A Political Candidate-Matcher Quiz by USA Today

Here is the link:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/candidate-match-game

I'm hoping folks will report results here.

Ed

Post 1

Tuesday, January 17, 2012 - 7:05pm

Can't view it from this dumb phone..grr

Post 2

Tuesday, January 17, 2012 - 9:44pm

Don't you mean smart phone? Regular phones don't go on the internet.

:-)

Ed

[Sorry, couldn't resist]

Post 3

Tuesday, January 17, 2012 - 10:17pm

I took the bugger and here are my results:

Ron Paul: 78.6%
Michelle Bachmann (dropped out): 50.1%
Rick Perry: 43%

Interestingly, I scored higher for Barack Obama than I did for Mitt Romney (see bar graph at bottom) -- whom I believe is nothing other than the simple republican version of a "Barack Obama" (an existentialist, who is merely masquerading as being an idealist, specifically an idealist who is happy to report to us all that he has been overcome with a pure sense of pragmatism -- so that we can be confident putting our trust in him to always do the right thing).

Ed

Post 4

Tuesday, January 17, 2012 - 10:26pm

Interestingly, I re-took the quiz with the express purpose to try to maximize the violation of individual rights with my answers (imposing statism upon others by force). Here are my results:

Barack Obama: 73.4%
Jon Huntsman: 46.8%
Newt Gingrich: 40.1%

As I said in another thread, Gingrich is an excellent speaker.

Ed

Post 5

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 4:50am

Paul 65.5, Gingrich 40.1, Bachmann 38.3.

Post 6

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 4:56am

I got:
Ron Paul 77.4
Rick Perry 51
Michele Bachmann 32.2

They botched Ron Paul's position on defense spending. He would answer "Should be reduced but carefully so as to not hurt national security"... but the person who made the pole probably disagrees with Ron Paul on whether his plan would hurt national security. They have his position as "Defense spending should be cut significantly" (with no implication on its impact on security).

Post 7

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 11:24am

Dean,

How could you tell which answers were linked with which candidates -- so that you can go ahead and concluded that, out of the 11 questions asked, that this is the particular answer which thwarted your correspondence to the views of Ron Paul?

I noticed that, while taking the thing, the unnamed candidates in the background would rise or fall, based on my answers. Did you figure out that Ron Paul was the 4th candidate from the left (or 5th, or whatever), and then watch for the associated bar graph to rise when you gave your answers? In the back of my mind, I was half-doing this, saying to myself: "This 4th guy from the left keeps going up, each time I answer. It must be that that's Ron Paul."

But I didn't go so far as to tabulate which answers might actually be mistaken attributions to Ron Paul, made by the crew at USA Today.

Ed

Post 8

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 1:17pm

Ed,

After you take the quiz, you can have your mouse hover over the colored blocks under a candidate's head and a pop-up shows the question associated with the candidate.

I scored about 78% Ron Paul, and looking at the questions, realized I'd misread one of the questions. And I answered "None of the above" on the Experience question - I don't give a damn about experience if they have the right principles.

I retook it, and changed my answer on just two of the questions: the one I misread, and the experience one - where I selected "legislator" on the experience question - that gave me 100% on Ron Paul.

Post 9

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 2:46pm

Whoa, Steve!

That must mean that you are one of those crazy-wacky Ron Paulites and therefore, according to the "wisdom" of the GOP (the same GOP that brought us up to the nomination, and subsequent election, of Obama), that you should be marginalized to the hilt. You should be made fun of, because humor deflects from the actual political philosophy issue. It deflects from policies and issues altogether, and focuses attention on people alone.

That is the new politics: sweep issues and policies aside, and focus solely on personalities. In this respect, US politics (e.g., people marginalizing Ron Paul supporters) is becoming more like a "reality TV show" where people get kicked off, rather than being anything more serious than that. The philosopher, Alasdair MacIntyre, warned that this kind of an unserious, whimsical, emotional glamour show' was coming to American politics. I hope it's not too late ...

Ed

Post 10

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 8:45pm

You need to look at your raw scores, not the percentages.

I came out with Ron Paul 58+% but the first time on only 3 of 11 points and again on 2 of 11. That is not much of a consonance.

For me, of all the phoney baloney non-alternatives, the one real thing that mattered to me in terms of objective political science was that I gave high marks to diplomatic as well as business, legislative and executive experience. That would indicate John Huntsman. Now, however, it would also point to Hillary R. Clinton.

