If I don't accept the candidate "who stabs me in the back" over the opponent that is worse, I still get either him or his even worse opponent. Not choosing doesn't change that.
Perhaps next election it will be safer to "send a message" than this one, but you can bet the RINOs will do everything they can to see that it isn't.
The fact that there are so many RINOs does appear to guarantee that if there is a Republican majority it won't be a conservative majority. Therefore very little that conservative voters want done gets done. The government keeps growing in size and in how it interferes in our daily lives.
I don't disagree with that. However, if you put Democrats in office, in most cases things will be even worse. If they have the majority they will also set the agenda. Instead of the true conservatives trying to push through good laws, they will spend all their time fighting bad laws.
I agree that the many in the Republican party have become liberal in their views. They push more government as the solution to every problem. We do need to change that. We need to unseat the RINOs in the primaries. That is something that very rarely happens, but there does appear to be a trend of primaries becoming closer races as more conservatives reject RINOs.
However, what message does withdrawing support from a RINO send? It tells the Democrats that the Republicans are defeatable. For many people the message will be that the voters have become more liberal and that more "moderate" Republican candidates are the ones who have a chance of winning (RINOs). Here in Ohio, the State Republican Party leadership is made of of mostly RINOs. They are not going to throw their weight behind a conservative candidate, because conservatives would take them out of positions of power in the party.
They instead back RINOs in primaries and we see them attacking candidates like Blackwell because of how his plans to cut taxes and limit the growth of government might prevent the State from being able to give local governments money for things like a fire engine.
That was actually in an attack add by Petro against Blackwell in the primary for the governor's race. How dare Blackwell attempt to reduce taxes when it might in some theoretical case prevent the state government from being able to provide money for the "needs" of local governments.
The choice you offer is no choice. The message you want to send isn't going to be clear. If it is a clear message by the majority of Republicans, then you'll be able to send it clearly in the primary.
Part of life is making hard choices. Refusing to accept reality and neglecting to make those choices is irresponsible.
RINOs and Democrats play "good cop/bad cop". People need to realize the "good cop" is not their friend.
True. But I'm not claiming RINOs are my friend. However in some cases they are the least bad of two bad choices.
You should educate yourself on the issues and on the candidates views and voting records on those issues, and then make an informed vote for the better of the two candidates.
The goal is to have someone not stab you in the back. The only way that's going to happen is if the politician in power knows that stabbing you in the back will be to his detriment.
Conservatives are in a bind because they have for years allowed RINOs to stab them in the back without reprisals. Every time the RINOs get away with stabbing conservatives in the back, the harder it will be to remove them, and the more unavoidable damage will result from the attempt.
Someone who refuses to amputate a fingertip because of gangrene will not save the finger. The problem won't go away, but it will instead get worse. If a different doctor finally decides to cut off an arm because most of it had become infected, the loss of the arm is not the fault of the doctor who cut it off but rather the fault of those who refused to amputate the fingertip.
However, what message does withdrawing support from a RINO send? It tells the Democrats that the Republicans are defeatable. For many people the message will be that the voters have become more liberal and that more "moderate" Republican candidates are the ones who have a chance of winning (RINOs).
Every vote received by a clearly conservative third-party candidate is a vote which everyone will know the Republican forfeited as a result of his refusal to act like a conservative.
How will that suggest that more "moderate" Republicans will have more chance of winning? To me, it would seem to make clear that for the Republicans to win they should recapture their conservative base. Look at the logic from a candidate perspective: move left, and fight over some voters whom the other candidate is trying hard to grab, or move left and pick up some voters with minimal competition. Shouldn't be a hard choice, if politicians were forced to actually make it.