I am sorry for my hostile responses.
Re true life experiences: For all intents and purposes, I know the guy that hit you. I went to a blue collar junior high school shortly after forced busing began. The African-American kids bussed in were outnumbered, angry and aggressive, and they loved to pick on small, bespectacled, straight-A white boys like me. I was insulted, pushed, punched - one guy threw a steel "cake-cutter" comb at me for fun which put a nice gash in my back. In 9th grade, I decided it was time to do something about it, only I didn't take the Conservative path and buy or steal a gun for protection; I learned boxing from a guy at my church. I simply got the hell beat out of me until I learned to punch back. For the next several years, I walked around with a chip on my shoulder, trying to prove to whites, blacks and anyone else how tough I was. Once I stopped being afraid, the confrontations ended very differently. But I also started to look more closely at the African-American assholes who had picked on me earlier, and I realized they were a lot like me - angry and scared, only they lived in the Central district in shacks, and many didn't have fathers around, and most wouldn't have the opportunities I had to grow out of their stupid behavior and grow into success.
Meanwhile, I had my grandfather to inspire me. Born in 1900 as a result of a union between a maid and a member of the family that began IBM (and employed her), he was a brilliant man who was passed from relative to relative. He had no funds and no hope of going to college, but he was strong and personable enough to be chosen as a foreman in a Weyerhaeuser logging camp during the Depression for 25 cents per day (no, that's not a typo). When his men went on strike, he insisted on striking with them. His boss offered him a promotion if he came to work; he turned it down and was fired. When his boss asked him why he did it, he told him, "Because I don't want to have to look down for the rest of my life when I pass a working man on the street." He helped form and then led a lumber union for many years. Back then, he often had to come to work with a baseball bat or rifle (NRA types take note), because corporations routinely hired "strike breakers," small armies of thugs with clubs who enforced the raw capitalism of the day (by the way, Grandpa couldn't stand communists and refused to align his union with anyone who was too far left).
I have a picture of my grandfather, the unwanted, uneducated boy, shaking hands with US senators. Because of his battles and determination, many loggers and others in the building trades have living wages and medical and pension plans where there were none before. It had nothing whatsoever to do with conservative, visionary CEO's who wanted to take care of their workers because competitive wages would keep the workforce more loyal; those CEO's were busy screaming "Commie" at my grandfather and hiring gangs to try to intimidate his men.
And this is where I often have a problem with Conservative thought - it often stops at the theoretical level and ignores the complexities of real life. Since my undergrad degree was economics, I know all about Adam Smith and how "unions are unnecessary because the Free Market will adjust wages to the marginal level at which people are willing to work," yada, yada. And there is much truth in that theoretical model. But it's not enough. Because in the real world, people can and do manipulate the free market conditions, and information is skewed, and economics can give one group an advantage over another, etc. And the recognition of those imperfections and the attempt to balance them is one of the principles of true Liberalism. Change occurred for my grandfather's workers because of something outside of the Conservative, economic model: there was a balance of power between the moneyed management team and the united workers, and the struggles between them created the improved working conditions we see today. There is no "Liberal lie" here, in fact, this is the opposite: it's an attempt to move beyond mere theory and incorporate everyday reality into the picture, the type of reality that hits one in the face, just as that idiot hit you. Adam Smith's "Invisible Hand" did not help my grandfater, the Visible Hand did, the one wrapped in a fist around a baseball bat, not to deny Capitalism, but to make it fairer. That's old-fashioned, tough, honest, Liberalism.
The same thing applies to the welfare state; Conservative theory does not always encompass the real world problems. The Conservative says, "I am against Federal Aid to the poor, not because I want the poor to suffer, but because I don't want to foster dependence by allowing people to become lazy by taking advantage of the system." But what if there is a faulty premise? There was a huge study done about 10 years ago (it was either done by the Census Bureau or the Dept of Commerce - I would encourage you to seek it out, because the results were very conclusive) on the habits of welfare recipients. The results were stunning, for many: 60% of all US welfare recipients went off welfare permanently within one year, 80% went off permanently within two years. Conservative theory addresses the chronic abuser, and rightly so, but that group makes up only 20% of the welfare population. And we Liberals are much more concerned about 80% who legitimately need help than 20% who don't.
I volunteer at a school for homeless kids in my city. It is a public program with some private elements, that sends school buses to homeless shelters to bring in the kids there and provide them with an almost normal learning environment (and a few extra meals). Over the years, I have made friends with many of those kids, and brought a few home to play with my kids. In many cases, their parents are screwups and undeserving bums. But those kids had nothing at all to do with the conditions they find themselves in, and if not for Federal and State programs, many would starve to death. Period. Charities are great, but there aren't enough of them, and people (even well-intentioned people like you and I) don't give enough to them to handle more than a fraction of the need there. Without free health care, financed by us taxpayers, many of these kids could not go to the doctor to get treated for the cuts and bruises they earn from the "stepfathers" that their mothers bring into their lives. That's not "The Way Things Ought To Be", that's welfare in the real world, Hugh. Currently there's a kid named Joshua who has been trying to learn from me how to dribble a basketball. There's a problem: he's not only fatherless, and in a shelter, he's also scrawny and somewhat disabled. But he tries very hard for me, and I praise him and try not to cry.
And then I hear quotes from alleged spokesmen on the Right such as, "The poor are the biggest piglets sucking at the Federal teat." And I admit, I start to feel a bit hostile. If that lying, draft-dodging sissy Limbaugh ever wants to repeat his quote in front of me, I'll take a chance on a lawsuit just to shut him up for a moment. For Joshua. You have the right, in this great country of ours, to disagree with my conclusions. But there's nothing dishonest here. I'm seeking the truth, especially the uncomfortable truths that people don't want to see.