So I had to get more librul just to prove her wrong.

My mother is a Democrat because her father was a Democrat and she raised 4 girls, all Democrats.

It was my CHILDREN who put into words the fallacy of that. Mom, you have never voted for a Republican. Mom, you hate what they stand for. WHY are you still an Independent? Folly of YOUTH? More like the folly of AGE.

I was raised similarly to you, in an intensely conservative, religious, southern household. My parents were the first in their families to break into the white collar, upper-middle class world, and I was raised on the principles of work hard or don't be surprised when your life sucks. Admittedly, I have not entirely divested myself of that world view; but I'm working on it.

Sociology and American history courses in college really opened my eyes to the realities of the world, the need for regulation to protect society from the excesses of certain elements. On the other hand, I've had enough economics to believe that capitalism (or a capitalistic mixed market system, really) is probably the best system for making everyone in society wealthier; but it has to be regulated to prevent the working classes from getting screwed. I'd really consider myself more a centrist than a liberal; personally, I admire Bill Clinton's policies very much. Hopefully that doesn't get me kicked out!

called myself independent. But reality was I voted for one repug and have regretted that vote ever since.

but I did register republican as a teen. My father was a Bircher so it was my first bold step away from his beliefs as republicans were almost as bad as democrats in his mind. When I started paying attention it wasn't difficult to recognize where I actually fit in.

I took it down after he resigned.

I was 14 and raised in a Republican household.

So they lost me a long time ago.

I grew up thinking I was a republican. Mind you, I grew up in a very blue collar neighborhood/town. Our govenor was GOP, but very "moderate" by modern standards. And really, the democrats were JUST coming out of their "Dixiecrat" expulsion, and LBJ was pissing everyone off with the WAR. I hated Nixon for being a crook but Ford seemed like a nice enough guy. But my first election was Reagan and he was an idiot. I was more of an Anderson kinda guy. Then the Gipper told me that if I was a "card carrying member" of the ACLU I should "get out of his party", so I did. Never looked back.

Most of my family were consrevative catholics. My mom was always a closet leftist, though. She tried to teach me some liberal perspective to balance out the BS the rest of the family pounded into my head.

Of course, at the time, I thought she was nuts.

Then, when I got to college, I started very slowly to realize just how right she was. About everything.

Remember that old Mart Twain quote?

"When I was 18, I was amazed at how little my Father knew. When I was 30 I was amazed at how much he'd learned."

Similar kind of thing.

to college...

The Libertarian attitude to trade put me off, and after that it was all the way downhill.

I do think someone slipped some shit in my drinks during those years because I agree with almost NOTHING in their platform.

I went to the type of church I now despise - the extreme right wing EV type. They claimed to be open to everyone but would routinely reject gay members, displayed extreme hostility toward women and praised and embraced Falwell types.

I was a part of this until 9/11 and all the crazies like Falwell and Robertson started saying that 9/11 was God's punishment on America were for being a sinful country. Needless to say that was a real eye opener for me. I quickly left the church and never looked back.

I first voted for a Democratic president, which was JFK.

to begin with. Not so easy when the people close to you are all conservatives.

In the vein of Alex P. Keaton, I was President of our high school's Young Republican in 1983 and 1984.




After high school, the realization of precisely how each party platform differed from the other slowly dawned on me, and I happily cast my first Dem vote for Clinton in '92. Which was a bit odd, because at the same time and over the next four years, my roommate was shifting in the opposite direction-- he listened to Limbaugh, I was taking college history classes at night.

Afterward: He became a tea-bagger, a xenophobe, and hates the people/places/demographics that he's told to hate by the tin gods on AM radio. I see him twice a year on the July 4th, and as good as friends as we once were, he's simply not a person I'd want to spend any considerable amount of time with anymore.

My first recollection of anything political was the Kennedy Nixon debates on our black and white TV ... Mom loved Kennedy and Dad hated him ... I took my Mom's lead ... about age 4

I watched as Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV ... age 7

I remember how mean and nasty the Goldwater LBJ election was, with my parents arguing persistently ... From what I understood, the Dems were kind and inclusive, and the Reps were absolute assholes ...

The die was cast and I have never looked back ...

I used to be more fiscally conservative and that part of the GOP appealed to me once before they let the religious crazies take over...There was once a real, honest-to-God effort to get minorities in the GOP before they let the race-baiters take over, too...

I'm not going to change their mind, they're not going to change mine.

So the whole union/non-union thing didn't really apply too much.

Of course, there is the delicious irony of relying on government for your job...

