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Either labor is entirely supported by the dregs of British society that depend on the welfare state, or there is a lot of bullshit from leftists in Britain.

New Labour are not left wing. They are almost as right-wing as the Conservatives these days.

See the Political Compass.

Political Compass.

I link to it so many times, it's really useful. As a rule politicians score highly on the authoritarian side. I can think of two obvious reasons for this;
1) If you don't think you can run the world better than everyone else, why become a politician?
2) Those who manage to climb the political ladder now have power and are loth to relinquish it.

That's funny, I've heard a lot of different people use the term "left-liberarian". Your ignorance is not my responsibility, but here's a gift for you anyway.

Political compass.

It's hard to analyze political positions when you only consider "left/liberal" and "right/conservative". Stalin is generally considered to be far on the left, but so is Gandhi. The difference between them is Stalin would rule with an iron fist, while Gandhi would decidedly be more libertarian in a social sense.

The current (and hopefully fading) so-called "neoconservative" regime would try to pass themselves off as right-wing libertarians-- highly capitalistic and small-government. In reality:

U.S.neo-conservatives, with their commitment to high military spending and the global assertion of national values, tend to be more authoritarian than hard right. By contrast, neo-liberals, opposed to such moral leadership and, more especially, the ensuing demands on the tax payer, belong to a further right but less authoritarian region. Paradoxically, the "free market", in neo-con parlance, also allows for the large-scale subsidy of the military-industrial complex, a considerable degree of corporate welfare, and protectionism when deemed in the national interest. These are viewed by neo-libs as impediments to the unfettered market forces that they champion.

Here is a link to a political compass.

http://politicalcompass.org/

As a non USian (I'm Australian),

I've always viewed Slashdot as having a slightly right leaning bias, mainly due to the libertarian aspect, libertarians I view as an extremist conservative philosophy (Anarchist conservatism) which is the complete opposite of communism (police state socialism). Although there are some political nutters on slashdot most people generally stay around the middle of the political compass which is comfortable for people who are not too political.

Libertarianism (bottom (liberal) right) and communism (top (authoritarian)left) are extremes of the political compass, the other two are Nazism (Authoritarian (police state) Conservatism) and Environmentalist/Agrarian (liberal (anarchist) socialism). Amazingly enough the only type of extremist government that has never existed is Environmentalist/Agrarian, the Khmer Rouge (Pol Pot) tried to be an agrarian state but ended up becoming a police state behind an Agrarian facade.

Judging by the political compass, the Australian Labour party is about as extremist as I'm comfortable with (although as the parent pointed out some Americans would consider the Australian government a few steps to the right of Lenin). Bear in mind, Australia is a two party system like the US so the only choices out of that nice diagram of Australian political party's were Liberal and Labour.

As a non USian (I'm Australian),

I've always viewed Slashdot as having a slightly right leaning bias, mainly due to the libertarian aspect, libertarians I view as an extremist conservative philosophy (Anarchist conservatism) which is the complete opposite of communism (police state socialism). Although there are some political nutters on slashdot most people generally stay around the middle of the political compass which is comfortable for people who are not too political.

Libertarianism (bottom (liberal) right) and communism (top (authoritarian)left) are extremes of the political compass, the other two are Nazism (Authoritarian (police state) Conservatism) and Environmentalist/Agrarian (liberal (anarchist) socialism). Amazingly enough the only type of extremist government that has never existed is Environmentalist/Agrarian, the Khmer Rouge (Pol Pot) tried to be an agrarian state but ended up becoming a police state behind an Agrarian facade.

Judging by the political compass, the Australian Labour party is about as extremist as I'm comfortable with (although as the parent pointed out some Americans would consider the Australian government a few steps to the right of Lenin). Bear in mind, Australia is a two party system like the US so the only choices out of that nice diagram of Australian political party's were Liberal and Labour.

I have always been fascinated by automated data analysis techniques applied to politics, are your results available anywhere?

BTW there are some interesting studies on the web, for instance:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/usprimaries2008

http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/ is very interesting (and open source based) but unfortunately is uk only...

