I agree with you absolutely. The problem has always been though not enough true conservatives running to fill those positions. Local level as well.
Ultimately finding younger true conservatives to run would be the best case scenario. One of the local universities around here at one time had a Young Republican's Club that was very active. But after several years it died out.
You WILL get MORE of what you vote FOR. The act of voting 'against' - not caring what your guy is - That almost necessitates a diminishing return in
your own. When people are not held to a standard, invariably they will gravitate lower. Walking up a ravine, it is clearly easier to follow the bottom. Why strive? That is why there are too few. Because striving sucks. People come out of the bottom of that ravine to struggle up the high sides only because they are driven there.
If you want Conservatism to increase, DEMAND they walk the line. And the young, up and coming, will be shaped by that environment. They will rise to meet the standard, because they will know getting in what that standard is. If that is sustained, it becomes the norm, and in that normalcy will rise statesmen instead of mere politicians, because those thieving bastards, young in that day, will not care to strive that hard, and will instead tend to turn to other venues, where picking peoples pockets might not be so hard to do.
It is the same thing in business - Everybody whines about crappy Chinese products. but everybody buys them. And businessmen are going to continue to sell y'all crap so long as you continue to buy it. And the next generation of products will be crappier than we have now.
It isn't until everybody starts demanding quality that there will be profit in quality. The demand for quality will provide it's own path as businessmen start failing because their junk won't sell, The next group up and coming will know a higher standard must be employed in order to profit.
It is the very same in ALL things. You get what you pay for. What you buy, you'll get more of. What you vote for, you'll get more of.
It is the demand for orthodoxy and real performance that will produce orthodoxy and real performance.