Of course I never intended to make a career out of the military and knew I would eventually be joining the civilian workforce. I just never could see voting against my own best interest.

I was a teenager when Reagan was elected and she (grandma) HATED him. I mean, she HATED him. She would talk about what a crappy actor he was and how stupid he was and how she couldn't believe this country was stupid enough to make him president. She was funny about it too - cracked me up and was absolutely correct!

I came here in 1990 as a centrist Conservative in the UK. I had a vague idea that a big C conservative would likely translate to what the US press called the small c conservative party here - the Republicans.

Took me maybe six weeks of actually reading the news as a resident and talking to others here to disabuse me of that notion. Republicans were in general not so far right as they are now, but they were certainly further to the right than anything but the most embarrassingly weird fringe of the UK Conservatives, and no Democrats with an ounce of influence were, or are, as far left as "old Labour" that I had no time for, so I was aligned with Dems long before the 5 yr citizenship path was done and I could vote.

The UK parties too have shifted rightward/centerward since I left. I suspect now I'd be somewhere around the New Labour/Lib-Dem overlap.

I envy you!

Looking back, I missed out on quite a bit of my youth because of my religious conservative upbringing.

while holding almost exactly the same views which makes me wonder how many Democrats are now conservatives/DINOS (aka Rethugs re-labled with a new ltter next to their names, with the same views).

It isn't even a blame thing because if you would have been to the ideological left of the John Birch Society 30, 40, or 50 years ago what party would you have to go with now? Hell, Ronnie Rayguns is slipping into the borderline, I'm not sure that Nixon can be considered to the right of any prominent, elected TeaPubliKlan, and Ike has long been some form of Democrat be it blue dog or now inching to the left of the center of the caucus.

I guess I'm saying that without really any change in beliefs, someone that would have been a mainstream Republican not so long ago could find the present incarnation of that party completely inhospitable and might find the current form of the Democratic party quite compatible ideologically.

I've been a Democrat since I came out of the womb!

now I know better, I'm 55 yo and am much smarter than I was when I was younger.

i have one great uncle who was a republican, but by the time he died in 1996, he had recovered. voting republican in my african-american means you have lost your gd mind. never have...never will.

Moved left from there and in my first years at college attended DSA meetings. My parents and grandparents walked for civil rights, women's issues and my grandmother was a union organizer.

My mother told me when the elections came around that, "While I respect your opinion you need to back someone who can win". I canvassed for Jackson in the primary and voted Democratic in the general election.

when I attended college in Northern California during the mid to late 1960's. The initials stood for Students for a Democratic Society. At that time, although I claimed to be apolitical, my sense of right and wrong tended to align more with them than with the right wing neo-nazis in Orange County, where I had come from. It has always amazed me how I somehow escaped from behind the Orange Curtain with my mind.

Remembering back, I owe it all to one or two teachers that I had in high school who planted the seeds of enlightened thinking in my mind. And to them I will always be grateful. If any of you are teachers out there, don't ever forget that although it might seem as though all of your hard work is falling upon deaf ears, you are most definitely planting seeds in the minds of your students that may some day sprout and grow.

As you might expect, I did not register to vote immediately when I attained the age of 21. Sometime later when I was ready, it was the Green Party who I chose to align myself with.

It is interesting to me that I have some friends who I have met and correspond with on the internet who live in the Scandinavian countries. They tell me that in Europe, The Green Party is considered to be only slightly to the left of the political middle ground. Imagine that!

Family Ties was big at the time, and I admired the Alex Keaton character. More importantly, I hung out with the rich kids, one of whom had a mother who was the head of the county Republicans, a Jimmy Carter hater, the whole works. This is how I got tickets to the 1984 Reagan/Mondale after-debate Republican party at the Hyatt in Louisville, KY.

I didn't have a political bone in my body to speak of, but I did want acceptance with my rich friends. This is not to say that I went around thinking, "I want acceptance with my rich friends". Rather, it's just something you kind of do when you're in 9th grade. Also of note: my parents have always been Democrats, and at that time, I wanted to rebel against my dad as much as possible. The Republican Party seemed to be the perfect vehicle for this sort of thing.

After the '84 election season, I went back to being a nothing, a student, a kid hanging out. I started nominally calling myself a Democrat again, but this didn't have any real meaning behind it. It wasn't until about 1996 that I became a Democrat, in name and in deed.

So I was never really a Republican. I was worse. I was a poser who wanted to be a Republican.

Oh,yes...I could quote Ayn Rand well.

