NP Rank:
Cheat Sheet for Where the 2008 Presidential Candidates Stand on the Issues
This data has been remixed from www.2decide.com/table.htm.
I reorganized the candidates to be grouped by Democrats and Republicans with the highest rated candidates ordered from left to right.
2decide.com are the ones who did the research into the issues from the candidate's websites, and they did the original layout of all of this data.
However, they ordered the candidates in alphabetical order and not even by political party. And it spanned across multiple pages, and so it was very difficult to get a gestalt overview of the core differences between the two parties on the issues.
So I took a screenshot of all of the data at http://2decide.com/table.htm, and then first split it between the Democrats and Republicans, and then ordered it by the candidates with the highest polling numbers from left to right using info from www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/democr... & www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/republ... The ordering is approximate since it was really difficult to get a precise ordering after the top 3-4 in each party.
I then overlaid a transparent blue and red over the candidates to prove my suspicion correct in that there are a lot of issues where there is a near black and white split between parties. If I would have placed Kucinich further to the right, then you'd probably see an even more homogenized field since he's more on the progressive fringe. And it's pretty noticable that libertarian-minded Ron Paul really lives up to his "Dr. No" moniker.
There are no independents listed, and only people who have officially declared their intentions of running and have a campaign site -- as far as I understand how 2decide.com aggregated the info.
Originally posted here: http://flickr.com/photos/kentbye/868063604/
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kentbye
Fairfax, California, United States



Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (6)
at 11:05 on August 7th, 2007
kentbye, now this is interesting work. What are you doing in 2008 to keep up this level of political engagement? Write me!
at 12:18 on August 7th, 2007
Assuming the information contained is accurate, this is terrific work. I followed your link to flicker, enlarged the image and downloaded it. Did you spell cheat wrong on purpose?
at 13:05 on August 7th, 2007
THIS is why the Internet's revolutionizing election coverage! Nice job there.
at 13:16 on August 7th, 2007
@Joellerose: Thanks for pointing out that I had misspelled "cheat" -- it's now corrected.
@ActualNewsGeezer: No big plans for '08 election coverage. Possibly other data visualizations using data aggregated by others as time and inspiration permits
at 14:56 on August 7th, 2007
kentbye, Good stuff.
at 23:21 on August 7th, 2007
kentbye, I like this story. It's good stuff.