Ten questions to decide if you are left, right or center

[BigJohn]

Maybe you could use some of these.
-------------------------------------------------------
Was Ronald Reagan a good or great president?
Would Al Gore have been a better president than GWBush?
Is Afirmative Action no longer necessary?
Did the Tea Party have a lot of good points?
Does OWS have a lot of good points?
Should we spend significantly more money on addressing climate change?
If someone earns over US$1,000,000, should they pay a minimum of 30 percent income tax?
Almost half of all American's don't pay any tax. Do you agree with this statement?
Is National Health Care a good thing?
Should we drill more now, so we aren't as dependent on the Middle East for oil?
Would you like to live in Austin, Texas?
Do you prefer hunting to organic farming?
Do you believe the quality of life in Scandinavia is better than that in America?
Does Tainan Cowboy know what he's talkin' about?
Does Chris tell it like it is?
Is Chewdawg too hard on Canadians or English teachers?

Yo, yankee doodle! Read the first post. This is not about what is considered lib / conservative strictly or even mainly in terms of modern American political discourse.

[GuyInTaiwan]

the divide and conquer technique and mentality is of old and serves no positive function.

It does if you win.

[Taffy]

In order to respond to such a line of thought, then one would have to forst concede that there was such a thing as left, or right. I do not.
I consider humans to all have special, unique qualities, and consider no two humans alike. I believe that there is no "them and us", or left and right, and that the divide and conquer technique and mentality is of old and serves no positive function.

Ah, you old lefty, you!

[Confuzius]

Would Al Gore have been a better president than GWBush?

So gotto choose between death by injection or electric chair? (ie both=horrible)

Is Afirmative Action no longer necessary?

Perhaps it was a stoooopid idea to begin with

Did the Tea Party have a lot of good points?
Does OWS have a lot of good points?

Yes and yes...so not very telling.

Should we spend significantly more money on addressing climate change?

Just throw money at the problem....

If someone earns over US$1,000,000, should they pay a minimum of 30 percent income tax?

Not sure about the figures, but this one has potential

Almost half of all American's don't pay any tax. Do you agree with this statement?

Are we talking about illegal immigrants here?

Is National Health Care a good thing?

Eh

Should we drill more now, so we aren't as dependent on the Middle East for oil?

OK

Would you like to live in Austin, Texas?

wtf

Do you prefer hunting to organic farming?

Maybe the worse of the bunch

Do you believe the quality of life in Scandinavia is better than that in America?

too damn cold

Does Tainan Cowboy know what he's talkin' about?
Does Chris tell it like it is?
Is Chewdawg too hard on Canadians or English teachers?

Noice

[Jaboney]

Q. Should the norms and institutions governing economic activity be enshrined in law and subject to public regulation, or enacted and enforced through free association as an emergent order?

(Too wordy. Sorry. Brain cramp. Someone want to translate that into English?)

[Chris]

The problem is that left vs. right varies from country to country, even in the Western world. I can think of a number of questions, but they end up applying to American politics and are quite meaningless elsewhere.

And other questions are too simplistic for "yes/no". For instance, "Do you think government should play a role in solving society's problems?" can't be answered as "yes" or "no" without more qualifications. Even the most hardcore Libertarian or Communist would have to say "no, but..." or "yes, but...".

[finley]

Chris is right. You're looking at it all backwards. Create some questions that you think have a strong political content (eg., "should the government provide for basic human needs such as food and shelter in case of unemployment, for as long as required?") and then use statistical tools to derive labels from them. If you do it that way round, I doubt you'll find any real connection with common political concepts such as "left/right", since those are normally just used as insults rather than descriptors - and, as Chris says, have completely different meanings in different countries. For example, in China, "communist" means "fascist", while in the West fascism is (roughly speaking) the opposite of communism.

[Gilgamesh]

You might find some good questions off of this recent quiz by the Manning Centre

http://manningcentre.ca/?page_id=27

[TheGingerMan]

I am soliciting input here to try and make a short list of questions (maybe around 10) which could help in pigeon-holing someone's left/rightness.

Thanks for any suggestions!

How 'bout this one:

Q. Do you often criticize behavior of those labeled conservative but remain slient or defend similar behavior when comitted by those labeled liberal?

Of course, this particular question can be turned around.

Indeed it can, and will.
Personally, I think this whole left/right habberdahery is all semantics.
Whatever happened to being of not a few stripes, that being a flagrant rampart jingoist on some issues, and a heathen heartless commie on others?

"Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes."
~~~~Walt Whitman

[sulavaca]

In order to respond to such a line of thought, then one would have to forst concede that there was such a thing as left, or right. I do not.
I consider humans to all have special, unique qualities, and consider no two humans alike. I believe that there is no "them and us", or left and right, and that the divide and conquer technique and mentality is of old and serves no positive function.

Ah, you old lefty, you!

I'm actually pleased to see that so far in this discussion no one seems to have tried to define one from the other.
That seems to tell me that there is a sense of enlightenment from polytics here. Perhaps I'm not as alone as I thought?!