They don’t necessarily have to be framed in terms of their relationship to conservatism. In fact, I think their answers would shed light when framed in terms of liberalism as well.

My answers:
Taxes – too low when the needs of the state cannot be paid for under the revenue provided by the tax base. Too high when the state is wasting more money than the lowest basic entropy of a bureaucratic system generates. “Needs of the state” include basic needs of its citizens and basic standards of opportunity for its citizens are being universally met.

I don’t think that this point is often found at in a region of the “Laffer Curve” that would see increased tax revenues as a result of decreasing tax rates – should it be found there, then obviously the formulae above would be reversed.

I think that taxes on any given group should never be more than they can afford without giving up basic needs and basic opportunities.

Family values: I believe that, “traditional” (by certain criteria) families are an excellent choice for many people, but that for some segments of the population, non-traditional arrangements are more stable and more functional. Included, certainly, are gay people. I do value function and stability over tradition.

Militarism: I believe that we have reached a point of military superiority that we should de-emphasize military spending. Given the current state of affairs, with unfinished wars in two foreign countries, that we cannot do so dramatically, but that we should make every effort to finish those wars, and return to a defensive footing as soon as possible. When that is done, we will have the strength necessary to meet any foreseeable new threat and to deal with current threats with less investment in the military than we currently make. So long as we are defensively secure, we need only provide offensive capability to cover contingencies long enough to re-adjust to a new situation.

*Life: I think that the most compelling moral imperative is to protect the right to life of intelligent and sentient beings: that is those who could be convinced to conceive of death and suffer at the prospect of it. Other compelling moral imperatives exist, but I’m not sure any are of a nature that it is appropriate for the state to address. Even if they are, where other considerations are not in play or are relatively unimportant, where the intelligence or sentience of that being are reasonably disputable, they should be taken as real and the being should be protected. This because protecting the life of the intelligent and sentient is probably the most compelling moral imperative any of us can conceive. However, where the dispute cannot be reasonably made, or can only be made tenuously, and in the presence of other compelling factors such as the need for better medical research, the right of a woman to self-determination, or respect for the stated wishes of a traumatized individual (as established by a preponderance of the evidence, duly litigated), the requirement to protect life holds less force and may be outweighed by these other factors. I can think of no morally binding reason that a non-sentient, non-intelligent being should be fully protected (as are fully sentient, intelligent human beings) by the state at the expense of any other consideration.

All of these notions trace back to an underlying ethic. You may call it “liberal” or not – I see no reason why it is exclusively liberal, though I do see that liberalism does seem to embrace that ethic in most cases. That ethic is basic fairness and welfare for sentient, intelligent beings. And, honestly, I think on some level or another it is an ethic acknowledged by mentally responsible humans universally. Perhaps the conservative positions on these three topics can also trace back to the same ethic. Perhaps there is an error in derivation along the line between the ethic and the conservative position or between the ethic and the liberal position. Perhaps, if other notions less important to our “civic religion” were set aside for the sake of argument, we could see more clearly which positions are better derived from the universal ethic. Or, maybe not.