Have you noticed that Cruz has been climbing his way up the polls?
Rubio’s team obviously has, and they’ve spent a bundle putting out attack ads to discredit him. It didn’t work out quite how they had planned, though, because when the ad came up in an interview with Megyn Kelly, Cruz had turned it right back around on Rubio. Call it political Judo, if you like. An attack against him was avoided, redirected, and turned back on his attacker. It was a thing of beauty.
Honestly, that’s a skill set we need to see more often from leaders hoping to represent the political Right. It’s the right reply to the rigged “do you still beat your wife” sort of question.
So what happened?
The interview began, asking Cruz about the foolishness of Obama’s claim that meeting in Paris could be “a powerful rebuke to the terrorists”. That segued smoothly into a conversation about qualities of leadership, and how the Conservative candidates keep making the mistake of drifting to the political middle, rather than being solidly and consistently Conservative, which keeps costing those candidates in election results.
Next came the tough question Rubio’s team was waiting to hear, repeating the questions posed in the attack ad. Would this be the direct hit they had hoped for?
Megyn’s question couldn’t have been more perfect if it was written by Rubio’s own team. “You’re getting hit by some on the right that YOU’RE the mainstream moderate guy, they say”.
And before you could say “what hit me?”, you see Ted’s sidestep and reversal.
“Let’s speak the truth” Cruz said, “I’m not getting hit by anyone on the Right. I’m getting hit by a PAC supporting Marco Rubio”.
And then — pardon me as I mix metaphors — he twists the knife.
“Marco Rubio’s PAC is doing this because they desperately want to change the discussion from his long-time support of President Obama’s massive Amnesty Plan. This PAC Ad by Rubio supporters where they’re spending hundreds of thousands of dollars… Listen, what it really is, Megyn is a sign of desperation they want to change the topic because I think Marco’s campaign has determined that his long term support of Chuck Schumer and Barack Obama’s amnesty plan — particularly making it easier to bring Syrian Muslim Refugees into this country that they’re now worried about it. Politically, they want to change it with a fake attack ad.”
Whoops, there’s hundreds of thousands of PAC dollars wasted Mr. Rubio.
You tried to get people talking about mistakes you think Cruz made, and yet now, the national conversation will be focused even more so on your support of Chuck Schumer and Barack Obama, framed by those damning words “I’m not getting hit from the right”.
If this is your “A” game where you’re only fighting against your own side, how exactly are you planning to square off against Hillary (or whomever) and the AV department of the Democrat party (aka: Mainstream media)?
Is there a pool somewhere going for when Rubio packs it in? Those of you who do that sort of thing, might want to get in on it sooner rather than later. It might not be that long before it pays out.
