“I don’t care if someone is a flaming whatever that supports abortion and gay marriage, if they will vote against big government and throw the bums out in November, I welcome their vote.”
I agree in principle, much as Reagan felt when he said that he could be friends with anyone who agreed with him on 70% of the issues (bad paraphrasing on my part).
But your examples of abortion and gay marriage aren’t likely to be championed by anyone who’d vote against big government, as most (if not all) supporters of those policies WANT big government, to mandate their legality nationally rather than letting the individual states decide.
That's the challenge, yes, well put.
I think: The hard-core on this as a single-issue is small and we won't get their vote in any case. Beyond this is a spectrum. Or goal is to get as many votes as possible from this spectrum. The more we appeal to freedom and economics and common ground critical issues, the better chance we have. The more we blow up on wedge issues, the less chance we have.
To me it's coalescing around the big important issues, nationalizing them and staying on message. Our opponents will try to knock us off by thwarting this - because it is our best strategy for defeating them.