[GPSCC-chat] 3D Politics - 'Political Compass' and Beyond

[alexcathy at aol.com]

Dear Green Friends, 

Scott McLarty, Green Party U.S. Media Coordinator,posted a Facebook link to an interactive web site known asPolitical Compass.According to Scott, the site returned these scores based on his reply to a battery of multiple choice questions:"Economic Left/Right: -7.12; Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -8.05, which places me in the lower left corner of the chart (slightly more libertarian than left)."

I was not surprised Scott's results were similar to mine. People at Political Compassstrongly believe the old one-dimensional "Left vs Right" model for describing politicalparties is obsolete.  They believe the model should include a"Libertarian vs. Authoritarian" dimension with four quarants for "Libertarian Left","Libertarian Right", "Authoritarian Left", and "Authoritarian Right." Hence, thedepiction of the 2008 presidential candidates posted on theTrèsSugar Web Site.



I agree. Indeed, I'd go further for two reasons.

First, the conflict between so-called conservative Republicans and so-calledliberal Democrats in the U.S. doesn't even make sense along the old"Left-Right" dimension, since both are clustered in the "Authoritarian Right"quadrant. The only difference is demagoguery. Republicans use Big Governmentauthoritarianism supposedly to serve hard-working, taxpaying,Christian "Whites" in "middle-class" neighborhoods.Democrats use Big Government authoritarianism supposedly to serve that70% of Californians labeled "minorities" including, allegedly lazy,welfare-dependent, savage "Blacks" like my family and me in the "ghetto."

Second, I am convinced the growing conflict between stand patters for "Gray"industry and innovators for "Green" industry constitutes a third dimension.And it's along this third dimension where the great 21st Century politicalstruggles are forming.



The irrelevance and divisiveness of the phony debate betweenso-called conservative Republicans and so-called liberal Democratsis why I plead for Greens, Libertarians, and all other serious independentsto quit propping up the One-Party-With-2-Names by framing our dissent withold clichés, slogans, and stereotypes.

Read more to see the "Political Compass" test prologue.  Check it out, take the test,then post a comment on my blog at California Greening:

http://cagreening.blogspot.com/2011/08/3d-politics-political-compass-and.html
http://tinyurl.com/3t6pze4


 


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