>Let's extract the political definitions from Websters, which is the gold standard for American English.
>
>http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/liberalism
>"a political philosophy based on belief in progress, the essential goodness of the human race, and the autonomy of the individual and standing for the protection of political and civil liberties"

Interesting - the above is closer to the definition of a libertarian than other political party. I think most Americans (if you remove any label) would consider themselves to fall into this category regardless of their voting history or political party affiliation.