ArcaMax

What's the most clearly defining moment so far in the 2016 presidential race? My choice would be Republican candidate Ted Cruz's New Hampshire campaign stop last March where he demonstrated his ability to frighten small children.

"The Obama-Clinton foreign policy of leading from behind," he preached passionately to a packed room assembled by the Strafford County Republican. "The whole world's on fire!"

"The whole world's on fire?" asked a clearly concerned little girl who sitting in the front row with her mother.

The crowd chuckled. Cruz, without skipping a beat, solemnly approached the little girl and offered comfort. "The world is on fire. Yes!" he said. "But you know what? Your mommy's here, and everyone's here to make sure that the world you grow up in is even better."

Sweet. The audience applauded and a tense moment for the child, identified by news reports as 3-year-old Julie Trant with her mother Michelle, was softened. Yay.

Yet, looking back, this particular pre-campaign YouTube moment seems to have offered an amusing trigger warning: Campaign 2016 may not always be suitable for younger or more sensitive viewers.

Or to put it more bluntly: Be afraid, very afraid.

"If we must choose between them," wrote political theorist Niccolo Machiavelli, "it is far safer to be feared than loved." In that spirit, this year's frontrunners in both parties seem to be telling us voters a simple message: Love me or hate me, but fear the possibility that I might lose.

Cruz's fellow Republican candidates weren't about to be outdone in their race to frighten the rest of us more than Cruz frightened the little girl in New Hampshire.

--Billionaire developer Donald Trump: "Our military is a disaster."

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