Like those predecessors, Romney calculated the formula for winning the nomination, says Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College, and an academic authority on the Republican Party: “Just conservative enough to get moderate traditionalists and a chunk of movement conservatives.”…
Is this formula permanent or is it ephemeral?
Vin Weber, a former congressman from Minnesota and a Republican luminary, believes it may be more deeply ingrained. “Reagan believed in a mixed system, conservative but with an appreciation of the safety net, a coherent governing philosophy,” he says. “What most Americans want is an activist, limited government.”
Not so, says Richard Viguerie, one of the oldest veterans of the right-wing movement: “This is the last time the establishment will have operational control of a convention,” the 78-year-old activist proclaims. The grass-roots, ideologically driven base typified by the Tea Party movement, he says, is maturing into full control.
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