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gljjt wrote:

Charles L. Cotton wrote:

Jim Beaux wrote:Instead of denigrating those of us who will no longer run with the herd & support an unprincipled candidate & a corrupt system, maybe you should consider the future for your children & grandchildren. If we lose our constitution it will not be because of a president, but a malignant system.

I will not look at my sons and tell them that everything I taught them was morally right, I went against.

I am thinking of my grandchildren when I do the best I can in a bad, no critical situation. You can teach your sons to "sit this one out" because you don't like the choices, but I'll tell mine to suit up and fight the best they can fight. Doing nothing is not an option.

Chas.

And again.... "Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act." ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Hillary is evil.

Yes she is, and no, I am not being silent.

JALLEN wrote:Many of us in a certain age group will probably be faced with accepting the idea that our cherished values are likely now shared by a shrinking, permanent minority.

You will not find candidates on ballots you can accept, who reflect your priorities, share your values, believe in many of your beliefs.

I can actually accept some things just fine. For instance, while I'm an unapologetic evangelical Christian, I could support an agnostic or even an atheist president, so long as they were not toxically intolerant with regard to religion. My single highest political value is individual liberty, and I think that the best means of preserving it is a strict adherence to the Constitution. So as long as the candidate takes a more or less original intent interpretation of the Constitution - and not just by lip service, but by record also - then I can support that candidate.......even if he does not share my faith.

But I do think you're right in that, increasingly, it is difficult to find candidates for office that are that committed to the Constitution. So yes, my options get reduced.

Charles L. Cotton wrote:My vote for Trump isn't a vote for the Republican Party or the Republican candidate. It's a vote against the person who will complete the destruction of America, not merely the Second Amendment. I do not vote with blinders on, nor out of any naive loyalty to the Republican Party. There are two people running and I'm voting for the best last chance to save the country.

Chas.

Charles, I'm not in the business of suggesting to people how they should vote anymore, so I did not mean to suggest that you or anyone else here is voting blindly. But I have a question, IF there were either an acceptable 3rd party candidate or acceptable independent candidate alternative who had a reasonable chance (meaning "not entirely out of the range of possibility) of splitting off enough democrat, republican, and independent voters to have a shot at winning......and he/she had a pretty decent platform and wasn't a complete tool, would you be willing to consider that option? Or, do you think it is important that the nominee be a republican for other reasons......like which party controls Congress, for instance?

In fact, I'd ask all of you who are supporting more or less grudgingly supporting Trump the same question. And I'm not asking it to make a point. I'm just curious to know — given the peculiar dynamics of this election cycle and the dysfunction of the republican party — how much of the support for Trump is enthusiastic, and how much is simply a vote against Clinton. But again, I'm not going to presume to suggest that y'alls picks are wrong.......just not necessarily the same as mine.

suthdj wrote:Now take your toys a run along home.

EXACTLY the attitude which drove me out of the republican party.

Vol Texan wrote:I was hoping to vote for someone I wanted, rather than to vote against someone I don't want. I haven't had that opportunity in a long while.

Blame that on party leadership. I left the party, so I no longer get a say in how the party manages its affairs......nor do I care that much since the divorce was as much emotional as intellectual. But I genuinely feel badly for those who continue to be loyal to the republican party, without that loyalty returned in kind (see my previous comment about my friend who has actually worked for the party for 60 years now). Just ONE of the hallmarks of a leader is loyalty to the people he or she leads. If that loyalty is absent, you don't have leadership.....you have something else.....but it isn't leadership. If you still call yourself a republican AND a conservative, you deserve a LOT better than the party "leadership" has delivered. They love your vote and your money, but they don't give a tinker's curse about your desires for the direction of the party. In fact, they don't think it is your party......they think it's theirs. If you want to come along for the ride, you're welcome to, but THEY decide where the train is headed, not you. That's why I left......or rather, they left me. Your continued support merely enables the continuing fecklessness of the leadership. You deserve better. They do not deserve you.

I'll not try to talk you out of voting for whomever you decide to vote for. If you think, in your heart and mind, that your vote for Trump is less disastrous than a vote for Clinton or someone else, that's fine. But just understand that, whatever loyalty you had for the republican party in years past, that loyalty has exactly zero value at the leadership level.

