As a "conservative Republican" since the Nixon era (didn't know why it was important that he beat HHH and George Wallace in '68, knew why it was and still is important that he beat McGovern in '72), I can say in short that we don't support these things.
Why does the Republican leadership support them? At the more reductionist level, I've seen it best described as a "donor riot"; rather obviously the interests of the wealthy who identify as Republican are different that the base (and this is one reason why the Emmanuel Goldsteining of the libertarian Koch brothers strikes us as bizarre, then again they've got some truly dangerous thoughts).
At a more general level, these "establishment" Republicans are, or aspire to be, members of the ruling class. We of the base obviously aren't, and I don't think many of us aspire to be.
"Offend" is a good word, we are mightily offended by all this. But there's only so much we can do short of, say, starting a 3rd party that's successful enough to either threaten the Republican party such that it adopts our positions, or replace it like it replaced the Whigs (or there's a thesis that the Democratic party will die since its war on arithmetic means it will eventually fail to keep its promises, the Republican party will replace it as the party of the state, and the 3rd party becomes the natural opposition). Short of that, we can withdraw our votes, which has a strictly limited effect in the Congress, and we can and have withheld our money, which gets us back to that donor riot.
Ah, I should note there's always been a non-conservative faction in the Republican party. Its abolitionist roots were in opposition to the conservative nature of the Whigs, remember the trusting busting and imperialism of Teddy Roosevelt, and the north-east wing in general is much less conservative. Think of Nelson Rockefeller who opposed conservative Goldwater, not so conservative Nixon, and was Ford's first VP. Or former governor of Massachusetts and "severe conservative" Mitt Romney (hint, that's the first and last time I've every heard someone use the word "severe" like that).
Why does the Republican leadership support them? At the more reductionist level, I've seen it best described as a "donor riot"; rather obviously the interests of the wealthy who identify as Republican are different that the base (and this is one reason why the Emmanuel Goldsteining of the libertarian Koch brothers strikes us as bizarre, then again they've got some truly dangerous thoughts).
At a more general level, these "establishment" Republicans are, or aspire to be, members of the ruling class. We of the base obviously aren't, and I don't think many of us aspire to be.
"Offend" is a good word, we are mightily offended by all this. But there's only so much we can do short of, say, starting a 3rd party that's successful enough to either threaten the Republican party such that it adopts our positions, or replace it like it replaced the Whigs (or there's a thesis that the Democratic party will die since its war on arithmetic means it will eventually fail to keep its promises, the Republican party will replace it as the party of the state, and the 3rd party becomes the natural opposition). Short of that, we can withdraw our votes, which has a strictly limited effect in the Congress, and we can and have withheld our money, which gets us back to that donor riot.
Ah, I should note there's always been a non-conservative faction in the Republican party. Its abolitionist roots were in opposition to the conservative nature of the Whigs, remember the trusting busting and imperialism of Teddy Roosevelt, and the north-east wing in general is much less conservative. Think of Nelson Rockefeller who opposed conservative Goldwater, not so conservative Nixon, and was Ford's first VP. Or former governor of Massachusetts and "severe conservative" Mitt Romney (hint, that's the first and last time I've every heard someone use the word "severe" like that).