Funny you should bring this up; I've often thought of writing a post on why God is a libertarian (note the small L).

All things considered, I do realize as you said in the previous post, God does not adhere to a political philosophy but I think libertarianism tends to be closer to God's characteristics than conservatism or liberalism.

So write your piece on why God is not a libertarian and then I'll respond, why He is (keeping in mind what I just said above of course).

I don't think you understand what conservative means. Or, at a minimum, our understandings of the term are quite at odds. However, rather than blindly throwing a stone, I looked up the word 'conservative'. Some aspects do apply to the current US political movement, of which little actually seems to exist and almost all of it is grassroots with little actual representation.

I will describe the conservative walk I believe and attempt to walk. As a conservative, I believe in caution in action especially as it regards government action, spending, policy making, and foreign involvement. Less, in these regards, is usually the best for all concerned. I believe in traditional institutions, including marriage as the basis of the family unit, upon which all other institutions within a good and healthy society are built. That family is based upon 1 man and 1 woman, entering a personal union through God, for the purposes of extending their lives, society, and religion via children. I believe government is necessary, though it should be limited to civil services and national concerns (military, police (limited), fire fighters, international trade delegates, international diplomats, and a very few other areas limited by the original constitution),(not to include charity, except perhaps on a local level (county social services) as voted by local citizens).

Charity is not a government thing, except as voted locally. Social Services, public education, and even much of the environmental controls the federal government has seen as it's place to control have been disasters. Charity must be from a man to those in need. When the government interferes, and orders the money from a man, then his sense of a need to give diminishes to the point that he eventually will not give. And, with public education, this has become broken because the separation of church and state, a principal not actually articulated in the Constitution or Bill of Rights, except that one church will not be held above another, has become malignant but only to Christian and sometimes Jewish faiths. The government is using it's mandated schooling as a means of enforcing anti-Christian learning. Which also crosses the separation of church and state, given that atheism and sciencism are religions of a sort.

As for the government forcing people to do this or that, regarding sexuality, drugs, and other current laws, that should be (and is to some degree) based upon an overwhelming social or cultural good being upheld. The current definition of marriage should be upheld by the government, simply because the family unit is all that holds a true society together. Watch that dissolve and you will see the society around it disintegrate. Look to Russian and then Europe to see this happening. Our laws and education system are leading us toward that end, just not as quickly. As for drugs, it seems our success is one of our weaknesses. In obtaining greatness, we have attained access to a forbidden fruit (on a grand scale). Even the European free drug testing grounds have been closed up (and the red light district is being drawn down toward potential dismantling) because the societal costs have been vastly too high (no pun intended). I think as Europe comes more our way in this war, the war will begin being won, as we (the US) will be refreshed in spirit as well as resources and allies.

However, as a society, we have broken down and moved away from God. For my part, rather than move with society, I have chosen to stay with God's way, as I understand it. Neither will I support a government intervention (should I be able to begin such a thing) nor do I support any personal action against the government or the people. I recommend to others as I do myself, that is to learn God's will more fully for our own lives and to try to fulfill that in the flesh, within our bounds of life in sin. To be examples of right living, justice in our community, and charity how we may. I have backed away from politics, as such. I feel I have no representation in this government. But being that it is my homeland, and as roughly and broadly as they are laid, my roots are in it's soil, I will stay and live out my time here. I will also say, I do expect to be persecuted for being a Christian, a Catholic, before my time is done.

Oh, one last thing. Liberals have stolen that word, as is known. Even progressive is a stolen term and notion. These referred to free people, with individual political power and choice, and free economics, where a man could make his way by choosing wisely without regard to being associated and approved of by a king or guild (or civil rights panel, quota system, or other artificial barrier or brace). These things are, in essence, conservative. As proof, the "conservative" movement in the U.S. is called "liberal, progressive, or radical" in all other nations on this globe save a few of the lying European states who have adopted the US's socialist and communist lies. Or, I should say, before the conservative politics became corrupted by modern "liberalism", it was considered liberal overseas.

The sort of conservatism that I was attacking was the common form of conservative found among the republican base today. As to the definition of liberal, it has been stolen, but my purpose in using the commonly accepted definition of it was to show why God isn't that, rather than to argue why God is not a socialist. We both know God is not a socialist, which is what most "liberals" really are, but most liberals would vehemently deny that they are socialists. They may be sympathetic, but they aren't socialists themselves in their mind. I disagree completely about the abuse of the term "progressive." Progressivism has always carried with it a quasi-fascist connotation that is quite comfortably situated on the political left. Just read Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg if you don't know what I mean.

Ah, fair arguments.

I keep hearing about Mr. Goldberg's book, and relatively favorably. I have done some of that research, though in no way nearly as exhaustively, I have merely loosely (if accurately?) put the puzzle together for the most part. If I do not create an exact chain of people and events, I understand that El Deuce was a socialist and his father was a socialist who named El Deuce after the Mexican radical who saw the last true revolution in Mexico to fruition (jointly, with another Mexican radical). That Mexican revolutionary did not see himself as a socialist (see your own discussion about liberals above), yet created that system in Mexico (and named his children Lucifer, Satan, and Stalin (Stalin or Lenin, but I think Stalin). Yes, lots of interesting mixes. That is just one example. Betty Freiden, the author of Feminist Mystique (sps?), was actually (when she wrote the book) married to a very wealthy man. She had a maid and a cook, so never spared her time doing 'the odious man-slave chores' she discusses in her book. Actually, she spent most of her time at a local 2-year college as a groupie for a Stalinist professor, professing communism and socialism (communists, like modern "liberals", are not socialists either, just ask them). There are literally thousands of nearly secret direct and indirect links between ideologies, people, through time and great distances.

I really think there are only two sides, good and evil. Though their are shades of each, often referred to as chaotic and lawful. Neutrality is not really a place, it is merely either an inability to make a choice between those due to a lack of real choice in being bound by superior and hostile forces from both sides or having nothing personal to gain or lose in the conflict from some odd perspective, or a lack of moral, ethical, or intellectual capacities. I know which side socialism and communism are on. And though capitalism has it's failings, if kept open to advancement through achievement, it is the only real system which looks more like what heaven seems to represent (a place with houses of many sizes, from shacks to mansions, and based on achievement).

Anyway. I might have to read his book and see about some of the other links. And, whether I concur. Though I generally like, and often enjoy, reading Mr. Goldberg's material, I sometimes have doubts about which side he really is on, or at least how strongly he leans in the right direction. Well, sometimes. Thanks for the advice, when I can, I think I will take you up on the reading.

Boy am I full of myself today! Never worry, I am off and away. A movie? Yeah, maybe... Have a good weekend.

I'm halfway through the book now. So far, I can't detect a hint of respect for the political left in it. If anything, I think the book illustrates that Goldberg probably became more adamantly anti-leftwing as he researched his book.