I’m a little teapot, short and stout Donald Trump’s bedtime lullaby
No, I am not making a prediction. But the craven, cowardly dick move we saw last night, along with the totally predictable outrage today, makes me think this ight just roll over into something bigger, and soon. Just stick a pin in it, as Rachel Maddow likes to say.
It looks like Rafael “Calgary Teddy” Cruz is in deep shit again. Let’s have no misunderstanding here. Cruz didn’t fly back to Texas last Saturday after refusing to vote Trump off of the island, grab Heidi and the kids, and head off to a week in Mexico. He flew them down there last night, day three of the deep freeze, and records show that he wasn’t scheduled to return until Saturday, with the rest of his family when, presumably, the power would be back on. It was a pure dick move, exactly what Cruz is famous for.
And he’s already paying a price politically. At the Cancun airport this morning he tried to slough this all off as pre planned, and he was always scheduled to be back in Texas within 24 hours. That cheap bullshit ploy if flying like an Emu. There is already bipartisan statewide demands for his immediate resignation, and you can bet your ass that Governor Greg Abbott, who looked like a total moron on FOX last night, trying to blame the power outage on The Green New Deal, will do everything in his power to make this all about Cruz, and slither away in the mud.
Here’s why this may matter nationally, and in the near future. As I’ve already written, the GOP Senate is now in open civil war. On the one hand, you have Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, who has publicly broken with the very concept of Trumpism, and called for Trump to be criminally convicted from the well of the Senate. And on the other is South Carolina Port-O-San Lindsey Graham, who is flying off to Mar-A-Lago this weekend to plot 2022 strategy with Trump, and all but begged McConnell to shut up about Trump.
This is why it might be important. Personally, my money is with McConnell, for reasons I will explain in my next article. But never forget one thing, Mitch McConnell is a pure geometric figure, the dude doesn’t exist without an angle. And right now, the smart angle would be to start clipping the wings of his strongest opponents in his caucus.
Enter Ted Cruz. Only Graham in the GOP Senate is a fiercer sycophant for Trump than Cruz. And he has the extra added bonus of being an incredibly soft target. In the 2016 GOP primaries, Graham famously quipped that If anybody killed Ted Cruz in the well of the Senate, and the trial was held in the Senate, nobody would ever be convicted. Hell, by the sound of it, even the dude’s own damn dog won’t play with him, even if he has that pork chop tied around his neck.
Look, right now I’d be surprised if McConnell wasn’t making a few discreet phone calls. Graham is a total moron, if Trump wants to go head-to-head with McConnell, he’s going to need a more effective operative than Loopy Lindsey Graham. And Cruz is perfect for the job. Like Trump, he honestly doesn’t give a shit what people think of him personally, never backs down, and lives to make trouble for any establishment figure.
McConnell has a full tool box. You can bet that the Senate Democrats are going to haul off on Cruz, McConnell can quietly give his caucus permission to join the outrage. If Schumer and the Democrats call for a censure of Cruz, McConnell could join them, or even call for it on his own. And if the motion was successful, he could move to strip Cruz of some or all of his committee assignments, basically making Cruz useless to his own constituents as a Senator.
The Russians have an old saying, In war, two blunders are not permitted. Cruz has butted heads with McConnell before, and survived because he was still an asset. But Cruz is now a direct threat to McConnell, and I would be amazed if Moscow Mitch doesn’t take steps to remove that threat. Don’t touch that dial.
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Cruz has long held the not at all honor of being the most hated Senator. No question. Undisputed and on a bipartisan basis I might add. His fellow Republicans all hate him too. Maybe not as much as Democrats but they are in the ballpark! Remember how recently there was speculation that Hawley might challenged Cruz for the “most hated” crown? Well, that’s over with. It was never much of a contest in the first place given ole Ted’s long history of pissing off even his own colleagues kept him solidly on top of that particular trash heap. I think you’re right that if McConnell green lights a censure Ted will lose. Huge. Doing that to Cruz would be a win win proposition for the GOP. Alas, even without committee assignments I don’t see Cruz resigning.
It’s fun to watch, though.
I don’t see him resigning, either. I can’t help it but I visualize him made up like Alfred E. Neumann on a MAD Magazine cover, over the paraphrase :”What, ME resign?” I believe he really does believe that he’s all that and a hairdryer.
I hate the bad faith aspect of forcing a resignation over what is something many Texans who were able did. On the other hand, it is clear that the public does not have the attention span for substantive criticism. since it seems impossible to get rid of Cruz for substantive reasons, this emotional reason will have to do, I suppose.