Outspoken firebrand conservative Ann Coulter versus outspoken firebrand libertarian John Stossel? …I love it. It’s like the two dueling voices of my innermost moral-political psyche having it out with verbal fisticuffs in an ideological boxing match.

My instincts tend to lean pretty libertarian on a lot of things (with a huge, resounding exception when it comes to foreign policy and security issues), and I agree with the Stossel camp that no way is it the federal government’s business to try to engineer society in any shape, manner, or form beyond enforcing contracts and common defense — but as Ann Coulter points out, however, our huge ever-burgeoning bureaucracy and welfare state mean that sometimes that simply and unfortunately is not the reality of the world in which we all live.

Anyhow, I’m going to let what I know are the many hardcore libertarians and staunch conservatives in the audience have fun with this one in the comments, but I think these are fantastic debates to have while we’re all talking anyway about all of the “soul searching” the Republican party needs to do, and the many areas in which conservatives and libertarians can mesh their ideas.

“We’re living in a country that is 70-percent socialist, the government takes 60 percent of your money. They are taking care of your health care, of your pensions. They’re telling you who you can hire, what the regulations will be. And you want to suck up to your little liberal friends and say, ‘Oh, but we want to legalize pot.’ You know, if you’re a little more manly you would tell them what your position on employment discrimination is. How about that? But it’s always ‘We want to legalize pot.’”

Stossel then asked: “Why can’t gays get married?” …

“This is another one where you’re just sucking up to liberals when there are big fights,” Coulter explained.

“No, we believe the individual should be left alone,” Stossel shot back. …

“First of all, for alleged individualists, you’re very mob-like,” Coulter snarked. “Second of all, it is my business because we are living in a welfare state … Right now, I have to pay for, it turns out, coming down the pike, your health care. I have to pay for your unemployment when you can’t hold a job. I have to pay for your food, for your housing. Yeah, it’s my business!”