In many cases, you are correct, in others, allegedly conservative social policy means the expansion of government (i.e. law enforcement/surveillance) power over citizens. One glaring counterexample, is the War on Drugs, which many (not all, but many) Republicans continue to support in the name of social conservatism and morality. You would think that advocates of limited government and constitutional liberties would see the WoD for the huge waste of resources and frequent violation of personal liberties that it is.
Now, you can argue that as long as the rest of us have to foot the bill for other people's healthcare, it makes sense to outlaw illicit drugs. The same argument could be applied to sugary snacks, cigarettes, and alcohol, the regulation of which most conservatives by the likes of Bloomberg (rightly) oppose. A much more sound and consistent argument should be made for a war against Medicaid and socialized medicine, instead of the current misguided and unwinnable criminalization of illicit drugs.
The same argument could be applied to sugary snacks, cigarettes, and alcohol, the regulation of which by the likes of Bloomberg most conservatives (rightly) oppose.
In my opinion, the legitimate premise underlying the war on drugs, and on what basis the federal government has built it's war on drugs empire upon, is maintaining social order.
Some argue that maintaining social order is irrelevant, others like myself argue that maintaining social order is what make society civil.
Looking at the social order issue I see a great divide between Libertarians (Social Anarchy) & Conservatives (Social Order) that entails on the one hand Libertarians promoting and celebrating federal government imposed social disorder/social anarchy and on the other hand Conservatives seeking to get federal government out of the business of defining social order and simply in the business of enforcing it WHILE at the same time NOT encroaching upon or violating individual unalienable rights