What Churchill really meant was that if you have a heart at 40 you have no brain. Discuss.
I am a 48 year old male. I was much more conservative when I was younger. I voted for Reagan twice. I grew up in the Vietnam era and the pervading cynicism.
Reagan made me feel proud about being an American and gave me hope for the future. (I didn’t dislike Carter - I just thought he lacked vision.)
I voted for Poppa Bush. (I now regret this - because it began the Bush legacy.)
I disliked Clinton at first, but started to appreciate him when he made valid efforts to balance the budget. My biggest dislike of Clinton is that he passed Nafta just to get re-elected. He sold out the American middle class just to get another term.
I would have liked him more if he had stuck to classic Democratic ideals (because it was time for a president to do this) instead of becoming the most effective Republican President in 20 years.
I also wish Clinton would have had the balls to look into the camera and say,“My sex life is none of anyone’s business, and if you think it is I would be happy to meet you behind the White House and kick your perverted window-peeping asses!” I think the majority of America would have backed him up and told the Republicans to stfu and stick to actual politics.
I voted for Dubya because I hoped he would be a fiscal conservative and a social moderate. I didn’t expect him to re-start his daddy’s war and begin to spend America into oblivion…
I voted for Bob Baar in the last election because I saw Obama as a classic FIB who would sell out the middle class for his socialist (note the lower-case s - in a Republic we are allowed to vote for socialist ideas if we want to) ideas.
I wish Obama would have stuck to deficit reduction, pulled us out of Iran and Afghanistan, and not concentrated on his asinine the-government-has-the-right-to-force-citizens-to-participate-in-healthcare bullshit. He had a chance to turn this country back toward fiscally conservative and (through guilt) socially liberal views.
I don’t care what consenting adults do in the privacy of their own homes as long as noone is being physically or emotionally harmed. I think the Commerce Clause is unconstitutional and should be abolished. I don’t think America should be the world’s police force.
I am fiscally conservative and more and more socially liberal (although I do wish that the pushiest end of the gay rights movement would just stfu - but this is coming more from a visceral dislike of pdas than from a dislike of gay sex/affection per se.)
So to sum up, I was once a conservative, but am now a fiscal conservative and a social moderate with liberal leanings.
I don’t have the courage.
Churchill would say that; it matched his experience. He was in many ways a liberal early on - he introduced Britain’s first minimum-wage legislation, for example - and a conservative later.
Yes, and now they’re conservative. Which is the point.
Originally Posted by Susanann View Post
Elizabeth Dole and Norm Coleman were NOT conservative, they were liberals.
What the heck are you talking about?
No, both Dole and Coleman are both self-admitted definite liberals.
Elizabeth Dole has always been an anti-gun liberal, and she still is. Anyone who is anti-gun is a liberal. (It is impossible for a conservative to be anti-gun)
*"Elizabeth Dole said Tuesday it is wrong to allow Americans to carry concealed weapons and that she supports mandatory safety locks on guns two guncontrol proposals that GOP frontrunner George W. Bush opposes. I think its wrong to let people carry concealed weapons…
The announcement for specific guncontrol measures distinguishes Dole from the rest of the GOP presidential field for the 2000 election.
Dole has recently been increasingly vocal in support of various guncontrol proposals, causing a stir this month when **Dole *announced support for other guncontrol proposals at a New Hampshire dinner of party activists."
http://articles.cnn.com/1999-05-12/politics/president.2000_dole.guns_1_safety-locks-weapons-law-governor-bush?_s=PM:ALLPOLITICS
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Coleman is and always was a liberal , he says so himself, and that is why he lost his senate seat to that comedian Franken.
*"In March 2007, National Journal ranked Coleman the fourth most liberal Republican in the Senate.
Coleman was a strong supporter of President Bush’s attempts in 2006 and 2007 to pass comprehensive immigration reform in the U.S. Senate, one of the few Republicans to do so despite the insistence of many in the GOP that it was “amnesty for illegal aliens”.
**
Coleman **voted in favor of DR-CAFTA
In 2008, Senator Coleman was named one of the Most Corrupt Members of Congress by government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.[27]
Coleman said: "I am a lifelong Democrat… my fiscal conservatism does not mean I am any less progressive in my Democratic ideals. From Bobby Kennedy to George McGovern to Warren Spannaus to Hubert Humphrey to Walter Mondale — my commitment to the great values of our party has remained solid…Coleman wrote that “while the political party I belong to changes, nothing about how I govern or what I believe changes at all.”*
Dubya is another apparent conservative, who, later in life, became a big spending war-mongering liberal . After being pro-gun in Texas when he was younger, he later in life said he as president would sign any gun control bill that reached his desk.
That always sort of surprised me. I could picture attitudes like these:
Liberal: “Sure, we should be able to carry guns, why not? Smoke pot, get abortions, shoot rifles, anything goes!”
