# Independents and Conservatives: Obama rated most liberal Senator...Do you care? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 16, 2008, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134 "2008-10-16T01:31:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Plan\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Plan\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plan_B)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/1 "2008-10-16T01:31:07Z")
According to the National Journal, Barack Obama is the most liberal Senator. And I believe that Joe Biden is the third most liberal. I seem to remember some consistent polling results saying that about 20% of Americans identify themselves as liberals, 40% as conservatives and 40% as independents. If that’s true it amazes me that Obama is ahead in the polls at this time. It makes sense that if you’re a liberal that you would be fine with the Dems nominating the most liberal Senator and you would be eager to vote for him. But I’d like to hear from independents and conservatives. Do you care? Does this affect your vote? I’ll answer for myself. Small “l” libertarian here, occasionally more of a conservative. I was considering voting Libertarian this time, but when Obama was nominated I decided to vote Republican. Not at all happy about their big spending ways, but it scares me to have an extreme liberal as POTUS for four years. And please, please, please, let’s remember, this is a poll, not a debate. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/2 "2008-10-16T01:40:28Z")
> [@Plan\_B](#): > > According to the National Journal, Barack Obama is the most liberal Senator. [Seems unlikely](http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Senate/con_senator_ratings-2007.html), but if they can provide a cite…or if you can provide a cite… ? ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/3 "2008-10-16T02:55:11Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > [Seems unlikely](http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Senate/con_senator_ratings-2007.html), but if they can provide a cite…or if you can provide a cite… ? I’ve heard this too. Apparently “most liberal” means only “voted with his/her party the most,” rather than being based on their professed beliefs and policies. ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/4 "2008-10-16T03:07:35Z")
That’s funny. Just four short years ago, I’m pretty sure John Kerry held that title. What an unusual coincidence. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/5 "2008-10-16T03:30:57Z")
> [@](#): > > That’s funny. Just four short years ago, I’m pretty sure John Kerry held that title. What an unusual coincidence. It’s almost as if the word liberal has acquired a new meaning. As in “most liberal” = “most likely to defeat a Republican in an upcoming election”. ---
**Author:** ![Hakuna\_Matata](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a88e4f/32.png) [@Hakuna\_Matata](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hakuna_Matata)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/6 "2008-10-16T03:39:17Z")
As a moderate I am fine with it–because I don’t believe it is true. I swear every four years this gets dragged out and dusted off. You know after awhile it sort of wears thin. So for me it is a non issue and in fact if I hear if from the McCain camp it goes as a negative against him. I like Obama and I liked McCain–the old McCain, not the one running right now. Too bad, but when he swung towards the conservative/religious side he lost my vote. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/7 "2008-10-16T03:49:45Z")
Political hit disguised as poll moved from IMHO to Great Debates. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/8 "2008-10-16T03:57:18Z")
I’m with **Giraffe** on this one. It seems every election the republicans break out this old saw with nary a fact to back it up. I suspect **Plan B** won’t be back with a legitimate cite with stats to back up the assertion. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/9 "2008-10-16T04:09:31Z")
As noted John Kerry was at the receiving end of the same bogus analysis. Here’s what happened. Presidential candidates miss a lot of votes - they show up only for the big ones. And on those big ones, they tend to vote the party line. So yeah, in 2007 a high share of Obama votes were with the Democratic caucus. Same for Kerry in 2003. Not so much during the other years - these 2 nominees had centrist inclinations. What about the lifetime rankings? According to the same source - the National Journal- these are the most liberal senators: National Journal: Most liberal senators, lifetime voting 1. Mark Dayton, D-Minn. 2. Paul Sarbanes, D-Md. 3. Jack Reed, D-R.I. 4. Jon Corzine, D-N.J. 5. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. 6. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif. 7. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa 8. Richard Durbin, D-Ill. 9. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J. 10. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt Neither Obama - nor John Kerry for that matter - are on the list. [http://delong.typepad.com/egregious\_moderation/2008/07/steve-benen-the.html](http://delong.typepad.com/egregious_moderation/2008/07/steve-benen-the.html) Blog devoted to debunking this meme: [Most Liberal Senator](http://www.mostliberalsenator.blogspot.com/). ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/10 "2008-10-16T04:10:44Z")
> [@Plan B](#): > > According to the National Journal, Barack Obama is the most liberal Senator. Has the _National Journal_ never heard of Bernie Sanders, say? As other posters have pointed out, four years ago, they found that [John Kerry was the most liberal Senator](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/31/flawed-study-ranks-obama-_n_84375.html): > [@](#): > > So much depends upon how many votes each lawmaker actually casts. The National Journal shunts every single vote into three separate “issue categories,” and if an individual member misses more than half the votes in any category, they don’t receive a composite score. By this logic, absenteeism somehow magically obscures your political leanings! This wasn’t a position the NJ took four years ago, by the way. As they admit, their considerations for absenteeism only came about “after Kerry was ranked the most liberal senator in our 2003 ratings despite having missed more than half of the votes in two categories.” Convenient! This year, somehow, John Kerry ranks as only 19th most liberal. How’d that happen? He hasn’t significantly switched any of his major positions, as far as I know. And remember Kerry’s running mate, John Edwards, who was ranked fourth most liberal in the same ratings that placed Kerry first? [He’s all over the map too](http://www.alternet.org/election04/19507/?page=2): > [@](#): > > As for Edwards, he was the fourth most liberal in 2003. But he was 40th in 2002, 35th in 2001, 19th in 2000, and 31st in 1999, his first year in the Senate. In short, these _National Review_ ratings look like semi-random bullshit that they tweak and fluff however they want in order to attach the “most liberal” label to the Democrat they happen to be gunning for at any particular time. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/11 "2008-10-16T04:14:55Z")
