# Drop your most strongly-held political belief: did you just switch parties? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 28, 2012, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drop-your-most-strongly-held-political-belief-did-you-just-switch-parties/611011 "2012-01-28T19:33:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2012, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drop-your-most-strongly-held-political-belief-did-you-just-switch-parties/611011/41 "2012-01-30T04:00:05Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > If I started thinking that all people should be equal, yes, I’d be a Democrat. As it stands, that idea disgusts me. Interesting. If I abandon the principle that all people are equal under the law, adopt the principle that elites are superior, then I could see the modern conservationism would be a real possibility. I think you’ve hit upon a very important difference between the parties. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2012, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drop-your-most-strongly-held-political-belief-did-you-just-switch-parties/611011/42 "2012-01-30T05:01:35Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > No. > > My impression is that some would turn away from the GOP if not for the single issue of gun control. This confuses me (I’ve thought of starting a thread) because AFAICT gun control advocates in America are mostly trying to make it harder for psychopaths to buy combat weapons, not to take away Joe Q. Sportsman’s pistol. Unfortunately for us, that is not quite the case. [QUOTE=Dianne Feinstein] [If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States for an outright ban, picking up every one of them . . . Mr. and Mrs. America, turn 'em all in, I would have done it. I could not do that. The votes weren’t here.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Dianne_Feinstein#Gun_politics) [/QUOTE] I certainly don’t intend to hijack this into gun debate #8675309, but I thought that an example (just one of many) would be illustrative in this case. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2012, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drop-your-most-strongly-held-political-belief-did-you-just-switch-parties/611011/43 "2012-01-30T05:37:20Z")
If I gave up my belief that history matters, I’d vote for a different party. If that also implied, as I think it would, giving up all those beliefs which stem from the first one (having several levels of government makes sense but it needs to be done properly; people should be able to do business in their own language as much as humanly possible; a culture belongs to those who belong to it), I might be one of the jerks who vote for UPyD. Right now I’m feeling dirty just from writing their acronym. ---
**Author:** ![MysteryFellow63427](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e4f/32.png) [@MysteryFellow63427](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MysteryFellow63427)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2012, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drop-your-most-strongly-held-political-belief-did-you-just-switch-parties/611011/44 "2012-01-30T23:00:30Z")
“The government should spend responsibly.” Since Democrats and Republicans alike seem to happily spend money like drunken sailors, looks like the answer for me is “no.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drop-your-most-strongly-held-political-belief-did-you-just-switch-parties/611011.md?page=2)