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candidate matcher
Jun. 25th, 2003 03:14 pmSelectSmart (link from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
insomnia) is a matchmaker between your political views and the current set of presidential candidates. Interesting idea; I'd say the implementation is so-so thus far. According to them I have 100% match with the Libertarian candidate (no real surprise there, though in reality it's more like 90%); next on their list was Pat Buchanan at 61%, which is a definite "no" for me. (And let me just throw in a "yuck!" toward a couple other folks in my top 10, shall we? Sharpton?! Jackson?! Give me a break.)
I think the big problem with the test as currently configured is that they don't adequately distinguish between "opposed to X" and "don't care about X". Each question has a high/medium/low setting for how much you care about that category of issues (e.g. taxes), but when a question is a group of positions (check all that apply), the absence of a check doesn't tell you whether the person filling out the survey doesn't care or is opposed to the position. So, for example, I didn't check "Law enforcement agencies should be granted greater discretion to read mail and email, tap phones, and conduct random searches"; I'm betting from some of the rankings I got that the test incorrectly interpreted that as "doesn't care".
( full results )
I see that they have the notion of negative ratings, though given that I consider some of the people on this list to be antithesis to what I believe -- and they didn't score negatively -- I'm not sure how to interpret that.
insomnia) is a matchmaker between your political views and the current set of presidential candidates. Interesting idea; I'd say the implementation is so-so thus far. According to them I have 100% match with the Libertarian candidate (no real surprise there, though in reality it's more like 90%); next on their list was Pat Buchanan at 61%, which is a definite "no" for me. (And let me just throw in a "yuck!" toward a couple other folks in my top 10, shall we? Sharpton?! Jackson?! Give me a break.)I think the big problem with the test as currently configured is that they don't adequately distinguish between "opposed to X" and "don't care about X". Each question has a high/medium/low setting for how much you care about that category of issues (e.g. taxes), but when a question is a group of positions (check all that apply), the absence of a check doesn't tell you whether the person filling out the survey doesn't care or is opposed to the position. So, for example, I didn't check "Law enforcement agencies should be granted greater discretion to read mail and email, tap phones, and conduct random searches"; I'm betting from some of the rankings I got that the test incorrectly interpreted that as "doesn't care".
( full results )
I see that they have the notion of negative ratings, though given that I consider some of the people on this list to be antithesis to what I believe -- and they didn't score negatively -- I'm not sure how to interpret that.