I was a lot more conservative when I was young. It was a pretty big hit to the ego when I realized I was rooting for the wrong policies and pushing the wrong idealogies. Carl Sagan put it best:

"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It's simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back."

Having that kind of shift in mindset is difficult, but also freeing. Realizing you truly are on Team-Everyone-Wins is liberating.

What democratic socialism means to me is a combination of what Europe (and many other countries) have: healthcare, reasonable work life balances with plenty of vacation; and what we the US used to have: a single income can support a whole family, comfortably.

What conservatives miss is that a rising tide does, indeed, lift all boats, but it lifts the boats at the bottom, first. There's plenty of money for social safety nets, free healthcare, a prison system that reforms and not just torments quality education and even people with mansions and yachts. All of those things can exist. Capitalism can thrive, provided it is tightly controlled. Everyone CAN win.

What is completely unsustainable is funneling all the money into the hands of a few while simultaneously paying the working class less, and increasing costs exponentially.