Conservative: “Oh no, I don’t think people should be having guns, wouldn’t be prudent, too dangerous. We should heavily regulate guns.”
Oh, my mistake. I was not previously aware that you were the sole arbiter of who is or is not conservative. :rolleyes:
Yeah, it would be easier for everyone to understand knowing that Conservatives and LIbertarians are pretty close to each other on most issues. Both Conservatives and Libertarians are against big government, against government interference, against government intrusion and regulation, against taxes, against big spending, FOR the Bill of Rights, For maximizing personal liberties, for states rights and against federal power. For example both Libertarians and Conservatives are both VERY pro-Second Amendment.
Conservatives and libertarians are gererally for the most personal freedoms, and for the most personal individual liberties.
Libertarians and Conservatives are on the same side, and if they are both in an election race then they naturally take votes away from each other.
(The liberals and Democrats are entirely different animals. It is liberals and Democrats and progressives who want BIG government, it is the liberals who want big taxes, and intrusive government. Some big-government politicians who wanted big government called themselves Republicans and kinda confused the issue, but foreget the Democrat/Republican titles, and just pay attention to Conservatives are the ones is for freedom and liberals are for for big government )
Originally Posted by Susanann View Post
Anyone who is anti-gun is a liberal. (It is impossible for a conservative to be anti-gun)
Thats ok.
Lots of people ocasionally forget that it is Conservatives that are the ones who are for personal liberties and who are against big government
You thought wrong. Obama is a liberal. …and so was bush, and so was bush’s daddy. Liberals believe in a strong federal government that meddle in other peoples affairs.
On the other hand, Conservatives and libertarians want a strong defense but at the same time we do not want to meddle in other countries affairs, nor meddle in individual peoples affairs. Conservatives and libertarians are usually accused of being “isolationists” and non-intrusive.
That’s because lots of people don’t consider the rights to own a gun and not pay taxes the only important personal liberties.
That sure explains the huge conservative contingent of the ACLU.
Originally Posted by Susanann
Lots of people ocasionally forget that it is Conservatives that are the ones who are for personal liberties and who are against big government
NO, of course not. The Right to Bear Arms, and the idea of low taxes and spending more of your own money on your own family, are only “2” conservative ideas.
Conservatives are the ones who believe in all personal liberties, and who are against big government infringing and intruding on individuals and against big government intruding in other countries affairs. Conservatives say: “Stay out of my life, stay out of my wallet, and dont get involved in other peoples’ wars”.
(Dont confuse Republican/Democrat with conservative/liberal, they are not the same thing. While all Democrats are liberals and all Democrats are for big government and less personal freedoms, the converse is not true. There are lots of Republicans today who are not conservative.)
Originally Posted by Susanann
Thats ok.Lots of people ocasionally forget that it is Conservatives that are the ones who are for personal liberties and who are against big government
Ha Ha Ha!!! That is funny! You are right, the ACLU is not conservative.
Yeah, the ACLU does not even know about : “…The Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms” means.
.
In fairness, it’s easy to get confused because so many self-identified conservatives say they’re for personal liberties and against big government, but have no problem disposing of personal liberties they don’t agree with and expanding government in ways that suits them.
It’s almost as though the “personal freedom/small government” thing were just a hollow platitude trotted out as a political expedient. Looks almost just like that, in fact.
As someone with a classic conservative mindset, Susanann is the ideal arbiter. Conservatives believe we must all accept simple truths, and that the best way to those truths is through whoever yells the loudest the longest.
Presuming the “my” in question isn’t a gay person or a pregnant woman, of course.
I’m not the confused person here.
My guess as to why white men become less conservative in their old age, might be because they become less independent when they get old, and older white men become more dependent on others(or dependent on the government) to take car of them.
A young white male does not “need” the government . A young white male can provide for himself, and protect his own family.
An old guy, who cant work, who has no savings, who is in failing health, who is dependent on government Social Security checks, is dependent on Medicare, who is dependent on government police to protect him.
Lots of old guys also probably dont pay any taxes, so they dont care about high taxes nor big government spending.
Older men dont have to worry anymore about getting drafted and going to war, nor do they worry about other liberal proposals for “mandatory service”.
Everything seems to fit that white males naturally are conservative and self supporting when they are young, and then in old age would have more of a propensty to become dependent on government and to become liberal when they are old.
Originally Posted by Susanann
Conservatives say: “Stay out of my life, stay out of my wallet, and dont get involved in other peoples’ wars”.
Apparantly you are still confused. Gays, women, and babies have the same rights in the conservative viewpoint. A conservative gives no favors, no preferential treatment, no affirmative action, and no abdication. A conservative is all about personal freedom for everyone, while at the same time limiting government.
The “Conservative Philosophy” also applies to gays, to women, and to babies. They all have the same rights, they all deserve freedom and they all want to be left alone and for the government to stay out of their lives and stay out of their wallets.
A “real” Conservative will be the one to protect and defend the rights of gays, women, and babies.