Robert Reich “served in the administrations of Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter and was Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997. . . . He was appointed a member of President-elect Barack Obama’s economic transition advisory board. . . . Time magazine named him one of the Ten Best Cabinet Members of the century, and The Wall Street Journal in 2008 placed him sixth on its list of the ‘Most Influential Business Thinkers’” even though he has never owned or run a business. Reich is a socialist living off capitalists.

He recently wrote “5 Reasons Ted Cruz Is Even More Dangerous than Donald Trump.” Reich’s article reads more like a campaign piece for Cruz. Is Reich so out of touch with America that he does not get why there is such a political uproar?

Read related article: “Why the GOP Establishment is Beginning to Like Trump and Hates Cruz.”

The following numbered and bold paragraphs are Reich’s comments. My comments follow:

1. He’s more fanatical. Trump is a bully and bigot but doesn’t hew to any sharp ideological line. Cruz is a fierce ideologue: He denies the existence of man-made climate change, rejects same-sex marriage, wants to abolish the Internal Revenue Service, believes the 2nd amendment guarantees everyone a right to guns, doesn’t believe in a constitutional divide between church and state, favors the death penalty, opposes international agreements, embraces a confrontational foreign policy, rejects immigration reform, demands the repeal of “every blessed word of Obamacare,” and takes a strict “originalist” view of the meaning of the Constitution.

What’s not to like here? Other than the use of the pejorative “fanatical” and the claim that Cruz “doesn’t believe in a constitutional divide between church and state,” Reich’s opposition to Cruz could be a campaign flier.

The First Amendment doesn’t say anything about “church and state.” It does say that Congress cannot establish a religion or prohibit the free exercise of religion. Christians, and that includes Cruz, believe in a jurisdictional separation of church and state, but that’s not what the First Amendment is dealing with.

2. Cruz is a true believer. Trump has no firm principles except making money, getting attention, and gaining power. But Cruz really does detest the federal government, and has spent much of his life embracing radical right economic and political views. When Cruz said “we are facing what I consider to be the epic battle of our generation,” he wasn’t referring to jihadist terrorism but to Obamacare.

A constitutionalist should “detest the federal government” since its operations are contrary to the Constitution, a document that every Representative, Senator, and President takes an oath to uphold. Cruz’s “radical right economic and political views” are (1) the free market and (2) limited government. There is nothing in the Constitution that gives authority to the Federal government to force people into a healthcare system and then fine them if they don’t participate.

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