The difference between Europe and America is that there IS such a thing as a French ethnicity, a German ethnicity, an Italian ethnicity, so that the encroaching pluralism of those countries in the form of increased immigration is seen as a threat to the country's identity, which in turn explains the increased shift to the "right" (which is still, as nerdnam points out, still pretty liberal by US standards.) A good 40% or so of Americans feel that there is such a thing as an American ethnicity and feel similarly about immigrants; what they seem to forget is that in America we're all immigrants and that the whole point of this country was to escape the oppressive tribalism of other countries.

Okay, that's an oversimplification. Actually, the Europeans who settled America in the 17th and 18th centuries fell into two main groups: those who wanted to flee opression and breathe free and those who wanted to create an even more oppressive society than the ones they left (like the Calvinists.) Even though the former group won out in the sense of creating a government based on Enlightenment principles, the latter group has always had tremendous power and influence. I freely admit that it's complicated; a lot of the same religious fanatics who were most opposed to freedom of expression and the rights of women, for example, were also some of the most vocal opponents of slavery, militarism and capital punishment. America is a big schizophrenic mess, but that doesn't really negate my argument.

In fact, argument is the whole point here. Democracy is supposed to be messy; no one gets everything they want; it's a constant difficult conversation. The reason liberals seem so wishy-washy is that they get that politicians are elected to serve, not dictate. You thought Bush was sexy because he was always so sure of himself. Having the power of your convictions is not itself a virtue, especially if you happen to be wrong 90% of the time. The Republicans freely admitted they weren't dealing with reality; they were acting out of their philosophies and convictions, which only apply to a small percent of the population. Liberalism isn't a coherent philosophy, and it's not trying to be one. We don't need or want to govern a country with a philosophy; we want to respond to the needs of the people through the mechanisms of the Constitution and the workings of government institutions. Conservatives would rather see the government fail and their philosophies remain pure. Meanwhile, a bunch of people died in New Orleans that didn't have to. I say again, Conservatism is wrong.