talking about? I don’t work for the government. I work hard at a private firm and I, like 80% of the country, have an employer sponsored plan. For now. Obama is working hard to get that percentage down.
All Democrats believe in doing as they say not as they do!
He’s hufpo plant. Nice try though. Anyway just points. I would disagee he works for the feds. He works for the citizenry. Further, its not just the demlicans. Plenty of repuklitards on that bandwagon too. They just want to try to stay in the closet. Great and kind explanarion though. I would have called troll and moved on.
Okay, what about the rest of the 24 hour t-Party People?
Well put, sir.
naksuthin I agree with the basis of your comment except for Cruz and his family do not participate in the federal healthcare. This dip shit and his children are covered by his wife, who is employed by a division of Goldman Sachs. Her healthcare is paid fully by GS to the mere amount of $40,000 per year! That’s right $40,000. This fucker is the fair haired boy of the Tea Party.
They have not had brains for awhile. Now they don’t have cajones. What’s going next?
Of course he would read from “Atlas Shrugged,” just like any other pseudo-intellectual high school boy. This is what passes for “cojones” in the current GOP?
Well, Ayn Rand might be a woman, but she’s closer to having testicles than many in Congress.
You do know that this was not a filibuster ?….That being said wonder if he went with Depends or a cath?….If it was a cath he should make it a quick jerk pull out. If it was Depends he should do a commercial for them.
Pyrrhic victory.He’s running for president?
Please God, let him be the candidate.
He can’t do any worse than Oshitforbrains. ??
No, he can’t do better than Romney.
Who was that? Mitt or McCain? He can do alot worse than Mitt. It is almost as if Republicans want Hillary to be the President.
“He read from Atlas Shrugged”
There’s a shocker….
Whoo hoo! The party of stupid gets funnier by the hour. Who’s next?
Ted Cruz has been accepting government paychecks for most of his adult life.
I guess what I’m saying is, he’s a typical Republican.
So the only way for conservatives to avoid the hypocrisy charge is to never hold public office or accept government employment. As I said below, “While I am sure liberals would appreciate unfettered and unopposed control of the levers of power, that argument is so stupid it should not even require a response. Yet here we are.”
It helps if they haven’t spent their entire professional lives on the public payroll, is all I’m saying.
It actually does not, since the argument from hypocrisy is a logical fallacy. But it does provide a pathetic fig leaf who have no substantive defense to offer for the bill Cruz is trying to repeal.
My entire point is that Ted Cruz and his ilk are a bunch of big fat hypocrites. That’s not a logical fallacy. See if you can figure out why.
Figure out why you cannot make a logical argument or why conservatives should be considered hypocrites for having the audacity to pursue public office/employment? I can guess at the former, but I must confess to being absolutely unable to conceive of a coherent argument for the latter.
It wasn’t a filibuster. It was grandstanding. What did he say that would lead me to opposed a plan that has already worked (RomneyCare in Mass.)?
What the hell is “pwned”? That’s not even a fucking word.
Considering the typo originated from a computer game (either Quake or Warcraft, depending on what you believe), I believe it would be more “nerdy” than “ghetto.” Then again, considering the rampant abuse and proliferation of memes and the like, it probably counts more as “annoying” than “nerdy.” The word’s been around for well over a decade now.
All your base are PWNed by Teh Gays but what is the frequency, Kenneth?
TBG, for one, welcomes our meme using internet overlords.
It makes him seems cool, or so he must think. I do the same kind of shit, but not as much. Easier to get away with when you are middle-aged like Will than an old fart like me.
easily outdistancing U.S. Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster against the Obama administration’s drone policy back in March.
So not only does the drone policy warrant a shorter speech than one for defunding Obamacare, it doesn’t warrant threatening to shut down the government over. Same with the abusive NSA programs. Same with the occupation in the Middle East. Same with indefinite detention of Americans.
I’m glad the GOP has its priorities straight, trying to gut health care reform but doing nothing about actual government bullshit and trampling of constitutional rights. I also like how threatening a government shutdown gets put off until right before a major piece gets implemented. You know, because there wasn’t any other time they could’ve done something in the past 3 years.
Obamacare will be a major force in getting Democrats ousted, so much that it’s author called it a train wreck and then a week later announced his retirement. He wasn’t want to have to defend it in 2014. How do you lose the labor unions???? Even those pigs are calling for it’s repeal?
Surely you jest.
2010 saw a massive push for Republicans due to the Tea Party, but 2012 saw Obama’s victory and Democrats actually winning seats in Congress.
Wait until a large number of Americans are insured on the exchanges and Republicans keep drilling forward trying to destroy them (and those peoples’ insurance).
Wait until insurance premiums and healthcare costs get so high that you have to look through a needle in a haystack for employers that offer health benefits. (they’re dripping it by the numbers). Bet even more Dems run from it then. Worst thing off for Dems, premiums are rising the highest among seniors and
Obama and Dems had a good cycle in 2012, but that’s largely because of a low turnout among Republicans, and Obama’s data crunchers were able to turn out his socialist base by telling them how vulnerable he was.
Anytime the labor unions come out so adamantly against a Democrat policy, there’s got to be something wrong.
After 8 years of Obama’s failed policies, “It’s Bush’s fault” wont be a legit. excuse. People want to see results and they’re not.
The whargarble is strong with this one.
Looking forward to your head exploding when all your predictions are proven wrong.
I wouldn’t count on that. If it does succeed she will be pointing out that it was originally proposed by the Heritage Foundation and first implemented in Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts.
Is the Tea Party winning?
Is Obama finally starting to fade from the scene?
