To a Right Winger, "Liberty" means the freedom to drive a Hummer in a petroleum-starved world, the freedom to declare themselves superior to all other races on the planet, shove all their messes and mistakes off on poor people, and invade other people’s countries, willy-nilly, on a bunch of cooked intelligence and a half-witted president’s whim, and declare that it’s for our "safety". And apparently it also means that said half-wit boy-king can do whatever he likes with regard to your privacy, even if that means destroying liberty in order to "save" it.

For you and me, "Liberty" means what it’s supposed to. Freedom to lead our own lives without being spied upon illegally, for instance. It means the right to adequate health care. It means the freedom to go to good schools, work hard, stay out of trouble and maybe one day make something of ourselves, regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or socioeconimic background. It means the government can’t interfere with our lives, tell us when to bear children, when to marry and not marry, or otherwise try to direct our choices, for good or ill, based on someone else’s backwards, superstitious, outdated ideological framework.

TRex @ Firedoglake