The genius of teaching the educated professional class to be “socially liberal, economically conservative” for the last 20 years was that the economically conservative part came for free during the Great Boom from 1983-2007. When the economy looked good forever and everyone's 401(k) was increasing, the professional class could easily be persuaded to look down on -- and actually fear! -- the bigoted Religious Right and vote for Democrats. Candidate Obama's remark about bitter clingers captured the meme perfectly.

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“Socially liberal, economically conservative” was always a scam recognizable by anyone with a 50 IQ.

The social decay embodied in the first part was, is and always will be a dagger in the heart of the second part.