I got an email recently that I feel explains in simple terms the difference in ideology in the two parties:

I was talking to a friend of mine's little girl, and she said she wanted to be President some day. Both of her parents, liberal Democrats, were standing there, so I asked her, "If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?"
She replied, "I'd give houses to all the homeless people."
"Wow...what a worthy goal." I told her, "You don't have to wait until you're President to do that. You can come over to my house and mow, pull weeds, and sweep my yard, and I'll pay you $50. Then I'll take you over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $50 to use toward a new house."
She thought that over for a few seconds while her Mom glared at me, then she looked me straight in the eye and asked, "Why doesn't the homeless guy come over and do the work, and you can just pay him the $50?"
And I said, "Welcome to the Republican Party."