2010 was also just a turning point for the Republicans, they used to be just like the democrats in terms of contempt for their own base. They used to be a liberal institutionalist party like the democrats are and would constantly bitchout democrats for being norm breakers for filibustering judges or things like that, and Romney still fits into that camp (it's just the party leadership didn't really understand what had happened yet in 2012).
The thing is though, Romney is still a religious zellot, he's never going to switch parties, it's just that the part of the Republican base the party has contempt towards has shifted. People like Pete Buttigieg that make direct appeals to suburban liberal christians will be successful in a way they wouldn't have been when the Republicans had a softer tone.
The thing is though, the tea party actually won. They took over like 100 seats via primaries against incumbents, something that was much more possible than it is for the left re: the democrats as Republican primary turnout is often far lower for non presidential elections, better financed alternative media, and so on. If the left was able to flip 30 dem incumbent seats in a single cycle from incumbents I promise you that the party would shift, it's just that this didn't happen in 2018 when the conditions for such seemed to be the closest match to what Republicans had done, I'd imagine had any single senator lost their seat to a primary challenger we'd have seen something very different but that hasn't happened at all yet. The tea party flipped 9 senate seats in a single cycle.
2010 was also just a turning point for the Republicans, they used to be just like the democrats in terms of contempt for their own base. They used to be a liberal institutionalist party like the democrats are and would constantly bitchout democrats for being norm breakers for filibustering judges or things like that, and Romney still fits into that camp (it's just the party leadership didn't really understand what had happened yet in 2012).
The thing is though, Romney is still a religious zellot, he's never going to switch parties, it's just that the part of the Republican base the party has contempt towards has shifted. People like Pete Buttigieg that make direct appeals to suburban liberal christians will be successful in a way they wouldn't have been when the Republicans had a softer tone.
The thing is though, the tea party actually won. They took over like 100 seats via primaries against incumbents, something that was much more possible than it is for the left re: the democrats as Republican primary turnout is often far lower for non presidential elections, better financed alternative media, and so on. If the left was able to flip 30 dem incumbent seats in a single cycle from incumbents I promise you that the party would shift, it's just that this didn't happen in 2018 when the conditions for such seemed to be the closest match to what Republicans had done, I'd imagine had any single senator lost their seat to a primary challenger we'd have seen something very different but that hasn't happened at all yet. The tea party flipped 9 senate seats in a single cycle.