So this is a question that has come up more than once, usually when the political extremes are accusing me of not fitting into their mold. No, I don’t, sorry. As far as I’ve always been concerned, ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal’ are political stances, they have nothing at all to do with the bizarre ideologies that infest the far left and the far right. Being conservative has nothing inherently to do with being religious and vice versa. There are a lot of very liberal Christians out there, just like there are a lot of very conservative atheists like me.

So let’s look at it.

You really can’t just look at “conservatism” as a monolith, there are actually two kinds. Fiscal conservatism is concerned with the economy and monetary matters and social conservatism, which is based around how society operates.

I am a very definite fiscal conservative. I am no longer a social conservative in most ways. Let’s look at fiscal conservatism first therefore, as it will be easier to get through.

Fiscal conservatives support tax cuts, small government, fiscal responsibility, the free market and a reduction in government debt and spending. They focus on the people solving their own problems, not the government stepping in to help.

I’m onboard with all of that. Now none of that is a hard and fast rule. Small government doesn’t mean no government, less spending doesn’t mean no spending and the government not helping doesn’t mean the government vanishes. That’s not how it works. There are things that we do need a government for, otherwise we’d have anarchy. It’s just that the current nanny state that we have, it’s gone absurdly overboard, to the point where most people can’t make their own decision, they can’t make a move without government oversight and most people look at the government like a parent who tells them what to do all of the time. That is not me.

On the other hand, social conservatism tend to value duty, traditional values and social structures and, in the modern world, that’s almost all coming from a hardcore Christian perspective. I reject all of that. Any position that cannot be rationally reached without believing in a god, I pass on.

What I am today is more of a right-leaning moderate than a true conservative. Of course, nobody can tell you what you have to believe to fit into a particular group. I could call myself a full-blown conservative if I wanted to and nobody could stop me. I just don’t think that the label fits anymore. Some of the things on the above list, I agree with. Many, I do not, especially when it comes to hating people because the Bible says to. That’s just stupid.

I’ve got friends who insist that if the Republicans would just stick to finances and get rid of the Bible-bothering, they’d never lose an election. The  government is not in business to address social issues at all. That’s one of the things I liked about Trump, his economy was humming, the stock market was in the stratosphere, the banks were doing great, the economy was growing consistently and people were making money hand-over-fist. It was the best economy that the country had seen in more than 50 years and there was no end to the growth in sight.

Of course, I’d never vote for Trump now because he’s turned into a complete religious loon and I want religion to have nothing at all to do with the government, so the Republicans this next election, I doubt they can get my vote. The thing is, neither can the Democrats. I haven’t actively supported a candidate in decades, but now, I actively hate both sides. I also probably hate every single independent. We need fiscal conservatives and social moderates in the White House.

Too bad that’s not going to happen in the modern ideologically-divided world.