It is obvious that you have not worked in any political campaign for at least 28 years.
In 1980 Reagan ran on an anti abortion anti gun control stance. In every stump speech he made in the mid west, west, and south he reinforced his position on abortion and gun control.
I remember nearly every other reporter covering Reagan thought he was making a terrible mistake by being pro gun and anti abortion. But Reagan knew what many other stupid media types and dumb Republicans did not. The truth is well over half of the so called Religious Right are Registered Democrats. An
The millions of Democrat votes that Reagan got nation wide were Democrats who wanted to keep their guns and did not want unborn babies killed.
If both candidates had been for Abortion and for Gun control then those Democrats would have voted for Jimmy Carter. But the leftist Republicans keep thinking that Rudy can get the Religious right to vote for him. THERE IS NOT A SNOWBALLS CHANCE IN HELL THAT THOSE REGISTERED DEMOCRATS WILL VOTE FOR RUDY. And to get the socialists leftwing votes Rudy would have to out Hillary... Hillary. Even the leftist moderates want more goverment programs that benefit them. He would have to be at least as liberal as Hillary to get their votes. That is not going to happen.
Those who think a Republican who takes Democratic positions on abortion and guns can win an election are totally ignorant of what both Reagan and Dubya knew well.
In 1980 I was a reporter and in 2004 I was very active in the Bush campaign. Over and over in 2004 here in Ohio Bush pushed his stance on abortion. As the Bush Media Rep for the bellwether county in Ohio, I was inside the campaign. I saw the polls I saw the research Karl Rove did. I know what it takes to win Ohio. Even if Taft, Blackwell, DeWine and assorted other Republicans did not.
Bush was against abortion and against gun control. He campaigned about it at every stop. He knew like Reagan that the key to Ohio was DEMOCRAT VOTERS voting for BUSH.
Bush got nearly all his base and half the moderates, but his winning margin was from anti abortion and anti gun control Democrats. That is why Kerry refused to concede until the next day. He could not believe that Registered Democrats would vote for Bush. But they sure did as the internal Bush polls showed they would. Seven out of every 10 anti abortion Democrats voted for Bush.
Rudy VS Hillary will lose Ohio by 700 thousand votes.
But Reagan didn’t tell off other conservatives.
He debated the issues, not the person.
He also won not on gun ownership, but on taxes, the economy and the fight against communism.
Not to mention LOSE PA and WV as well. If it's Rudy vs Hillary, the Republicans should save their $ and not bother to spend anything in those 3 states, as it will all be wasted.
Not only would Rudy lose to Hillary he would do great damage to the Republican Party at the local, city, and state level too.
As the Rudy Apologists keep telling us in the conservative base that we are not needed (and in some cases told 'to take a hike')--as we can easily be replaced by independents and liberals would vote for Giuliani for security reasons.
With many in the conservative base either voting third party (with some not even voting in a LIBERAL RUNOFF election) who the heck do the Rudy Apologists think those independents and liberals will vote for locally, and on the state, and even senate level??? (Hint: It's NOT going to be the conservative candidates)
Conservative candidates at ALL levels would pay a huge price for the nomination of a LIBERAL like Giuliani. Rudy would be a disaster in SO MANY WAYS to the Republican Party!!