It doesn’t HAVE to be a lasting split IF the party
will support whoever is the nominee.
If they won’t, THEN they have split from the
base and will deserve what ever happens to them.
The craziest part of where we are right now is that Trump is really exactly what the establishment has continually tried to push on us, a moderate that even Democrats like, and yet they hate him. What this reveals is that they never stood for principles of any sort. They are for their own power and control. They want someone they can control.
The other crazy part is that Trump is exactly what conservatives have said they don’t want, a moderate/social liberal, and yet they love him. This reveals that power is what they mostly want, too.
The Establishment faction and The Trump faction both try to paint the Constitutionally conservative faction as too small to win. Yet they attach themselves to fringe elements in the name of being “big tent” and/or cede long held values as “extreme” just as the left does, even though in the only real polling (done at ballot boxes) majorities still support those traditional Judeo-Christian values.
No one seems to see that a politician needs to have Constitutionally sound principles and the ability to articulate and educate, so as to persuade the public because understanding is not inherited. You have to teach it to each generation. Instead polls are taken and white flags waved everywhere necessary so long as the next poll says you are on your way to grabbing power.
As I’m sure you know, a Trump or Cruz nomination will have the GOPe voting Hillary in an instant.
Y'now, it would be real difficult or a party to survive without any voters.