I then entered the "Real World", and quickly became a Democrat.I have consistently voted for a Democrat since 1982.

n/t

a democrat ever since first being moderate but moving further to the left. My family never really talked about politics around me although my mother was a liberal. They let me make up my own mind and it just so happens that we're all democrats.

Reagan was too much for me. I spread my wings, encountered more diversity and started my road to liberalism. I've never been happier with myself, nor had more self respect, as I do now.

Hated 'em both -- still do to this day.

I see no joy
I see only sorrow
I see no chance of your bright new tomorrow
So stand down, Margaret, stand down please
stand down Margaret.

But didn't really care about politics. I thought Rush Limbaugh was a dumb ass, and didn't really care about politics. 2008 was the first election I could vote in.

Remember walking the picket lines with my father as a child.Was always taught that the Rep's were out for the rich and the Dem's were for everyone else.

...but I did used to be an idiot. I was a low info voter who voted for Reagan in my first ever presidential election.

I got better quick. The next election (California Governor) I voted for Tom Bradley (lost to Deukmajian), and I've voted straight Dem ever since.

I remember how heartbroken my mom was when I told her I voted for Reagan my sophmore year in college. She was like "you come from a long line of Democrats." I didn't understand her anguish then but I sure do now.


But I was never conservative. I remember distincly, two years later, arguing politcs (as little as I understood then) with my pro-GHWB anti-union friend. He had me so mad I wanted to smash an Illini Inn beer mug over his head (my friend is an all out pinko too now)

Always been a democrat, always will be.

Read some Trotsky in a Russian History class when I was 19 or so and I've considered myself a Bolshevik-Leninist ever since.

Last edited Tue Feb 28, 2012, 08:38 PM - Edit history (1)

If you do, stick around and learn a few things.

If your post is still here after being alerted on (which I am sure it is), I will happily answer you.

"I wish that the people who didn't want to pay taxes didn't have to and the people who wanted to pay taxes had to. That way everybody would be happy. What % of the people would be on the " don't want to pay taxes side" ?"

If you don't want to pay taxes, then you should be prepared to forgo everything -- and I do mean everything -- that taxes pay for. That means no riding on the roads and highways systems for you. No emergency services, no national park visits. Turn off Elmo, don't even think about getting medical treatment using that drug discovered through research funded by the government. No hurricane or tornado warnings for you, no flood insurance, and certainly no help if you should be struck by a disaster -- be it natural or man made. I personally like all the things that go with paying taxes and I am very happy to pay modest taxes, and so should you. I don't want to live in a Third World country, which is what a country without sufficient tax support looks like.

"What did Rush Limbaugh lie about that made him a BS'er in your eyes? And what was twisted?"

There are entire websites devoted to debunking what Mr. Limbaugh says. Over the years he has been proven to be factually inaccurate on more occassions than I can count -- facts are neither liberal or conservative, simply true or untrue. I do not agree with his conservative opinions, but he is entitled to them -- on the other hand he is not entitled to his own facts. Go here for a lengthy and accurate examination of untruths Rush has pushed. http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1895

"Michael Savage has a book out called " liberalism is a mental disorder ". If you can't come up with sensible replies of what I asked, without lieing or wrongful facts, then I would think you are one of those mentally disordered people"

Michael Savage should look in the mirror. Seriously, what expertise does Michael Savage have to proclaim liberalism a "mental disorder"? Is he a licensed doctor? Medical researcher? Or is he simply a media pundit trying to make some bucks?

"I am willing to listen but this question I ask seems to stump liberals. You should have a reason for not liking something. I am a conservative and I have nothing against the poor, minorities, homos, and lower-middle class so I know that you don't know what you are talking about. See if you can answer my questions I proposed and see if you can reframe from name calling."

Well, you could perhaps make your case better by not calling gay and lesbian Americans "homos". Now who is calling names?

I find that, with folks like you, we liberals can provide you with many, many reasoned and reasonable answers to your questions, but you aren't really interested in the answers, especially if it does not fit in with your world view.

As for reasons for not liking something, I will share my very specific reasons on two things you've mentioned. Conservative viewpoints are one thing, I have no problems listening to and reflecting on solid conservative thought, but that is not what the likes of Rush and Savage do. I do not like Rush and Savage because they too often demonize our fellow Americans. They attempt to divide us along race, gender, religion, and sexual identity in ways that do not do our country good. They feed the worst in us, they feed our ugliest, nastiest fears. And they too often do it with lies and half-truths.