If you are interested in the topic, take a look here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliamentary_informatics (notice the absence of any U.S. initiative)

According to this graphic there was one candidate who fit your qualifications.

Go from one to two axis and it will make it much easier for you:
http://www.politicalcompass.org/analysis2

[citation needed]

I don't know exactly how you're defining "conservative" and "Republican", but this latest batch of canidates shows a pretty clear trend that the Republicans are more to the "Right" than the Democrats. I don't think I need to go digging up much more information to prove my point. Suffice to say, as close as they are at times, the Democrats and Republicans are NOT the same in terms of conservatism.

You say liberal like it's a bad thing.

Actually, compared to the rest of the world's politicians, Obama and the other democratic candidates actually lean towards the moderate-conservative side. Personally, whether the candidates are liberal are conservative is not important to me at this point. The important thing is the direction that the U.S. is heading. If you like the direction, vote for McCain because he has the most similar policies as the current president.

By the way, just because one small magazine said that Obama had the most liberal votes for ONE YEAR doesn't mean he is the most liberal Senator. Also, your attempt to smear Obama is pretty pathetic. It's almost Jack Thompsonesque. You might as well have said "Obama is more liberal than Pol Pot, who is responsible for massacring millions of people." It doesn't mean hes going to do something similar or worse. Your divisive attitude is quite disgusting.

oops didnt spell check the link its http://www.politicalcompass.org/

can you please explain what the actual difference is? I've seen more than one person point out that there is none, and I wouldn't find that hard to believe.

http://www.politicalcompass.org/printablegraph?ec=4.00&soc=-3.49

right/libertarian, but not to the extreme of either.. Just where I expected to fall.

I couldn't disagree with you more. Libertarianism encourages exploitation, it doesn't encourage non-profit ventures at all.

If you haven't seen it before, take a look at The Political Compass. I scored (-9, -9).

I find it useful to define words precisely. Therefore, I suggest that libertarianism has two strands: capitalistic and socialistic. Find out which kind YOU are at http://www.politicalcompass.org/. There's a fun little quiz there that will place you on the political grid. For, you see, there is not just economic "left" and "right". Another axis exists: authoritarianism and libertarianism. In other words, for math geeks, two political axes exist, not just one. I am located in the very lower left corner of the grid :) It's a nice place chock full of gentle, humble, brilliant, sociable poeple. Peace, Debocracy

2D political attenuation, here ya go.
http://www.politicalcompass.org/usprimaries2008

It's a 2D (a social and an economic axis) chart, with some references to political figures in the sidebar.

This is bullshit. With my score of (1.75,-2.82), there's no leaders even in the same quadrant as me.

All the mainstream candidates from both parties are different flavors of the same thing

http://www.politicalcompass.org/usprimaries2008

Also note that both Gravel and Kucinich are more libertarian in policy than Paul.

http://www.politicalcompass.org/usprimaries2008 actually lists all three of the as conservative.

I got the email last night. So now 3 liberals to decide between... I believe that Obama is the best of the worst and I predict that he will win by an enormous landslide, perhaps even greater than Johnson. A significant number of those who would normally vote for Republican candidates are extraordinarily pissed off at the travesty that is the RNC and "party" now. And this is the party of Lincoln? I think not (at least, not in any recognizable form). It has been hijacked.

And I would probably be considered "a staunch conservative" by most slashdotters, even though I am really a moderate (at least according to http://www.politicalcompass.org/).

The term "Nerds" encompasses a very wide range of people and personalities. You'll find all types here, although politically it's a safe bet to say most Slashdotters lean towards liberalism--at least as it's applied to social issues. I'm no libertarian (-5.62, -5.33). As much as liberals and progressives would like to consider themselves compassionate and caring we're still humans, we still can't help but look at the car accident as we pass by. There's a morbid fascination with death that all humans have. It's a strange urge to take a peak at something you'll have to experience first hand in the end, and it scares us, but it also captivates us. I don't think there's anything wrong with commentating on someone's death; and Slashdot certainly didn't invent dark humor, nor is it the most extreme example of it to be found on the web. Not by a long shot. I've seen things you wouldn't believe.

