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Ted Cruz's Oddly Sexual-Sounding Losing Speech

by Emily Shire

No one would say Tuesday night was easy for Ted Cruz. The Texas senator didn't just lose to Donald Trump in the New York primary. It's looking like perennial non-winner John Kasich may have beaten him in the Empire State, too. Staring down the possibility of a dead-last finish is likely driving Cruz a bit crazy with despair. Perhaps, he is ruminating over that "New York values" comment, wishing those handful of words had never escaped his lips. Whatever is going through the Texas senator's head, he appears to not be thinking clearly based on the comments he made Tuesday night that came off surprisingly sexual:

America has always been best when she is lying down with her back on the mat.

What's not surprising is that the internet has pounced on this snippet. To be fair to TrusTed, in the full of context of his speech, the prose seems way more Rocky than dirty. Speaking at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, Cruz acknowledged his crushing New York loss before devolving into metaphors about America and his presidential campaign that I think (I hope) were meant to be inspiring. "Join me in this journey of less talk and more action," Cruz told the crowd (Okay, that sort of could be construed as sexual, but fine, I'll get my mind out of the gutter). "You may have been knocked down, but America has always been best when she is lying down with her back on the mat and the crowd has given the final count."

I get what Cruz was going for, but I am definitely wondering how he or someone with his campaign didn't realize that Twitter wasn't going to have a field day with the line, "America has always been best when she is lying down with her back on the mat."

Seriously, a good chunk of last week was spent wondering why you tried to defend a ban on dildos in Texas, Ted! If you're being scrutinized for trying to create strangely, restrictive sexual legislation, you should really avoid any and all possible innuendo in your concession speeches.