Easy... Divide the conservative vote in the Republican party by 8 (soon to be 9 if enough people scrape up enough $ to put Newt in the race.) Liberal Republicans (20 - 25% of the party) = l crummy candidate, Rudy. IF the lazy Country Club Republicans show up to vote in the primary, Rudy will be the nominee.
It’s easy enough to understand. Conservatives split between a number of candidates, Rudy pictures at 9-11 and the fact he’s been someone that as held firm on the WOT when others Republicans went wobbly.
The GOP base takes the WOT VERY seriously, and Rudy’s been rewarded for taking it seriously. They’ve grown to respect him for doing so, and until he decided to run for President, that respect didn’t have to war with their feelings on other domestic issues. Kind of like conservatives strongly support Joe leiberman. The fact he’s a liberal doesn’t matter because he was only running for Senator in CT where we couldn’t win anyway.
Then there is the electability factor, and there is a core that cares more about defeating Hillary then anything else.
Oh, and of course there is the fact they did not trust Romney’s conversion, McCain has spit on them many times, and the others showed no ability to get traction nationally. That left Rudy as the default candidate they at least respected and trusted on one issue, whereas they did not trust or respect the other two.
Now Thompson has entered the field, he’s doing well nationally, he’s more inline with their core issues as well as the war. As a result Rudy’s support is sliding. Conservatives just need to keep hammering that Rudy is NOT electable because he doesn’t win blue states and puts red states in play, and Thompson needs to continue making the case he IS electable and preaching conservative values.
Head over to Lucianne and search “Rudy”. You’ll get your answer.