What are you politically?

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

I'm socially conservative on some issues (marriage, abortion), socially liberal on others (war on drugs).  Economically, I'm a moderate.  I believe in low taxes and that private enterprise is preferable to big government.  I also believe some amount of socialization is a necessary evil - as may be the case with health care in the near future.  I also believe government has a strong regulatory role to play in order to make private enterprise play fair.  I believe in responsible management of the environment.

In other words, I'm a Centrist.

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

On behalf of myself, Gustaf, and others, I would like to note for the record that economic conservative/social liberal remains in the lead by a wide margin.

There, now go about your daily lives.

I think that, in an abstract, idealistic sense, everyone is an economic conservative/social liberal.  Who *isn't* for freedom?  This was, by far, the most common political philosophy I encountered in college.  People should be free to do what they want, live the way they want, without government interference and taxes.

When you get into the real world, things get more complex.  You start to see the consequences of too much freedom.  You learn that sometimes the absense of government leads to the natural, unjust domination of the strong over the weak.  You learn that some stuff has to be paid for by everyone, and we share a world in which our actions have an effect on everyone else.  Hard-core libertarianism gets softened after time.

Just my $0.02.

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

I'm socially very liberal (I believe in gay marriage, legalisation of Cannabis etc.) and economically fairly liberal (I believe in a free market, private enterprise etc. but don't believe in letting the poor rot on the streets).

This brings up a good point: what do we mean by "economically liberal/conservative?"  The American left/right sense, or the European, classical sense?  In the classical sense, liberal means an unfettered free market, but in the American sense, it means the exact opposite.

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

Great post, Beef. I often disagree with your views but this defense of government is one of the most logical that I have heard in a long time. Government, in many cases, creates more freedom, and often the free market and letting people do whatever they want to, only enables the strong and the wealthy to have unrestricted freedom and creates much less freedom for the poor and the weak. The purpose of government is to balance out inequalities and to ensure equal opportunity for all so that thus the maximum possible freedom for EVERYONE can be attained.

Thanks!  I'm sure we would agree on a lot of things, and there is a reason my avatar isn't blue .

The ironic thing is that unfettered capitalism is that it ultimately leads to large monopolies and the elimination of competition, and it's competition that makes capitalism work so well.

I'd still say I have libertarian leanings - I believe that government mainly exists to protect us from force and fraud.  But a little bit of state "tyranny" can save us from a lot of private tyranny.