2016 Election

[Franklin Pierce]

You could add Cruz as running mate and take Texas, or Rubio and take Florida.

 

[mrorange211]

Jofficially ending the Muslim presidency of Hussein Obama.

You are a disgrace.

 

[Gramps]

You could add Cruz as running mate and take Texas, or Rubio and take Florida.

He won't need Cruz to take TX.

Rubio could help with FL.

Looking at the polling trends it is quickly turning into to a 3 man race, Trump, Cruz and Rubio. Carson is still polling on low teens but he is dropping fast.

I would not vote for Ted Cruz under any circumstance that I can imagine.

I still like Kasich but he isn't catching on with the voters.

 

[UTCVol]

I can't say I would ever vote for Trump or want him to be president, but the whining from the left if it happened would be incredible.

 

[MercyPercy]

Vigo County Indiana has correctly chosen every president since 1888, except for 1908 and 1952. That is an astounding track record.

Donald Trump has wide and fervent support in Vigo County.

All of you Communists and Liberal republicans better begin reconciling yourself to the fact that Donald Trump is getting closer to becoming the Republican nominee, and President of the United States.

Just think about the excitement in America as Trump rests his hand on the Holy Bible and takes the oath of office, officially ending the Muslim presidency of Hussein Obama.

Fascinating. Donald Trump is the christian savior, who thought this day would ever come?

By the way, which account of yours do you consider a bigger caricature of the stereotypical american idiot, Silence Dogood or Franklin Pierce? You post the same hilarious nonsense on each account, so I wasn't sure if one was supposed to the real you and one was supposed to be outrageous you.

 

[Franklin Pierce]

It will be interesting to see who Trump chooses as his running mate.

It will also be interesting to see who carries New York in the general election, Trump or pants suits woman.

 

[UTCVol]

It will be interesting to see who Trump chooses as his running mate.

It will also be interesting to see who carries New York in the general election, Trump or pants suits woman.

Trump has the same chance of carrying NY that Hillary has of carrying TN.

 

[UTCVol]

Fascinating. Donald Trump is the christian savior, who thought this day would ever come?

By the way, which account of yours do you consider a bigger caricature of the stereotypical american idiot, Silence Dogood or Franklin Pierce? You post the same hilarious nonsense on each account, so I wasn't sure if one was supposed to the real you and one was supposed to be outrageous you.

Oh, you just missed the 11th Commandment: "Keep all the brown people out." Totally in line with Christian ideology.

I wonder if Trump will memorize a Bible verse for the occasion.

 

[AirVol]

If Hillary gets elected, what's the O/U on RESETS?

 

[SpaceCoastVol]

I would not vote for Ted Cruz under any circumstance that I can imagine.

You'd vote for Cankles over him?

 

[Gramps]

You'd vote for Cankles over him?

There are other options, third party or stay home.
If someone helded a gun to my head and said I had to vote for Cruz or Hillary I would tell them to pull the trigger.
IMO, Cruz is as bad for America as Hillary is, if not worse.

 

[hog88]

There are other options, third party or stay home.
If someone helded a gun to my head and said I had to vote for Cruz or Hillary I would tell them to pull the trigger.
IMO, Cruz is as bad for America as Hillary is, if not worse.

Please elaborate as to why.

 

[volfanhill]

It will be interesting to see who Trump chooses as his running mate.

It will also be interesting to see who carries New York in the general election, Trump or pants suits woman.

There is 0 chance Trump wins New York. If negative were possible that's what he would get:

 

[Ernest T. Vol]

He won't need Cruz to take TX.

Rubio could help with FL.

Looking at the polling trends it is quickly turning into to a 3 man race, Trump, Cruz and Rubio. Carson is still polling on low teens but he is dropping fast.

I would not vote for Ted Cruz under any circumstance that I can imagine.

I still like Kasich but he isn't catching on with the voters.

Come on, Gramps. (Respectfully ) You sound like one of my business associates. He said he was voting for Hillary if Bush was the nominee just to crash this thing on the rocks so we could rebuild. What is so wrong with Cruz? Your party left you along time ago and any of the repub candidates are preferable to Hillary.

 

[UTCVol]

There are other options, third party or stay home.
If someone helded a gun to my head and said I had to vote for Cruz or Hillary I would tell them to pull the trigger.
IMO, Cruz is as bad for America as Hillary is, if not worse.