...and thank you for saying it succinctly and to the point.

There was so much wrong with that post that I couldn't even begin to collect my thoughts for a response.

The MIRT team is on the case!!!

I wanted to answer because I know that non-Democrats read DU and wanted to give them something to contemplate.

Duh. Try reading the terms of service next time or a quick glance in the forum will tell you we don't want right wingers here. Maybe because trying to debate them is hopeless, they usually don't bring anything to the table that isn't a regurgitation of Rush and that crowd, and those arguments are about as sophisticated as a 5 year olds.

Bye, and good riddance.

Two posts and the douche can't spell in either one.

Both were rather political and were union folks. Just different backgrounds. I say 'was' for my mum, because she voted for Obama. But then my dad did vote for Bush II for the second term (only Repub vote he ever did in his life). My mum is on her Obama bash but will vote for Obama. My dad passed away but he would have voted for Obama. I wish he was alive for that...

I had 5 year period where I was pro life and very far right religious in my early 20's, thank god I woke up from that and came back to reality!

i was born in 1955 to a republican mother and a democratic father. one early memory i have is of wanting JFK to win in 1960. i believe that i am a born bleeding heart liberal. the older i get the further to the left i go.

I guess I could call myself a conservative; I wasn't old enough to vote, and was never in any kind of Republican organization. But my father, his parents, his brother and sister-in-law, and my adult first cousins were all Republicans. My mother's mother was a Dem (ULTRA conservative). I was brought up to hate, fear, and consider purely criminal anyone who was a Dem. I was convinced a Mondale presidency meant sure nuclear war. I thought Reagan was a great man. I was taught to believe that Jimmy Carter had nearly destroyed the US, single-handedly.

Then I had to take Civics (called "Liberty and the Law" in my district. My teacher was unbiased, and just taught the facts. Reading about what politicians actually STOOD FOR for the first time was eye-opening. That was fall 1990. By the time the 1992 election happened, I was in college, and a Democrat. I never looked back.

My mother's family were all Republicans, but I'm talking old time Wendell Willke presbyterian Republicans. My father was more populist, but he was a business man/ farmer and was far more utilitarian (and cynical) when it came to politics and usually judged politicians based on what he thought they could do for him. So I grew up sort of marginally self identified as a republican, but once I got old enough to actually pay attention I've always taken the liberal side of things. That's just what always made sense to me. I attribute that to two things: 1. I'm not a sociopath and 2. Alan Alda. M*A*S*H was my favorite show growing up in the 70's so I grew up wanting to be Hawkeye, a guy who hated war and prejudice and challenged authority and drank too much. I generally succeeded.

but I freaking DESPISED Reagan from the minute I first became aware of who he was and what he stood for. I was an instant liberal at 14, and cast my first presidential vote for Mondale in 1984.

I voted for a Republican once, in a Washington DC mayoral race. The woman running against Marion Barry would have been considered a liberal Democrat in any other city/situation.

Can't say that I'm disappointed.

Never. Ever. No way. No How.

My father was, though.

My mother wasn't.

They divorced.

Yep, "youthful indiscretion" (I was 18 at the time). Other than that, which is a lot like asking
"Other than that, Mrs Lincoln, how was the play?", I've been a dyed in the wool liberal.

And will be till I'm planted.

Once I broke away from that, once I came out of the closet, I learned to be true to myself.

most of my friends where I grew up are still Republicans by default. I went to two conservative schools. Yet I think I was more influenced my Kennedy loving grandparents. I have always been independent. Reagan made me ill. I would occasional vote moderate rethug in my younger days. Now I can't find one to vote for in that party. I seem to get more liberal as I get older. The positive of growing up in conservative surroundings, is I know way too many Republican campaign managers. I know how fake their campaigns are and what they think of the average voter. Why would I vote for a party that I know personally has no respect for me at all?

although I'll admit to voting for Gerald Ford in 1976, mainly because I really liked Betty. My dad was a strong Democrat and my mom was a moderate Republican but peace, justice and compassion were important to both of them, so that's what I was raised with.

I'm not a party purist. At different times I have voted for Republicans, Democrats, Greens and Independents.

I was never a hard line conservative and despite a Christian upbringing my politics were always secular. Back then, the whole neocon bill of goods made sense, since I was too young to judge it against anything else I've actually seen and lived. It was cool ( or so I thought then ) to be a Tom Clancy reading, flag waving, rugged individualist USA! USA! dittohead. Somewhere around the early 90's I began to see what bullshit it all was, though Bill Clinton's corporatism and rabid support for globalism sure didn't help.

