Fair enough; And yes, I do agree that Huckabee’s supporters would not go to Romney, largely due to his religion; However that does not change my point about the Senator being extremely fortunate to have weak opponents and a split field.
I also agree that we need to have more civil discourse and recognize some of the excessive vitriol against the Senator; However, I also think that it should be kept in mind that it has been Senator McCain who has shown tremendous disrespect and condescension towards conservatives over the last 8 years, so it should not come as a surprise that many have such a visceral dislike for him. In many ways, he is simply reaping what he has sowed.
Finally, I certainly appreciate and agree that McCain would be far better on foreign policy, health care, and judicial appointments then a Democrat would. However, all of those must be balanced against the damage he likely will do to conservativism, the GOP, and the country in the long run. As such, I think there will be a significant split in November, and he will not get the “vast majority” of conservatives to support him. Much depends on the next few months, but in my view at this point given his record the presumption should be AGAINST him, not for him.
I’ll agree to disagree on some of your other points, but I think you are far underestimating conservative discontent with the Senator. Given his record, if he wants to have any chance of garnering support from the base it is HIS burden to make amends, and demonstrate he is sincere in his desire to do so. He certainly hasn’t done so yet, and I simply doubt he has it in him since it appears to me that his vindictiveness appears to outweigh his capacity to conciliate.
I think CPAC will be a very telling and seminal point in seeing which way the wind will blow in November. If he were sincere about trying to unite the party, at MINIMUM he would start to make amends by promising that he would focus SOLELY on border enforcement and not sign ANY legalization bill for illegals during his first 4 years in office if elected, since that is the one issue where conservatives are united and he can demonstrate he has truly “heard” us...
I think your post is thoughtful. If I have a disagreement with it, it is over the degree of the disaffection. Highly engaged conservatives who do not view right to life as the seminal issue may have more of a problem with McCain than the pure social con right to lifers. I honestly have not noticed this animosity among the many evangelicals and conservative Catholics I know. That said, I agree that McCain should reach out to the conservatives, perhaps reinforcing with a pledge that he would build the border fence before confronting what to do about the illegals still here. There is a lot of time until the convention. And, honestly, aside from the half dozen issues regularly mentioned here, McCain’s total record over the course of a nearly 30 year career is quite conservative. He needs to explain and tout that record.
But Hillary and Obama (probably Hillary) will unite the GOP by her mere presence, particularly because most Freepers and most conservatives are unwilling to consign our troops to a Commander in Chief Hillary. In light of their stalwart service in defense of our nation, that would represent a monumental injustice and ingratitude to them, and I firmly believe most conservatives, even those with white hot hatred of McCain, would put that aside in order not to jeopardize our brave soldiers, especially in time of war.