Over all, we never know ... It is famous that Lincoln and Truman were both among the presidents who failed in business and other pursuits. OTOH, Franklin D. Roosevelt had the kind of experience I would want, 12 years as Assistant Secy of the Navy. The problem with him is that in 1920, as Smith's presumptive veep, he was a prohibitionist. But, when he ran in 1932, he reversed his advovcy to the repeal of Prohibition.

Kennedy and Nixon were also interesting. In fact, Kennedy was the more conservative. Kennedy did not "get" the civil rights movement: it had to be explained to him; and of course there were the Green Berets, the Berlin Speech, the Missile Crisis and much more. On the other hand, Nixon normalized relations with Mao Zedong's China, created the Environmental Protection Agency, froze wages and prices, and more.

For these and many supporting reasons, I believe that the times make the man. Thus, I wait for millions of other people to pick the President.

The only reason that Objectivists follow the Republican Party like good fans (in the Swiftian sense) is that Ayn Rand held sway with Tricia Nixon, thus bringing a job to Alan Greenspan. Short of that, we'd all be Democrats, as Ayn Rand so completely endorsed the intellectualism of the liberals in opposition to the folksy way of the conservatives.

Post 11

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 - 9:25pm

Mike,

The only reason that Objectivists follow the Republican Party like good fans (in the Swiftian sense) is that Ayn Rand held sway with Tricia Nixon, thus bringing a job to Alan Greenspan. Short of that, we'd all be Democrats, as Ayn Rand so completely endorsed the intellectualism of the liberals in opposition to the folksy way of the conservatives.

Hey, you're my buddy, but I disagree. What makes me a follower of a party is the party's principles, not whether some guru somewhere did or thought something that had once aligned them with one party or another. You portray the matter as if Objectivists are mindless, true believers -- you portray the matter just like an unthinking person (usually a liberal) would. One reason to do that is to project your own willful mindlessness (mental laziness) onto others, in order to feel better about yourself by bringing others down to your level (instead of accepting the responsibility of personal growth). I'm not say that that is the reason you just chose to say what you did, but it's one reason that people act just as you did.

It's like you miss the whole point of Objectivism, or something. It's very disconcerting.

Ed

(Edited by Ed Thompson on 1/18, 9:28pm)

Post 12

Thursday, January 19, 2012 - 4:53am

Well, Ed, it might surprise you to know that not only do I often vote Republican, but I have held elected office as a Republican. That said, I have donated more money to local Democrats for Democratic Party primary races and I have voted in Democratic primaries. (Not enough Republicans for a race; two or more Democrats in the contest that mattered. All politics is local.) Like Objectivist entrepreneur T. J. Rodgers, I voted for Barack Obama in 2008 -- and he is probably just as sorry as I am... I also vote Libertarian, no surprise; and ran for Congress as a Libertarian.

To me, politics is about people, not parties. Parties are coalitions. Parties are aggregates of individuals. A given candidate or politiician may or may not act on the principles of the party, or follow any of the party platform. The historic crossovers among conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans is so deep that, really, Democrat and Republican have mattered very little for about 50 years. Conservative and liberal matter more.

In addition, with the ascendency of libertarian ideas, evidenced no less by the continued popularity of the works of Ayn Rand, we now look at social and fiscal issues, domestic and foreign affairs. The Smallest Political Quiz reflects this, and likely helped advertise this thinking. Thus, I would say that most American voters consider themselves socially liberal and fiscally conservative.

However.... researching religion in America, I found a reliable poll (Pew, I think) that showed something like 3% of Fundamentalist Christians are not sure if Jesus was divine. I puzzled over that. Then, I remembered working with census data in Lansing, Michigan, and being surprised at the large number of Eskimos in our community. Some people don't know what they are; other people will say anything; sometimes those are the same people. The socially liberal, fiscally conservative voters will elect and re-elect candidates diametrically opposed to both standards.

In this age - if not always, perhaps, since 1789 - the president is less important than his advisors. We not only do not pick them, we do not know who they are. Presidents Reagan was very likely his own man. Presidents Bushes and Obama very likely just stand in for others.

And politicians often change their views once they are in office. More information makes a difference. Responsibility makes a difference. Events play out differently than we predict or expect. President Obama was elected in 2008. By the time I left school in 2010, just about every one of my professors was disappointed in the continuation of the Bush Presidency.

Post 13

Thursday, January 19, 2012 - 8:57am

Ed,

I was going to post a reply to the same, objectionable sentence in Michael's post. I believe that he has always held himself apart from Objectivism (while claiming to be an Objectivist) and doesn't seem to be able to help himself from taking cheap shots at Rand (maybe he isn't even aware of these tendencies).

