Ted Cruz, the Republican freshman senator from Texas, has, to put it lightly, been a colossal embarrassment for our state. I won’t even bother listing his accomplishments in his barely two months in office, but if his goal was to keep himself in the headlines making all Texans look bad, then he is doing a bang-up job.

A recent vote on a seemingly uncontroversial resolution, however, has made me wonder if there is something deeper at work here:

In an unusual move, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) objected last week to a routine Senate resolution commemorating Multiple Sclerosis Awareness Week.

Congress passes hundreds of resolutions, meant to commemorate everything from a special awareness week or Little League champions. The resolutions lack any real power of law and are predominantly ceremonial. For example, earlier this month the Senate passed resolutions to mark “World Plumbing Day” and commemorating the three-year anniversary of the Haiti earthquake.

In order to keep business moving and not clog the Senate floor, they are normally passed in bulk through a  “unanimous consent agreement,” meaning a vote isn’t tallied since both sides agree to it.

But last week, Cruz objected to including the MS Awareness resolution. He was unhappy with a clause in the resolution describing the purpose of the Multiple Sclerosis Coalition, according to a Democratic staffer.

Now, I suppose we should take anything a “Democratic staffer” says with a grain of salt, as it could be anybody from a 16 year-old Senate page to Vice President Joe Biden. Either way, it is unlikely to be someone with first-hand knowledge of the contents of Ted Cruz’s head (that joke is too easy.) We don’t know, based on Politico‘s reporting, what clause the senator found objectionable. I am going to assume that it reads “WHEREAS, kittens are adorable…” Continue reading →