teaching political ideologies

Here's how I tend to teach the definitions of liberal vs. conservative (as prep for showing Bowling for Columbine).   I teach a simple, basic system: liberals focus on the future and bringing about change to old crap, and conservatives focus on the past and not wrecking or disrespecting that good old stuff that we have the honour of protecting and maintaining. Manson focusses on being a free individual, and Heston refers to "the country that a bunch of dead white guys invented." The fact that Heston died last weekend added an extra note of interest to it. I feel good about presenting the film as something I agree with, with the proviso that Moore is absolutely up to propaganda and oversimplification, and I pointed out what facile connections he was asking us to draw, and left it up to them if they felt these were fair connections to claim the existance of. The typical textbook stuff always presents liberal views as "in the middle" or "moderate" while it presents conservative views as "right-wing." I presented the idea that everyone thinks his or her views are moderate and perfectly reasonable, while everyone else's need special labels, evidence and consideration.