Does the GOP want a winner or a conservative?

[DonViejo]

WASHINGTON -- It's lucky that the presidential primary season has a long way to go, because Republicans seem no closer to deciding what their priority should be. A poll released Tuesday by Public Policy Polling, a left-leaning operation that has an impressive track record of predicting elections, put the question to Iowa GOP voters, who hold the first primary contest in the presidential cycle and have an outsize influence on picking the winner. The state’s Republican voters are split: 44 percent say they are more concerned about picking the most conservative candidate, and 45 percent say they would rather back the person more likely to beat the Democratic nominee.

The poll didn't name names, but Jeb Bush and Chris Christie would represent the moderate, more-likely-to-win-a-general-election side of the argument, with Ted Cruz and Rick Santorum to their right. (Scott Walker ranks slightly higher with the "ideology" side, while Marco Rubio may have lost support on the right because of his interest in immigration reform.)

The argument has been going on within the Republican Party for decades. In the 1952 primary featuring the conservative Robert Taft and more moderate Dwight Eisenhower, the moderate won. There was the 1964 primary featuring the moderate Nelson Rockefeller and conservative Barry Goldwater, who won the primary but lost the general election in a landslide. And conservatives will point to 1980, when moderates argued that Ronald Reagan was too conservative to win a general election and he defeated George H. W. Bush and went on to be a two-term president.

Iowa's Republican voters tend to skew conservative, said Larry Sabato, a political science professor at the University of Virginia. “If this question is asked in New Hampshire, I would expect a decisive margin for choosing an electable candidate,” he said. “There are clearly conservatives who buy the theory that the problem for the GOP is the party hasn't been nominating true conservatives who excite the base. But I suspect a majority of conservatives don't buy this, and certainly almost no one else does."

The Republican right does contend that conservatism and electability aren’t mutually exclusive. Santorum and Newt Gingrich spent much of 2012 arguing that a conservative candidate stood a better chance against Barack Obama in the general election because it would be a “stark contrast” and provide voters a “clear choice.” And conservatives are continuing to make that case. Cruz has said the “mushy middle” can't win.

more
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/04/does-the-gop-want-a-winner-or-a-conservative/

[Turbineguy]

1. They don't need a winner

they cheat.

[Cosmic Kitten]

2. It's not like a Right-winger would vote Democrat.

The state’s Republican voters are split: 44 percent say they are more concerned about picking the most conservative candidate, and 45 percent say they would rather back the person more likely to beat the Democratic nominee.

But they will vote for their PARTY regardless
It's all about voting (R) or (D)
pay no attention to policy
or past performance in the
general election.

The right-will make their
base hold their nose and vote
republican because if they don't...
HILLARY!!!!11!11!11!!

See how that works?
The party establishment
pushes their candidate
on the voters and then
they are told, hold your
nose and vote, or else!!!11!11!1

[onehandle]

3. They want neither. They just want us to lose.

And continue doing jack shit for America.