Re: liberalism
What irks me about liberalism isn't food drives, recycling, low-energy light bulbs, conservation, charity, or anything else like that.
I do all of those things, including using twisty bulbs before they were cool (and before they worked very well).
What irks me is the idea that I have to be forced by law to do these things. Puritanism was once described as the "fear that someone, somewhere, is having fun." Modern liberal political thinking seems to be the fear that someone, somewhere, is doing something outside of the authority and involvement of the State.
"Everything not forbidden is compulsory"
- motto of the totalitarian ant kingdom in T. H. White's Once and Future King