Liberals believe in Limited Government ... wait, it's not the 17th century, is it?

Liberalism (from the Latin liberalis, "of freedom") is the belief in the importance of individual liberty.

So, liberals support individual liberty in the face of monarchies ...the original incarnation of liberal philosophy dates back to the time of John Locke (the guy that Jefferson ripped off with his whole “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” thing).But, as we will prove, time changes all definitions. By the beginning of the 20th century, political liberalism had become the norm throughout the West, and economic liberalism had resulted in a vast concentration of wealth, with the majority of mankind living, as it always had, in a state of poverty. The economic world was shaken by a series of depressions. Freedom, which in the past had been threatened by autocratic governments, was now threatened by the despotism of the rich. Enter communists stage left ... to which the “liberal” response was to compromise, to use government to raise the poor out of the muck that made communism look so popular in the first place. And that takes us to the present day, where liberals support the “level playing field” concept at the expense of individual liberty.

Libertarianism is a political theory that advocates the maximization of individual liberty in thought and action.

The history of this one is much cloudier than “liberalism”, but there are libertarians that support anarchy, free market capitalism, socialism ... you name it. The term appears later than liberalism and I think, was created in response to the changing definition of liberalism. The people who believed in personal liberty had to find a new word to describe themselves because their original term got hijacked. And then this one got hijacked too. There is a faction of the libertarian movement that does not believe in private property ... there might even be a faction that does not believe in individual liberty ... but I have no proof of that.

Individualism - the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, or social outlook that stresses "the moral worth of the individual. Individualists promote the exercise of one's goals and desires and so independence and self-reliance while opposing most external interference upon one's own interests, whether by society, or by any other group or institution.

I think that eventually the “tea party” people are going to grab hold of this one, they will name themselves the individualists, not because it is the best word to describe their beliefs, but because in fact they are Liberals whose name was stolen by their adversaries a few generations ago.

The idea behind all this is that, although often renamed, the belief that government’s role is to protect people’s God given rights (life, liberty, property) and little else, refuses to die. There have always been people who believed in the individual’s right to self determine and the individual’s responsibility to society. This doctrine requires two basic beliefs, God created us all (otherwise there are no universal rights) and that people will make altruistic choices without being forced to (otherwise individual liberty would be utter chaos). So, I guess I’m a Liberal, and a Libertarian ... I just don’t agree with anyone else who is a “liberal” or a “libertarian”. Definitions are fun. Can you re-hijack a word? I’d like to get Marxist and Communist back too if we’re going there. In my utopia, Liberals believe in individual liberty above all else, Marxists believe in a gradual change in the global economic system that ends with workers owning the means of production, Communists believe in small communities of people working together for the good of the group without a structured government and Anarchists wouldn’t throw bricks through store front windows ... hooray future!