The GOP base was once defined by quite rigid orthodoxies on cutting government, projecting US power and moral conservatism. Cheery, optimistic Reaganism is dead; the Bush administration helped kill it with Iraq, the credit crunch and a series of ethics scandals that prepared the GOP base nicely for compromise with Trump. One regard in which the GOP is unchanged is that it is the white people's party. The GOP base will demand a nominee in 2020 who calls Clinton out as an anti-American socialist. The GOP nominated an extremist in 1964 yet won with a moderate in 1968; the Democrats did the same in 1972 and 1976.

Source: CNN October 12, 2016 12:33 UTC