I also believe that the greater truth is that there is some very real reason that people who disagree with this view are reluctant to assent to what seems obvious to us.
It's simple.
Conservatives are no longer going to vote for liberal Democrats who run as Republicans so as to take the nation further Left. We're done playing that game of insanity. We do not care which one is said to be 'better' than the other one decreed to be 'worse'. We don't care anymore. We realize voting for the candidate who best represents our principles is all that matters, and we no longer care if those principles no longer exist within the GOP, as it has become self-evident they have been discarded and not wanted along with those of us who have been told to get out and get lost by your party leaders.
So, we are building a new home and coalition elsewhere and leaving your Uniparty to itself.
I've noticed that continuing to pursue discussion of it seems only to arouse resentment, not understanding.
Because 'discussion' and 'understanding' is not the intention. Shaming, insulting, ridiculing and threatening us into submission or silence out of fear of Democrats is the intention. Because of that, there is no possibility of 'understanding'. Besides the fact that we have already explained our intention to uphold our principles since the primaries and that was clearly 'understood' by people like yourself. In fact, we were told that our principles were 'an enemy of the good'.
The issue is that voting and speaking our consciences was REJECTED. We were told we do not have the liberty to vote our consciences because the country was at stake. It has been a solid bass drumbeat of "VOTE TRUMP OR ELSE YOU ARE THE ENEMY" which has since morphed itself into "CRITICIZE TRUMP AND YOU ARE THE ENEMY". So fine, having been told we have to shut up, sit down and get out of the party - along with everything that has transpired since, we're done. We reject the insistence of a binary choice and no longer care which Statist your party and this people want to make as your ruler considering many of us are breathing the fresh air of choosing other candidates in other parties that best represent our principles and values. Finally - we are getting to enjoy voting FOR someone as opposed to voting AGAINST someone else.
IOW, resistance of this magnitude often has roots in something legitimately worth addressing.
It has already been addressed and has been rejected by the Trump and GOP Party faithful. So we are done with them and their party. The divide at this point is irreconcilable and each shaming effort simply widens it and deepens it.
The unifying theme that seems to reoccur in virtually all cases is the belief that they and their values have in some significant way been disrespected, ignored or dismissed.
Duh! It's not like you folks were not aware of that fact. We have been told point blank that those values and beliefs do not win elections and they are a drag on the party and the country. We have been told that Reagan Conservatism is dead and Nationalist Populism is where it is at and that we must adapt or die. We have told by your party "There is the door" after attempting to beguile us of our votes via scare tactics and intimidation. Your party has made itself completely and totally hostile to the fundamental core of principles that govern and animate us, and all your party and people have done is confirm the fact that we have no place among you - and given behaviors exhibited, we are glad this is now so.
What I can't live with is to enable further schism in the conservative cause by allowing my own personal sense of frustration in my failure to convince others, to affect the conservative movement.
Maybe you can convince your pals to take some of that advice to heart. Each time they attempt to ridicule and shame us of our views, that schism grows to the point of hostility.
Personally, the damage is already done, and your party is forever as repulsive to me as the Democrat party is. Trump didn't do that alone, McConnell and Ryan didn't do that alone - the mobs of party fanatics and Trump supporters helped confirm that a divorce was an absolute necessity.
So in our estimation Conservatism will have to exist in a new home outside of the beltway and many of us are working to build new avenues and parties to do so. We do not care that it may take a generation or more to accomplish. The existing party is as corrupted and tyrannical in nature as the other party is and our values and principles have been repeatedly said to have no place among them.
So be it.
The message of our Founding principles needs to be preached to a willfully ignorant and brainwashed people and it has become self-evident that cannot take place from within the existing GOP whose goal is to better manage Statism than Democrats. The split has scattered the seeds, and we may not see a harvest in our lifetimes but unless we want a famine of the principles that make liberty possible, being scattered to the wilderness for a time is necessary.