Liberals and Conservatives

The problem with America today is that there are too many Liberals. And there are too many Conservatives. I don't mean to say there are too many individual liberals and conservatives. I mean there are too many different kinds of Liberals and Conservatives. Consider the following labels:

The Liberals:

American liberalism
Classical liberalism
Economic liberalism
Neoliberalism
Ordoliberalism
Paleoliberalism
Social liberalism

The Conservatives:

American conservatism
Christian Democracy
Liberal conservatism
National conservatism
Neoconservatism
Paleoconservatism

Now each of these labels represent a certain type or model of either liberalism or conservatism. If I described a position for you, that position could be held by one or more of these different types of political movements. Let's take abortion for an example. Now it is often said that liberals support abortion and conservatives oppose it. But if you look past these broad labels (what popular culture describes as conservative and liberal) you will find liberal and conservative arguments in favor and in opposition to abortion. Not all liberals favor abortion on demand and not all conservatives oppose it. Some liberals may look at the question of when life begins (lots of different views here) and decide that it begins at conception. If you, as a liberal, adopt this view, then you would be more likely to oppose abortion because you would view this as the of taking of an innocent life. You would favor government intervention to prevent this from happening (just as you would support child labor laws or child abuse prevention regulations). Conservatives face this same problem. If you are a conservative (say like Barry Goldwater, the father of modern American conservatism) you would argue that abortion and control of the individual's own body should not be a matter of government regulation. Goldwater believed in less government regulation in the private lives of individuals. Right now in this country we expect our liberals to be pro-choice and our conservatives to be pro-life. If I as a liberal, said I was opposed to abortion, I would be villified. If I as a conservative, said I supported a woman's right to choose (or say gay rights...) I would be viewed in the same negative light.

I consider myself liberal. Often I have found myself to be intellectually lazy when it came to understanding the conservative viewpoint. It was easier for me to just to say that they were ignorant rednecks and discount their views altogether. That was a big mistake. But I am not alone. Many of my liberal friends have done the same thing. We have stopped growing. We have become elitist. We have lost touch with the roots of liberalism. We don't have the "common touch" anymore. Worst of all, we are so caught up in our own little world, we no longer even care what others think because we assume we are right and have all the right answers. The same, by the way, can be said of the conservative movement in this country which has gone out of its way to use the "liberal" label in the same way as they might describe "child molesters." Look, the bottom line is, we all need to get inside each others heads. Liberals and Conservatives are much more diverse and complicated then what is being presented. My goal is to read as much non-political theory about conservatism and liberalism as I can. I am turning off the Michael Moores and the Anne Coulters of the word (who are not intellectually curious but baised toward their own partisan political views) and doing my own research. I encourage you all to do the same. Eric gave me this assignment to tell you what the differences between Liberals and Conservatives are. Well, Eric, I have thought about this long and hard and at the moment I can't find consensus on what even a liberal or conservative is. So I will keep working on this.