Liberal: "...tolerant of views differing from one's own; broadminded; favoring reform or progress, as in religion, education, etc.; specif. favoring political reforms tending toward democracy and personal freedom for the individual; progressive;..." Webster's New World College Dictionary, 3rd Edition, c.1996 {and earlier}.

That word gets thrown around a lot by people, but this is the real definition. Sounds good to me.

BTW, "conservative" is often used as though it meant gun-toting Fascist, with a barefoot and pregnant wife back in the kitchen and who last had an original thought about the time of the Teapot Dome Scandal. The same sourse defines conservative as "...tending to preserve established traditions or institutions and to resist or oppose and changes in these; moderate, cautious, safe..." That mostly sounds OK too, doesn't it?