@JLeslie – you probably already know where I am on the political scale and where I stand on most of these issues. The idea that the US is center right is based on a comparison between other countries. In much of Europe, what is considered to be “conservative” would be more liberal than some of our most liberal politicians. That’s the essence of what it means.
There’s a test somewhere on line that shows political views on two axes, the left right axis is the communism on the far left and capitalism on the far right, and the up down axis is authoritarianism on the top and anarchism on the bottom. Centrist would be half way between on both of these scales, but we look at the enitre spectrum of Democrats and Republicans in this country, and they all end up towards the center of the upper right quadrant…more capitalist, less about sharing the wealth, and more about rules, less about social freedoms. So even our most liberal elected leaders when you measure based on pure ideology are more into allowing the market forces to decide on economics and less about equalization via government means, and are more about controlling what we do socially than they are about letting people make their own decisions. When you look at where American leaders of the past fall (all in a very limited space towards the center of the upper right quadrant), and where political leaders in other countries fall, we’re basically a center-right country ideologically…our range of political though from the most liberal to the most conservative is still in terms of pure definition of liberalism/conservatism, is to the right of center.