[Riot]

Originally Posted by Nascar1966

I dont mind seeing change as long as it is for the good of our country. Nothing wrong with being a conservative.

Not at all

Interesting comment on how the identity of "conservatism" has changed in the past 40 years or so:

Excerpt from Geoffrey R. Stone 12/08/09 - "The Republican Struggle for 'Ascendency'"

It's interesting to ask what created this state of affairs. As we know from Thucydides, this is hardly a new problem. But it seems worse now than at any time in living memory. Several factors have contributed to the sharp polarization of American politics.

First, and perhaps most important, was the realignment of the Democratic and Republican parties beginning in the 1960s. Until then, neither party was defined by a clear ideology. The Democrats included many white Southerners, who were still so furious at the party of Lincoln for the Civil War and Reconstruction that they couldn't bring themselves to vote Republican.

The Republicans, on the other hand, included many socially-liberal individuals who favored the Republicans' generally conservative economic policies.

Thus, party identity did not conform sharply to "conservative" and "liberal" ideological beliefs. This complicated politics, but it also ensured that members of the two parties would often find themselves in agreement on important issues.

With the civil rights movement, however, Southern Democrats finally figured out that it was time to get over their anger with the Republicans, and they began to shift their political allegiance.

As the influx of Southern conservatives transformed the GOP, and as culture war issues began to inflame ideological differences on such emotional issues as abortion, homosexuality and gun control, socially-liberal Republicans found themselves increasingly estranged from their party and they gradually drifted over to the Democrats.

As a result, we now have two ideologically-defined parties, and partisan polarization is a logical consequence of this development.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/geoffr..._b_384353.html