I've already decided that I'm voting for Gary Johnson. I have too many fundamental disagreements with all of the other candidates (besides Paul, but every other candidate would have to drop dead for him to get the nom).

 

[IBlvNTmWrk]

There are other options, third party or stay home.
If someone helded a gun to my head and said I had to vote for Cruz or Hillary I would tell them to pull the trigger.
IMO, Cruz is as bad for America as Hillary is, if not worse.

Please elaborate as to why.

I'm also interested in your thoughts here Gramps, even though you clearly stated it's your opinion. That said... I generally respect your opinion even though I may not always agree with it, so I would be interested in your reasoning if you'd be kind enough to share it.

 

[Gramps]

I'm also interested in your thoughts here Gramps, even though you clearly stated it's your opinion. That said... I generally respect your opinion even though I may not always agree with it, so I would be interested in your reasoning if you'd be kind enough to share it.

He has done nothing during his time in the Senate but be a trouble maker. He is way, way to far right with extreme positions.

How many GOP members of the Senate support him?

Read what Lindsey Graham said about him yesterday. He hit the nail square on the head concerning Cruz as far as I am concerned.

How can any POTUS govern if he/she cannot gain the support of his own party?

 

[hog88]

He has done nothing during his time in the Senate but be a trouble maker. He is way, way to far right with extreme positions.

How many GOP members of the Senate support him?

Read what Lindsey Graham said about him yesterday. He hit the nail square on the head concerning Cruz as far as I am concerned.

How can any POTUS govern if he/she cannot gain the support of his own party?

Still doesn't explain why he would be as bad or worse than Hillary in your opinion? By the above at worst he gets nothing done.

 

[IBlvNTmWrk]

He has done nothing during his time in the Senate but be a trouble maker. He is way, way to far right with extreme positions.

How many GOP members of the Senate support him?

Gramps... thanks for responding. I honestly hadn't done much research on Cruz myself which is why I was interested in your opinion. So... after a quick Google search here are a few details that I found interesting.

Cruz graduated Princeton University and the got his law degree from Harvard 3 years later. He also clerked for Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. And like Obama, he took Laurence Tribe’s constitutional law class while at Harvard. But unlike Obama, we actually know his grade which was an A. Before becoming Senator, as Texas solicitor general from 2003 to 2008, Cruz argued before the Supreme Court nine times.

I would say that Cruz has accomplished quite a bit during his time. See below for some additional information regarding his time in Senate.

Read what Lindsey Graham said about him yesterday. He hit the nail square on the head concerning Cruz as far as I am concerned.

I don't honestly give a crap what Lindsey might have said. He is part of the old guard that needs to get out of politics imo. So if Cruz is pissing him off, then good for Cruz.

How can any POTUS govern if he/she cannot gain the support of his own party?

Again... see additional information below. Cruz has proven he can gain support, but he has also shown that he will do so strategically and won't just bow down to the establishment.

Still doesn't explain why he would be as bad or worse than Hillary in your opinion? By the above at worst he gets nothing done.

Hillary is a congenital liar with an ego twice the size of her cankles. I honestly can not think of a worse candidate.

Here are some details on Cruz's relatively short time as a Senator. Based on this I would think he has been quite active and reasonably successful.

Cruz has sponsored only one bill that was passed by the House and Senate and signed into law by President Obama.

In April 2014, Cruz introduced legislation to prevent representatives to the United Nations who are believed to be spies or terrorists from entering the country. It was approved unanimously by the House and Senate, and signed into law only weeks after having been introduced.

While it’s just one bill, Cruz is no outlier here. Only four Republican Senators in the 113th Congress had more than one bill signed into law, and another 16, like Cruz, had just a singular bill signed into law.

In the 113th Congress, Cruz introduced 25 bills, and he’s put forth another 10 so far in the current session. The 25 he introduced last session put him near the middle of the pack of Senate Republicans. He ranked 18th out of the 45 Republicans in the last Senate for most bills introduced.

Of the 25 bills Cruz introduced in the 113th Congress, only two made it through the Senate. However, only three Republican Senators in the last Congress got more than two bills through the upper chamber, making Cruz the fourth most successful in his party.

The Texas Republican has had some success moving his bills through committee. According to Quorum, 8 percent of Cruz’s bills made it out of committee in the 113th Congress, ranking him 11th among Senate Republicans.

The bulk of Cruz’s bills have focused on crime and law enforcement, civil rights and liberties, and international affairs, according to the Quorum analysis.

