Can Beto O'Rourke beat Ted Cruz in Texas? The GOP thinks so.

The conservative cavalry, as planned, is en route to Texas to try to save Senator Ted Cruz. "Behind the scenes," reports Politico, "the White House, party leaders and a group of conservative outside groups have begun to make efforts to strengthen Cruz." Trump, a fundraiser for Cruz in a high-priced DC steakhouse, a seven-digit advertising blitz of the Club for Growth, and additional help potentially coming from the Koch brothers' dark money machine and a super CAP

Cruz's allies also spent the weekend ringing the alarm on his behalf. In an in-camera meeting with GOP donors in New York, White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney suggested that Cruz is not "nice enough" to defeat the Beto Democratic Republic O ' Rourke this fall. Appearing on MSNBC, a member of Rick's 2016 presidential campaign, Rick Tyler, also warned that his former boss was in danger. And while addressing Politico, Texas Sen. John Cornyn said, "We are not bluffing, it's real and it's a serious threat."

That so many Republicans can even be called Cruz allies tells you all you need to know about the zero-sum nature of partisan politics right now, where your enemy's enemy is your friend – even if you have spent years insulting yourself.

A small sample of some of the most memorable things that Cruz's other Republicans have said about him over the years: the late Senator John McCain called him a wacko bird. Former Speaker of the House John Boehner called it flesh. "McConnell once compared it to a" mullet. "Senator Lindsey Graham even joked about how you could kill Cruz and get by if the arbitration was in the Senate. of course, there was Trump, who spent a lot of the 2016 primary jumps at 'Lyin' Ted '. interrogates Cruz's evangelical faith is mocked at the appearance of his wife, suggested that his father was somehow involved in the assassination of JFK and stated that the Texas senator was, gasp, "Worse than Hillary when you think about it." All this was only a prelude to the 2016 convention, during which Cruz refused to support Trump, Trump pleading against the angry mob while he was nodding Cruz, and Cruz's wife was expected to present to cover accompanied by a security escort.

Trump's GOP on Cruz is not a surprise. After all, Republicans have said a lot of nasty things about Trump, and Trump even more mean things about many of them, during the 2016 campaign. But since then, they have joined forces in the name of the reduction. taxes for the rich, which makes health insurance for the rest of the country more difficult and the accumulation of courts with conservative judges. However, everyone involved here would clearly prefer to spend their time and money pretty much everywhere else. The fact that they can not provide further evidence that O'Rourke legitimately worried them of being able to win one of the two Democratic seats must take control of the Senate.

Cruz remains the favorite in a state that has not elected a Democrat to the state office since 1994, but it is clear that this one is not the republican jig that Texas racing is generally. Cruz leads O'Rourke by only 4.4 percentage points in average RealClearPolitics polls, and his lead scored just two digits in two polls taken by RCP this year, most recently in June. Of the five investigations since then, four found O'Rourke within the margin of error.

These are not the only numbers that worry Republicans. O'Rourke proved to be a magnet for money, both inside and outside the state, despite the devaluation of CAP contributions. During the last fundraising period, he contributed $ 10.4 million to Cruz's $ 4.6 million, marking the second consecutive quarter that the challenger has more than doubled. Cruz had cashed about $ 10 million even before O'Rourke entered the race, but at the end of June, both teams had almost identical totals. Meanwhile, O'Rourke spent much less: he started in July with $ 14 million in his account, about $ 5 million more than Cruz.

O & # 39; Rourke's strength has created a kind of feedback loop, thanks to which his success in fundraising and his stronger than expected performance in the polls have earned him coverage in the national press under the title The man able to beat Ted Cruz. to be able to ask more money from the Liberals who are clearly excited about his campaign and who clearly despise his opponent.

This is not a hit on all the press attention. The outcome of this race will go a long way in determining the Senate's control, and the contrasting styles of the two men illustrate a greater intra and interparty dynamic that shapes the political climate on a national scale. We must keep an eye on what happens next. Now that there is no doubt that Cruz is fighting in his hands, the GOP is doing everything possible to push him to victory. But it is unlikely that the Democratic establishment will fully endorse O'Rourke in response, given that the truly awful mid-term card they face in the Senate has already scattered them. If O'Rourke really has a chance to win this month of November, he will have to prove that he is the star of political rock, and that all these profiles do not cease to convince him.