Whether they are based on 10 questions or 144 questions, I can’t resist taking quizzes that supposedly identify one’s political or economic philosophy.
The good news, according to various quizzes, is that I’m 92 percent minarchist and only 6 percent communist.
And, based on the quiz I shared most recently, I’m a “minimalist” who is “in favor of smaller government.”
I certainly won’t argue with those results.
For today’s column, we’re going to look at a quiz on hypothetical political parties that Lee Drutman put together for yesterday’s New York Times. You can click here to take it.
Here are my results.
Given the various alternatives, I’m not surprised that I’m part of the “Growth and Opportunity Party.”
But I don’t like this description of this group.
The Growth and Opportunity Party is the socially moderate, pro-business wing of the Republican Party. It is the heir to the old moderate “Rockefeller Republican,” the East Coast wing of the G.O.P. Its potential leaders include Larry Hogan, Charlie Baker, Mitt Romney, John Kasich and Michael Bloomberg. Based on data from the Democracy Fund’s VOTER survey, this party would be the best fit for about 14 percent of the electorate.
My objections are partly historical (I was a “Reaganite” in my youth rather than a big-government “Rockefeller Republican”) and partly based on the politicians listed as political leaders.
I don’t know enough about Larry Hogan and Charlie Baker to have an opinion, but Mitt Romney, John Kasich, and Michael Bloomberg are definitely proponents of bigger government.
I’ll close by grousing about a couple of the questions.
For instance, should you “agree” or “disagree” with this question? I definitely want to decrease the scope of police work if that means less enforcement of victimless crimes such as drugs, gambling, and prostitution, but I don’t want to decrease the scope of police work in fighting genuine crime.
I also wasn’t sure how to answer this next question. Does it mean creating more opportunities to come to the United States, especially for people that are unlikely to become dependent on government handouts? Or does it mean allowing limitless illegal border crossing?
Because the wording was not very clear, I basically punted on these two question.
P.S. For what it’s worth, I think the two best quizzes are the “definitive political orientation test” and the “libertarian purity test.”
International Liberty 
Since there’s no guarantee – but a strong likelyhood – that many of the illegal aliens hordes now coming to America and Western Europe come to gain from government handouts, I’m against unfettered uncontrolled immigration. So I’m now probably a conservatarian rather than a libertarian.
I refuse to pay even a dollar to the NYT so couldn’t take your test.
Quizzes are made to pigeon hole you and sway your political opinions.
Took the “definitive political orientation test”. Who writes these poorly-worded ambiguous questions? Take the first question, about being “patriotic.” What does that mean? “My country right or wrong” or “I like living here but I hate the government” or something in between? Such tests do have wonderful aggravation value. As a libertarian-capitalist, I was surprised to learn I’m a leftist-libertarian, just shy of being a democratic-socialist. I can only suppose that this is because it is impossible for an adherent of capitalism to have compassion or support anyone’s rights other than his own. Yeah, I said it, “his”, the original English pronoun for a person of unspecified gender.
I got the Patriot Party. I don’t like any of the descriptions.
On Thu, Sep 9, 2021 at 11:04 AM International Liberty wrote:
> Dan Mitchell posted: “Whether they are based on 10 questions or 144 > questions, I can’t resist taking quizzes that supposedly identify one’s > political or economic philosophy. The good news, according to various > quizzes, is that I’m 92 percent minarchist and only 6 percent co” >