Why are there so many liberals?

It is well known in legal circles that eye witnesses are notoriously unreliable. It is not terribly uncommon to have eye witnesses who give, not only different, but conflicting, and mutually impossible accounts of an event . Why is that? How can two people see the same thing and see it so differently?

I recently preached on the topic of Grace, Faith and Works and how they relate to one another. Someone remarked, with disdain, that the sermon was no different than what would be heard in a very liberal denomination. This week, a dear friend informed me he can no longer worship with me because I am a legalist. What is so interesting [and candidly, heart breaking] about this is that I am the same guy, believing and teaching the same thing. Yet to hear these people talk, you'd think one of them heard John Calvin preach, while the other was hearing Charles Russell. Again I ask, how is that possible?Well, as usual, I have a theory, and it goes like this. If you consider liberal/conservative beliefs on a continuum, from one extreme to another it would look something like this:

On the one [left] hand you have liberal theology which dismisses the literal truth of God's word. A belief that discounts the necessity of recognizing that Jesus is not only my savior, he is my Lord, and as such gives me commands that I am required to obey. On the other [right] hand, you have radical theology that not only requires obedience to the commands of scripture, it also demands submission to the man made [non-biblical] commands made by the leadership of the particular fellowship.
Now, most of us know that the actual truth is somewhere in between the two extremes, but that isn't really what I am concerned about in this post. What I am wondering is why two people, can hear the same message, preached by the same man, and one walk away believing the message was ultra liberal and the other believing it was radically conservative.
I think that at least part of the answer is that whatever I believe others to be is just as much an indication of what I am as what they are; in fact it may say even more about me than them. You see, if I am very legalistic, considerably more so than the average person, then most people will be more liberal than I am. The result is that, since most people are more liberal than me, I will tend to see more people as liberal. The further right on the chart I am, the greater number of people will be on my left, and therefore seen as liberal from my Point of View.
If on the other hand, I am very liberal in my thinking, most people will be more conservative than me. I will then naturally see a legalist behind every tree. Everyone seems legalistic because they are more legalistic than me. This tendency is not new.
Paul warned against this type of judging by the standard of ourselves when he said:

"For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves. But they, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise." 2 Corinthians 10:12

I judge truth, error and my fellowman using my own opinions and judgments as the standard. One great danger in this is that, if my point of view is more legalistic than scripture, I will tend to think those who walk in truth are too liberal. If my point of view is more liberal than scriptural, I am likely to judge those who embrace the truth to be legalists.

So, my friend, where do you stand? Do you see a liberal behind every tree? Or are we being over-run by right-wing radicals?