NOBODY ends up with that snake by accident.

A few weeks ago Sen. Ted Cruz dropped a surprise in the middle of a casual policy discussion with a prominent conservative activist.

The freshman Texas senator predicted that longtime Republican attorney Ben Ginsberg would serve as his campaign lawyer should Mr. Cruz run for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination.

The statement caught the supporter by surprise. Mr. Cruz, after all, has become one of the Senate's most stubborn nonconformists, unafraid to buck his party's leadership while laying out his own vision of conservatism with from-the-hip speeches that require no prepared text.