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| Everybody hates this guy |
It's miniscule, but it's there.
It seems everybody hates, HATES Ted Cruz. This is probably not fair, but when I Googled "Ted Cruz hated" I got 20,600,000 results.
Think about it. All we've heard in the news for months is how much everybody hates Ted Cruz. I'm sure he's heard it, too.
His presidential campaign collapsed in a heap Tuesday in Indiana, and the end was a mess. Donald Trump managed to get into Cruz's head just by repeating the bullcrap from the National Enquirer about Cruz's dad somehow being involved with the JFK assassination.
Even Cruz's erstwhile, brief running mate Carly Fiorina fell off a stage, which seemed like an omen a day or two before the Indiana vote. Cruz also accidentally punched his wife while hugging one of his very few supporters the other night.
Cruz was hated in college. There's an interesting article in Slate written by a person who remembers what a slog it was to be in a debate club with Cruz.
"Most of my memories of debating Ted Cruz involve being hollered at," writes Dahlia Lithwick.
As a young lawyer, In the Senate people hated him. Didn't former House Speaker John Boehner just call Cruz "Lucifer in the flesh"?
Senator Lindsey Graham said: "If you killed Ted Cruz on the floor of the Senate, and the trial was in the Senate, nobody would convict you."
Congressman Peter King of New York said he would take cyanide if Cruz won the nomination.
Not exactly loving words.
Almost all politicians are rejected by voters from time to time. You need an amazingly thick skin to get into that line of work.
But the word "hate" comes up so often when people are talking about Cruz, and he must be aware of it. This has to sting.
Lithwick, in Slate, sees the same "qualities" in Cruz now as she saw in the college debate gatherings:
"Watching Cruz's halting rise and crushing fall on the campaign trail this season, I've seen so many of the same behaviors: the canned absolutists lines, the just-add-water-outrage machine the too-loud, too-much quality that thrums through every venue until your face hurts."
Politico suggests that maybe Cruz likes to be hated:
"He wants to be hated. He draws strength from the attention it delivers and he has sought the hatred of others since high school......"
"From the view inside Cruz's skull, once you get people to like you, your job has only begun. Additional acts of kindness, consideration and fairness must be extended or your likability will fade into the background.
But hatred is a much more efficient use of emotional energy. Often, a single does of malice can seal the impression among most people that you're a terminal prick. By acquiring as his enemies the Washington political establishment, Cruz figures he can inherit their enemies and the 2016 campaign has proved him right. Nobody until Cruz had the stomach to build his political foundation on a bedrock of loathing."
This obviously was written before Cruz's campaign crashed and burned.
So now what? If Politico is right, then being the most hated person in the room didn't get Cruz very far.
Does being hated hurt Cruz emotionally? What is it like to have everybody say they hate you. It has to be crushing.
It would be for me and you, but for Cruz, I have no idea.
It all makes you want to give poor Ted Cruz a teddy bear to hug.
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