Teaching the Republicans a lesson was he rational that some suggested for throwing the election to the Democrats
If you are talking about driving a car I agree that the way to get the car to turn to the right is to turn the wheel in that direction.
However we are not driving a car and there is no steering wheel in politics so your analogy does not make any sense.
In politics the candidate that gets 51% of the vote wins the election and gets to govern. By voting against the candidate that most closely mirrors your position you are likely to throw the election to the candidate that least closely mirrors your positions.
The GOP political party (not a ship) is based on principles that we share. If not enough people share our principles or have watered them down to the point where they are almost worthless the only solution is education.
We need to explain our positions more effectively. We need to convert more voters to conservatism. A revival.
And as long as liberal Republicans continue to win, the GOP will not be able to field candidates to mirror conservative positions.
A vote is a tool very much like the wheel on a car. It is not an abstract concept, it is a real tool whose use has real consequences, and that consequence influences the direction of the party. There is no "lesson teaching" involved.
The candidate that gets the most votes gets to govern. You say you want me to vote for the candidate that most closely mirrors my positions, but there is none. What you really want me to vote for is the Republican. I used to think the way you do, and I have many times for the sole reason that the candidate was registered in the Republican party, ended up voting for -- handing power to -- bad candidates who acted against my and America's interests, as surely as Meg Whitman will act against my and America's interests on many fronts -- 2nd amendment, illegal immigration, environmentalist power-grabs, and more government intrusion in business and personal affairs.
That approach has only made the Republican party progressively more liberal by the year, and is greatly responsible for making Obama possible. Had enough of us years ago refrained from using our votes, the ONLY tools available, to put into office big government liberal Republicans, then they would have lost and been forced to make way for Republican candidates that could win. But by making them win on the comforting illusion that we were being pragmatic, we set up very solid groundwork for the continued growth of big government liberalism in the GOP. As long as that big GOP government mindset continues to win elections, the GOP will continue to be liberal and apolitical voters will continue to understand that the GOP holds little more promise for them than the Democrat party.