We're not laughing at people we killed, they died by their own hands. Speculating on the ramifications their removal from the gene pool has on the larger society doesn't make them any more or less dead. I will grant you that my opinion would change if it was a loved one or a friend being talked about and laughed at. Isn't that the essence of comedy though? Something bad happens, to someone else. And It's not always your day to be merely a spectator.

While it is no replacement for doing real research and finding out where candidates stand relative to you on specific issues, there is a very interesting site called "Political Compass" at http://www.politicalcompass.org/ It gives a Cartesian representation (2 dimensional rather than just left/right) of your political values based on a questionnaire in terms of Authoritarian vs Personal Liberty AND Economic Right vs Left.

In addition to providing info on where you stand (you might be surprised) it shows were historical figures and the current candidates fall (based on their statements and voting records.)

You can also compare US politicians to the current crop in countries such as Canada, Australia, and England.

Very neat site!

I think you're referring to the Political compass

Heh.
Already well aware of him, I'm not a registered republican so I can vote for him in the primary, but if he makes it to the main election he'll get mine. Of course thats a snowballs chance in hell.
What would be interesting is if candidates had to to answer a series of questions to honestly indicate where on they really fell, something like the political compass test.

Any sane libertarian would . . . say 'The producers bought the rights, they can do anything they please with it. They're consenting adults, it's none of my business."

The people who produce the political compass website http://www.politicalcompass.org/ suggest that there are multiple dimensions. Social libertarians are leaning more toward anarchy than authoritarianism. Economic libertarians, are more like Milton Friedman vs. Karl Marx at the opposite extreme of that dimension.

Anyway, it's worth a look to see some of the ways "libertarian" is used.

Well, I don't belive in that more weapons are the solution on how to stop wars. I would assume that LESS weapons is it. Thought then you will still have problems with crime syndicates and so on, I don't know how to solve that, except giving everyone decent lives.

I haven't read the book 1984, nor did I know the communism of USSR where spreading and that they forced more people to join. Also I guess I'm quite much for communism as in that everyone should be given similair lifes and benefits, but of the liberal kind and not the authoritan which might had been the case of USSR.
http://www.politicalcompass.org/
(I'm from Sweden, born 79.)

Oh, which you already knew it seems :D

Well, it's true that we managed to avoid it, mostly because of pure luck I guess, you people solved the war for us before it hit us. Anyway Sweden wasn't rich during early 20th centrury, we did become rich after WWII but that was probably to a huge extent because the rest of europe had taken a huge hit and we hadn't. Also we had a lot more military back then when we have now, now it's more or less nothing and all resources are spent on coorporative exercises and UN-work and stuff like that in other countries instread of protecting our own.
But no matter how much military resources we would spend we would still lose to the nazis or soviet in the end, we are a small country and they where huge. Thought Finland is even smaller and actually managed to keep the russians back! A major feat of theirs I guess. Also I've got the impression that we indeed have no nukes but that we could get them if there was a need quite fast.

Our economy suck, we have lost a lot since the 70s and companies are moving away from us to, also we waste a huge amount of the knowledge from immigrants by not giving them jobs on what they are trained for. Foreign people got no job at all or shit jobs even thought they have had good training in the home countries.

So what will happen if everyone get nukes then? (I guess we already know, US paranoia will hit and there will be wars anyway.)
And in that way does nukes protects against terrorists which are already in your country and fights on your streets?

But your points are very good ones, and I would probably have argued a lot more different and been much more nationalistic if the nazis or ussr had every invaded us. I guess we swedes are a little ignorant and trust that everything will be fine just because we haven't been in any war for the last 200 years. It's easy to argue that if we don't have any military, don't pose a treat to anyone, that noone will get upset and therefor not invade us.

I guess chances are the next war might be a religious one thought, like so many have been before that one. I for one does not welcome our muhammedian overlords :D
(Belive whatever you want and do whatever you want but don't try to forcefeed someone else your bullshit.)