Toeing the party line?

Unsurprisingly, Cruz has a history of breaking with GOP leadership on votes, although it’s not as extreme as one might suppose.

In 684 votes spanning his entire time in the Senate, Cruz has bucked party leadership 73 times. His 82.8 percent rate of voting with the party in the 113th Congress ranks him 29th out of 45 Republicans.

Cruz’s favorite legislative partner in the Senate is another Tea Party conservative: Utah Sen. Mike Lee. The two have co-sponsored 14 bills together, with fellow Texan, Senate GOP Whip John Cornyn, who comes in a close second, at 13.

Cruz has also worked closely with two other potential GOP contenders in the upper chamber: Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Rand Paul (Ky.). Cruz has signed on to 11 of Rubio’s bills, and nine of Paul’s.

Amendments

Only two of the 68 amendments Cruz has offered have been adopted, but that’s not an uncommonly low success rate. The 65 amendments Cruz put forth in the 113th Congress ranks him 12th in his party and 13th overall.

Floor Statements

The 213 floor speeches Cruz gave over the course of the 113th Congress ranked him as the fifth most active Senate floor speaker, and it’s here that Cruz has distinguished himself.

Ted Cruz's Senate record by the numbers | TheHill

 

[PKT_VOL]

I've already decided that I'm voting for Gary Johnson. I have too many fundamental disagreements with all of the other candidates (besides Paul, but every other candidate would have to drop dead for him to get the nom).

Has Gary Johnson declared?

 

[PKT_VOL]

He has done nothing during his time in the Senate but be a trouble maker. He is way, way to far right with extreme positions.

How many GOP members of the Senate support him?

Read what Lindsey Graham said about him yesterday. He hit the nail square on the head concerning Cruz as far as I am concerned.

How can any POTUS govern if he/she cannot gain the support of his own party?

Bump for people's reference.

?We Will Lose?: Graham Delivers Scathing, Unscripted Rebuke of Ted Cruz, GOP Field at Presidential Forum | Video | TheBlaze.com

Lindsey Graham on Thursday delivered a scathing rebuke of Republican candidates — especially Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Donald Trump — for alienating Hispanic and female voters with “hard-ass” policies and hateful rhetoric.

Graham hit back hard on the Texas Republican senator’sremarks*that opened the RJC forum, during which Cruz argued that the Republican Party would never beat Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton with a moderate or centrist nominee. As part of his answer to a question on how to sway pro-choice voters to support him in the general election, Cruz mentioned the need to turn out more evangelical voters.

“I believe that it is not about turning out evangelical Christians,” Graham said. “It is about repairing the damage done by incredibly hateful rhetoric driving a wall between us and the fastest-growing demographic in America, who should be Republicans.”

Cruz’s strategy of playing to the conservative base is setting the party up for oblivion, Graham said. Instead, Republicans should focus on bringing new voters into the fold, he said.

“It’s about looking the Hispanic American in the eye and saying, ‘We get it. You’re pro-life, you’re entrepreneurial, you’re hard-working, you’re very patriotic,’” Graham said. “‘Be part of our cause.’”

He also knocked Republican voters for letting leading candidates off the hook for inflammatory statements.*“Do you want to win this election?” Graham asked the crowd. “Well, start taking everything that we say seriously — and push back when we make absolutely no sense.”

Graham took aim at businessman Donald Trump for his tone on illegal immigration, arguing that he’s pushing voters away from the Republican party.*“I believe Donald Trump is destroying Republicans’ chance to win an election that we can’t afford to lose,” Graham said.

Mitt Romney made a mistake when promoting the idea of self-deportation as a presidential candidate, Graham said. And now, Trump has taken the idea even farther, he added.

“Now it’s not self-deportation, it’s forced deportation,” Graham continued. “We’re literally going to round them up. That sound familiar to you? Every one of them, including their American citizen children. That’s the leader of the Republican Party.”

Many in the Republican Party have a problem with female voters because of their stances on abortion, Graham argued — for example, not allowing an exception in cases of rape or incest alienates most Americans, he said.*“If the nominee of the Republican party will not allow for an exception for rape and incest, they will not win,” he said. “Ted Cruz doesn’t have an exception for rape or incest.”

The general election will become a debate about abortion — rather than the threat from the Islamic State or other foreign policy concerns*—*if that’s the nominee’s stance, Graham said.