Oh well, what does it all matter just how: The point is, I've arrived.

I would have been considered an "Irish Catholic" Boston Democrat from birth. Only it was Irish/English/Scottish, and I hated Catholicism because I hated an awful lot of nuns.

I even grew up in Brookline, MA, home of JFK and the rest of the Kennedy clan, and besides, my grandmother WAS a Kennedy (though probably quite some distance from the OTHER Kennedys). If someone could become a Repug with that kind of background, I'd be impressed.

All of us got fed-up when Raygun got control of the party and we all ended up becoming Democrats.

but I never voted for a Republican, and didn't even really think about what that meant.

from about 16, when I got my first job and had to join the union, had no idea what it was all about, or what it was for. I worked in a grocery store butcher shop and all I know is I came home every night with soggy boots for 3.18 an hour. Got fired for eating a deli sandwhich on the clock, at 16, union rep said there was nothing he could do, made me write a resignation statement and that was that. Went to the other grocery store less than a mile away, got hired, no union, was paid a little better and got a better position, produce night clerk! Over the course of many years, many jobs, military service, college, working for my dad, more college, more jobs I ditched the communism and found myself moving to the right, the center to both extreme right and extreme left. A workers world, utopian idealists, pipe dreams, human nature is the only reality.

and then you found how bad those unions were and got a better job at a non-union store.

grandfather and uncle worked at a tire factory BEFORE the union. The work was hard and hazardous-both died of cancer. Since unions have become out of style since raygun-safety in mining has gone down. The so-called "right to work" states, sounds like some rights for workers; yet, it's more rights for corporations to do away with pensions, benefits and pay shitty wages; and in some cases long hours.

I'm glad you found a non-union decent job; but, don't give me the shite about the unions. It's because of the unions that you probably got a decent wage (or you got lucky by having a boss with better business ethics than some corporations today). Because, while many big corporations have seen an increase (some up to 80 percent profit), they still find more ways to screw their workers and attempt to get even more out of the worker without paying a LIVING wage. All because of labor unions going from 31% to under 10% membership. Oh, but y'all need to fear the unions--oooh, yep it's those unions keeping you from getting one of those deregulated, slave wage jobs!!!!

My german great grandfather was a democratic socialist and loathed hitler! My grandfather and most of my family are pro-union, pro-labor. my family are democrats, except for one black sheep uncle who listens to the likes of limpballs and beck. Of course, he's also the uncle who would screw his family for a buck and has done so.

Mom, Dad, older sister and brother.

Early on I followed the family's lead in terms of beliefs but I was the first one in the family to really take an academic interest in politics. I really wanted to be some kind of political or foreign policy advisor. In early high school i read a book about the dakota native american cheif Crazy Horse which would have been a perfect springboard to introduce me to progressive ideas. But a freak encounter of my young impressionable mind with Ayn Rand sidetrack my progress and sent me on a little detour for awhile. It was during the Clinton administration as I watched and heard how the conservative establishment treated both Bill and Hillary that my eyes started to open to the ugliness of the movement, as a "student of objectivism", I partially was allied with. I knew there was something wrong with the way they were talking about the Clinton's. It was really ugly and I didn't like it. And when the Lewinski story broke I flipped out and called total bs on the republicans and Ken Starr. Ugly. Disgusting. Over the 2000 election campaign I had epiphany after epiphany until by the time Bush Jr. was about to be nominated, who i immediately thought was an idiot and refused to vote for, I was hurtling end over end toward Liberalism like a comet. It was a painful detour but through it all I never forgot or let go of the things I learned about greed and war and the kind of personalities that manifest such behaviors from that book on Crazy Horse's life. In a way, I think it primed me to end up a liberal progressive and gave me just enough of a right wing bullshit detector to eventually free myself from its illusions. I'm so far left now I have no objections to the political requests of any group except the groups intolerant of others, which always seem to exist on the right.

A portrait of FDR hung in my parent's house, and from my earliest days I was told that I owed my good life to him.
My parents drilled into me that the Republicans were the Party of MILLIONAIRES (1950 dollars) and BIG Corporations,
and anybody who Worked for a Living and voted for the Republicans was an idiot.

The portrait of FDR was joined by a portrait of JFK after his assassination.

THESE are the traditional Democratic party Values with which I was raised:

It is a significant change in ideology to go from Rethug to liberal democrat. I don't imagine too many people to be capable of such a drastic change.

in the rethug party. If you did not do it that way you had no say.