If Obama is, in fact, the most liberal Senator while Biden is, in fact, the third most liberal Senator, that’s fine by me. I only wish it were so. ---
**Author:** ![Bobotheoptimist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/919ad9/32.png) [@Bobotheoptimist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bobotheoptimist)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/12 "2008-10-16T04:19:20Z")
Nah, doesn’t matter to me. He’s too liberal and that’s enough to keep me from voting for him. Relative liberalness isn’t the problem, absolute liberalness is (same with conservatives). ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/13 "2008-10-16T04:22:18Z")
> [@Plan B](#): > > And I believe that Joe Biden is the third most liberal. Gee, and just back in 2006, _National Review_ ranked him only at [19th most liberal](http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/02/24/rankings/). What an interesting coincidence that the Democratic Presidential candidate, in both 2004 and 2008, was rated by _National Review_ as the Number One Absolutely Mostest Liberalest Senator (with his running mate, in both cases, only a couple-three slots behind), whereas all four people in other years had been pretty much everywhere in the “liberality” rankings from the 50th or 30th percentile on up! > [@Plan B](#): > > when Obama was nominated I decided to vote Republican. Not at all happy about their big spending ways, but it scares me to have an extreme liberal as POTUS for four years. I don’t think you’ve got a thing to worry about, sugar. Obama is not an “extreme liberal” by any stretch of the imagination, unless you happen to have an imagination like the _National Review_’s. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/14 "2008-10-16T04:54:42Z")
> [@Plan\_B](#): > > And please, please, please, let’s remember, this is a poll, not a debate. Since you’ve already been called on this one, let’s go ahead and end the debate. It’s a bullshit claim. Even the National Journal themselves will happily tell you it was bullshit when they made the same claim regarding Kerry. Why don’t I just let them speak for themselves. This [little essay](http://www.nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2004/0830nj_liberalratings.htm) came out after they labelled John Kerry in the same manner: > [@](#): > > In short, our magazine – or, more precisely, our annual congressional vote ratings edition – has become a Republican talking point in the 2004 presidential campaign. And that’s been a fascinating, and disconcerting, experience. Fascinating because we’re more used to being cited in congressional hearings than on the Today show. **Disconcerting because the shorthand used to describe our ratings of Kerry and Edwards is sometimes misleading – or just plain wrong.** ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/15 "2008-10-16T04:57:12Z")
deleted ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/16 "2008-10-16T04:59:34Z")
Whoops, I typed “National Review” several times in the above posts when I meant “National Journal”. Never mind, sorry, carry on. ---
**Author:** ![IClaudius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c37758/32.png) [@IClaudius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IClaudius)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/17 "2008-10-16T05:29:12Z")
As argued above, the tag most liberal comes from a rather simplistic assessment based on Congressional vote polarisation, and not any substantive political positions. It’s a very limited measure on the substance. Obama is more liberal than Hillary on some issues, and less liberal than her on others. He’s hard to pigeon hole when you actually examine his stances. One thing we do know is that he has a deserved reputation for listening to advice from all walks of life, which has been demonstrated through his political life by the kind of advisers and wonk team he surrounds himself with. Another thing we know, and it came out a bit in the debates, is that he resists indulging in pith despite its political potency because he bring a law professorial temperate to his considerations - conceding validity to different views, balancing values and opinions. IMO that takes a lot of balance, humility and moderation to carry off sincerely. You can’t fake it. Of course, some people will buy into this narrative anyway. But ask yourself, in the comparison between McCain’s 90% Bush record, and Obama’s lesser record of working with Republicans, does it not matter that much of this occurred during a time when one party has been consistently wrong on the issues. Bipartisanship for the sake of bipartisanship is meaningless if one side is significantly more repugnant. If Republicans were all like Hagel and Lugar - it would make a bit more sense to rate voting record bipartisanship as a virtue in the abstract. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/18 "2008-10-16T05:32:08Z")
I wish he were more liberal. He is too damn conservative for me. I prefer Fiengold or Sanders. ---
**Author:** ![Plan\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Plan\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plan_B)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/19 "2008-10-16T13:08:26Z")
Well as I said, I was interested in a poll, not a debate. No big deal, the OP only has no much influence. Enjoy! ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2008, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134/20 "2008-10-16T13:17:59Z")
Yes but your poll was based on a (at the very least) debatable premise. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/independents-and-conservatives-obama-rated-most-liberal-senator-do-you-care/468134.md?page=2)