We haven’t heard from Ted Cruz in a while. It seems like a lifetime ago that the sad-sack, arch-conservative Texas senator and failed presidential candidate was the Internet’s whipping boy. This picture of him sadly making phone calls on behalf of the presidential campaign of Donald Trump (a man who publicly mocked both Cruz and his wife) went viral, as did the absurd urban legend that Cruz was the really the Zodiac Killer, the never-caught serial murderer who terrorized San Francisco in the late 1960s. He’s a hard guy to like.
Well, Ted Cruz is back, baby! For some reason, he thought it was a good idea to align himself with the Republican-controlled FCC’s wildly unpopular decision to repeal Net Neutrality, the rules that make the Internet an open and equal place for large and small corporations alike.
Cruz went on the hostile defensive, hurling that old chestnut of “snowflake” at the millions upon millions who dare to express the idea that the Net Neutrality repeal isn’t good.
Snowflake, believing online propaganda: "OMG w/o net neutrality, the Internet is gone!" Informed observer: "You know, the FCC issued that rule in 2015. The Internet grew up wonderfully free from govt regulation & this restores the status quo ante." Snowflake: "Uh, never mind…"
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 15, 2017
So basically, if you don’t like the FCC’s decision, you’re a triggered liberal snowflake who is dumb and doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Unlike technology and digital communications historian Ted Cruz, apparently.
Except that people do know Internet history, and they used their computer skills to immediately savage and school Cruz on Twitter. Jimmy Kimmel Live and SNL writer Zack Bornstein led the charge.
Oof this is a rough script man, I have a lot of notes. Going to take a page 1 rewrite.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
First thing, you're incredibly misguided, and have been since youth.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
Second, throughout your entire life, your peers have hated you feverishly. They talk behind your back, they can't stand you. It's not everyone that's the problem. Maybe once or twice. But this has always been your case. It's you.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
Third, you've never helped anyone else achieve anything. You are only out for yourself. You don't even pretend well.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
Fourth, your easily the least funny person after Mike Huckabee.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
Fifth, you lost to the most unpopular man of all time. He's a literal tax-dodging sexual assaulter with zero ideas and no concept of how government works, and you still fell flat on your face, then got right back on your knees to beg him for work after he insulted your dad/wife.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
Sixth, you murdered people operating in Northern California from at least the late 1960s to the early 1970s.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
Address these and get me a new draft by tomorrow AM, and we can go through it again.
— Zack Bornstein (@ZackBornstein) December 15, 2017
https://twitter.com/LukeSirWhite/status/941491245704204288
https://twitter.com/DrawG_/status/941714981808164864
https://twitter.com/haleynms/status/941490896176107520
Before high speed Internet became widespread, there wasn't much need to enforce neutrality. When it did become prevalent in the early '00s, the FCC assumed ISPs would avoid discriminating among traffic. That didn't happen and the FCC had to step in to ensure innovation continues.
— let's throw a country over party (@OkayWordsByJoel) December 15, 2017
https://twitter.com/PossieElizabeth/status/941491524524634117
Perhaps nobody said it better than @EoinHiggins_, who offered up a screengrab from a porno movie Cruz’s Twitter feed “liked” earlier this year (with a “loading” graphic overlaid on top).
https://twitter.com/EoinHiggins_/status/941499433585438720