Lots of Capricorn and Scopio in his astrological chart - domination and deviousness combined. (Of course, being a big fan of Latino guys, I do find him rather sexy.)
It wasn't just that he was the fifth or sixth Republican Senator badgering and trying to skewer Secretary of Defense nominee Chuck "I work for America not Israel" Hagel with obnoxious questions. "Why didn't you answer those detailed questions we sent you two days ago - what are you hiding? Read paragraph five of that 2011 speech by former US Ambassador Charles Freeman - who you haven't seen in years - and tell us what you think."
It was the Charistmatic Monomaniacal-ness with which he did it. He would have been great playing the chief advisor to King Philip in the Errol Flynn movie "The Adventures of Don Juan" - the guy who grabs power from the king, and tries to kill the queen, all to start a nasty war with England - until, of course Errol Flynn duels him to the death. (The actor who played the bad guy, and has the same long nose as Cruz, Robert Douglas, also played villain statist Ellsworth Toohey in The Fountainhead film.) What is unbelievable is that Ron Paul endorsed this "Tea Party" guy - certainly not for his civil liberties and noninterventionist foreign policy positions. His performance has been described as like an "attack dog" launching a "bogus attack". So what was it that Charles Freeman said that was so earthshaking he demanded Hagel comment? Here is paragraph five of Freeman's talk at the Palestine Center, May 4, 2011:
Similarly, the cruelties of Israelis to their Arab captives and neighbors, especially in the ongoing siege of Gaza and repeated attacks on the people of Lebanon, have cost the Jewish state much of the global sympathy that the Holocaust previously conferred on it. The racist tyranny of Jewish settlers over West Bank Arabs and the progressive emergence of a version of apartheid in Israel itself are deeply troubling to a growing number of people abroad who have traditionally identified with Israel. Many – perhaps most of the most disaffected – are Jews. They are in the process of dissociating themselves from Israel. They know that, to the extent that Judaism comes to be conflated with racist arrogance (as terrorism is now conflated with Islam), Israeli behavior threatens a rebirth of anti-Semitism in the West. Ironically, Israel – conceived as a refuge and guarantee against European anti-Semitism – has become the sole conceivable stimulus to its revival and globalization. Demonstrably, Israel has been bad for the Palestinians. It is turning out also to be bad for the Jews.
Hmmmm, sounds like something 96% of the world's population - and lots of Jews - would agree with...
Watching Hagel flounder and fold against the onslaught of attacks, I first thought - wow, does this ever PROVE how easily intimidated American politicians are by the Israel Lobby. (Raimondo agrees.) I also couldn't help but wonder what Obama really was up to. Was Hagel a "stalking horse" for some candidate who had been quieter on the issues than Hagel, but actually was more radical? Searching "stalking horse" and Hagel, I discovered others had just such a theory and that the real candidate if/after Hagel goes down is Michele Flournoy: you know one of those awful pragmatists who don't think the US should dash into wars to defend foreign interests. Time will tell.
Finally, think I'm just being paranoid about Cruz? After I wrote the first draft of this blog entry I read that a couple months ago The New Yorker wrote that Cruz might run for President in 2016. "Though he was born in Canada, he informed me that he was qualified to serve. “The Constitution requires that one be a natural-born citizen,” he said, “and my mother was a U.S. citizen when I was born.”
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