Texas Senator Ted Cruz has spent his career being difficult, so it's no surprise that he decided it would be a winning strategy tonight as well and threw what can be charitably called a temper-tantrum on stage Wednesday night.
After CNBC's moderators asked fellow Senator Marco Rubio about criticism of him leveled by his hometown newspaper, Cruz exploded, saying "the questions asked in this debate illustrate why the American people don't trust the media."
"This is not a 'cage match,'" he continued. "Donald Trump, are you a 'comic book villain'? Marco Rubio, why don't you resign? Jeb Bush, why have your numbers fallen? How about talking about the substantive issues?"
Cruz noted that "the contrast with the Democratic debate, where every thought and question from the media was, 'Which of you is more handsome and why?'
"The men and women on this stage have more ideas, more experience, more common sense than every participant in the Democratic debate," he contended.
"That debate reflected a debate between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks. Nobody believes that the moderators have any intention of voting in a Republican primary. The questions being asked shouldn't be trying to get people to tear into each other. It should be what are your substantive [ideas]."
Watch Ted's tantrum below:
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