I find that a lot of people really have no idea of what the words conservative and liberal actually mean. Don't be distorted by what people say they are either. In politics you can't say person A is conservative, person B is liberal and neccesarily be able to judge what they actually believe in. A British conservative is likely to be far more leftwing and liberal than your average US republican for example. By European standards there is little social democracy preached let alone socialism in the US. The democrats if they were to stand for elections in Britain would probably have to put themselves to the right of our conservative party.

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Is Bush still a conservative this morning? It is conservative to spy on Americans and completely ignore the bill of rights?

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Conservative doesn't come into it at all. It is authoritarian , and the sort of policy that comes from those who do not trust their own people. Authoritarianism can come from the left or right. The natural place for them to end up, if allowed by a countrys political system, is as a dictator. Of course most democracy's have seperation of powers, but I have seen exmples recently both in Britain and the US of moves by those in power to undermine this important principle.