Senator-elect Cruz Paints Sharp Contrast Between Parties at Federalist Society

Post-election, leaders of both parties in Congress have been talking about partisan healing. But it appears Ted Cruz, the Republican Senator-elect from Texas, didn't get the message.

At the Federalist Society's annual convention, Cruz painted the differences between Democrats and Republicans in stark contrast during a November 16 speech. "Our ideas work," he said. "Their ideas don't work."

Cruz, a partner at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius who takes office early next year, recalled his first experience with the Federalist Society 20 years ago as a first-year law school student. He also talked about how he survived one of the costliest primary battles this election.

In the $50 million, three-way primary and subsequent run-off against former Texas Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst, Cruz said his campaign was outspent three to one.

"In any other race, I should have been road kill – an armadillo on the side of the road," Cruz said.

But Cruz endured, and won the general election with 56.6 percent of the vote. But the victory, he said, was bittersweet for Republicans who failed to defeat President Barack Obama.

"What the heck happened last Tuesday?," Cruz asked the crowd. He described the high point of the election as the period following the first debate. Cruz said that during the first debate, Mitt Romney did well to challenge the ideas of Obama's party. But his pride soon faded to disappointment.

"By the third debate, I'm pretty sure Mitt Romney French-kissed Barack Obama," Cruz said.

Cruz also called the allegations of the Republican party's war on women and contraception as "utter and complete nonsense."

"I don't know a single conservative on the planet that wants to do away with contraception," Cruz said.

In the Senate, Cruz said he plans to move forward with the agenda that helped bring him into office.

"If you want growth and jobs, the answer is simple: decrease regulation, decrease taxes and unchain small businesses," Cruz said.

Comments

[Adamakis]

/ "...wanting to do away with contraception. Their attempts to make access to contraception more difficult for women have been ongoing for years, and they would criminalize certain forms of contraception." /

difficult = not paid for by others

certain forms of contraception = abortion

abortion = "the termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by the death of the embryo or fetus"~~Merriam-Webster

[Joe]

GOP: every complicated problem has a simple unworkable solution. Cruz mines this vein like every other shallow tea partier I have heard. Ignorance is a badge of honor with those folks. I am enjoying watching the GOP and their "ideas that work" swirl down the toilet of history.

[bob]

I wonder where Cruz falls on the political spectrum of the Federalist Society. He's clearly wrong about conservatives not wanting to do away with contraception. Their attempts to make access to contraception more difficult for women have been ongoing for years, and they would criminalize certain forms of contraception.