Here's a link for a web quiz that plops you on a scale of Liberal to Conservative (0 to 40 points):



I finished with a 14 - a little left of Bill Clinton but right of Hillary, Ted Kennedy and Jesse Jackson.

Argh.

A one-dimensional political spectrum is crap and is one of the things wrong with the political process in this country. It leads to way too much of the "my team will beat yours" nonsense that goes on between the Republicans and Democrats, both of whom appear to operate nearly completely from a desire for power rather than from any consistent, principled stand.

Check out the political diamond, formed from a two-dimensional understanding (still not great obviously but better than just one dimension):

While I find this more useful than the idea of a one-dimensional spectrum, I also find it somehow deceptive, because I see absolutely no fundamental difference between so-called economic and so-called personal freedoms.

Both major American political parties seek to reduce my freedom in too many key ways for me to be interested in identifying with them.
--matt

I also found this one to be pretty good:

I agree with this completely.

For example, in the survey it gives you 2 more conservative points if you don't trust the government. Trust the government how? I know plenty of liberals who don't trust the Bush administration, does that make them conservative?

People need to think about what they truly believe in instead of siding with a single party.

I'm a 34... probably doesn't surprise anyone that knows me though. - I'm a campaign volunteer for GWB, have threatened to move to the constitutional party if McCain ever got the nomination, and openly say I'm a member of the religious right.

Maybe not scientific, but political compass last I checked had me at right in GWB's ballpark.

Well, according to the lot of them, I am an extreme moderate. Although, the political compass showed me with slight libertarian-conservative tendencies.

Yeah, politicalcompass.org seems like a much better one - of course, I say that because it plops me in the same area of the grid as Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and the Dali Lama.

Yeah, it does seem pretty good. I'm put about where I expected: Middle of the lower-right quandrant.

--matt

Economic Left/Right: 8.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 5.59

From politicalcompass.org

Slightly to the right of George W. Bush, right in Thatcher's area.

--- I've taken this 3 times over the past year, I've just been moving further and further right and upward. :>

Me too :) - Gandhi is my new middle name, I guess :P

Welcor "Gandhi" Lama

Heh, I got as far as page 2 on the compass test, before I realized it badly needs two more options: Wrong question and I don't care.

To exclude the option to select "i dont care" is an easy way to force people to take a standing point, as you might have noticed there was also no "middle" answer. Which also can be seen as a way to force people to take a standing point.
Looks to me that the person who made the test had given it some thought on the psychological things, even if there is times where i wished that there was some sort of "middle" answer. Making decisions and taking stands can be a hard thing to do, heck i can almost get depressed when thinking of what to eat and what to not eat.


And on a side note:
Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: -7.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -8.87

And was a 7 on the first one.

It's also an easy way to get completely incorrect results, as people are forced to choose options that do not represent their views.

I agree with Angie.

[quote= ]What i mean is that, how often are there an issue where you dont have an opinion? I guess it can happen, but if there is a "middle" option i would guarantie that it would screw things up more than not having it. But from time to time there would be nice to have it yes.

Edit: Fixed the nasty little quote box.

No, as any seasoned sociologist will tell you having a middle option (or N/A) is a prerequisite to having accurate results.

How often is there an issue where I don't have an opinion? Not often. But it's not that I have or don't have opinions on issues, it's that the opinion I have may be irrelevant to the context of the survey or that the question is incorrectly worded (or 'loaded', as we would say). For example:

The question presupposes an invalid premise. The correct answer is N/A. As for political questions, the compass asks:
Now I do have an opinion on this issue. But the opinion is too complex to express with a simple agree/disagree response format. I think that it's worrying from a social perspective but that doesn't at all imply that I think the government should do anything about it. Answering 'agree' there most certainly shifts me down the authoritarian axis, which is incorrect and exactly opposite of my philosophy. Ergo the results are now inaccurate.

Then there's the loaded questions:
Who honestly would disagree with such a thing? But from the perspective of government and law, my philosophy is one of non-interference. So agreeing or disagreeing is again inaccurate.

And that's just the first page.