Conscience of the Republican Party?

Mitt Romney is held up as the conscience of the Republican Party, the last voice of truth in a national party which has sold its soul to Trump.  Thanks to his personal wealth from birth and his own work in venture capitalism, he is not dependent upon politics for his livelihood and thus can speak and vote his conscience without worry about his future finances.  He was therefore the sole republican who voted Trump guilty in his impeachment trial.  He routinely criticizes the President's behavior, statements, and policies, sometimes finding himself alone in his criticism.  He is seen as the last light of sanity in a party which has descended into sycophancy, obliviousness to facts, and pursuit of wealth unconcerned with human and environmental cost. But consider his words eight years ago, when he was running for president.

"All right, there are 47 percent who are with him (Obama), who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president  (Obama) no matter what.  These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message of low taxes doesn’t connect. So he’ll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. I mean, that’s what they sell every four years. And so my job is is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. '

OK, a few questions:  Has the party reached the point where the national party's sole independent voice of sanity dismisses the elderly and the working poor, perhaps unaware in his isolated wealth that the working poor DO pay payroll taxes toward social security and medicare?  Who insults the integrity of half of the population?  

On one hand, as a lifelong liberal Democrat, this fulfills a simplistic stereotype of Republicans as racist toadies of big business.  However I have known Republicans my whole life who value all people's work, no matter how meager, who have compassion for those not as fortunate by chance of birth as they, and who believe in justice for all, no matter their circumstances.  But these Republicans have been abandoning the party for two decades, ever since national party leadership led the nation into ruinous wars abroad, encouraged backward-looking culture wars at home, resorted to occasionally subtle or blatant racism toward non-whites, and condoned incompetent leadership laden with cronyism at the highest levels of government.  There are still current and former Republican governors in states such as Ohio, Massachusetts, and Maryland who have not drunk the kool-aid and continue to be responsible both as leaders and servants of the people, but they have sadly become a minority.

So when pollsters find 90% of Republicans support the current path of the party and President, they are not including the millions of former Republicans who have abandoned the party thanks to its descent the last five decades, a descent  which hopefully reached bottom in the current President.  Only in current circumstances could someone who said the comments above in public be considered a man of vision, honor, leadership.  Can Republicans abandon the culture wars, the racism, the greed, the lust for power at any cost to the nation and recruit national leaders of true honor, who consider all Americans truly equal, deserving of opportunity and respect, and who think not of just today's win but, instead, toward tomorrow's promise?  

Our two party system depends on two vibrant political parties to keep excesses by either party in check.  Though my partisan self is gleeful at the possibility of an electoral implosion within the Republican party, my practical self accepts both parties are needed to prevent abuse of power by either, and, more importantly, to provide a consensus so all voices are heard in government and to avert a tyranny of the majority (or minority).