Long ago, when I was a mushy headed moderate, I studied conservatism and liberalism to try to figure out what the best philosophy was for my life and for my country. After doing that, I became a conservative because...

* I don't think some politician in Washington who has never held a job outside of politics in his entire life, has a better handle on what to do with my money than I do.

* I don't resent wealthy people. To the contrary, I want to become one of them one day.

* Government policies should be based on whether they work or not and whether they are constitutional, not on whether they make the people advocating them feel "nice" or "mean."

* "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings." In other words, I'm not a victim, you're not a victim, and 99 times out of a hundred, the person on TV screaming about how he's a victim, isn't a victim either. If you're not happy with your life, it's your responsibility to fix it, not the government's responsibility.

* I don't get upset that the federal government "doesn't care about me." In fact, I'd be pleased if it forgets that I exist.

* Human beings are inherently superior to animals. That doesn't mean we should mistreat them or take them for granted, but it does mean that what's good for humankind is more important than what's good for animals.

* I am a citizen of the United States, not a citizen of the world. As such, my loyalty will always belong to this country and its people, not to any other nation, group of nations, or any sort of world governing body.

* I believe women and men are different, should be treated differently, and are not interchangeable. There are jobs women tend to be better at than men and vice-versa. There are ways a man behaves that women shouldn't behave in and vice-versa.

* There are no fantastic new programs left for the federal government to implement.

* It isn't the job of the federal government to make us successful; it's the job of the federal government to create an environment that allows us to make ourselves successful.

* I believe that citizens of the United States have more to be proud of than the people of other countries and that every one of us should cherish this country and should thank God that we've been given the privilege of being part of such a great nation.

* The market and private industry almost always do a better job of allocating resources than the federal government could ever hope to do.

* Morals do matter. "If America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great." If that ever happens, it would be a tragedy not just for us and our children, but for the whole world.

* "Out of every hundred new ideas ninety-nine or more will probably be inferior to the traditional responses which they propose to replace. No one man, however brilliant or well-informed, can come in one lifetime to such fullness of understanding as to safely judge and dismiss the customs or institutions of his society, for those are the wisdom of generations after centuries of experiment in the laboratory of history."

* People of all races should be treated equally and any laws, whether we're talking about Jim Crow laws or Affirmative Action, that do otherwise are immoral, unconstitutional, and un-American. Continued...