[Mr. Jeeves]

The second paragraph rebuts his thesis and provides the real answer: there just aren't that many conservative voters any more. Ronald Reagan's base of WWII veterans is long gone - the average voter today went to school in the Sixties and Seventies, sang "Kumbaya" and engaged in "Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF", makes more money than he is worth in an office job with an extremely uncertain future, and feels very threatened economically and by urban crime, which he believes is caused by the existence of guns and lack of school funding. He'll pay any amount of taxes he believes necessary to reduce those threats.

The conservative message of independence and self-reliance isn't selling to this crowd - which is why Ron Paul and Duncan Hunter were the only ones trying to sell it this year. Ending up with a cast of apparent RINOs was the only logical outcome - unfortunately, the one with the most famous name is beating out the one who would make the most capable administrator.

[outofstyle]

Ronald Reagan's base of WWII veterans is long gone - the average voter today went to school in the Sixties and Seventies, sang "Kumbaya" and engaged in "Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF", makes more money than he is worth

Reagan carried the youth vote. There was an army of us twenty-somethings in 1980 who became life long conservatives because of RR. We are not the WWII generation. However, we remain faithful.