“It will be about the nominee of the Republican Party telling a woman who’s been raped, you’ve got to carry the child of the rapist,” Graham said. “Good luck with that.”

“Not the speech you thought you were going to hear, right? Not the speech I thought I was going to give,” Graham said. “But he didn’t answer the question. … I am going to answer the question: We will lose if that’s the position of the nominee of the Republican Party. We will lose young women in droves.”

 

[UTCVol]

Has Gary Johnson declared?

He wrote this post a few months ago (which I thought was a very good read) in which he basically said that he is planning to run in 2016. And it's not like the Libertarian Party has any other alternatives who actually have a proven record like Johnson.

 

[IBlvNTmWrk]

Bump for people's reference.

I had read Graham's comments earlier, and am still a bit confused regarding him "hitting the nail square on the head" regarding Cruz. Other than having different opinions on abortion (which I would actually think Gramps may be more in line with Cruz), this was his primary comment...

“I believe that it is not about turning out evangelical Christians,” Graham said. “It is about repairing the damage done by incredibly hateful rhetoric driving a wall between us and the fastest-growing demographic in America, who should be Republicans.”

Since you bumped the post, do you or Gramps have any additional information on what "hateful rhetoric" Cruz may have used against Hispanics? I'm well aware of Trump's comments, but am not aware of anything Cruz may have said.

 

[TennFan]

Heard that Jeb Bush told his people that he is the only candidate that beat Hillary Clinton! Ha, ha, ha!

If there is an election and Clinton is elected, we're not much better off than we are now. Need a total change of parties in the White House.

In my opinion the top 4 candidates in the GOP are: Trump, Cruz, Rubio, Carson. As far as the Democrats are concerned it's a two way race.
We could have the GOP ticket represented by two of the aforementioned candidates.

 

[Gramps]

Gramps... thanks for responding. I honestly hadn't done much research on Cruz myself which is why I was interested in your opinion. So... after a quick Google search here are a few details that I found interesting.

Cruz graduated Princeton University and the got his law degree from Harvard 3 years later. He also clerked for Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. And like Obama, he took Laurence Tribe’s constitutional law class while at Harvard. But unlike Obama, we actually know his grade which was an A. Before becoming Senator, as Texas solicitor general from 2003 to 2008, Cruz argued before the Supreme Court nine times.

I would say that Cruz has accomplished quite a bit during his time. See below for some additional information regarding his time in Senate.



I don't honestly give a crap what Lindsey might have said. He is part of the old guard that needs to get out of politics imo. So if Cruz is pissing him off, then good for Cruz.



Again... see additional information below. Cruz has proven he can gain support, but he has also shown that he will do so strategically and won't just bow down to the establishment.



Hillary is a congenital liar with an ego twice the size of her cankles. I honestly can not think of a worse candidate.

Here are some details on Cruz's relatively short time as a Senator. Based on this I would think he has been quite active and reasonably successful.



Ted Cruz's Senate record by the numbers | TheHill

From Jan 2013 to Jul 2015, Cruz missed 103 of 908 roll call votes, which is 11.3%. This is much worse than the median of 1.6% among the lifetime records of senators currently serving.


Remember Cruz's stunt that allow Obama's nomineees approved?

Republicans are furious with Ted Cruz when a stunt designed to block President Obama’s immigration actions backfired, opening the door for Harry Reid to push through numerous Obama nominations.

Several Republicans are criticizing the move by Cruz that ultimately led to Reid being able to finish work on the nominees.

Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA) likened Cruz’s actions to his role in the 16-day government shutdown last year, stating: “I’ve seen this movie before, and I wouldn’t pay money to see it again.”

Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) told reporters: “Suffice it to say I’m not happy with the strategy [Cruz] has come up with, I think it’s totally counterproductive,” adding “This reminds me very much of the shutdown last year where the strategy made absolutely no sense and was counterproductive, and I believe we’re in the same kind of situation today.”

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said, “I wish you hadn’t pointed that out,” when asked if Cruz had created an opening for the Democrats, adding “You should have an end goal in sight if you’re going to do these types of things and I don’t see an end goal other than irritating a lot of people.”

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) said “I was in the House for 14 years, and I’m not opposed to lonely tactics, but if you’re achieving something, that’s the test, and I don’t see what we’re achieving here. I just don’t.”

Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) said “The other concern I have here now is the nominations that are going to get through that otherwise wouldn’t.”