I'm coming out, I'm a left leaning Liberaltarian

Picture from "The World's Smallest Political Quiz" (facebook edition) I scored 100% on the social and 50% on the economic.

I had lunch with my dad yesterday, he commented to the Mayor of Cheraw that he doesn't know where he went wrong, that throughout my formative years that I was a conservative and was a Republican (which is true) but that I have become a raging liberal. And while I tentatively hold that title in my mind - it's not really true.

I'm reminded of a conversation with Waldo over at Waldo Lydecker's Journal, who recounted his own political journey from being a young Republican in South Carolina in the 70's when no one was a Republican and being a part of the Reagan Revolution. But he's no longer a Republican. The Republican Party, and to the point Conservatism he said, left him - he didn't leave the party. It's why today he laughs about recently being rated so highly on both the 'conservative' and 'liberal' indexes over at Blog Net News, before the Aggregators realized they had him categorized at both. But that's just it - he is. And so am I, it's why we're bloggy pals.

But what to call ourselves? We're neither 'Democrats' nor Republicans though perhaps we've trended Democratic as the 'right' has pushed those who aren't ideologically pure out (whatever ideological purity means today).

I only realized today that there even was a name for such folks outside of the old South Park Republicans (but we're not Republicans anymore!), and apparently it's been around since at least 2006: Liberaltarians.

And why not? I read tihs which Sullivan quoted:

... conservatives are vile, that conventional liberals are too deep in the pocket of the Democratic Party to actually promote prosperity and opportunity, and that Libertarians are dogmatic, weird, and irrelevant.

It's from Will Wilkinson's post, The Hope and Horror of Liberaltarianism, which I then read and made the connection. And while I am certainly a little further left, I think I more identify with this appellation and school of thought than the vile 'conservatives', conventional liberals and cooky libertarians.

It's like a second coming out of sorts.

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