In American political discourse "liberal" means supports abortion rights, environmental regulation, more social programs as opposed to military spending, and if you are wayyy out there, unions.
Incidentally I _do_ support free markets -- not Nozick-Hayek free markets, but I am a market socialist.
jks
--- Travis Fast <tfast at yorku.ca> wrote:
> You could, but liberal means something quite
> different in those
> contexts. It has a particular meaning when used
> before the word
> democrat. Just like "social" means something quite
> specific when
> followed by democrat. But keep dancing :)
>
> Travis
>
>
> martin wrote:
>
> > On Dec 4, 2005, at 11:44 AM, Travis Fast wrote:
> >
> >> So what you really meant to write must have been
> "since I am a
> >> democrat" since the status of of the modifier
> liberal has no
> >> purchase sans a nod to free markets and Bentham.
> >
> >
> > Try this one for 'purchase' ...
> >
> > 4 given, used, or occurring in generous amounts :
> liberal amounts of
> > wine had been consumed.
> > • (of a person) giving generously : Sam was too
> liberal with the wine.
> > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> >
> > Martin
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