It should be pretty clear that we can't tell the conservatives from the liberals based on a political party designation. Regardless of what the parties call themselves, they often act much differently than one who understands the differences between their idealologies might expect. The last eight years should have taught us that much.

I thought it might be meaningful to review the definitions of "conservative" and "liberal". I'll skip all the sub-sets of each major philosophy, just saying that there are fiscal conservatives, social liberals, religious conservatives, green liberals, and so forth an so on. But let's just take a look at the definitions of the terms so we can each figure out what we really are.

Here's the description of one of the two political philosophies, leaving out the actual name. Which do you think it is? Is this what you believe?....

_________ is a broad class of political philosophies that considers individual liberty and equality to be the most important political goals. _______ emphasizes individual rights and equality of opportunity. Within ________ there are various streams of thought which compete over the use of the term and may propose very different policies, but they are generally united by their support for a number of principles, including: freedom of thought and speech, limitations on the power of governments, the rule of law, an individual's right to private property, and a transparent system of government. All _______, as well as some adherents of other political ideologies, support some variant of the form of government known as democracy, with open and fair elections, where all citizens have equal rights by law.

Those who identify themselves as __________, to distinguish themselves from ___________, oppose all government regulation of business and the economy, with the exception of laws against force and fraud, and support free market laissez-faire capitalism. In Europe, the term ________ is closer to the economic outlook of American _________. In the United States, __________ is most often used in the sense of modern ____________, which supports some regulation of business and other economic interventionism which they believe to be in the public interest.

OK, the opposite of the political philosophy above is described as follows.....

__________ has no ideology, in the sense of a program with some form of master plan. __________ strongly support the right of property. _________ looks to a modified free market order in which the state's role is to promote competition while maintaining the national interest, community and identity.

_____________ supports freedom for the individual in both the economic and social spheres. It is a fundamental belief of __________ that a government does not have the right to run up large debts and then throw the burden on the taxpayer; the taxpayers' right not to be taxed oppressively takes precedence even over paying back debts a government may have imprudently undertaken.

Green _____________ is a term used to refer to ______________ who have incorporated ecological concerns into their ideology. _____________ is a philosophy that supports preservation of the heritage of a nation or culture. ____________ seeks to apply the teachings of particular religious ideologies to politics, sometimes by proclaiming the value of those teachings, at other times seeking to have those teachings influence laws.

-----------------------------

OK, which is which? Which description is that of a "conservative" and which is a "liberal"?

Take a shot. I'll post the answer later in the thread. To the extent that you see some elements that attract you in both tells you that the difference between the political philosophies we refer to every day maybe isn't as great as is so often implied.