Let us start by the definitions. By "Libertarian", I assume you mean someone who on the political compass tends towards the southeast quadrant (favours high social freedom and low/no state intervention in economic affairs). If that is the case, then I beg to differ. Me and most of my geek friends tend towards the far southwest quadrant. I would go as far as saying that is default assumption around here (I am european) when I meet someone who is intelligent and "geeky".

This is not quite right as there is such a thing as libertarians.

I think what you mean to say is that: In America there are many traditionally conservatives abandoning the republican party and espousing the views of libertarianism. They still are conservative so they probably would be best called "Conservative Libertarians". I would suggest that this along the lines of the 2008 presidential candidate Ron Paul.

This also is not to say that it is not possible to be both a Progressive and a Libertarian or both Socialist and Libertarian (as I am).

I have the opinion that part of what causes this confusion is that the vast majority of political dialog and opinion in the United States of America is both Conservative and Authoritarian... in fact all but 2 of the 2008 presidential candidates fall in this quadrant of political thought.
This graphic shows what I am speaking of: http://www.politicalcompass.org/usprimaries2007

Nerds have to be, in order to be nerds, independent thinkers. To have any serious problem solving skills requires a mind free to explore options, and thus good problem solvers tend to reject authority. Unfortunately, the American political discourse shapes how American nerds express this rejection of authority. For a start, Americans have the idea of socialism=big government constantly drilled into them. Most modern socialists want to [i]reduce[/i] the scope of government. We were actually paying attention in 1989, you know, and the horrors of the USSR and its satellites have had a great effect on socialist thinking. I consider myself a libertarian socialist - a term that has been around for about 150 years, but to most Americans would sound like an absurd oxymoron (Like Fascist Anarchist or something). This is a position that most of you will simply not have heard of or considered, because the political discourse in your media suggests to you that capitalism is an synonym for freedom. This idea is so ingrained in your culture, many of you think George Orwell was opposed to socialism! As an anti-authoritarian in America, right-libertarianism is the only option presented to you. So why have I (and many others) expressed our anti-authoritarian tenancies to the left instead of the right? Simply put: Capitalism doesn't work. No, seriously. Capitalism is a system of allocating resources - and in this world there is enough food produced to give everyone 3000 calories per day, but according to UN figures 9 million day a year from starvation and most of those are small children. I think such a system of allocating resources really, really sucks. Lets find an alternative. By the way, this website may be informative for going beyond traditional left/right stereotypes. http://www.politicalcompass.org/

And take the test at The Political Compass as well.

...try the political compass to find out your left/ right and authoritarian/ libertarian tendencies.

FWIW, I'd disagree that most nerds here in the UK are libertarians. I think that many have a feeling of intellectual superiority over the rest of society, leading to an authoritarian sense that they know what's best for other people.

It's a mistake to think of libertarianism as a right wing concept. It *can* be right wing (and that is who the name is currently associated with) but there are also left wing libertarians.

How much of an ass do you have to be to argue against individual freedom, at least as an ideal?

Most of the people here are smart enough to realise that ideals are something you work towards, not a binary condition. So, in a word where established authority seems to be committed to totalitarianism (not a huge surprise) why wouldn't even fairly moderate people want a shift towards individual freedom as a priority?

So, if you look at the political compass putting a large number of geeks in the bottom half is as expected.

More interesting is the *other* spectrum - left (social welfare) vs right (opportunity to win or lose).Note that this is *not* communism vs capitalism - it is communism or capitalism to the extent that is compatible with personal freedom - neither mega state nor mega corp should be allowed to run your life or know everything about you. There seems to be a much bigger range of opinion here.

Personally I fall somewhere in the middle. People should be free, and the role of the government is to regulate effectively to maintain that freedom without forcing anyone below a certain (low) standard of living. However I would gladly vote for *anyone* on the libertarian side of the line, despite left or right ideology, because pretty much every candidate in recent history has been in favour of totalitarianism - at least once they get into power.

First off, I don't agree that Libertarianism is "leftist" per-se.

Indeed. It's perfectly possible to be leftist and libertarian. Rather than left v. right as a political spectrum, I much prefer the dual axes that the politicalcompass.org advocates: authoritarianism v. libertarianism and economic left v/ right.

