As Cruz Rises In Presidential Polls, Trump Calls Him ‘Maniac’

A Des Moines Register-Bloomberg poll released Sunday, conducted by venerable Iowa pollster J. Ann Selzer, showed Cruz opening up a 10-point lead over Trump in that state, with 45 percent of evangelicals backing Cruz.

In an interview late last week with The Associated Press, Christie suggested two of his chief Republican rivals don’t have the right experience or priorities to keep the country safe.

He said on FOX, about Clinton: “She talks about me being unsafe”.

“If Hillary gets elected, they figure it’s game over – they’ll figure out a way to make the Clean Power Plan” happen, Garland said at a Wells Fargo investor conference Wednesday in NY. Cruz instead is a “rigorously conservative candidate” hoping he can “lure millions of new right-wing voters to the polls – and avoid alienating too many moderates and independents in the process”.

Cruz even spoke about the tactic directly himself to NBC in October, saying: ‘I think Donald’s campaign has been immensely beneficial for our campaign and the reason is, he’s framed the central issue of the Republican primary as, “who will stand up to Washington?”.

Cruz won 90 votes in the non-binding preference poll, nearly twice as many votes as second-place finisher Marco Rubio.

Not all Republicans share his fear-mongering and hatred, but the fact that he is the leading Republican candidate for president is a sad commentary on the moral climate in America.

The New York Times takes a big look at the climate deal that was six years in the making. There are less obvious wins in those states for Cruz, but he would nearly certainly run well in North Carolina and Missouri under any circumstance and might do well in the other three states depending on who else was left in the contest.

‘Well, the natural follow up if that’s the question is, “who has actually stood up to Washington?”‘

Trump, speaking to CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday’s “State of the Union”, defended his call for a ban on all Muslim travel to the U.S. Almost half of Republican and GOP-leaning voters (47 percent) both support the deportation of undocumented immigrants and oppose the acceptance of refugees from Syria or other conflicts in the Mideast – and slightly more than half of that pro-deportation/anti-refugee group supports Trump.

Wallace mentioned leaked comments Cruz made at a closed-door fundraiser earlier this week, saying that he questioned Trump’s judgment. Sorry to disappoint – is terrific.

Recent general GOP polls (like this one and this one), where Trump is winning, factor in new Republican voters – a key portion of his support, but also those less likely to engage in the arduous Iowa caucus voting.

Cruz, on paper, should not be as repellent to the GOP political class as he is. (The race will go into deep freeze from around next week through the beginning of 2016.) His campaign is perfectly positioned to make him the last man standing. As Cruz held court on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” last week, “you could’ve sworn he was working for George Herbert Walker Bush on his foreign policy”, a senior Republican said.

Another thing Cruz has going for him is the primary calendar, where you can see his path shaping up.