I never vote straight ticket and never will. IMO, each of us should take that approach, regardless of how zealous we are, party-wise. It forces us to review each candidate, each issue, etc. For that matter, I never vote for someone who is running unopposed. Force that guy to show up and vote for himself
I first voted in a presidential election in 1988, selecting GHWB. Was he perfect? No, but he was superior to the other options. After that, I took the “since I live in Texas, I am going to vote for the least crazy 3rd party for president” approach. In some cases, it was difficult to find, but Texas was going “R” despite my selection. I’ll spare everyone the duopoly concerns that motivated those choices, but we need choices.
The Tea Party overtaking the R’s led to the likes of Abbott, Cruz, Paxton, Patrick, etc. These are a far cry from the R’s we all grew up with - “moderation” seemed gone. They ran off moderate Rs like Dewhurst, Strauss, etc. Were they perfect? No! But they had the capacity to listen and compromise.
Politics today has evolved into a perceived zero-sum game of bitter rivals - worse than sports rivalries. And a cult of personality like Trump is the worst catalyst for something like this. His “drain the swamp” crap violates the basic tenets of Chesterton’s fence: know why the fence is there before you remove it. Sure, the spoils system is real, but understand the “how, what, and why” before declaring you are going to burn it to the ground.
In 2020, I voted Biden. Trump is a risk to freedom. He is and will always be an autocratic megalomaniac.
In 2024, I will vote Harris - Trump remains a risk to freedom. For every other position, I will assess.
EDIT - that all said, I skipped over the obvious that Trump is a lying, cheating, woman-hating, white supremicist turd.