This is the most important week of Ted Cruz’s (short) career Say what you want about Ted Cruz (and people say lots of things — both good and bad) but the Texas Republican has spent his first nine months in the Senate drastically raising his national profile with nary a slip-up along the way. That is, until last week when Cruz found himself publicly cross-wise with House Republicans over his oft-repeated demand to give him a chance to defund Obamacare. The House passed a bill that did just that and Cruz quickly released a statement insisting that it was unlikely that he would be able to defund the law in the Senate. (He repeated that sentiment Sunday; “The House is the only body where Republicans have the majority, so the House has to lead on this,” Cruz said on “Fox News Sunday”.) House Republicans, notably, have sneered at Cruz’s assertion that he has no power to keep the defunding provision in the legislation (“Thank God he wasn’t there fighting at the Alamo,” said Rep. Sean Duffy of Wisconsin) and insisted publicly that the ball was now in the court of the Senate GOP. And so, as the attention turns to the Senate this week in the ongoing fight over whether the government will remain open past Sept. 30 (it might not) and if President Obama’s health-care law will be defunded (it won’t), the question is whether Cruz can bounce back from the only major stumble he’s experienced to date. Cruz must prove this week is that he’s more than just talk; that when he has the chance to act on principle, he does everything he can to do exactly that. (Think Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster on drones.) In short: It’s put up or shut up time for Ted Cruz this week.
Posted on: Mon, 23 Sep 2013 16:53:24 +0000
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