What wins elections, is staying true to your principles, and having the courage to give voice to them at every opportunity.
You think that's it? You think that's mostly what it takes? You are so naive. Good grief man, the average citizen is a political idiot. Not just here, almost everywhere. Human nature is the first consideration. You have to determine which, among your slate of possible candidates, is ELECTABLE in said district/state/etc. Alan Keyes stayed true to his principles as much or more than anyone around - why isn't he a Senator in Maryland or Illinois? Why is he not President for that matter. There are candidates all over the country - left and right, that absolutely adhere to principles and they get destroyed election cycle after election cycle. The most important thing about a candidate is whether they are capable of being a skilled, charismatic politician.
Politics is a skill. Most people take a long time to get good at it, some people are naturals. How many times do we hear from people "oh how I wish regular people would run and win elections"? Quite a lot. We've all probably even read that sentiment here. The problems is, people won't, usually, actually vote for those kind of candidates. They don't have the political skill to avoid gaffes that destroy their campaign. All it takes is one stupid comment and an entire campaign is ruined. Just ask Akin or Murdoch.
Which is why Reagan lost to Carter in 1980.......oh wait.....he didn't lose to Carter. He whupped him soundly from coast to coast by speaking the plain and unassailable truth to the voting public.
You need to come out of the closet. It's pretty obvious by your posts to me that you're a dyed-in-the-wool establishment GOPer. I'll bet you were one of Mitt's staunchest supporters on FR during the last election. I'd probably have a hard time finding a single cross word from you about John McCain. Scathing posts about the Bush's in your posting history? I'll bet I'd have a hard time finding any of those either.
Like I said, you seem not to have noticed that we're living in a time, and under a presidential regime, that isn't comparable to any other in our history. There is a radical, diabolical deconstruction, and out right dismantling of our Constitutional foundations occurring right before your eyes, yet you believe people are being hysterical.
It's why you're still trying to operate on an obsolete political model that has no relevance to the situation our nation is in today. The very notion that we even have a functioning civil system is even debatable now. This moment in time could rightfully be called a 'calm before the storm', but despite the fact that you're exposed to the best aggregation of information on the web, you're not seeing it for some reason.
I can't help you. Politics is nearly a side story to the rapid and fundamental changes that are taking place as we speak. There's every chance that it's going to take something a lot larger than a few elections to bring it to a halt and turn it around.
We've now reached a point where the Declaration is more relevant than the Constitution. Think with that and proceed accordingly.