With some number crunching, conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer is attempting to show that Republican voters are more interested this presidential election in “conservatism” than in Donald Trump’s ideas about governing.
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Krauthammer wrote Thursday night in the Washington Post that the results of the Iowa caucuses this week whittled down the GOP field of nine candidates to just three: Ted Cruz (who won the caucus), Marco Rubio (who came in third) and Trump (who came in second).
But if you combine the support behind Rubio and Cruz in Iowa, Krauthammer said, it shows what GOP voters really want.
“Trumpian populism got 24 percent, conservatism (Rubio plus Cruz) got 51 percent,” he said. “There will be a spirited contest between the two conservatives over who has the better chance of winning the general election and of governing effectively. But … there’s no denying that either Rubio or Cruz would retain the GOP’s fundamental ideological identity. Trump would not.”
He continued, “What Iowa confirms is that whatever beating the ‘establishment’ takes during this campaign, Republicans are choosing conservatism over Trumpian populism by 2 to 1. Which means their chances of survival as the party of Reagan are very good.”
Krauthammer acknowledged that Trump is favored to win New Hampshire, but did not say what it would mean about the GOP if he did.
Trump’s conservative bona fides are often called into question by thought leaders in the conservative movement, because some of his policy positions, such as strengthening Social Security, call for more government action.
Even so, Trump has led national polls among GOP voters for almost every week since he launched his campaign in June.
