Politics is about power, policies should adjust accordingly

Probably one of the single most important points that my conservative friends refuse to include in their political equations is this key point:

There is an important lesson here about the nature of politics.  Politics generally encourages such misdirections of resources as the political system encourages people to enrich themselves by picking others’ pockets.  It also encourages people to invest in keeping their pockets from being picked.  All of the lobbyists in Washington, DC and state capitals across the country are consuming resources without producing anything valuable in return.

If you don't acknowledge rent seeking and efforts at regulatory capture into your equation you are missing out on what politics actually is about: power. The policies you support vs. the political parties, candidates, et al. that you back can be quite different.