From The New Republic’s That Which Must Not Be Said: “When the National Election Study asks Americans to categorize their political views, they’re much more likely to call themselves conservative than liberal, and have been for decades. Americans say this even though, when Pew asks Americans to say where they stand on individual policies or attitudes, they sound not only more liberal than conservative, but also more liberal than the median elected Democrat. But the term ‘liberal’ is so tainted by various slanders and misrepresentations, even people who support government assistance to the poor and federal funding for health care, who back civil liberties and think gays ought to be able to get on with the business of their own lives, and who are more likely to call themselves Democrat than Republican, are unlikely to call themselves liberal.”