Before I say the first word about politics, I need to be clear that I'm neither a registered Democrat or Republican; I am a independent voter who holds both political parties in pretty much equal disdain. They don't even bother trying to represent me in Washington. I'd love to be able to think of myself as a liberal -- it sounds wonderful, at least in principle. Some of the synonyms for the word 'liberal' are generous, abundant, copious, and plentiful. And of course, the antonyms for liberal include intolerant, stingy, narrow-minded, mean, and greedy. Really...who wants to be thought of as mean, or intolerant? I certainly don't. But the problem with self-identifying as a liberal is that the political ideology and the dictionary definition of the word appear to have very little in common with each other. Now people who know me personally know that I'm not really a confrontational sort of person, but neither am I the "go along to get along" sort of person, either. I'm about ten times more likely to initiate a conversation about the upcoming football season for the Georgia Bulldogs than politics or religion, but I'm also not shy about expressing my opinions or correcting the record whenever it seems necessary. I have this very annoying tendency of stubbornly refusing to concede that I could be wrong about something in lieu of better evidence. I'm also very unlikely to simply take your word for anything if the argument from authority has been invoked. Naturally, being radically liberal is a political orientation, not a religious one. It has been my experience … [Read more...]