Understand, politics today, are not about the person, party loyalty trumps all.. if you think a hard core democrat or republican will not vote the candidate regardless of who it is, you are foolish.
They will either vote for them or stay home, but they won’t cross the line.
Hillary is a horrible candidate, no doubt, but if you put up any republican who is remotely connected to the establishment you will wind up with her carrying most of the same states Obama carried.
The election will effectively boil down to the GOTV efforts in a few states.. because there is no effective structural change being offered to the voters.
They could take out their anger at Obama on Hillary and you may get more than a handful to flip... but voter anger didn’t stop Obama from a second term so I wouldn’t bet on that.
If Republicans want to win they have to fight, and FIGHT HARD, politics are blood sport and the establishment plays it like its nerf football. Because they have no real desire to change the underlying system, just stay in power... they would rather see Hillary win and Republicans lose than see someone who truly threatens the system win.
Reality is, a Rubio or a Cruz or anyone else V Hillary and the Hillary is in the race, no matter what folks say. It will not be a blowout, even though she is a terrible candidate. It will boil down to republicans trying to flip a handful of states, and I am dubious after Mitt couldn’t even muster the same votes as McCain that they will be able to do it.
Trump cracks the map wide open, which is what scares both sides so much. If he wins, he will win huge, and if he wins, he’s a huge threat to the political class on both sides of the isle because he can’t be controlled by the money men.. who effectively all want the same general things, but put different lipstick on their pigs, as they screw over the American people.
Don’t underestimate Hillary, she’s a disaster and in a sane world Democrats would never put up such an unlikable, corrupted candidate, but the days of sanity left politics long ago. Beating her should be a cakewalk, but it won’t be if the Republican party stands for nothing different other than matters of degree with the democrats, which is effectively where the GOPe has been for decades now.
Except polls have consistently shown Cruz and Rubio doing better in one-on-one match-ups against Hillary.