Growing Up

As a high school teen, I believed I was probably a Democrat, but couldn't really tell you why besides that my father was a Democrat.  My teachers seemed to all be Democrats, so out of respect and because we never heard any other points of view they had a significant influence on most of their students.

I was in high school when Nixon and Ford were presidents.  Naturally I saw the movie about Woodward & Bernstein and was convinced Nixon was corrupt.  Funny how Clinton and Obama have done much worse illegal, immoral, and unethical things since then while the media and Hollywood yawned.

Vietnam left me feeling conflicted.  I heard the arguments for and against the war, and understood that we were fulfilling a promise to protect friendly countries from violent Communist overthrow.  But the politicians seemed to be on tip-toe, trying harder to manage public perceptions than win a war.  I definitely was appalled at the way liberal Democrats were treating returning veterans.

But not all Democrats were that radical back then.  Many were people of faith and mostly conservative on issues, but were Democrats because they believed that Democrats cared more about the ordinary citizen than Republicans.

Being a Democrat back then mostly just meant you didn't believe that Corporate America deserved all the support and goodies they could possibly get in the name of a strong economy.  I of course couldn't relate to the Corporate Executive and Country Club crowd that I believed ran the GOP.

The issues of the day I barely understood.  Of course, back then nobody was even talking about today's hot social issues - we'd never heard of Political Correctness, nobody ever believed Gay Marriage would become a serious argument, nor would mandates for free contraception.  Religious expression in public was taken for granted.  People used to argue about tax rates and how much spending the government should be permitted.

In the college years I found myself surrounded by fairly radical leftists, especially amongst the professors.  My reaction was more skepticism than agreement, and I was more likely to poke fun at some of the more outrageous characters.  Such as my Sociology professor, who was a lesbian woman that embodied a cartoonish caricature of the angry, manly and man-hating liberal lesbian.  She was so ridiculously over the top that I sometimes covered my mouth during class to stifle the urge to laugh out loud at one of her tirades against the "White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Male" who was responsible for every injustice on the planet.

It was after Ronald Reagan beat Jimmy Carter that I became a Republican.  That was when I first became aware of policy and observed first-hand how Reagan's free market, limited government, strength and courage in the face of enemies, and personal responsibility policies completely reversed the pain and suffering imposed by Carter's socialism at home and appeasement abroad.  Under Carter I struggled to survive as a young adult, but saw my fortunes improve dramatically when Reagan took over.

Just as important, Ronald Reagan made sense to me.  I connected with his gentle affability and agreed with most every argument he made in support of his vision for the country.  I began to understand the code language used by Democrats that they still use in an attempt to divide people and sow envy and distrust without clearly stating what specific policies they would impose themselves.

Since I came of age, I've come to understand that conservatives believe in Freedom, while Democrats believe in Fairness.  Freedom's easy to define.  Fairness tends to be in the eye of the beholder. 

I'm a Freedom guy.