At this point, I think most people who qualify as merely conservative are Democrats. The Republican party in general has moved far right of “conservative” and well into “fanatical”.

I don’t think its too uncommon for tourist areas to try to pressure tourists to pay with foreign currency that has a favorable exchange rate to the local currency. That way they can make extra money by quoting a figure in USD (or other currency) that they know they can exchange for much more than the regular cost in local currency. If pressured with “I don’t have USD, so its either local currency or I go elsewhere” they’ll usually give in and accept local currency.