If asked directly, or if the conversation naturally turns towards politics, sure. Anyone who knows me well knows that I’m a pretty hardcore Democrat (although I’ve often voted for Republicans, esp. in local races, where the GOP fielded the better candidate). I don’t go out of my way to talk about politics with recent acquaintances, and of course I try to be respectful of those who vote differently from me. I have many Republican friends and we haven’t killed each other… yet. Some even ask for my suggestions for the more obscure races such as judgeships, because they know I follow local politics pretty closely.
If it comes up, I am more than happy to discuss it. The weird thing is how many of my friends are Democrats or Liberals and I always got along with them fine and now this year I was more for Obama than most of them. (HRC & Edwards supporters for some reason.) Of course my few friends that were McCain supporters were annoyed that I actually had Obama signs up and tried to convince them why they should change their vote. I think I actually convince many in both the Primary and the Election this year. A lot of the Greens I hang out with did not really think through that Obama’s plans were Greener than HRC and the Clintons were not really great friends to environmentalist when Bill was President.
Jim
I have a theory on why Canadian culture puts such a high value on privacy for controversial subjects like religion and political affiliation - we have long, cold winters, with everyone cooped up together. We have to get along or we’d all drive each other crazy. We aren’t quite as cooped up as we used to be, but our culture developed when people spent long winters in very small houses.