Win without conservatives? Of course that’s the way he’s been thinking right along. Sad thing is, he may well be right. Other than the occasional bone and some lip service, conservatives get little from him.Basically Mccain knows that he conservatives don't have anywhere else to go. He's going to steal a note from Obama's and W's playbook and "be a uniter not a divider" knowing that he can move to the left as far as he wants and still get enough support from disgruntled conservatives afraid of Obama while picking up Hillary democrats along the way.
It's a winning strategy, but he's going to wreck the party along the way. We desperately need a conservative 3rd party. If not to win, to keep the republicans honest.
I believe it is.
Then McCain is an even bigger simpleton than I originally took him to be.
Conservatives certainly do "have other places to go." Some (like myself) will either vote for conservative candidates down ticket while leaving the top space blank, or else vote third party. A great many others can, and doubtless will, opt to stay home altogether.
No genuinely principled conservative, anywhere, needs to robotically reward any given Republican candidate with their vote every four years, solely on the grounds that, well, after all, The Other Guy sucks, too. Given the jaw-droppingly pathetic level of Juan McCain's cash-donations-on-hand, to date: it's a safe bet that a significant (and growing) number of conservatives have reached precisely that same conclusion.