I know what you mean. I wouldn't have joined the Libertarian Party even in my wild youth (ha, my 30s) if there weren't areas that resonated with me. I'd approximately call myself a Liberal these days, but in part that's to push back at the way that the Wingers have turned "Lib'ral [haacck-ptui!]" into a slur. Ya know, "I'm Lib'ral! I'm here! Get used to it!" sorta thing.

I think there's some overlap between Lib'ralism and Libertarianism, and it's not just the first five letters, though that's a clue to the root meanings they share. A Lib'ral saying "I wanna do my own thing, man" and a Libertarianianaian saying "don't fence me in!" are saying the same thing. Same with privacy and freedom of speech and the rights guaranteed in the Constitution. Can't see why Wingers call the ACLU a Liberal organization; they're a Libertarian organization too; and what's wrong with Conservatives anyway that they disapprove of the American Civil Liberties Union? Does "union" have some sort of Commie pinko bastard overtones that induce inchoate rage?

Some of these ideological chasms are just too wide for me to grasp. But I digress...

It's funny the reaction Tom has to me bringing up the skeleton of my Libertarian past. He's a purist Libertarian, yet a Republican at the same time, and sees no irony in that; and yet he absolutely cannot recognize the slightest compatibility between his Calvinist Libertarianism and my eccentric Lib'ral-leaning beliefs which I insist partially overlap Libertarianismism. The rebuttal he often falls back on is, basically, they don't make Lib'rals like they used too, which I find a charming irony from one so conservative. My gawd, even the Lefties are going to hell in a handbasket! The end must be nigh!

Mustn't it? Yet I've heard that all my life from Conservatives, and I'm your age [I post little these days but read lots]. When will the sky fall and the world end? ... Oh, I just got the joke in the phrase "going to hell in a handbasket": It doesn't specify the distance from here to Hell or the rate of speed at which a handbasket travels. Which probably is about the walking speed of the person carrying it. Seems to me that, considering all the other modes of high-speed transportationi available to us these days, it's actually not a bad thing that the world's going to Hell in a handbasket. Wouldn't you rather go to Hell in a handbasket than, say, a supersonic aircraft or a Space Shuttle? Me too.

Now, see, that's my Lib'ral side talking, always finding a way to see the glass half full rather than half empty.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.