Friday, March 25, 2016

DEAR CRUZ SCANDALMONGERS: THIS MAY NOT BOUNCE THE WAY YOU WANT IT TO BOUNCE (updated)

I see that the National Enquirer has a story alleging that Ted Cruz has had extramarital affairs with five different women. The Enquirer doesn't ID the women, but Internet gossipmongers claim they've determined who three of them are. One is a Trump spokeswoman. One was Carly Fiorina's campaign manager -- which is raising further questions about a mysterious donation a Cruz super PAC made to a Fiorina super PAC last July:



This looks bad for Cruz, right? Yes -- but I remember January 2012:
Did John King blow it?

The CNN host stepped on a land mine named Newt Gingrich when he opened Thursday night’s Republican presidential debate by asking him about his second ex-wife’s allegation that he suggested she accept his affair as part of their marriage.

Gingrich’s now-famous response practically blew back King’s hair. “I think the destructive, vicious, negative nature of much of the news media makes it harder to govern this country, harder to attract decent people to run for public office,” he said to thunderous applause during the forum in Charleston, S.C. “And I am appalled that you would begin a presidential debate on a topic like that.”

To even more enthusiastic applause, the former House speaker added, “I am tired of the elite media protecting Barack Obama by attacking Republicans.”
Two days after that debate, Gingrich won the South Carolina primary by double digits.

Of course, Gingrich's marital troubles were old news. This story isn't -- and if any of it is true, it could be confirmed by embarrassing evidence.

But if it's not true, or if it's true but the accusers can't prove it, Cruz has the opportunity to be very, very self-righteous. Cruz, when he's angry, is pompous and haughty, just the way Gingrich was in that debate moment:



Perhaps unfortunately for Cruz, there are no more Republican debates scheduled. But if he thinks he's in the clear, either because he's innocent or because he's sure no one can prove anything, he really might find a way to use this to his advantage.

Or he could admit marital troubles, with Heidi at his side, and win sympathy. GOP voters love repentant sinners. They reelected David Vitter in his first election after his prostitution scandal. They eventually forgave Mark Sanford and sent him to Congress.

Or he could say nothing. In that case, the story could fester and hurt him -- or it could seem like mudslinging and help him.

I know, I know -- Gingrich didn't win the 2012 nomination. But he was never the establishment favorite and his campaign wasn't awash in cash the way Mitt Romney's was. Cruz is the establishment's pick now, and he's extremely well funded.

So this might cripple the Cruz campaign -- or, bizarrely, it could be the #NeverTrump movement's big break.

****

UPDATE: Charlie Pierce is right about this:
1) True or not, this has all the earmarks of a ratfck by a career ratfcker, and I would be willing to hazard a guess that the "Washington insider" quoted by the National Enquirer is an old Nixon hand whose name rhymes with "Dodger Drone."
Yup -- Trump pal (and, I suspect, still top adviser) Roger Stone, the guy who brought down Eliot Spitzer. Then again, Stone's scuttlebutt was true in that case.

ALSO: As New York magazine's Gabriel Sherman reported last fall, "Trump and Enquirer CEO David Pecker have been friends for years."

16 comments:

mlbxxxxxx said...

Kinda hard to believe that there are 5 women besides his wife who have been willing to have sex with Ted Cruz.

AllieG said...

I have no idea how this story will affect the election, but from being stuck in lines at the Stop and Shop I know that the Enquirer has been touting Trump as America's savior since last summer.

Steve M. said...

Kinda hard to believe that there are 5 women besides his wife who have been willing to have sex with Ted Cruz.

Well, I feel the same way about Donald Trump.

Ten Bears said...

Bingo!

Unknown said...

If history teaches us anything, it's that a loudly Christian public figure can not be harmed by a sex scandal. One emotional press conference with the betrayed wife standing "supportively" stone-faced in the background, a pious intonation of "not perfect, but forgiven", and then back to the grift.

Ten Bears said...

There's a foul oder in the fridge. That Cruz is dipping his wick in strange street-walking potang would be no surprise, it's nature of game. It wouldn't surprise me if he's been sniffing methamphetamine with a male hooker. But dipping his wick with Donald T Rump's spokesperson, with Carly Fiona's campaign manager? Something stinks in Peoria. Cruz is an asshole, but he's not an idiot.

