Fiscal Conservative, social Liberal

[William769]

That's how I always described myself.

Seeing it in action in our highest parts of Government has changed my mind.

I'm Liberal through & through now not because it affects me, but because it affects my fellow Americans.

There are safety nets for a reason.

My apologies for not figuring this out earlier in life.

[gcomeau]

1. I think you're probably "fiscally conservative"

...in the sense those terms were defined maybe, oh, 50 years ago... which had nothing in particular to do with the Republican Party.

It used to just mean, plain and simply, that you were responsible with your budgeting. Don't run up unnecessary debts. That kind of thing. Since Reagan it suddenly started meaning "Taxes evil! Spending by government evil!"

[William769]

6. Good point.

[One_Life_To_Give]

2. How about Socially Liberal, Fiscal Yankee?

There is a difference between being cautious with what one spends and being a hoarder.

[JaneyVee]

3. Socially Liberal, Fiscally Progressive

[Tommy_Carcetti]

4. There's a different to me between "Fiscally Conservative" and "Fiscally Responsible."

To me, "Fiscally Responsible" means that government should be supported with sufficient revenue so not to accumulate mass deficits.

But "Fiscally Conservative" to me screams resistant to government programs, government support, having to pay one's fair share in taxes, opposing government regulation of business, etc.

I definitely consider myself Fiscally Responsible. But I'm far, far, far from Fiscally Conservative.

[William769]

5. Thank you.

I see I chose my rods poorly.

[PETRUS]

7. I like where you're coming from, but I'd tweak your definition somewhat.

A quote from Joe Firestone of neweconomicperspectives.org will do:

"Fiscal responsibility is assessing fiscal policy against its projected impacts on society and democracy. It is not about projecting its impact on the levels of the deficit, the debt, and the debt-to-GDP ratio."

We have a crisis of unemployment and poverty NOW.

As Dean Baker put it in an op-ed this morning:

"The debate around the budget is getting ever further removed from reality. As every budget expert knows, the reason that we have seen large budget deficits in the last five years is that the economy plunged following the collapse of the housing bubble. This collapse cost us more than $600 billion in annual construction demand and more than $500 billion in annual consumption demand.

This lost demand gave us large deficits because it led to plunging tax collections and more spending on programs like unemployment insurance. We deliberately raised deficits by roughly $300 billion annually in 2009 and 2010 with the stimulus package.

These deficits were supporting the economy, making up for the loss of private sector demand. They took the deficit from a very modest 1.2 percent of GDP in 2007 to a peak of more than 9 percent of GDP in 2009.

Unfortunately, rather than deal with the reality – that we need deficits to sustain demand in a context where the private sector will not do it – the politicians in Washington have gotten hysterical. This is like complaining about our use of water when the school is on fire with the kids still inside."

[hrmjustin]

8. You are a good soul!!!

[Egalitarian Thug]

9. Apology accepted. Now, you can help us reimagine our society to benefit from

the positives of both social liberalism and fiscal conservation.