If you think Donald Trump is scary, get a load of Ted Cruz’s foreign policy team

The Texas senator has assembled one of the most terrifying collections of disgraced aficionados in existence

On Wednesday the Donald Trump Fan Club on “Morning Joe” asked the candidate who he is talking to for foreign policy advice. He replied: “I’m speaking with myself, number one, because I have a very good brain and I’ve said a lot of things.”

Remarkably, this was only the second dumbest foreign policy-related news coming out of the Republican primary this week. Because even though Trump’s steroidal jingoism could easily overtake the Bush era for the worst foreign policy of the post-World War II era, Ted Cruz is always there in the background to remind us that it can always be worse.

To wit: Meet the Texas senator’s newly announced team of foreign policy advisors.

Let’s start with Elliott Abrams, a poster boy for failing upward in Republican circles. Aficionados of the Reagan administration’s Iran-Contra scandal remember that Abrams was buried up to his neck in that affair, to the point that Lawrence Walsh, the independent counsel who investigated it, was prepared to charge him with multiple felonies. Abrams slithered out of that with an agreement that had him plead guilty to two misdemeanors, was later pardoned by George H.W. Bush, and then censured by the D.C. Court of Appeals for giving false testimony to Congress on three separate occasions.

Then there is Andrew McCarthy. No, not that one. This is the bad Andrew McCarthy, the National Review writer and conservative activist who wrote one of the greatest “Yeah but” columns ever about Obama and birtherism. McCarthy’s argument was essentially that, while there is no doubt the president was born in Hawaii, the fact that there was any controversy over it at all was proof he couldn’t be trusted to be honest about anything. He has also used his perch at NR to excoriate the president for, among other things, wanting to close Gitmo, calling waterboarding “torture,” and having any association with “radical America-hating leftists” like Bill Ayers.

But the crown jewel of Cruz’s foreign policy team, the shining star of the firmament, has got to be Frank Gaffney. The Newsmax columnist and Pamela Geller running buddy is so far to the right that the Reagan administration shut him out of working on nuclear arms-control negotiations with the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, despite the fact that his job title then was Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for — wait for it — Nuclear Forces and Arms Control Policy. He was eventually fired, but the right wing being what it is, there was apparently still plenty of work for a guy who the Southern Poverty Law Center has called one of our country’s “most notorious Islamophobes.”

http://www.salon.com/2016/03/18/if_you_ … licy_team/

Seems to be a hate it or love it track. For me it's just too cheesy and upbeat. GN'R in hair metal mode. It doesn't fit the album, nor do I think the song is all that great.

(CNN)Prominent conservatives led by Erick Erickson on Thursday called for a unity ticket and a convention fight to stop Republican front-runner Donald Trump.

"If that unity ticket is unable to get 1,237 delegates prior to the convention, we recognize that it took Abraham Lincoln three ballots at the Republican convention in 1860 to become the party's nominee and if it is good enough for Lincoln, that process should be good enough for all the candidates without threats of riots," Erickson wrote in a statement after conservatives gathered in Washington to discuss ways to thwart Trump's march to the nomination.

The billionaire businessman dominated primary contests on Tuesday, but his loss in Ohio raised the prospect that he won't secure the delegates needed to win the GOP nomination. His campaign has come under heated criticism from many Republicans over the past week after violence erupted at some of his events and some in the party are searching for last-minute ways to avoid him becoming their standard-bearer.

"We are committed to ensuring a real conservative candidate is elected," Erickson said in the statement. "We believe that neither Hillary Clinton nor Donald Trump, a Hillary Clinton donor, is that person."

The statement also called for a unity ticket.

Conservatives at the meeting had "absolute consensus" on trying to stop Trump from getting enough delegates to clinch the party's presidential nomination, according to a source familiar with the discussion.

Conservative leader Bob Fischer gathered more than a dozen activists and Republican lawmakers to discuss how to stop Trump from getting their party's nomination.

The source said the consensus was around preventing Trump from reaching 1,237 delegates, and then stopping him at the convention. The source added that the conservatives are optimistic for this option, adding they believe "it is possible."

The idea of a third party being formed to combat Trump remained a bone of contention for the group, the source said, adding, there was "real division" over the idea. But there was also discussion that if Trump is the GOP nominee, then "the GOP ceases to be a party for traditional conservatives, who must go elsewhere." The thought process at this session was to work with "an existing third party instead of trying for ballot access." That would probably be the existing Libertarian or Constitution parties.

This source said the meeting was made up mostly of "diehards of the conservative movement," including, "Reagan revolutionaries, if you will."

Not all the attendees appeared to be giving up on Trump's existing challengers.

"I'm there to support Ted Cruz," said Mike Farris, a Republican lawyer, as he left the Army and Navy Club, where the group met behind closed doors for close to three hours. "There's a lot of Cruz support."

Rep. Trent Franks, a member of the House Freedom Caucus, attended the meeting briefly. So did conservative leader Bill Wichterman.

The event was advertised as a meeting of the group Conservatives of Faith. Erickson, who has floated the idea of a third-party candidate against Trump dialed in to the meeting by phone.

With wins in at least three nominating contests on Tuesday, Trump is the overwhelming front-runner in Republican delegates, though he still faces the possibility of a contested convention this summer, particularly if either of his remaining rivals, Cruz or Ohio Gov. John Kasich, gathers momentum.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/17/polit … index.html