and ted cruz and the tea party. not a straight-line, the center of power and the gop moved steadily to the right. it is now further to the right than it has ever been in modern times. cruz and the base still believe that the gop is too moderate, too mushy, the only way to win back the white house in 2016 is by becoming more conservative. let me show you something. this is last november s presidential election. almost 130 million americans voted, when all of their ballots were counted, here s what they added up to. barack obama with 51.01%. mitt romney, 47.15%. now here are the numbers for last year s presidential election from the commonwealth of virginia. they have been on your screen for a while. here i am talking about them now. barack obama 51.16, romney 47.28. that is what you call a bellwether state. obama s national margin over romney was 3.86 points. and in virginia, almost exactly the same. 3.88 points. no other state in the country to track as closely to the national result l