Forgive me if this is a silly question, but when you say "liberal" what exactly do you mean?
"Liberals" in the U.S. are the political left. "Conservatives" are the political right.
There's a saying: "Liberals believe good government produces good people; Conservatives believe good people produce good government."
It's a little corny, but does capture a little of the ideological divide between the two groups.
Liberals tend to favor collective rights over individual rights. Conservatives tend to favor individual rights over collective rights.
Liberals tend to favor larger government and more social programs.
Conservatives tend to favor smaller government and fewer social programs
Personally, I think the truth is somewhere in the middle, which tends to anger both sides.
Libertarians, despite the name, are not liberal. They are an offshoot of conservatism who hold individual rights as paramount. The want the government to stay the hell out of everybody's life
Both sides have their fringe groups. Radical environmentalism is mostly a liberal movement. The Christian Right is mostly a conservative movement.
Both Liberals and Conservatives characterize each other by their fringe elements, so arguments tend to be about extreme positions that aren't completely accepted by everyone even within their respective groups.
There's whole books on the subject, so none of us can do much more than scratch the surface here.
