Today’s Clear Winner: The Palin Movement

A lot of questions will remain unanswered until the polls close Tuesday night, but one thing is absolutely certain:

The conservative movement that cohered around former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin in 2008 has emerged as the vibrant core of the modern Republican Party.

Moderates and pragmatists within the GOP — leaders as varied as Michael Steele and Newt Gingrich — had staked a slice of the party’s future on leaders like Dede Scozzafava.

The argument is simple: Without a chunk of moderate and even liberal Republicans winning in “blue” districts, it will be very very difficult to rebuild a majority in Congress.

But conservatives see this very differently. They’re convinced that much of the GOP’s sag in recent years has stemmed from a liberalization of the Republican establishment.

Even George W. Bush flirted with “compassionate” conservatism in ways that angered rank-and-file activists.

Now that movement leaders — and groups like Club for Growth — have sent Scozzafava packing, they are clearly kingmakers within the party.

There’s just one more big item on the to-do list, and that’s getting Doug Hoffman, standard-bearer and political phenomenon, elected.

If he falls short on Tuesday, look for a fresh round of finger-pointing, acrimony and indecision with the GOP.

But if he wins, conservative Republicans will have a clear message for their leaders in Washington.

Don’t stray outside the ideological lines that we draw, or we’ll cut your candidates off at the knees every time.