Because social conservatives want "Big Government" to prevent abortion and "mercy killing."
I ain't buyin' it. Abortion and assisted suicide were illegal way back in those very, very small government days.
If you and Armey want to take the libertarian side of those arguments, fine, but don't accuse those who disagree of being "big government" types, because we're not.
There are only a few instances of this. Armey is right about Schiavo. That did not belong in congress. Florida made its decision, a bad decision, but that was Florida's mistake to make.
The principal position of evangelicals about abortion is that the federal gvt (by way of the federal courts) should be out of the abortion issue. And I know a lot of political evangelicals. That's a small gvt constitutional position.
On homosexual marriage, the marriage amendment is proposed because the federal constitution, thru the full faith and credit clause, will eventually require mississippi to recognize massasachussets homosexual marriages. That is a principled response to a glitch in the constitutional structure that turns out to be deeply inconsistent with any notion of federalism.
TJ, there are a few social conservatives who are not small government conservatives. But I would wager that, if you took the moderate R's and counted the percentage of them that would expand federal power and compared that with the percentage of social conservatives that would expand federal power, you would find at least double the percentage amongst the moderates.
You are fishing in the wrong tank for small government conservatives. The real problem is, if you line up everyone who is in favor of smaller government, it's way less than 50% of the population--at most 35-40%. So real conservatives are always a minority. But you publically blame the inevitable results of that minority position on evangelicals. And, overwhelmingly, the accusation is just wrong.
Not wise politics. Not wise at all.