For the past 50 years, the Democrats, the media, AND the GOPe have played upon these divisions among conservatives to push their candidates in the primaries. Mitt won the primary because Cain, Gingrich, Santorum, and others split the vote.
Newt was running third, and Santorum a close second behind Romney, but they successfully painted Santorum as someone who would “impose his morality” on the country, which pretty much cost Santorum the libertarian vote. No, Santorum was a man with moral values, but he had no intention of “imposing” them on anyone. But that was the meme—and it worked.
And the GOPe has organized the primaries with liberal states and open voting states in the lead to help ensure that no decent conservative will win.
It’s imperative that we just have one Conservative in the primary, so we don’t water down the vote. But, with Sarah, “OR” Allen West, not both, in the primaries, any other milktoast kind of Conservative, such as Santorum, would be inconsequential.