Maybe the fact he is running out of other people’s money to give away proves the concepts of socialism to be flawed. Liberals never spend their own money, it would require they actually believe their own tripe. We all know that to be pure BS.
Our boy king has proven he is a loser and simply is there to speak the words his white plantation masters write for him. He has agreed to be their pool boy for future riches to keep that wh*re of a wife in fat azz clothes and lobster. he also needs to have free schooling for his two little breeders so they don’t breed with gangbangers later.
Liberalism is on full display now and many people are waking up to its laughingly obvious stupidity. Now all we have to do is wait for the final collapse and watch Parasite Nation rise up to begin to prey on their masters first before they spread out like a plague on the rest of mankind.
Let us hope the Tea Party will start a rebirth of sanity.
You left out the word Nazi…….as a Tea Party member won’t you be fined for that? I have to also say that using Tea Party and sanity in the same sentence is HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA breath HAHAHAHAHA.
The Tea Party is dead or slowly dying. Maybe they’ll use some of that ACA money and get their teeth fixed.
The Tea Party Is Winning—the Liberal Agenda Is Being Suffocated.
And it only gets worse from here……
Tea Party Winning???
Those booger-eating, slope-headed morons couldn’t win a checkers game against a gang of drunken kangaroos.
Cuban-Canadian Senator Cruz?
A billy goat without the ewes;
Silliness without the goose;
Imelda Marcos without the shoes;
Roger Ailes without Fox News.
Again, Texas Senator Ted Cruz?
Hezbollah without the Druze;
Agatha Christie without the clues;
“Risky Business” without Tom Cruise;
Janis Joplin without the blues.
And more Ted Cruz:
Jimmy Hoffa without the dues;
Billy Graham without the pews;
George W. Bush without the ruse;
Elsie’s Elmer without the glues.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz?
A nursery school without the “twos”;
Yosemite Sam without the fuse;
Green Eggs and Ham without the Suess;
Just Joe McCarthy without the booze.
David Brinkley without the news
A bark and a brig without their crews
A weirdo cult without its muse
A forged Rembrandt without his hues
A bar mitzvah somehow sans Jews
Soft Sigh: How about “Sarah Palin sans caribous”–
“Rocky Mountains without the views”–
“stool pigeons without their coos”–
“Lindsey Graham without the boos!”
Bill Clinton without Janet Reno!
He read from Green Eggs and Ham by that commie Dr. Seuss.
Patriots beware! Purge this fellow traveler before it’s too late!
Have you seen Seuss’s WWII propaganda work?
.
Fun to see where some of his later characters came from.
.
I am not positive that I am remembering right (from a recent book on early Seuss) but I think Seuss long-preceded Don Martin in showing flies buzzng around the heads of his ridiculed characters, here specifically Hitler.
Will, I’m not a gamer but those Tynon ads are about to make me one.
Thank God there’s SOME kinda soft-core porn left on here during the “cleaning up Will’s act for Nancy” phase of FITSNews. I’d do me some poon-cartoonage like that that ginger one, yes I would. I’d drover like Rover — or maybe Pluto!
And then he voted with the Democrats: From CNN:
“He spent more than 21 straight hours railing against any government funding for Obamacare. Then Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas joined the other 99 senators from both parties in voting Wednesday to move ahead on a spending plan expected to do just that.”
…. ah, and then he voted for it in the end. Hmmm.
Mr Cruz reminds me of Mr. Haney from Green Acres in more ways than 1.
Guy talks for 21 hours and yet it is still a 100-0 vote to move on with the House bill. Even Cruz voted to push it forward. Totally not grandstranding. And actually, this shortens the amount of time the House has to deal with the bill once it gets back to them, making it even harder for the House GOP to react. I’m sure they appreciate this shit.
Going with how pissed off people were last week when Cruz admitted he couldn’t do jack in the Senate and would have to rely on the House to stop funding, this is just more proof that even Ted knows he can’t defund Obamacare and just wants to make sure the blame doesn’t fall on his lap. He’s seen the polls. He knows who America will blame for a shutdown and why the shutdown happened (even if this site doesn’t).
What a hero. Not only does he scrape the blame off onto other people, he likely gets to sit back and watch as thousands of gullible morons donate to his campaign, thinking he actually accomplished something.
Amazing how little the MSM even bothers to check their facts. But I guess confirmation bias is too strong to check on something that might let them take a shot at Cruz:
http://washingtonexaminer.com/are-you-confused-by-cruzs-vote-on-cloture-ahem-ny-times.-then-read-this./article/2536395
Pseudo-intellectual ??. Where did you get your Ivy League degrees ?. He got his at Princeton and Harvard. Oh and forget the old bull shit argument “anybody can buy their way into Harvard, Yale and Princeton”. Hopefully your a big fan of Pelosi and Reid.
So Ted Cruz 1) introduced a bill 2) spoke for hours AGAINST his own bill , and then 3) voted for the bill which he’d denounced.
In the alternative universe that is Libertardia, that makes him a hero.
I strongly oppose government-run or subsidized healthcare. But as far as conservative and libertarian outrage against the Affordable Care Act, to me it’s the least toxic of numerous statist policies paraded by both parties. How about take a stand against the NSA, the Patriot Act, the pending war in Iran, our foreign policy in general, unwavering support for Israel, the use of drones on civilians in countries not at war with the U.S., the militarization of state and local police in the post-9/11 era, the failure and immorality of the War on Drugs or the continuing Idiocracy that defines the American public? These issues are all far more important to the libertarian movement than the feigned outrage at corporatized medicine.