The real question is : how are " the liberals" different from everyone else? They seem to be as hard core radicals as their detractors. What is liberalism about then?
Typically liberal means progressive and conservative means reactionary. In the past liberals were lazziez faire capitalists. Today that's conservatives.
For sure, if you can get it that's a good way to go. For my company I want my developers to fully understand our business, which is pretty arcane, and be fully invested in it. That requires that they be in the office with the program managers at least a couple days a week working through our platforms, suggesting improvements, and basically being a full part of the company. I've done remote work before but it's very much commoditized, I give a detailed set of specs and get exactly that even if there were much better ways to do things that I didn't ask for because I wasn't aware they existed. I'm a big believer that I don't know what I don't know, so for me having my software experts also being experts in our industry and the particular problems we're facing this week is crucial. Definitely a personal preference/fit thing, some developers love this and some absolutely hate it.
The conservatives are economically liberal but very conservative and intrusive when it comes to society, supporting interference with people's life choices.
Progress toward what? What's the end game? What's scientific basis of the progress? Or is it a religion by itself?
New ideas vs old ones. It's not a value judgement - though I'm sure you will make it something about being unfair to Trump.
Today. But 100 years ago the lazziez faire proponents were the liberals. They also challenged the social structures. today liberals wants more economic regulation and still challenge the current social structure. Obviously, overly generalized.
What's the new idea? If I say it's not going to work, am I a conservative? You don't seem to know what you're talking about. Why beat about the bush?
If you say it's not going to work because you're used to the way things were and refuse to look at the research then yes, you're a conservative. Think climate change, people who investigate the subject in detail overwhelmingly agree that we are modified the climate for the worse. Then comes someone like Trump who claims it's a Chinese invention. Or autonomous driving. It's been proven to be safer than humans at the wheel but statistics and facts aren't what sway the population - it's extreme cases in the news. So if a Tesla crashes, people assume it doesn't work. If 1000 people crash their cars, that's just the good ol' way of doing things and "how it should be".