Mine, and those us evil purists share, are. --
I'm not sure either side is "winning," at least not in a short or medium term. The party faithful are trotting out the old "voter's fault" justification for losing the popularity contest (invoked prosectively as "vote for us, we're not overtly socialist like the other guy"), and predictably, people who yearn for elected representatives that will try to roll back the government, aren't buying in.
That's a broad brush, and of course there are exceptions (Cruz, Sessions, LePage). It's up to each candidate, and to some extent, the party itself, to come up with a message that gets it into power.
I wonder about the political debates in countries like Venezuela, Russia, Iraq, etc. that had free and open elections. I bet the same sort of empassioned arguments occurred there, too. Fat lot of difference it made.
Well, Today, more people than ever are publicly saying ‘Never again’ will they go the lesser evil/no matter what route. It’s a start.
And some of those people fought tooth and nail with us last election. They admit it was a mistake to help further the GOP liberalism. So it might not be any rousing victory yet I freely admit. But it’s moving our way.
Ergo, we are gaining, not ceding ground in this insanity. this crap never should have happened. Conservative values are not a ‘living document’.