This is one reason Neocons hate Ted Cruz.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz says the United States is safer if we leave Bashar Assad in power in Syria.

The GOP presidential hopeful told the Associated Press that while Assad is a “bad man” who has “murdered hundreds of thousands of his own citizens,” toppling him would be “materially worse for U.S. national security interests.”

He faulted the Obama administration as well as one of his Republican rivals, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, for wanting to get rid of the Syrian leader.

“If President Obama and Hillary Clinton and Sen. Rubio succeed in toppling Assad, the result will be the radical Islamic terrorist will take over Syria, that Syria will be controlled by ISIS, and that is materially worse for U.S. national security interests,” Cruz said.

Cruz, who has been gaining some ground in recent polls, also said the United States should not have supported the overthrow of former Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, or even former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

“If you topple a stable ruler, throw a Middle Eastern country into chaos and hand it over to radical Islamic terrorists, that hurts America,” he said.

Neocons foolishly believe in the export of liberty.  But as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have taught us again, some people don’t want liberty.  They love their enslavement, and Islam is a prime example of the kind of Fascism that comes to dominate a man’s heart, soul and culture.  It cannot coexist with anything.  Only by overthrowing Islam can a country embrace liberty, and so the so-called Green movement in Iraq would have gone to war with the Iranian establishment had the U.S. supported it.  Instead we relegated it to a failing and sidelined movement, destined to perish like every other ideology that met the Mullahs head on.

In the case of Libya and Syria, Cruz knows what the Neocons don’t.  The dictator we know is better than the one we know will come to power in his place, and without the destruction of Islamism in Iran, it’s better to leave well enough alone.  Meddling has produced bad results, and so the meddling should stop.

But Cruz is hated for that and other anti-Neocon positions.  I listened to Brit Hume tonight on Fox News O’Reilly (Hume misspelled Cruz’s name), and Brit was all somber and insistent about Cruz’s upcoming month being an opportunity for the good folks of Iowa to find out what his “real” positions are, and they may not like them.  Positions such as Cruz’s opposition to the NSA spying program, which according to Hume, people may find that they want in the wake of the San Bernardino shootings.

Really, Brit?  Conservatives want larger government programs that enable the Leviathan executive branch to spy on U.S. citizens?  Really?  Is this the great dagger in the heart of Cruz?  Look, we know that the best bet to ameliorate terrorism in America is to close the borders, which runs directly contrary to Rubio’s position.  You won’t have any success convincing us that it’s best to leave the borders open and try to fight them when they get here.  That’s weak tea.  As far as we conservatives are concerned, leave the *.us.gov out of it except to close the borders, and leave our guns alone.  We’ll be just fine.  We’re unimpressed, but I will make a note of the fact that it sounds like you got your talking points from Karl Rove before coming on the air with O’Reilly, who was too stupid to interrupt you and tell you to go back to the drawing board.

Next up is Max Boot, who waxes emotional about Regan’s demeanor.

Like many of his rivals for the Republican nomination, Ted Cruz has embraced the mantle of Ronald Reagan. He regularly cites the Gipper as an inspiration, and last week gave a foreign policy address at the Heritage Foundation that was laced with tributes to him: “As Reagan knew well, the best way to project America’s leadership is by protecting and promoting America’s strength and this principle should always guide our actions.”

You have got to be kidding me?  In Boot’s alternate universe, McConnell is a “staunch” conservative, and Boehner, old yellowstain himself, is somehow worthy of anything but our most robust disapprobation and insults.  And yet these two quisling traitors are responsible for much of the socialism, crony capitalism, indebtedness, and unfunded liabilities with which our nation is plagued today.

This is rich.  Boot begins with apparently his strongest condemnation of Cruz, which is that Cruz condemns socialism, crony capitalism and debt.  And Boot thinks that this is somehow going to be effective with conservatives.  Again, this is just rich.  But it is telling that it sounds like Boot got his talking points from Karl Rove.

Message to Hume and Boot.  Don’t hang around with Karl Rove.  It’ll prove to be your undoing.  And don’t be persuaded that those outside the beltway think like you do.  We don’t.  You lead the insular life of the effete, inner city dwellers, out of touch with just about everyone except those with whom you dine and discuss.  You should get out a bit more.

Oh, and none of the things Rove has planned for Cruz will change a thing.  Rove is a putz, and you can tell him I said so over dinner.