According to National Journal, during this period Rubio did not entirely adhere to doctrinaire conservative principles, and some colleagues described him as a centrist "who sought out Democrats and groups that don’t typically align with the GOP".He co-sponsored legislation that would have let farm workers sue growers in state court if they were shortchanged on pay, and co-sponsored a bill for giving in-state tuition rates to the children of undocumented immigrants. In the wake of the September 11 attacks, he voiced suspicion about expanding police detention powers, and helped defeat a GOP bill that would have required colleges to increase reporting to the state about foreign students.

El Wikipedio

I'm not expecting to vote for Rubio. However, I think there's a hell of a difference between Cruz and Rubio: Cruz is a true believer while Rubio is a dyed-in-the-wool opportunist. I think he became a Tea Party conservative when the winds of change were blowing that way, and I think he dropped the Tea Party rhetoric the minute it wasn't getting him anywhere. Marco Rubio is basically a young Bill Richardson - a political operative who will ride whatever politics will take him the furthest because it's the politics that makes the lobbying and board of directors seats possible.

I think his tax plan is shaky and useless and indefensible because he never intends to use it. It was written purely as pandering. Your article starts out with

Republicans like tax cuts, but for the last couple of years the focus of a lively debate among Republican policy wonks has been on how to cut taxes.

So fuck the policy wonks and promise bread and circuses to the proles because you can't get shit done without being in office. Then once you're there, distract them with something about gay marriage or abortion because that's what you always do. Barring that, send troops somewhere nobody can find on a map. Pretty much been the game plan since... well, Reagan at least.

That's why I still say Rubio is the closest thing they have to a rational politician - he's an archetypal opportunist who would have run as a democrat if there had been a dire shortage of idealistic young hispanic democrats. But there aren't, and there never were, and there never will be, so he ran as a Republican.

I've got a buddy. He just got his JD. For the past eight years he's been in charge of LA's food welfare program. He's a dyed-in-the-wool liberal. However, he's from a prominent family in San Diego and he looks like a Republican. I've almost talked him into running as an (R) for the simple reason that there's like nobody on that side of the aisle his age. It's all part of the game - I mean yeah, promise to cut taxes and talk about the importance of family and panderbear all throughout the OC but once you're in office, do a term or two, flame out and go work for some big stupid law firm at a half million a year.

It's just a game, and Rubio plays it well. Cruz is playing a whole other game and he's playing it for keeps.