A blogger who writes for townhall.com recently posted what he considers to be 7 non-political differences between liberals and conservatives. I think those would do well to be subjected to critical examination.
1) Conservatives are more patriotic than liberals:Conservatives tend to focus on the positive things about America, while liberals focus on the negative. If the first thoughts that came to your mind when you thought of America were “slavery,” "imperialism," and "unfairly using too much of the world's resources," you probably wouldn't like America very much either. Conservatives, on the other hand, look at the fact that we saved the world in WWI, WWII, and the Cold War, take pride in the fact that we have contributed so much to the planet, and believe America has had a tremendous positive impact on history. The conservative view produces love of country. The other view produces a deep seated dislike of our nation.
Gee, that's great... you're optimists. Or you've failed to see the reality in front of you, which is that the rest of the world doesn't much like us because of an imperialist, unilateral foreign policy. Am I less patriotic than some/most conservatives? Perhaps, but I don't consider that to be a bad thing, and it doesn't mean I don't want 'murica to succeed, it means I view it in a more reasonable light. Rampant nationalism doesn't have much to recommend it, historically speaking.
