> Answer - I firmly believe that making laws about moral issues is not going to change people's minds, or, in many cases, their lives.

This is not my own reasoning, though I understand yours. My interest is not at all in making people adopt a certain set of morals; my concern is with what our government, as a unit, adopts to represent the country as a whole. Given that I believe abortion is no different from murder, I refuse to use my vote and cast it in a way that would further a government that sanctions it. Some will have abortions anyway; that isn't really the point.

With regard to social issues, it is true that Democrats are typically more active about these sorts of things; on the Republican side, it depends on the individual person. The view I side with is that it's that, yes, they're important; no, the government doesn't have any business getting involved in many of these things. Of course it depends on the specific issue at hand; for some, the government *is* the right entity to be involved; for others (for example, social security -- huh? -- what does mandatorily enforcing participation in an inefficient retirement savings plan have ANYTHING to do with governing the country? This should be left up to the private sector; they're currently doing a far better [read: actually functional] job of providing retirement savings plans anyway), it just makes things worse if they don't keep their noses out. Because anything the government gets its hands in is an infringement of personal freedoms, it is important, I think, to make sure they stick to just the things they should be doing, particularly on the federal level.

So that's an elaboration of my own thinking. I do understand and respect yours, and appreciate the difference in your background from mine that led you to it.