“What is ‘an evil Mormon conspiracy’, Alex?”

Seriously, Seana-Anna. You really need to reserve judgement before assuming the worst about someone.

If she didn’t get the instructions from the Mother Ship when she beamed down with the hordes of other demonic gay people from whatever hellish planet you seem to believe we came from, she might not.

Can one be a conservative and be in favor of big government to use its power to disenfranchise gays?

Can one be a conservative and be in favor of small government, fiscal prudence, love of country and in favor of gay marriage?

Are you liberal if you favor gay marriage rights?

Are the religious far-right who use government to prevent gay really conservative?

Who decides, and by what litmus test?

The abouve is a very insightful and significant commentary, although incomplete.

The reality is that what has come to be (mis)defined in this country as “conservative” and “liberal” are in fact two sides of the same coin of statism, both working in favor of failed government solutions.

“Liberalism” on the other hand is defined by Merriam Webster as “a theory in economics emphasizing individual freedom from restraint and usually based on free competition, the self-regulating market, and the gold standard; a political philosophy based on belief in progress, the essential goodness of the human race, the autonomy of the individual, and standing for the protection of political and civil liberties”.

Essentially, this is the liberalism of John Locke, Adam Smith, etal. Sadly, liberals (real ones) are very few and far between today.

Credit may be given to Sen. Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota for being the loudest voice in support for legislation in the late ’50s and early ’60s. Credit may be given to LBJ for pushing legislation.

However, without the leadership and help of Republicans, who had voted for bills to help minorities for decades before 1964, any Democratic Party legislative effort would have been watered down or failed because of obstinate Democrats – i.e., the Dixiecrats.

Neither political party, however, has the right to claim it was responsible for making civil rights for African-Americans happen. Changing times and the efforts of blacks themselves, plus the thousands of electronic pictures blazing across the screens on national television, finally brought it home to white America that injustices were being done to their brethren who happened to be black.

The fact that Democrats are quick to take credit for the Civil Rights Act and for the civil rights movement itself is both phony and a self-absorbed vanity.
Diane Alden http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/12/13/194350.shtml

Sorry, Tano, it was the Liberal Dems who fought against giving civil rights OR equal rights to women or blacks. Conservatives are FOR protecting FREEDOM. Libs were VERY afraid that the equality issue would upset their social rigging of the status quo. You will find that Liberals are far more “closed minded” than their literature would profess. Protecting the sanctity of marriage is about protecting rights…rights that are trampled daily by “progressive” initaitves that seek to tear down marriage, family, Christian values – separately and together.

Religious freedom of Christians – who founded this nation and upon whose precepts so many of our founding prinicipals are built – has been stomped on by loud, vulgar in-your-face hostile voices. The gay community – unfortunately – has taken this tactic (ie. the post Prop 8 vote terrorism, the GLSEN indoctrination in public schools etc) and allied itself with rationale that has nothing to do with protecting right and freedoms but instead taking away others’ right to practice their faith.

Are you liberal if you favor gay marriage rights?

You are to at least some extent a *left*-liberal, yes, since under U.S. case, law a State marriage license isn’t even a right for straights yet. Sorry Man

Other ‘eighteenth century attitudes’ from Ronaldus Maximus.

“Recognizing the equality of all men and women, we are willing and able to lift the weak, cradle those who hurt, and nurture the bonds that tie us together as one nation under God. ”

“There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.”

“If we look to the answer as to why for so many years we achieved so much, prospered as no other people on earth, it was because here in this land we unleashed the energy and individual genius of man to a greater extent than has ever been done before. Freedom and the dignity of the individual have been more available and assured here than in any other place on earth. The price for this freedom at times has been high, but we have never been unwilling to pay the price. ”

“In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem. From time to time we’ve been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people. Well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else? All of us together, in and out of government, must bear the burden. ”

“You and I, as individuals, can, by borrowing, live beyond our means, but for only a limited period of time. Why, then, should we think that collectively, as a nation, we’re not bound by that same limitation? We must act today in order to preserve tomorrow. ”

“I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.”

“”We the people” tell the government what to do, it doesn’t tell us. “We the people” are the driver, the government is the car. And we decide where it should go, and by what route, and how fast. Almost all the world’s constitutions are documents in which governments tell the people what their privileges are. Our Constitution is a document in which “We the people” tell the government what it is allowed to do. “We the people” are free.”

And….if a Democrat can wise up, maybe Republicans will too.

Talking Points Tano, considering that you are well-known on this blog to be an admitted RACIST who supports and endorses the advancement and promotion of individuals based SOLELY on the degree and hue of pigmentation in their skin, please be advised that the rest of us listen closely for an uproarious laugh-track when you condescendingly prattle on about “social innovations.” Irrational, racist policies that reward darker-skinned individuals with lesser qualifications at the expense of lighter-skinned individuals with superior qualifications are not socially innovative. They are RACIST, and no matter how many more decades you and your gang of ignorant bigots fight tooth-and-nail to preserve it as a “traditional” part of American society, it will NEVER find support with conservatives. Deciding who in our society is valued and rewarded and who is condemned and victimized based on things like skin color, genitalia, and sexual attraction is YOOOOUUUUR thing. Not our thing. YOUR thing. The only difference between you and a 1930s slack-jawed Louisiana Grand Dragon is that you haven’t started burning crosses yet. Which basically means you’re a bigot AND a lazy so-and-so.

Can you anti-Texas folks now please go back to your identity politics and maybe elect a gay mayor in say, Boston, Chicago, New York.
It’s not difficult, you just vote for the person and not the group.

Of course they are. I agree with you that the meaning of “liberal” and “conservative” are ever changing in our culture – but the definition of “conservatism’ as being equal to nothing other than smaller government is totally bogus. It is an attempt by the libertarian wing of the right to appropriate the name of an ideology which has far broader support than they do.

Conservatism, if it is to have any meaning at all, is based on preserving the traditional social relationships and institutions. Opposing social innovations in favor of how things have always been done. Conservatives were against civil rights, against women’s rights, against gay rights – because the second or third class citizenship of these groups is simply how it has always been in Western, and non-Western civilizations. There is almost always a religious justification thrown in for good measure.

The notion that we in the West, for the first time in human history, should up end the traditional set of values and allow gays to live openly as fully equal citizens, is a radically liberal idea. Of course, like all other social innovations, to the extent that it is actually taken up by society and accepted, then it begins to find support amongst a new generation of conservatives – because now it is becoming part of the new tradition.

Conservatism eventually embraces all these movements for equality, but only after a new generation has grown up in a world where these rights are taken for granted.