Fascism (as an extreme of capitalism) and Communism (as an extreme of socialism) are independent of authoritarianism and libertarianism. You can have both fascist dictatorships, such as Nazi Germany, and communist dictatorships, such as the USSR and China. In theory, you could have a libertarian, capitalist government (everyone, including corporations, are pretty much allowed to do whatever they want while the government sits around doing nothing) or a libertarian, socialist government (you pay taxes, and the government gives out money to help people but otherwise stays out of people's personal lives). The Political Compass is a good site to check out.

Actually, I just made those same points elsewhere in this discussion but with
Political Compass coordinates of (-6.88, -4.46) I sure
as hell am not a neo-con :-P

Well, everything but the crying Red.

Ah, the wonderful Political Compass

I tend to agree, though...the cartesian -10,-10 has never been tried except maybe by Roddenberry. And using the two dimensional system can also show the vast differences between the Republican candidates for president this go around...they're all "right wing / conservative" in traditional 1-dimensional measures, but they aren't even close in two dimensions (Tancredo being probably 6,10 (fascist) and Ron Paul being 10,-7 (libertarian) and Romney about 9,4 (douchebag)).

First, the problem isn't that obvious to the majority of the people in America. This issue, for instance, will only see major coverage on places like Slashdot, I haven't seen it on my local news and very few people watch the major news outlets. It doesn't affect them directly in their day-to-day lives, so it gets bumped for the local high school's latest win. The issues with electronic voting didn't get wide coverage, either, so that's not going to change any time soon. The only national issue most Americans are aware of right now is the Iraq war, which is where the lines are drawn. That tiny percentage who still support the 'pubs do so because they think we should be in Iraq.

Secondly, the vast majority of Americans are single-issue voters. They pick their one issue and vote for the one of the two "teams" that claims to support their stance on it. The remainder of the issues are too big for the average person to deal with. Illegal immigration? Economic policy? Foreign policy? What are the right solutions to these problems? Joe Smith barely can balance his checkbook, how does he determine whose economic policy to vote for? So, he picks his single issue and then regurgitates the remaining stances of the party he voted for as if they're the only real solution to the other problems he doesn't understand. After all, if they believe how he believes on that one issue, they must be right on all of the others. Right? They ignore everything else that party stands for because they're just voting AGAINST the other side on their one issue (no one votes for anyone anymore, they just vote against). My wife, for example, is pro-choice, so she always voted for the Dems. Had she paid attention to them, she would've disliked a lot of their other stances, but voted for them because the only other choice was to vote for pro-lifers. For the longest time, I voted Republican because I believed in their stated goals and didn't believe in those of the Democrats. I was able to ignore the theist side of the 'pubs because I didn't think it represented a major portion of their stance. I've learned my lesson, especially now that I see they don't follow ANY of their stated goals. I still found it difficult to vote Democrat during the last election, but I couldn't take the chance of the 'pubs maintaining a majority. That said, I will be looking at other candidates in the future from outside the two parties. I've come to learn that voting for other parties is not as much a "waste" of my vote as voting for either of the two majors.

I think it should be required that all people take the Political Compass test before being allowed to register to vote. I think everyone would be surprised to find where their true political views lie (I've always considered myself a bit of a social liberal, but fiscally conservative which the chart more or less confirmed). If nothing else, it shows people there's more than one axis on which to base their decisions.

... or they realize that due to the spoiler problem, voting third party doesn't actually get them any closer to getting the government that they want, and is in fact equivalent to not voting at all. Thus they vote for the lesser of two evils, not because they like doing so, but because they are forced to either do that or essentially throw away their vote. That's an unfortunate fact about the winner-take-all electoral system used in the USA, but it's still a fact, and no amount of complaining about the two major parties will change it. If you really want better politics in the USA, we need reforms to the way elections are run (e.g. instant runoff elections, proportional voting, etc) so that more than two parties can realistically compete at a time.

Is voting for the Republicans and Democrats (RD) going to cause election reform? It seems to me it's the opposite. It seems to me that voting third party does actually get them closer to getting the government that they want, and voting for the RD takes them further from it.

