How far right are you?

[Ed Anger]

And I sincerely doubt that Beeb or any other poster who responded 10 see themselves as Hitler.

Ed does.

[Ideologue]

I think the 10 spot has to go to Hitler though. When you hear of "far right extremist groups", you know the discussion isn't about Milton Friedman disciples.

I don't know that.

[Norgy]

2.
There's no united left. I fall between most chairs.
I'd be hard pushed to see common values between a neo-nazi and a libertarian, though. Except that both are bunk.

[DontSayBanana]

Fairly centrist, but my pretty severe case of anti-union (and my belief that government should get out of a few businesses its gotten itself into) probably put me somewhere around a 6 or 7.

[Razgovory]

I'm trying to figure out a calibration...

1: Lenin, Castro
2: Chavez, Morales, Gorbachev
3. Kucinich
4. Obama
5. Clinton, Lieberman
6. Cameron
7. Bush
8. Ashcroft, Santorum
9. Franco
10. Hitler

This is reasonable, if deeply debatable, up to 9 and 10.  Both Franco and Hitler pursued very statist economic policies.  And it's not as if someone who is center-right enjoys wars of conquest and exterminating race enemies, just not quite as much as Hitler did.

Of course, as someone already pointed out it's impossible for a linear scale to encompass all the variation in political opinions.

Statism is not exactly a left wing issue.  And historically in the US conquest of the West, destruction of the Indians, and holding millions of inferior peoples as slaves tended to be championed by conservatives.

[Eddie Teach]

Statism is not exactly a left wing issue.

That's the problem, no issues are exactly left wing issues. Any position one takes could be derived from a number of different motivations, but charting people on a left/right axis requires arbirtrarily choosing a set of positions to define each side. Generally the more satisfied you are with the set you've defined yourself by, the less satisfied the opposition will be.

[Admiral Yi]

Statism is not exactly a left wing issue.

I'm having a hard time coming up with examples of countries, at any point in history, in which the generally accepted political right favored greater public involvement in the economy than the generally accepted left.

[Valmy]

I'm having a hard time coming up with examples of countries, at any point in history, in which the generally accepted political right favored greater public involvement in the economy than the generally accepted left.

I find this very hard to believe.  Free trade and laissez faire politics started as a left wing thing.  Are the UK and France really that obscure of places?

[Rex Francorum]

5. Well, leaning to the Right on fiscal issues but definitely a Leftist on most moral/social issues. In all, I may stand from 3 to 7 depending of the topic.

[Valmy]

5. Well, leaning to the Right on fiscal issues but definitely a Leftist on most moral/social issues. In all, I may stand from 3 to 7 depending of the topic.

Yeah this describes me as well.

[Admiral Yi]

I find this very hard to believe.  Free trade and laissez faire politics started as a left wing thing.  Are the UK and France really that obscure of places?

Yes.  Trade restrictions are the great exception.

[Barrister]

But the question wasn't about how far right extremist you are.

And I sincerely doubt that Beeb or any other poster who responded 10 see themselves as Hitler.

I always took Burke as the ur-Conservative.

Let's remember Hitler styled himself as a National Socialist.  While I concede that doesn't make him a leftist, it doesn't mean he was an arch-Conservative either.

[Valmy]

Bismark believed in paternalistic socialism. Continental Europe does not map very well on the Left-Ring things in the English speaking world. Which is why I disagree with Yi's assertion.

Besides Burke was all about preservation of traditional institutions. If those institutions are paternalistic or stifle economic freedom, then Burkean conservatives would support those things no?  Or at least their gradual reform.

[Razgovory]

Statism is not exactly a left wing issue.

I'm having a hard time coming up with examples of countries, at any point in history, in which the generally accepted political right favored greater public involvement in the economy than the generally accepted left.

US early late 18th century to mid 19th century.  Britain in the same time period.  Czarist Russia.  Qing China.

EDIT: And all the people who promoted the liberal economics of the 18th and 19th century were still "statists".  They believed that people should live in states.

[Razgovory]

But the question wasn't about how far right extremist you are.

And I sincerely doubt that Beeb or any other poster who responded 10 see themselves as Hitler.

I always took Burke as the ur-Conservative.

Let's remember Hitler styled himself as a National Socialist.  While I concede that doesn't make him a leftist, it doesn't mean he was an arch-Conservative either.

No, he wasn't a conservative but he was definitely a rightest.  His allies were rightist, he drew followers from the right, and well wishers in France, Britain and the US were right wingers.