Post 14

Thursday, January 19, 2012 - 11:47am

Steve,

Keeping in mind that I feel a little bit uncomfortable talking about someone in front of their back**, let's continue talking about Michael for a little more. You said:

I believe that he has always held himself apart from Objectivism (while claiming to be an Objectivist) and doesn't seem to be able to help himself from taking cheap shots at Rand (maybe he isn't even aware of these tendencies).

I agree. And his answer to me didn't directly address my criticism, but instead was the kind of a long-winded, scatter-gun answer a politician might give when put on the spot. Now, the crude explanation is that he realized I was on to him and, like a blowfish does in defense, he splattered the board here with semi- or quasi-related factoids -- giving the mere appearance that he addressed the criticism.

An alternative explanation, which you brought up, is that part of this process may be unconscious to him. It is something that we shouldn't rule out prematurely.

On a related tangent:
There is something called 'blindsight' and it's when your brain isn't totally connected neurologically. Those with 'blindsight' will claim that they don't see experimental signs in front of them, but their subsequent behavior -- which involves a specific response to those very signs -- gives it away that at least part of their brain is "conscious" of what it was that was put in front of their eyes.

Perhaps there is such a thing as "philosophical blindsight," where the victim does not understand that they are operating under a false philosophy -- indeed, ANY philosophy! -- even though they are firmly in the grips of it. This is something that would explain Marotta's behavior entirely. This charge need not be an instance of ad hominem -- to charge someone with not even knowing why they believe something -- because the victim can be given ample chance to explain how it is that an interplay of facts and logic led them to behave in the way that they did (i.e., to exonerate themselves from the charge).

Ed

**Occurs when you talk about someone in the 3rd person, even when they are in the same (chat) room with you.

(Edited by Ed Thompson on 1/19, 6:01pm)

Post 15

Thursday, January 19, 2012 - 12:12pm

In the interest of resolving the tensions of heterogenous interpretations of what Mike did, how I responded, and how Mike responded back, here is a mock example of a response that Mike could have given back to me, but for some reason, didn't:

**************************************************
Ed, ole' buddy ... ole' pal ... you responded to my quote:

The only reason that Objectivists follow the Republican Party like good fans (in the Swiftian sense) is that Ayn Rand held sway with Tricia Nixon, thus bringing a job to Alan Greenspan. Short of that, we'd all be Democrats, as Ayn Rand so completely endorsed the intellectualism of the liberals in opposition to the folksy way of the conservatives.
Hey, you're my buddy, but I disagree. What makes me a follower of a party is the party's principles, not whether some guru somewhere did or thought something that had once aligned them with one party or another. You portray the matter as if Objectivists are mindless, true believers ...

Hey, Ed, it's Mike Marotta here, responding to you. Just letting you know that I'm Mike Marotta, and that this is my response to you. Anyway, you know, Ed, I can see how what it is that I said could be taken as insulting to virtually all Objectivists. On the surface, it really does appear that I was characterizing pretty much all Objectivists as mindless, true-believing robots getting marching orders from a dictaphone. For example, when I said that Rand endorsed the intellectualism of liberals as against the folksy way of conservatives, and -- on that basis and on no other basis -- that that should make us all Democrats, I was perhaps embellishing a little too much.

So, I agree with you, Ed, that it is not literally true that, on the basis of Rand liking one aspect of a party as against another, that we'd all actually flock -- like mindless cattle, or something -- to the same liked party (and for the same liked reason). I admit that this statement of mine, having the potential to be insulting to virtually any Objectivist, was not one of my better sentences. But I'm here to tell you that I didn't mean it that way. That I don't actually believe that Objectivism is a philosophy that relegates the individual to a secondary status, secondary to the rationalized, floating abstraction that is the glorified philosophy of Objectivism -- to which all "good little" Objectivists must serve.

Mike
**************************************************

Ed

(Edited by Ed Thompson on 1/19, 6:05pm)

Post 16

Friday, January 20, 2012 - 1:39pm

There is much to be said for "sticking to the point" in consistent plainly understandable sentences...

Post 17

Sunday, January 22, 2012 - 8:42am

Could someone explain Ron Paul's answer on health care? I'm afraid I don't understand it.

66.7 Ron Paul
39.7 Huntsman
35.6 Obama

Post 18

Sunday, January 22, 2012 - 9:27am

He believes that medicare should not be under federal jurisdiction and that it be left up to each individual state as to how much or how little it would contribute to such programs.

Post 19

Sunday, January 22, 2012 - 9:45am