Almost look up to a liberal officer (7)
I believe the answer is:
admiral
'officer' is the definition.
(admiral is a kind of officer)
'almost look up to a liberal' is the wordplay.
'almost' means to remove the last letter (most of the word but not all of it).
'look up to' becomes 'admire' ('admire' can be a synonym of 'look up to').
'a liberal' becomes 'al' (I've seen this in other clues).
'admire' with its final letter taken away is 'admir'.
'admir'+'al'='ADMIRAL'
(Other definitions for admiral that I've seen before include "Naval chief" , "Naval officer of high rank" , "Eg, Nelson" , "Commander of the fleet or butterfly" , "Brightly coloured butterfly" .)