Ted Cruz for President

We have been entertained for some time now by the spectacle of all the Republican candidates for president. Now the time for tough decisions is upon us. The debates might have some entertainment value, but  the questions asked, and the answers provided, are often meant to elicit verbal fireworks rather than analysis of the issues. While we might wait for the results of the Iowa caucus and the first of the primaries, it may then be too late to decide if we are to help our candidate do well in those early contests.

One suggested approach would be to focus on one candidate on the basis to which he, or she, best represents the positions which we feel are most important in the next Commander in Chief, rather than who might fare better or worse against an assumed democratic candidate. The qualifier "best represents" is operative. It is hard to find a perfect fit. This may seem a bit simplistic, but it might just define an effective decision timeline, rather than the present tail-chasing punditry.

What exactly are the key issues of the campaign? As in so many other things, it depends upon what we, as individuals, think they are.

Clearly, Safety for the Homeland has emerged as a hot topic as a result of recent terrorist attacks. When the U.S. Attorney General is more concerned about possible hate speech rather than the victims of the San Bernardino attacks, and when our elected leaders are unable, or unwilling, to accurately label those who would harm us, there is clearly a disconnect.

Immigration is an especially thorny issue as it covers a number of facets of concern.  The governments continued unwillingness to enforce our existing laws, has helped continue the flow of anonymous illegal entrants, which raises, at least two concerns: which of these are evil-doers intending to do us harm, and which are seeking only to clamp on to our expanding array of social programs. And not for a minute should we close our hearts to those simply seeking a better way of life for themselves and their families, and possessing a strong work ethic to achieve that goal.
Sorting this out may, in fact, require the building of a wall to secure our borders, but in any event it needs considerable improvement to the enforcement of our existing laws over the benign neglect being practiced by the current administration. The reality is that there are some bad actors in the world, and we had better do a much better job of stopping them at our borders.

Yesterday, Congress  passed an $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill that increases spending $112 billion over the next two years, blowing through the spending caps. Democrats rejoiced while Republicans scrambled to identify those precious few slivers of gains toward Republican priorities contained in the bill. With the deficit fast approaching $19 Trillion, it seems unreal that Congress could possibly hatch such a fiscal bomb.  BTW, don't the Republicans control both houses? Ted Cruz voted against this bill.

While the growing disregard of the U.S. Constitution dates back to the emergence of the progressive movement in the early 1900's, this trend has gone into hyper-space under the current administration, with its elective enforcement of the law and its fast-draw use of the executive edict. Hand-in-glove with this trend is the unchecked growth of federal agencies, many of which operate with little or no oversight from either the congress or the executive branch. In a country founded upon the principle of government of the people, by the people and for the people, we find ourselves asking: who's in charge?

Clearly there are more issues than these three broad themes, and we plan to focus on them in future posts. At the same time, as we try to narrow the field, it is becoming more and more clear, that we need to identify candidates with the strength and determination to push for conservative ideals in government and stand up against the mindless drift of progressive ideas.  In past years we have favored candidates with a willingness to "work across the aisle" and strive for compromise with those on the left. It has become apparent, that, with but a few exceptions, this has been a losing game. We need a strong candidate who will stand up for our principles.

As a suggested starting point, we submit that Ted Cruz may well be the candidate we need to represent conservative Republican principles in November. Watch  a SPEECH he recently delivered at the Heritage Foundation. Read his book, A time for Truth, and rather than reactively looking for reasons to not support him, test his background and talents against the criteria outlined above. He may well be the one who can help us take back our country.