I am writing this article for those who would describe themselves as conservative on JoeUser. While you are in the majority here and in the US government, your opinions are often shouted down in the mainstream media and in the world.

Many conservatives are quick to cry that they are victims; that the attacks on their ideologies are unmerited and personal, when nothing could be further from the truth. And yet I, a former leftist, have not been able to find a home among the conservative camp in America.

The ideals you claim are noble: fiscal responsibility and smaller government. Yet, with a majority in both houses of Congress and the Presidency, you've succeeded in INCREASING federal control under tha mask of "accountability", and removing rights from the states, in direct defiance of the Constitution you've sworn to uphold. You've created a potential disaster in No Child Left Behind, and driven many good, responsible teachers with established careers out of education entirely and into other sectors of employment because of the way these goals have been implemented. You've exploited the tragedy that shocked all America on September 11, 2001 to advance initiatives that could potentially effect the implied right to privacy of all Americans, which is not stated outright in the US Constitution, but heavily implied in the first, fourth, fifth and sixth amendments. In 1994, you created a Contract with America that garnered intense popular support, and just as quickly, many of your legislators broke it. You have proven yourselves to be anything BUT fiscally responsible in awarding contracts, tax incentives, and other considerations to big businesses. And while you've preached moral responsibility, too many of your politicians have been caught either with their hands in the cookie jar or at least standing very close to that cookie jar.

You mock and ridicule the left without giving due consideration to what they have to say. Many of the left have good ideas about the nature of problems in our country, even if they're not perfectly in line with the right solutions. I believe that with your understanding of economics, and their understanding of the social problems throughout the nation and the world, we can achieve practical, viable solutions to make a better nation.

This country was BUILT on compromise; politics only works when we are willing to sit down and have open discourse with our opponents. And we can't have that kind of discourse when we wholly disrespect our opponent's  point of view. Many off you think of yourselves as the "bigger man"; let's try to act like it and discuss workable solutions to our mutual problems.