[af_vet_rr]

Build local organizations get get people elected to school boards and county commissions, then work up to seats on the state legislature and the US Congress.

That sounds great on paper (or on the screen as it were), but the problem is, you have money and influence coming down from the top to make sure that this doesn't happen.

Example: Run a Conservative candidate against a Republican candidate at the lowest of government levels - at the city or county level. If the Conservative candidate looks to be doing well, you'll find Republicans from the state level (and maybe above depending on the city or county) coming down to help.

Everybody knows how the game is played, there won't be any sneaking in through the backdoor. Both major parties know how to go after third parties.

Don't get me wrong, you'll win seats here and there, but eventually you'll lose those seats, because neither party will let it stand - they'd almost rather have the other major party in there than have a third party.

[Constantine XIII]

It's harder for the big parties to squeeze them out if it happens in more than one place. Besides, running lots of ads in small districts (aka "throwing money at the opponent") doesn't have as great of an impact if the candiate with moxy can personally visit every registered voter, or at least shake their hand. This is something that requires a couple of decades of organized hard work; something that is in short demand in these days where everyone desires instant gratification.

That hard work, specifically in the form of building an organization from the local level up, is something third parties usually fail to do. Historically, what usually happens is that they become vehicles for the edification of "the boss", whether it be Perot or Peroutka. That will lead nowhere, because either the party will disintigrate when the leader drops out, ala the Reform Party, or it will never get past the phase of being a small knot of self-styled righteous revolutionaries, like the Constitution Party.

Unless a critical mass of the people decide that they will work and suffer for a long time to attain that goal, the overthrow the Republican Party as the flagbearer of the Conservative movement, then the only option, especially for those of us worried about the short term, is to fight it out old-school-style in the primaries.