Your sobering post on the wisdom of going with a moderate is distressing. Not because I don't agree -- you may very well be right -- but if you're right, we're screwed for the forseeable future.
Is "It is written ..." real?
There is no wisdom associated with “going with a moderate”.
The party went with a moderate in 1976 (Ford) and lost. We went with a moderate in 1988 (Bush 41) who was elected only because of the coattails of the “unelectable right winger Reagan”. He promptly raised taxes and gave us Billy Jeff Clinton for 8 years. (If the party had gone with Jack Kemp, who was the conservative alternative in 1988, he never would have hiked taxes and would have easily been reelected in 1992). But the GOP went with the moderate, because he was “electable”. The polls said so.
Now people are allegedly lining up to vote for Rudy because he is electable. The polls all say so. I doubt if he will win the nomination, but if he does, the GOP will once again deserve the moniker “the Stupid Party” because Rudy will take the party down to a crashing defeat. It is so obvious that I cannot believe there are people who do not see it.