Unfortunately, there are too many Republicans who, honing their knives and lengthening their lists of unforgivable heresies, seem to derive more satisfaction from burning Republicans at the stake than from defeating Democrats. And there are too many other Republicans who think their task is to save the party from its base of principled activists.

Bush is fluent in Spanish and accomplished at courting the approximately 17 percent of the Florida electorate that is Hispanic: He received 61 percent of their votes in 1998 and almost that much in 2002. The time is ripe for Republicans to do as well with Hispanics as Jeb Bush’s brother did in 2000.

Political analyst Michael Barone writes in the Washington Examiner: “By my estimate, about one-third of the homeowners foreclosed on in the years just after the housing price collapse were Hispanics.” And since the Obamacare rollout, during which the Spanish-language version of the Web site was completely inoperative for weeks, “the president’s job approval has declined more among Hispanics — 23 percentage points — than among any other demographic group.” It should be possible for Republicans to find a nominee who can do as well as George W. Bush did in winning 40 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2004.