“But Dem will still beat Dem-Lite almost every time.”
I agree with you. I initially backed Cruz, but realized my error when he refused to back Trump and basically turned into a pouting teenager. I think he would have lost against Hillary.
Harry Truman once said, “I may not win running as a Democrat, but I certainly won’t win running as a Republican.” (Running as a Republican against a real Republican. We’re talking policies.)
He was correct. You must satisfy your base first and foremost. The big tent, come-to-the-middle, compromising RINO’s have lost us much over the last twenty years.
The problem with the GOP, is that they were originally the party of upper crusty Mainline Protestants. So when working class patriot Democrats defected, and joined the GOP, after the hippies gravitated to the Democrats in the late 60’s/early 70’s, they were never truly welcomed by the GOP party Establishment.
This is why the GOP Establishment barely gets upset over Liberal media bias. When the media talks about “Right wing wackos”, the Establishment thinks “they’re not talking about us, they’re talking about all those crazy yahoos in with their guns and pick up trucks”. So they’re perfectly fine the media bashing the activist base, who they view as riffraff.