One of our newer users has repeatedly accused me of being a neocon. Frankly, it's gone beyond ticking me off. The reason this person continues to use such grossly inaccurate labelling is because he has been trained and conditioned to see politics as left or right (with an occasional nod to the middle). The problem is, political and philosophical views go FAR beyond that.
One of the most appalling mistakes the Democrats have made, in my opinion, is not recognizing that fact. If you want to wear the tag of "liberal", you have to not only accept their perception of the problems in society, but their prescriptions for the solution to those problems. If you believe, for instance, that we need to care for the poor in the community, you must believe that the A, B, and C governmental mandated solutions to the problem are the answer, and in a de facto redistribution of wealth. You must believe in abortion on demand, in gun control, and in removing public expressions of religion from public view.
The fact is, I believe that, philosophically, the Democrats are right on many points. We SHOULD be compassionate individuals to the poor. But we should not be enablers of the poor. Many of the poor have become so through lifestyle choices that they have made and continue to make, and it is only through self reliance that they will ever see their way out of poverty.
And so, the question arises, then: am I a "compassionate conservative"? No, that label wouldn't fit either. I believe Bush and the GOP to be wrong on a great number of counts, it's just that I was raised to have a certain level of respect for the office, and I feel that there are enough in the media already attacking Bush that I don't need to add to their number.
I think that intelligent individuals should be capable of thinking beyond simplistic labels to sum up political views. Very few people that I have ever met have fallen CONSISTENTLY on either the left or the right side of the political spectrum. Take George W. Bush, for instance. He is a big government Republican, big government being the antithesis of conservative thought. He is also in many ways a compassionate conservative, having proposed programs such as a weighted Social Security system that would enable lower wage earners to retire with closer to average incomes that could have come right out of the DNC playbook.
Left-right political labelling is demeaning, and, almost completely inaccurate. Furthermore, it suggests a lack of intelligence on the part of the labeller, who cannot distinguish between an individual and an ideology. If we want to advance in our thinking, we have to discard this simplistic system.