> It's not really hypocrisy so much as the fact that in order to maintain electoral dominance, the parties need to adopt to society. They (the parties) can then do the mental gymnastics to rationalize on their platforms how big war and surveillance is small government, or how censorship is liberal, afterwards.
This is a handwaving claim about "motivation" ("in order to maintain electoral dominance"), when the only thing for which there is much evidence for is the change of thinking. Do you find it so unbelievable that a bunch of people might, en masse, change their minds about gay marriage? Do you find it so unbelievable that a bunch of people might change their minds about wholewheat bread? Jogging? Mixed-race marriage? What is the reason why you (cynically) assume that the change is motivated simply by electoral politics?
> I could illustrate this with details, but it's much easier to just use an example. Abraham Lincoln was a republican, and every single confederate state was democrat. The transition from democrats becoming republicans and vice versa is something [ ... ]
Instead of taking the easy way out and focusing merely on a label swap, I would suggest you check the way political positions did and did not change during "party swapping" periods. It's not much of a transition if everyone's actual opinions remain substantively the same, but they just swap labels.