Get the Ricochet app
Ricochet will work fine in a browser on your mobile devices, but for the best experience please download our app.
"I think it's an enormous blessing to be the child of an immigrant who fled oppression, because you realize how fragile liberty is and how easily it can be taken away." – Ted Cruz
"I was so horrifically bad at tennis" — Ted Cruz
I like Ted Cruz a lot, and have grown to like him even more in the last few years. He doesn’t mince words, and is brutal and fearless when he challenges people who are either seeking appointments or testifying about their corporate actions. He’s also very articulate, has a deep understanding of the Constitution, and a great sense of humor.
When I saw the first quotation above, I couldn’t help but appreciate how he translated his experiences in Cuba into a love and commitment to liberty in this country. I think that attitude is true of many immigrant Cubans; we see them becoming very successful, especially in southern Florida.
But why do other immigrants who come from oppressive countries not have the same reaction? Why do they bring some of the archaic and primitive beliefs with them, especially the very reasons they have fled their native countries?
Do we pin the problem on Joe Biden because he has made it so easy for migrants to break the law? What about the illegals in New York, who expected comfortable accommodations and to be served food they preferred?
Finally, I added the second quotation because some people mistaken Cruz’s self-confidence for arrogance. Any man who admits to being terrible at a sport can’t be all bad.
Discussion (38)
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
Cuba chased away its elites. Most modern "migrants" are not the elites, simply starving peasants who want to know where the next meal is coming from.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
So you think if they are starving peasants, they aren't going to appreciate the advantages of liberty? You might be right.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
I think they do not think deeply about such things. Ted Cruz is a thinker. His parents were probably thinkers. The majority of people out there would rather be drinkin' than thinkin'. It has always been so.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
But what about those migrants who came here for the American Dream? Many who came early on were poor, too.
To read this bio, please join Ricochet.
And some came in groups searching for the freedom to be the oppressors rather than the oppressed. And I do not say that as some closet leftists. The Pilgrims came because they did not have enough freedom to practice their religion in England. But, they had had that freedom when they lived in the Seven United Provinces. The problem was that there were too many licentious people around. They wanted a Puritan government.
Most of the early colonies had established religions within the colony. That persisted when they became states within the United States until some judges on the Supreme Court decided that limits on the Federal Government also applied to state and other governments within the United States. (History says, that was not the intent.)
There were plenty of immigrants all along who simply wanted to be left alone. But most adhered to human nature, and that included various forms of tribalism. Many religions are about striving for higher than human nature at its basest form. But few are the people who do.
You're seeing five of 38 comments. Sign in, or join for just $5 per month, to read them all and add your own.