I had the pleasure of meeting the Fred Barnes, executive editor of Weekly Standard and Fox News personality, a couple of weeks ago when he was visiting Denver for the Independence Institute’s sixth annual Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Party. (Which was somewhat anti-climatic considering Fred doesn’t drink, smoke or shoot.)
Conservatives, they fight for your right to do the things they themselves choose not to do.
Liberals, they fight to take away your right to do the things they themselves choose to do.
Those descriptions aren't always the case, but in general, small government conservatives are a little more inclined to be for personal abstinence while supporting choice, while liberals seem to have a habit of hypocrisy when it comes to stuff like firearms, the environment, and high rates of taxation.
The big glaring exception (that the press loves to point out) would be on sexual issues, especially of the closeted homosexual variety. Given that the social conservatives don't have a candidate in the general election this go round, hopefully that's a sign that their presence as a highly coveted nationally voting block is on the wane. Maybe the GOP can lurch back to the Goldwater/Reagan small government style of conservatism again, with or without McCain as president (might be easier for a neo-Reagan to emerge in 2012 in the aftermath of a McCain failure, unfortunately. If we're lucky, McCain might turn out to be more Reagan-esque in practice as Executive, then one would suspect from his campaign rhetoric).
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