I can understand that there are people who actually agree with the RD' platforms and voting histories. I can also understand that there are people who think that either the Rs or the Ds are much closer to their personal philosophies. What I do not understand is how in a country with a total population of about 300 million people, ~97% of voters can be that close to the RD. What I certainly don't understand is how people who say they are libertarian left or libertarian right can either not vote, or actually vote RD and then complain about the government they have and the actions that government takes in their name using their tax dollars.

"It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it." - Eugene Victor Debs

... or they realize that due to the spoiler problem, voting third party doesn't actually get them any closer to getting the government that they want, and is in fact equivalent to not voting at all. Thus they vote for the lesser of two evils, not because they like doing so, but because they are forced to either do that or essentially throw away their vote. That's an unfortunate fact about the winner-take-all electoral system used in the USA, but it's still a fact, and no amount of complaining about the two major parties will change it. If you really want better politics in the USA, we need reforms to the way elections are run (e.g. instant runoff elections, proportional voting, etc) so that more than two parties can realistically compete at a time.

Is voting for the Republicans and Democrats (RD) going to cause election reform? It seems to me it's the opposite. It seems to me that voting third party does actually get them closer to getting the government that they want, and voting for the RD takes them further from it.

I can understand that there are people who actually agree with the RD' platforms and voting histories. I can also understand that there are people who think that either the Rs or the Ds are much closer to their personal philosophies. What I do not understand is how in a country with a total population of about 300 million people, ~97% of voters can be that close to the RD. What I certainly don't understand is how people who say they are libertarian left or libertarian right can either not vote, or actually vote RD and then complain about the government they have and the actions that government takes in their name using their tax dollars.

"It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it." - Eugene Victor Debs

Damn Americans using the word liberal. Liberalism is being opposed to dictatorships, not opposed to conservatives.
Please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal and http://www.politicalcompass.org/. While your there take the test.

You're hitting on the fact that left/right is not a valid distinction, because economics and rights are orthogonal issues. There's a neat site called the Political Compass, which plots you in a Cartesian space (left/right & libertarian/authoritarian), rather than on a left/right spectrum...

The attitude to free software does not correlate well to the left-right axes of politics, but rather to the libertarian-authoritarian axes.

RMS and ESR are on opposite ends of the left-right axes, but they are both extreme libertarians on the libertarian-authoritarian axes.

"Does is mean authoritarian/libertarian, or socialist/capitalist?"

Where in California are you that you don't see CFLs everywhere? In the Bay Area you can't get away from them. Seriously, probably 90% of the bulbs I see are CFLs or other high-efficiency lights.

Bay Area also. If they're everywhere, I guess I just didn't notice that they weren't normal bulbs...they're supposed to look the same, right? If their advantage is supposed to be energy efficiency, what would work better is headlines saying "State of California saves $BIGNUM through CFLs". Better to point out the economic impact they already have than create a new artificial one.

I come from Indiana. The difference between midwestern liberals and Californian liberals is that midwestern liberals don't exist. And I know it's hard (again, coming from Indiana) to realize bad != liberal != bad, but don't forget that for the last three and a half years, all this "nanny state" legislation you talk about has been autographed by the Republican governor.

I'd say midwestern liberals exist (and would consider myself one), but "liberal" is a vague word and I think we're disagreeing on its meaning. In the terminology of the two-axis political compass, there are midwestern Democrats who fall more toward the liberatian left, vs. Californian ones who apparently favor the authoritarian left. (And apparently that Republican governator you mention more toward the authoritarian side as well, and presumably more on the right.)

You might be served by checking out the political compass of the U.S. election. The dimension that you are missing is authoritarian vs. libertarian. There are plenty of right and left wing people with a libertarian bent that would agree with your position. In fact, classic Liberalism places liberty as the primary political value. The people you are talking about are the Stalins and the the Thatchers of the world - which has very little to do with where they happen to fall on the left and right portion of the political spectrum.

Common sense is lost when your major parties and governments around the world all field candidates that sit in the same quadrant - right, authoritarian.