I'm not going to be used that way any longer. Trump is a billionaire (if he is to be believed). He doesn't need my money to get elected. The republican party doesn't care about my economic values. They obviously don't need my money. The republican party doesn't care about my political values. It obviously doesn't need my vote. All of the above can also be said about Clinton and the democrats.......with the exception that Clinton, while not a billionaire yet (she hasn't been in politics quite long enough yet, but give her time), the rich enemies of my country and big Wall Street investment houses whom she sucks up to are more than willing to fund her campaign and bank account.

I'm going to abstain from any comments on the fitness of the candidates themselves. However, I have to say, regardless of whom the republicans run, and regardless of whether or not the republican nominee wins or loses, and regardless of whether or not that nominee is a true reflection of the will of republican voters........ the republican party leadership have some SERIOUS soul-searching to do going forward. The party elites are directly to blame for the schism, having invested so much political capital in marginalizing the party's own grass roots, insulting their intelligence in the process. Those elites are the ones who alienated all the voters who are now refusing to cooperate with those leaders to get behind Trump.

It may be self-defeating for those voters to challenge the leadership, but the party faithful aren't the ones who got the party to this point. I have a very dear friend in New Mexico whom I've known for nearly 20 years now. She has been active in republican politics since she was a teenager, and she's in her 70s now. She worked in campaign offices as a volunteer, made phone calls, licked envelopes, canvassed neighborhoods, been a convention delegate, etc. etc. etc. She did it in upstate New York, in Kansas, in Texas, and now in New Mexico. She's seen all of the party's ups and downs for more than 60 years now, and for the first time in her life, she is discouraged with the party. She is a #NeverTrump person today. Her Facebook post this morning said:

I harbor no illusions that anything I say at this point will make a bit of difference to anyone at all.

I am posting this column because it most clearly explains my ‪#‎NeverTrump‬ ‪#‎NeverHillary‬ position. My actions are based on my conscience and concern for my country and the future of my grandchildren, not on a political party or any partisan candidate.

In my opinion, we are in a lose-lose situation. Both candidates are equally bad and will hurt our republic. You cannot pick one evil over another. Evil is evil.

I am posting this only to put my beliefs about the election on the record. I really don't care at this point what anyone else's opinion is, or if anyone agrees with me. You can respond if you wish, but PLEASE BE AWARE that my opinion on this election is not going to change. All I ask from you is that you read the entire column that I posted before you respond.

The presumptive Republican nominee has made it very clear that he does not want or need the conservative vote. I believe him. With no conservative voice in our government, we are in very deep trouble.

Therefore, my plan going forward is to promote the down ballot candidates. We absolutely MUST retain control in the House and the Senate if we are to hold any hope at all of stopping the actions of a bad president.

And in my own opinion, right now we are facing the grim prospect of having a very bad president for at least the next four years. No matter who you decide to pull the lever for.

Thank you for listening.

So, here is a loyal republican, who has actually worked for the party for over 60 years (more than most republicans can claim, people who mostly turn out to vote, but that's the extent of their commitment), who has thrown in the towel. Like a good soldier, she will continue to work hard for the down ballot republican candidates, but she's abstaining from voting for the party's nominee for the first time in her life. She is fully aware that one less vote for Trump makes things easier for Clinton, but she is no longer interested in enabling the leadership's bad behavior. She knows what other disillusioned republicans know, and that is that the reason the leadership gets away with their fecklessness is that millions of good people hold their noses and give their votes to the RNC candidates, NOT out of an affirmative belief in that candidate's fitness for office, but rather out of fear of the other party's candidate getting elected.

Well, they are no longer afraid of the outcome, not because they LIKE what would happen if Clinton wins, but because they see the direction the country has taken as inevitable regardless of who gets elected.......exactly because the RNC is aiding and abetting the decline.

And there are tens of thousands like her. The party really screwed up, but the screw-up LONG predates Trumps run for the presidency. That is why the state of the party lays squarely at the feet of the party elites.