will a true moderate be a serious contender for the gop nomination?

[Lief 🗽]

I kind of echo officepark's question. Who is considered moderate? There's no reason to run a center left Republican because we'd never win the base. Likewise, the question can be asked whether the Democrats will ever run a moderate? Would the liberal left vote for them?

Yes, Bill Clinton.

And Giuliani was the most fascist major contender for the Republican nomination. I don't know in what world fascism is "moderate."

[RIP Robert H Bork]

unfortunately, probably not.

Fortunately probably not.  We have the Democrat party all ready.  We do not need a Democrat Lite party also.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

jodi rell 2012.

why not?

You could justify Ron Paul's 2008 campaign the same way. Her chances of winning would be about equal to what Paul's were.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Of course not, otherwise Barack Obama would get the nomination.

[pbrower2a]

The Hard Right has largely expelled the moderates in the GOP. Aside from the two Senators from Maine (who might as well be Democrats), the moderates in the GOP who remain are... old. The moderates got their political reputations before Karl Rove took over the GOP.

The 2008 Republican National Convention demonstrated that even if the least Hard Right of the Presidential candidates would win the nomination, the Hard Right controlled the Party. When I consider that John McCain won't be the GOP nominee for President, then all that I can see is the Hard Right.

John McCain was the strongest candidate that the Republicans could offer in 2008. In 2012 the Republicans are unlikely to run a war hero -- but they will run an ideologue who can only fail if Obama is at all successful.  

[Psychic Octopus]

The conservatives may split there votes again to let a Rockefeller Republican squeak by.

[Phony Moderate]

No.

[California8429]

unless someone like Colin Powell is in it...but he endorsed Obama..

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Rudy was a serious contender, it just didn't work out.

He could've won if he had better strategists who didn't advise him to basically skip all of the primaries before Florida.

But no, we won't.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

The GOP should have learned their lesson from nominating true moderate John McCain.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

JS, I was referring to Giuliani as a moderate. I do realize he does possess hawkish views, but if those subsided as Iraq et al. slows down, I see him backing off that. Those aside, I think Mr. Giuliani is very moderate. He's a small government, hands off on social issues guy but does have a neocon streak.

McCain was hardly a moderate, but he did not answer to the far right until he selected Palin. I do believe McCain had stated in his past that he would accept gay marriage if there was a ceremony, but he obviously backed off that statement during the GOP primaries.

Giuliani is not a "moderate" by any stretch of the imagination.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

The GOP should have learned their lesson from nominating true moderate John McCain.

Moderate McCain had less to do with him losing than a failure of campaign strategy combined with hatred of Republicans because of Bush.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

The GOP should have learned their lesson from nominating true moderate John McCain.

Moderate McCain had less to do with him losing than a failure of campaign strategy combined with hatred of Republicans because of Bush.

No, I'm pretty sure McCain's "moderate" mishandling of the financial crisis was what brought him down.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

The GOP should have learned their lesson from nominating true moderate John McCain.

Moderate McCain had less to do with him losing than a failure of campaign strategy combined with hatred of Republicans because of Bush.

No, I'm pretty sure McCain's "moderate" mishandling of the financial crisis was what brought him down.

It was a factor.  My only point is that it wasn't moderatism that killed it for McCain - it was the circumstances around the election that really did him in.

[Mint]

The GOP should have learned their lesson from nominating true moderate John McCain.

Moderate McCain had less to do with him losing than a failure of campaign strategy combined with hatred of Republicans because of Bush.

No, I'm pretty sure McCain's "moderate" mishandling of the financial crisis was what brought him down.

This. And hugging Bush. And continuing to take the same stance on foreign policy and then some as his predecessor. Actually come to think of it, if McCain campaigned more like Bush in 2000 instead of doing a bad imitation of Bush in 2004 he would have done far better.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

The GOP should have learned their lesson from nominating true moderate John McCain.

Moderate McCain had less to do with him losing than a failure of campaign strategy combined with hatred of Republicans because of Bush.

No, I'm pretty sure McCain's "moderate" mishandling of the financial crisis was what brought him down.

It was a factor.  My only point is that it wasn't moderatism that killed it for McCain - it was the circumstances around the election that really did him in.

If McCain were a true conservative, the economic situation could have been an opportunity rather than his downfall.

[Mint]

If McCain was a conservative (without the 'neo' attached to it) the establishment would never allow him to get nominated in the first place.

[Bleeding heart conservative, HTMLdon]

Yes, if only McCain had advocated a return to the gold standard, an end to the Federal Reserve, an end to Medicare and Medicaid, and had told the old ladies they wouldn't be getting their social security check anymore, he would have won in a landslide.

[Mint]

Yes, if only McCain had advocated a return to the gold standard, an end to the Federal Reserve, an end to Medicare and Medicaid, and had told the old ladies they wouldn't be getting their social security check anymore, he would have won in a landslide.

Nice strawman.

[Mint]

Honestly if it wasn't for his neocon views on the war on terror (big if there obviously) I wouldn't mind if Huckabee was the nominee.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

Honestly if it wasn't for his neocon views on the war on terror (big if there obviously) I wouldn't mind if Huckabee was the nominee.

[Mint]

Well okay obviously I have more strong disagreements than that, but that's the one major deal breaker other than the bail outs (which he did not want).

[#CriminalizeSobriety]

McCain's ardent support of the war was the only thing that got him the support he did get in the Republican Primary. He really had nothing else to run on. Most GOP'ers aren't that enthusiastic for Campaign Finance Reform or Amnesty.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Rudy was a serious contender, it just didn't work out.

He could've won if he had better strategists who didn't advise him to basically skip all of the primaries before Florida.

But no, we won't.

What state before Florida could he have won? That's why he did the stupid strategy. Giuliani was just a bad candidate all around.

[pbrower2a]

John McCain might have lost in a closer election had:

1. He not made the quixotic, and ultimately futile, efforts to win Pennsylvania and Minnesota.

2. He not picked the shrill, but intellectually-lightweight and polarizing Sarah Palin.

3. The Hard Right not taken over the GOP.

The fourth is significant. Gordon Smith, Elizabeth Dole, and Norm Coleman might still be Senators, and Arlen Specter might still be a Republican.  Such would have kept the President's pet health-care legislation from passing; the President wouldn't have the Senate votes that he needed for stopping the filibuster. 

A moderate might win the nomination in 2008, but the Hard Right would show him who was the real boss.  Americans weren't sure whether they were getting a greatly-changed and somewhat-penitent leader or a weakened President who would have to watch his back due to intrigues by powerbrokers from the recent past.