In 2016, the late Charles Krauthammer famously said, in reaction to Ted Cruz’s jaw-dropping appeal to the RNC to refuse to vote for Donald Trump as the Republican presidential nominee, “Last night what Cruz delivered was the longest suicide note in American political history.”  Krauthammer was spot on, but it was puzzling why someone as brilliant as Cruz would attempt such a doomed stunt.

To his credit, however, Cruz rehabilitated himself over the next five years by becoming a loyal Trump supporter.  I had to give him credit for his turnabout, but my wife, with her superior female intuition, wasn’t sold.  Whenever Cruz’s name came up, she quickly dismissed him as “a snake in the grass.”

Sure enough, this week the snake slipped up again by referring to the January 6 protest at the Capitol as “a violent terrorist attack.”  Charles Krauthammer must have been groaning in his grave.

On top of everything else, Cruz made the mistake of inviting himself on Tucker Carlson’s show to explain how it had all been nothing more than a misunderstanding and that he really meant those words only for the handful of protestors who attacked the police.

Needless to say, to voluntarily subject himself to Tucker’s scrutiny on national television was an act of pure masochism.  Predictably, it turned out to be the shortest suicide note in American political history.”  Cruz’s White House hopes are now on a par with those of Willie Brown’s ex-girlfriend.

Which raises the question, how can someone as astute as Ted Cruz make such career-ending blunders?  I can only think back on Forrest Gump’s famous words in quoting his mama, “Stupid is as stupid does.”  Apparently, Cruz never saw the movie.

RIP, Ted.