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Presidential Candidate 'Computer Dating'
engywook writes "On National Public Radio's Morning Edition this morning, there was a story that mentioned the SelectSmart Presidential Candidate Selector. This was described as a kind of 'computer dating service' for deciding which of the remaining presidential candidates match your views most closely. According to the story, it is not limited to just the Democratic and Republican candidates. Might be just the thing to help gel a decision in swinging undecideds!"
it is interesting as you say, but the biggest issue is how do you know that there's no inherent bias built into the system? the only way to decide who to vote for is to make up your own mind. This may be a tool to help you, but please, it's like telling your neighbor/newspaper columnist/random person on the street your views on everything and let them tell you who you should vote for. Fine if it works, but how do you know they don't have a vested interest?
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I took this test two weeks ago. IT IS HEAVILY BIASED TOWARDS BUSH. The test is a push poll, a type of poll that askes biased questions in the hopes of directing people in one direction or another.
Specifically, the test's first set of questions dealt with taxes. The question was something like "Are you in favor of more taxes or fewer taxes?" and gave the nod to Bush for being for lower taxes.
This hides the true position of both candidates. Bush and the Republican congress have passed the tax cuts that gave most of the benefits to the richest 1 percent, and barely anything to the middle class or working-class poor.
Kerry has proposed repealing the tax cut (also known as "raising taxes") on the richest 1% in order to pay for important social spending (medicare = healthcare so the very poor and children don't die). Do you want to pay less taxes so children die from not having immunizations, antibiotics when they're sick, fixed broken bones, etc.?
SelectSmart has a good set of polls for other things, but I found this poll to be VERY VERY BIASED and would challenge anyone taking it to consider the way the questions are asked.
Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
It seemed like the questions were leading, but in the opposite direction. I ended up with 7% agreement with Bush.
1. Your ideal theoretical candidate. (100%) (i.e., writing my own name on the ballot)
2. Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat (81%)
3. Cobb, David - Green Party (78%)
4. Nader, Ralph - Independent (78%)
5. Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat (75%)
6. Clark, Retired General Wesley K., AR - Democrat (72%)
7. Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol, IL - Democrat (66%)
8. Kucinich, Rep. Dennis, OH - Democrat (65%)
9. Badnarik, Michael - Libertarian (64%)
10. Brown, Walt - Socialist Party (58%)
11. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (56%)
12. Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat (56%)
13. Gephardt, Rep. Dick, MO - Democrat (52%)
14. LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat (43%)
15. Lieberman, Senator Joe, CT - Democrat (37%)
16. Peroutka, Michael - Constitution Party (22%)
17. Hagelin, Dr. John - Natural Law (19%)
18. Bush, President George W. - Republican (7%)
I removed candidates that are no longer running from your list of results. It's interesting that you have four candidates who match your views up to 70% or more according to this quiz. Let's check my results:
1. Your ideal theoretical candidate. (100%)
2. Badnarik, Michael - Libertarian (72%)
3. Bush, President George W. - Republican (60%)
4. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (38%)
5. Peroutka, Michael - Constitution Party (36%)
6. Cobb, David - Green Party (26%)
7. Nader, Ralph - Independent (26%)
8. Brown, Walt - Socialist Party (22%)
I only get one candidate--Badnarik--who breaks the 70% threshhold. And only two candidates break 50%. That suggests to me that the candidates are not evenly distributed along ideological lines. That is, there are more candidates who hold liberal views (and thus your four candidates with 70% a or higher rating) than there are candidates who hold conservative values (as seen in my results.) This suggests several questions: why are candidates not evenly distributed throughout the ideological spectrum? Is this a bad thing for America? If so, how can we change it?
As an aside, I'm not surprised at all at my results on this quiz. I had already decided to vote for Badnarik, and I know that I support Bush over Kerry slightly. And of course all the other candidates are out of the question for me, as they support few or none of the policies I find important.
I missed the last debate, but something i caught reading a transcript and sounded alarms in my head was Bush saying (and i quote):
"...So I tried diplomacy, went to the United Nations. But as we learned in the same report I quoted, Saddam Hussein was gaming the oil-for-food program to get rid of sanctions. He was trying to get rid of sanctions for a reason: He wanted to restart his weapons programs.
We all thought there was weapons there, Robin. My opponent thought there was weapons there. That's why he called him a grave threat.
I wasn't happy when we found out there wasn't weapons, and we've got an intelligence group together to figure out why.
But Saddam Hussein was a unique threat. And the world is better off without him in power.
And my opponent's plans lead me to conclude that Saddam Hussein would still be in power, and the world would be more dangerous."
So, in few words, first it was about terrorists, then about WMD, since there were no terorrists there, and now there's no WMD, it's all about Sadaam being an evil, dangerous man. Which is not something i disagree with, but it begs the question: why the fuck did the Bush administration was so eager to rush into war with Iraq - so much that they bypassed the UN completely? To this day, just like you, i have no idea.
Oil? I thought it was far fetched back then. Now i don't know.
What scares me is that so many people over the USA not only accept this, but embraces and defends this actions.
I found this page very interesting - http://www.selectsmart.com/PRESIDENT/who.php. They compiled a list based on everyone's responses what the idea candidate for everyone would be. I was surprised to see the results.
Winners of the presidential selector race:
36% Cobb, David - Green Party
31% Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat
18% Bush, President George W. - Republican
6% Badnarik, Michael - Libertarian
3% Brown, Walt - Socialist Party
2% Kucinich, Rep. Dennis, OH - Democrat
2% Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat
1% Gephardt, Rep. Dick, MO - Democrat
1% Clark, Retired General Wesley K., AR - Democrat
0% Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol, IL - Democrat
0% Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat
0% Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat
0% Nader, Ralph - Independent
0% Peroutka, Michael - Constitution Party
0% Lieberman, Senator Joe, CT - Democrat
0% LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat
0% ideal theoretical candidate.
According to this, it would be in America's best interest if David Cobb were president. We are being shafted, because I can't honestly say I've heard his name once on TV. I was also intersted to find that he got a 68% on my matchup, ranking in at #2 behind Badnarik (who got 69%). Nobody passed the 70% mark. After reading Cobb's positions, I want to vote for this guy, but I live in NH and its going to be a damned close battle. Kerry got a 46%, which I guess is close enough. If this was not a vote for my country's future, I'd vote Green. Unfortunatly, I have to vote for the viable candidate, Kerry. In 2008 I'll vote my heart.
This page was also interesting. 63% of Americans feel we must have a balanced budget, 80% support universal health care, 58% agree with the ACLU, and 54% agree with the League of Conservation Voters. I rarely *ever* hear CNN/FOX/ABC/NBC talk about these issues, yet they are of high importance to most Americans. That goes to show you just how poor quality broadcast journalism has become in this country.