Kamicruze crashes!

Kaleidoscope
By Perry Diaz

During World War II, when Japan was losing naval battles against the United States in the Pacific, a Japanese officer proposed the formation of suicide missions known askamikaze (God wind) attacks by pilots who were ready to die for the Emperor.  On October 15, 1944, the first kamikaze attack, which consisted of about 100 dive-bombers, attacked the American armada near Leyte Gulf in the Philippines. 

At the end of the war, at least 47 Allied vessels — from PT boats to escort carriers — were sunk by kamikaze attacks, and about 300 damaged. Nearly 4,000 kamikaze pilots sacrificed their lives.  (Source: Wikipedia)

Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee

Sixty-nine years later, another suicide mission was proposed.  This time around, it was not the idea of a Japanese officer; it was the brainchild of a Harvard-trained American lawyer, Ted Cruz.  Cruz also happens to be the Junior Senator from Texas.  He and his kamicruze sidekick and fellow Tea Partier, Junior Senator Mike Lee of Utah, led a pack of Tea Partiers in the House of Representatives to campaign for shutting down the U.S. government and forcing it to default on its financial obligations unless President Barack Obama defunds the Affordable Care Act (ACA), known as “Obamacare.” Cruz and Lee inundated the airwaves with commercials calling for the defunding of Obamacare.  The campaign was nasty, to say the least.

Double whammy

On October 1, 2013, after Congress failed to pass a budget, the government was forced to shut down.  It was the first time since 1995 when the Republican majority in the House shut the government down for several weeks.  This time, more than 800,000 Federal employees were furloughed and all non-essential agencies and units were closed for business.  The list is so long for it to fit in this column.

On October 17, if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling, a financial crisis far worse than the financial meltdown in September 2008 would occur, which would affect the global economy with a magnitude greater than any in more than half a century. 

Sixteen days after the government shutdown and just a few days before the debt ceiling is breached, there was no solution in sight.  The House Republicans were standing their ground and offered no compromise solutions.  However, the Senate Republicans had passed a budget that kept Obamacare untouched.  As expected, it died on arrival in the House.

That was then.  Today, we’re seeing a different scene in Washington, DC after all the polls were published, which showed the Republicans beaten to pulp in survey after survey.  It was one bloody hell for the Republicans.

GOP vs. GOP

Suddenly, the Republicans were fighting among themselves: the wild Tea Party kamicruzebunch against the mainstream Republicans, who were now taking a pragmatic position in the budget and debt ceiling fight. Suddenly, “Obamacare” is no longer being spoken even in whisper, well, except for the kamicruze diehards.

But something really strange is happening to the GOP.  Suddenly, Ted Cruz is no longer part of the conversation.  Instantly, he became pariah and nobody would touch him with a 10-foot pole.  Even his kamicruze second-in-command, Mike Lee, had dropped out of the conversation, a victim of self-inflicted wounds for putting his fungi-infected foot in his mouth.

Last October 14, in a last attempt to keep his “crusade” against Obamacare, Cruz and his kamicruze gang of about 15 to 20 House Republicans held a secret meeting at the — of all places! — Tortilla Coast, which is one of the most popular watering holes where Republicans hang out. 

But just like the Japanese kamikaze pilots, the kamicruze zealots had nary a chance of stopping the growing number of Democrats and Republicans who wanted to reopen the government and prevent a debt default.   

Sen. Ted Cruz

Pretty soon, Cruz and Lee were no longer in the GOP loop.  When the Republicans met for lunch last October 15 to plot their strategy to deal with the fiscal crisis, Cruz and Lee were conspicuously absent. 

Now that the Senate and the House finally passed a bill to reopen the government and increase the debt ceiling, the Republicans learned the hard way that a threat of government shutdown couldn’t be used to force Obama to agree to defund Obamacare.   Simply put, Obamacare is now the law of the land and it passed muster by the Supreme Court.  Obama stood his ground and did not wield an iota of concession to the Republicans. 

At the end of the day, the U.S. government won but the American people lost, courtesy of Cruz and his kamicruze cohorts.  And this brings to mind how Cruz’s assault on Obamacare would play up to his presidential ambitions?  With the presidential derby just a couple of years away, Cruz has to claw his way back from the abyss his fellow Republicans threw him into. 

Indeed, what happened to Cruz couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.

(PerryDiaz@gmail.com)

 NOTE:  Perry Diaz’s “Kaleidoscope” column delves into American politics and governance issues.  His other column, “PerryScope,” has been running for more than 10 years.