Ted Cruz goes squish

By Mustang Bobby

Jennifer Rubin, the right-wing columnist for The Washington Post, is peeved at Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) for not playing nice with other Republicans and calling those who supported background checks for guns "squishes."

For starters, it's just not smart to annoy colleagues whose cooperation and support you'll need in the future. Second, as a conservative he should understand humility and grace are not incompatible with "standing on principle"; the absence of these qualities doesn't make him more principled or more effective. Third, for a guy who lacks manners (see his condescending questioning of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) he comes across as whiny. They yelled at me! Boo hoo, senator.

When liberals go after each other, it's like watching Quakers argue: "Friend, I have a concern," and you can practically hear the sorrowful sighs. Not so with conservatives. They can really get into it.

In Ms. Rubin's case, it's not surprising that she'd be put out. She just got herself pilloried by just about everyone for the puff piece she wrote last week about how wonderful George W. Bush was and how history will treat the gentle fool with kindness. Then in comes this new senator from Texas like he was Godzilla and Washington was a Japanese fishing village. Squish. There goes the compassionate-conservative rehab.

What's interesting is that it's not like they didn't know what they were getting when he ran. He campaigned as a whack-job, he won the primary against the hand-picked Republican establishment candidate, and he won as a whack-job. Unlike Democrats -- or anyone with prefrontal development beyond the age of 14 -- he never learned that once you get into office you pretty much have to learn that to do much more than get your 15 minutes on C-SPAN, you have to work together. Your constituency is slightly larger than the Tea Party rally in the parking lot of Family Dollar in Buzzard Gulch.

(Cross-posted at Bark Bark Woof Woof.)