Strong or Wacko?

Ted Cruz isn't shy.

He's combative. He rejects compromise as "the mushy middle." He's not inclined to wait his turn. And he doesn't seem to mind annoying his Republican elders with tactics that critics see as destructive and short-sighted.

So perhaps it's no surprise that little more than two years after he was sworn in to the Senate, the 44-year-old Texan on Monday became the first contender to officially announce his campaign for the Republican p

The audience should have belonged to Sen. Rand Paul. After all, the thousand or so clean-cut millennials in the D.C.-area ballroom were members of Young Americans for Liberty, a student group founded by Paul’s father, former Rep. Ron Paul.

The kids chuckled appreciatively as Rand unspooled his tart, college-dorm-room disdain for government. But he didn’t fire them up. Neither did Utah Sen. Mike Lee, the thoughtful-sounding son of a Reagan-era U.S. solicitor general.

The man who got them cheering, who got them going, who got them roaring with derisive laughter...