Good example, however of what T Rump thinks of the rest of us.

Ten Bears said...

Stupid "smart" phone.

Ten Bears said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
retiredeng said...

Seems that I'm not the only one that thinks Cruz, or Trump for that matter, doesn't have sex without paying for it. Being any woman, man, goat or worse.

Feud Turgidson said...

Codger bone ...

From the look of Steve M's latest catch, the females are all off nesting. Fellahs? NYE FELLAh? Woman are

1) more than some of you, it's pretty clear, assume, or can imagine
2) not a separate species
3) not classifiable the at least some of you clearly seem to think
4) more numerous than we are
5) mostly look at us differently than we look at each other, for a bunch of evolutionary reasons (We're not very well respresented in the science crowd totay are we?)

Lodger Drone is not actually creative. Twisted, yes, perverse, sure; but he's not a novelist - he's a 3rd rate used car sales ad amn, with a massive tattoo of Richard Nixon on his back. He's not CLEVER, he's FERAL.

We're some of you not paying attention to the news from Alabammy the last few days? That ol' comb-over white sumpremacist god-bothering weirdo Bentley and that - SPEAKING AS A MAN - quite superficially attractive mysteriously-funded Drumpfian Missus America type - with the husband who looks DWEEBIER THAN BENTLEY?

"You're out of your depth, Donnie!"

No, Donnie was never out of his depth. He just didn't imagine he knew everything like Walter imagined Walter did. It's a magical mystery tour, dudes, and we're all enjoying a beverage at Ben Gazzara's house, and at some point, despite our being unemployed "stone slackers" a quarter ripped a third of the time, hey, man: they all still want me - for THEIR reasons, not mine.

Victor said...

Nixon is one of two male politicians who I don't suspect ever had affairs, because... well... he's Nixon... and eew...
And he didn't get his Tricky Dick nickname for his sexual prowess.

The other is Obama, because he knows Michelle would kill him!

On Cruz, yeah, it's probably ratfucking.
Sadly...

Never Ben Better said...

I tried to think of something witty or cogent or even half-assed sensible to say.

Couldn't get past the idea that any woman in something even approaching her right mind would want to have sex with Cruz.

Ick. Just... ick.

As a conservative woman friend of mine says, "He makes my skin crawl."

Feud Turgidson said...

Never BB, I'm still amaze-balls that ANY woman could possibly resist me, not because I'm so goldarn hamdsome or rich or sexytime, but because EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THE REST OF YOUR battling dung beetles is sooooo ikcy. Okay, Brad Pitt gets ONE, but that's it, Brad; the rest are all mine.

See, BenBen, the fog in our eyes on this is that we're on the same evolutionary side of the eternal struggle. When one of us dismisses Cruz with Da Laydees, we're really 'competing'. Get it?

Woman are not all the same, TG. There are over 4 billio of them and on those sorts of numbers, if just one in a thousand woman would be open to doing the horizontal tango with the Cuban-Canadian Cruz that's still approaching half a billion worldwide, and still well over 100 thousand just in this country.

The sheer scale of time, distance, numbers and nature is all so HARD for us. Evolution hasn't chaped us all that well to deal with them, except in the abstract.

Never Ben Better said...

Sorry, Feud, but I'm not on your side; I'm a she, unlike my avatar and nom de Internet here.

My friend and I don't agree on a lot of political issues, but we are as one in our loathing of Cruz. She also thinks Trump is a clown, but she despises Clinton and wouldn't give Sanders the time of day, so I have no idea what she'll do in November -- maybe say the hell with it and stay home.

Unknown said...

Feud, are you, in fact, Neil deGrasse Tyson?

Ten Bears said...

Don't know about Tyson, it doesn't feel quite right, but Feud said something the other day here that turned up elsewhere (and now I can't find it ((I only read, sometimes twice, about a hundred blogs and websites a day)) that leaves me with the feeling that our Unknown cum Feud is a bit more than your average blogger, or troll.

It wouldn't surprise me if trolling the web is something on Obama's bucket list.