He got re-elected because people WILL NOT change horses in the middle of the stream and he painted himself as a wartime president, just like I expect Biden to do as soon as he can throw our troops into the Ukraine ----Those "good old days" when conservatives ruled the roost are long gone.
To win a majority these days you need to win indys.
The squishy middle of suburbanites and soccer moms are not the hard asses of long ago.
Dubya got re-elected, by 270 votes, but he got re-elected. IMHO "populism" is the best policy for the GOP going forward.
Bush Jr. was a total failure in that war all along, however. He and the two people who actually ran the government and the war, Cheney and Rumsfeld.