Is Ted Cruz Going To Win The GOP Nomination?

Ted Cruz, more than any of the other plausible Republican presidential candidates, really is in touch with the heart and soul of the Republican activist base. While Jeb Bush is milking the Establishment fat cats for millions and millions of dollars, Cruz has been developing an organic bond with the party's always-aggrieved base (and is getting decent fundraising results). When I've predicted he would be the nominee, all of my political friends have laughed at me. Did Bush scoop up $100 million this quarter? He needs that kind of money if he's going to have any shot to persuade Republican voters to get behind him. Cruz has already been doing that. He's their candidate and he's got the momentum right now-- as a new PPP poll showed yesterday. "His support," wrote PPP's Tom Jensen, "has increased from 5% to 16% in just over a month, enough to make him one of three candidates in the top tier of GOP contenders, along with Scott Walker and Jeb Bush."

Walker continues to lead the field with 20%, although that's down from his 25% standing a month ago. Bush continues to poll at 17%, followed by Cruz at 16%, Ben Carson and Rand Paul at 10%, Marco Rubio and Mike Huckabee at 6%, Chris Christie at 4%, and Rick Perry at 3%.

Cruz has really caught fire with voters identifying themselves as 'very conservative' since his announcement. After polling at only 11% with them a month ago, he now leads the GOP field with 33% to 25% for Walker and 12% for Carson with no one else in double digits. Last month Walker led with that group and almost all of the decline in his overall support over the last month has come within it as those folks have moved toward Cruz. Cruz's name recognition with Republican voters has increased from 61% to 82% since his announcement.

Two candidates are clearly losing ground. The biggest is Ben Carson, who's dropped from 18% to his new 10% standing. There's a lot of overlap between the voters who like Carson and the voters who like Cruz and where previously they'd been naming Carson as their first choice the momentum for Cruz lately seems to have really cut into Carson's support. The other potential candidate who seems to be losing some steam is Mike Huckabee. A month ago he was at 10%, but now his standing has declined to 6%.

Cruz will say anything to appeal to the inner demons of the psychologically fragile right-wing base; accuracy and truth don't get in his way. Yesterday David Horsey in the L.A. Times dubbed him "Sarah Palin with a high IQ." "His views," Horsey wrote, "place him in the same camp as all of those throughout U.S. history who have resisted federal authority-- including slave owners, Confederate politicians, rapacious industrialists and die-hard segregationists. Because most Americans are not keen on going back to the 18th century, chances are reasonably good that Cruz will be no more successful in national politics than Palin has been. Still, he could be a much more formidable voice in the presidential race. Cruz can articulate a complex argument for his point of view." 

For those motivated by unfocused hatred towards "liberals"-- and focused hatred towards Obama-- no one is going to be a better candidate than Cruz. He's one of them-- or at least adept at seeming to be one of them. His primary strategy is impeccable-- which has Democrats hoping it works well enough to win him the nomination in time for a Goldwateresque debacle... and as many as 10 less GOP Senate seats and dozens of non-Confederate House seats. This week he led the Republican 2016 field into an untenable extremist defense of Mike Pence's bigoted and very unpopular any-gay legislation. He's gone so far as to start attacking business leaders over the issue.

"Religious liberty is not some fringe view," Cruz, currently the only declared candidate for president, said to about 300 people in Sioux City, the first stop on a two-day tour. "Sadly, a whole lot of Republicans are terrified of this issue."

Cruz had strong words for business leaders who haven't defended religious freedom laws like the one in Indiana, which has sparked a firestorm of debate.

"The Fortune 500 is running shamelessly to endorse the radical gay marriage agenda over religious liberty to say: 'We will persecute a Christian pastor, a Catholic priest, a Jewish rabbi,' " he said. "Any person of faith is subject to persecution if they dare disagree, if their religious faith parts way from their political commitment to gay marriage."