Like many other conservatives, the 2008 election inspired me to do more than follow politics from the sidelines. I wanted to get involved, and before I found my niche blogging, I began to get involved with various conservative organizations in the area — such as the Chicago Young Republicans and the Chicago Republican Women’s Network.

After doing my own research on each of the conservative candidates running in the primary, I lent my support and my time to Greg. Greg is a fellow attorney who was new to the political scene. Having spent time living in France, he knew what it was like to live under a socialized system of health care and had experienced the problems with that type of system first-hand. He understood that those problems are widespread; they don’t just end with health care.

My focus during the campaign was to research and analyze the critical issues of the election and hone in on the most effective ways of getting our conservative message out in a tough, partisan environment. Many Chicagoans have no idea what conservatives stand for; they just know it’s not what they want. We had quite a long road ahead of us.

From the start, I personally did not see any of the other candidates as serious contenders. Aside from Greg, there was only one other candidate that I could see giving the Democrats a run for their money. I’m all for citizen activists getting involved in politics, but many of the other candidates just didn’t do their homework, weren’t well versed in the facts and pandered to whatever audience was in front of them.

In February of last year, our hard work was recognized when the Chicago Tribune endorsed Greg. The other city paper, the Chicago Sun-Times, didn’t bother endorsing a candidate with conservative leanings — writing us out of the election off the bat.

Working on the campaign itself was a wonderful experience. Interacting with Chicagoans was satisfying, especially when people opened up and actually gave us a chance to relate our positions to them — something that unfortunately, didn’t happen often enough. At other times, it was disheartening to witness hard-working people, even veterans, who spent their lives paying into a system that has done nothing for them, shut us out completely. Instead, they chose to endorse the same life-long politicians, the same party, whose policies had left Illinois with an $11.5 billion budget, who caused Illinois to be ranked the 48th state in terms of economic growth by the Illinois Policy Institute, only doing better than Michigan and Ohio.

Of course, being the political geek that I am, the candidate forums were a blast. Finding flaws or misinformation in opponents’ answers, noting our candidates’ (and conservatives’ general) strengths and weaknesses and watching citizens participate in the political process — what could be better?

But, even on a small, local level, I also witnessed the dark side to political parties and the positioning and kowtowing that comes with it. Until I participated in campaigning, I didn’t fully realize the extent to which parties care more about the initial following politicians’ name, than they do their positions, background, qualifications or morals. The local party leaders put a big emphasis on having the different campaigns come together at the end of the primary to support whichever ‘R’ won. But not all ‘Rs’ are created equal. And there was at least one in particular, that not only fell short of being a serious candidate, but whose positions and the way she articulated them, were offensive.

I kept asking myself, is this really the Republican party that these leaders want to showcase? We had taken enough of a beating in the 2008 elections. Having some of those candidates represent conservatives in this heavily Democrat area, would only serve to further cement that the Republican party in the city of Chicago would become extinct.

The night that Greg lost the primary, I found myself sneaking out of the venue where all the Republican candidates had gathered, avoiding conversing with those people to whom the future of the party was far more important than the future of our city, state, country. When Greg’s race was done, I was done. There was no way I could support the candidate that won the primary.

Of course, when it came down to my personal vote, I would vote for the candidate whose votes would align with my views the most. But, voting for the lesser of two evils and actively working to get them elected are very different.

It was after the campaign that I started writing. The satisfaction I got from writing along with the experiences I had campaigning, made me realize that I like engaging in politics on a different level. I’d rather spend my time understanding and analyzing the facts than playing the game and jumping through the hoops it requires to campaign or work in government.

Unfortunately, as I saw firsthand, those that stand up to their party risk losing the support they need to get their message out. In a way, this was what 2009 was about, with everyday Americans who lean conservative joining the tea parties and starting a movement with no allegiance to any one political party. In 2010, with the mid-term elections coming up, we’ll begin to see what effects this new wave of activists will have on our political system. And maybe a year from now, we’ll look back on 2010 as a year of real ‘hope and change.’