I don’t have the patience anymore to watch most convention speeches or to listen to the chatter on television. What struck me the most about this convention — other than the sheer disorganization of the event and the parade of speakers, especially on Monday night, who looked like comic book villains from the ’50s — was the debased quality of the opposition within the convention to Trump’s nomination. It was led by former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, who headed Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign, and led the “stop Trump” effort on the convention floor, and Cruz himself, who boldly refused to endorse Trump in his convention speech last night.
If I were given the choice of supporting Cuccinelli or Chris Christie for Attorney General and Cruz or Trump for president, I’d have a hard time making up mind. Purely on the basis of their stands, I’d probably take Christie and Trump. That says a lot of where the Republican party is at this summer. Here’s the record of these guys.
As attorney general, Cuccinelli filed suit to declare the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional, favored allowing police in Virginia to stop anyone without cause and demand proof of their immigration status; appealed to the Supreme Court to defend the constitutionality of Virginia’s anti-sodomy law that a lower court had thrown out; demanded that the Environmental Protection Agency withdraw its findings that greenhouse gases are harmful, filed suit to prevent the enforcement of motor vehicle emission standards. and launched an investigation of a climate researcher at the University of Virginia. As state senator, he sponsored bills to disqualify any worker for unemployment benefits who could not speak English and sought to repeal Virginia’s law barring concealed weapons in a restaurant or club.
Cruz — his stands are well known. He was the leader of the attempt to shut the government for failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act. As presidential candidate, he echoed Trump’s stands on deporting illegal immigrations and building a wall. He advocated a flat tax that would eliminate whatever is progressive about the federal income tax. In the closing month of his campaign, he focussed his attack on Trump’s indifference to what bathrooms transexuals could use in North Carolina. Think back to 1964 when the Republicans were bitterly divided at a convention and when the leader of the opposition got booed. Barry Goldwater was the nominee, and Nelson Rockefeller, who got booed for his call to repudiate the extremism of the Ku Klux Klan and John Birch Society, and Pennsylvania Governor William Scranton were leading the opposition. Both men were in the political center and were more plausible presidents than Goldwater. Compare Cruz and Cuccinelli to them. The latter are, if anything, to the right of Trump. The GOP has truly gone nuts.
