Let’s start with an easy one: What does a Republican believe?
Well, maybe not so easy. In the Reagan and Bush eras, there was a rather simple answer for what the GOP wanted: a hawkish foreign policy, limited government, and social conservatism — the various factions all living under one Big Tent.
But by 2012, the year Rick Santorum and Ron Paul both commanded large subsections of the Republican base, it was becoming increasingly hazy what the GOP stood for, and how it could translate that message into something electable at the national level.
It turned out a guy with no political experience – one who had spent much of his life as a liberalish New York Democrat – had the answer to that riddle. Donald Trump, guided by his strategist Steve Bannon, figured out how to cobble together a winning message with a hodgepodge of ideological parts.
Trump’s formula was inelegant, and remains so. But from a vote-getting standpoint, it also worked.
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