Should local Democrats give Republican candidates time to speak?

[summer_in_TX]

5. I'm in a purple county where we at one time had a conservative Dem for State Rep.

Some of the liberals he'd offended mounted a campaign to crossover in the primary, to help choose his opponent. Needless to say, he lost that election. But the effect for 10-12 years was to discourage Dems from running, because the numbers showed the Rs far outnumbered the Ds. We paid by not being able to get Dems to run for maybe 10 years. Luckily that has finally turned around. In the meantime a Tea Party Republican defeated the conservative Democrat and was re-elected 3-4 terms. Now his even worse wife holds that seat. The Dem voted agains liberal and moderately liberal positions a fair amount. Both Tea Party State Reps voted against them 100% of the time.