Infighting, Jumping Ship, and Dead Horses

I'm beating a dead horse here, (Ross Douthat uses the same phrase in a link I just found as I returned to this to edit before posting), but I'm at a loss for why party loyalty trumps reason. I have no problem admitting that Joe Biden does no one any favors a good 10% of the time he opens his mouth (o.k., 50% of the time). But the fact remains that he is a good man, who made a commitment to his boys and stuck to it, through their entire childhood. He and John McCain have been very close friends for years, and he has tremendous respect for his foreign policy knowledge and experience. It is utterly disturbing the vitreous hate that is coming from the hangers on to the McCain/Palin campaign.

Everyone has a right to their beliefs; but to say that questioning your candidate is blasphemy is the makings of a fine dictatorship. While Andrew Sullivan is whole-heartedly behind Senator Obama, (I encourage you to read the linked piece of his) Daniel Larison, at American Conservative Magazine, is most definitely NOT. But he, in my opinion, is correct in pointing out that the GOP is not what it once was; fiscal conservancy, reduced government, strong military. It has become the captive of the "neocons', the far Christian right. But the current party has strayed from that; but better to hear that from a committed conservative:
Daniel Larison:
Having defended and enabled Mr. Bush for years, many of the recent ship-jumpers and critics of Palin finally declared that enough was enough, while some conservatives who have had more problems with the administration have decided that what is needed is more party loyalty and sycophancy focused now on Palin instead of Bush. When it is pointed out that this is self-defeating and actually makes more “purist” conservative arguments more politically irrelevant than ever, there is a flood of anathemas. (click here for full article)

I came back to this after reading a post from Ross Douthat. He does not think that conservatives/Republicans should vote for Barack Obama our of a jumping on the bandwagon mentality, but rather, decries the infighting that is going on, which IS MY POINT.
Ross Douthat: (click here for full post)
The bigger point (and I know I'm a broken record here) is this. Whatever direction you think conservatism should be going in from here on out, the absolute worst thing the members of a losing political movement can do - if they ever want to win again, at least - is attempt to pre-emptively close off debate about the movement's future. Conservatives need to have arguments, not promise excommunications, or else pretty soon there won't be very much worth arguing over.