The problem is that at the end of the day, conservatives are just practical people. Why do we have the bomb shelters? We like to survive. And you don’t survive by getting caught up in wild-eyed fantasies. While we want to nominate some crazed anti-politician, at the end of the day we can’t pull the trigger when we know it just means we’re guaranteeing four more years of having a far left Democrat in charge. Sure, we’d love to send an extreme right-winger to the White House screaming about how Gardasil makes you retarded — if for no other reason than to make the left apoplectic — but we know that’s not going to happen. That’s why we always end up with someone like Mitt Romney, the creator of Obamacare’s predecessor. Yes, conservatives loathe him, and he loathes us, but he seems like the best chance to win.

And maybe it’s best that there is some loathing between conservatives and our presidential nominee. The last thing we want to do is fall in love with a politician. Because what type of people become skilled politicians? People who hate government? No, those people never learn to work in the system. The people who succeed in politics are those who kinda like government and see it as a great tool for change — i.e., they’re the enemy. No one gets to the level of being able to run a skilled campaign for president and remains a true conservative. So that’s why conservatives holding onto Reagan as the ideal politician hurts us in the end. We have this fantasy that the move to reduce government will one day be led from the top, but it’s just not going to happen. Anyone who makes it to that level is no longer one of us.