# Short Political Quiz for American Dopers **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 7, 2003, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087 "2003-10-07T16:24:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Dogface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9d8465/32.png) [@Dogface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogface)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/21 "2003-10-07T18:21:38Z")
Well-designed tests very often intentionally leave out mushy-head options, forcing people to choose a side on some matter or another. The other part of the good design is to have a lot of questions that are designed so that the total picture can emerge from this. ---
**Author:** ![cowgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8c91f0/32.png) [@cowgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cowgirl)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/22 "2003-10-07T18:29:02Z")
Nine. But I left the athletes/owners one blank. … upon checking, it didn’t make a difference to the score ! ---
**Author:** ![lel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8797f3/32.png) [@lel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lel)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/23 "2003-10-07T18:31:12Z")
21 here, and of course there’s some questions that left me scratching my head and/or trying to figure out the bias of things. **My Darn Snake Legs** , I remember Haiti being a major foreign policy issue in 1994 (when this test was written) – was Korea the same? (Somehow, I can’t recall what the Korea issue was in 1994.) ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/24 "2003-10-07T18:37:11Z")
9 (I would have guessed slightly lower) Again, I agree with some of the statements others have said about the test - too limited in choices or had bizarre qualifiers to the choices which made neither statement appropriate. ---
**Author:** ![Not\_In\_Anger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3ab097/32.png) [@Not\_In\_Anger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Not_In_Anger)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/25 "2003-10-07T18:44:20Z")
1. I would have scored lower but for my anti-government bias. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/26 "2003-10-07T18:51:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Dogface \* > \*\*Well-designed tests very often intentionally leave out mushy-head options, forcing people to choose a side on some matter or another. The other part of the good design is to have a lot of questions that are designed so that the total picture can emerge from this. \*\* I think I understand what you’re saying, but how does it apply in this case? If a person believes that neither the FBI nor the IRS is trustworthy whatsoever, then how is he to answer the question of which he trusts more? Why couldn’t they have had a “neither” option? That’s not mushy-headed, is it? It just means that you trust them equally. By not allowing for honest responses, it seems to me that the whole test is rendered mushily. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/27 "2003-10-07T18:52:30Z")
> [@](#): > > (Somehow, I can’t recall what the Korea issue was in 1994.) Nuclear weapons. North Korea was making bellicose sounds about wanting to manufacute weapons-grade plutonium at their Yongbyon plant and threatening to turn Seoul into a lake of fire. (I was in Seoul at the time). Jimmy Carter came by and brokered an agreement between the North and the US which both sides have since violated. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/28 "2003-10-07T18:55:32Z")
Oh, and I scored an 18, between Bill Clinton and Colin Powell,[sup]\*[/sup] which is about right, since Clinton was not much of a liberal and Powell isn’t all that conservative. [sup[/sup] Although I’d rather be between Russell Crowe and Sean William Scott. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/29 "2003-10-07T18:55:50Z")
Oh, and I scored an 18, between Bill Clinton and Colin Powell,[sup]_[/sup] which is about right, since Clinton was not much of a liberal and Powell isn’t all that conservative. [sup]_[/sup] Although I’d rather be between Russell Crowe and Seann William Scott. ---
**Author:** ![Lsura](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7993a0/32.png) [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/30 "2003-10-07T19:08:42Z")
I’m another 9, but if I’d chosen differently on a couple of the ones (the pro athletes vs team owners thing for example), I figure that my score would have been slightly higher. Either way I’d still be pretty liberal. ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/31 "2003-10-07T19:15:37Z")
9 – they seem to think I’m more conservative than I actually am 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/32 "2003-10-07T19:16:01Z")
17 here. I’ve taken this test before, in fact I have authors’ book. I take this test every couple of years to see how my ideas have changed. I wrote my scores in the back of the book, but that’s at home so I don’t know how this score differs from the last time I took it. Probably about the same. Happy ---
**Author:** ![Uvula\_Donor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e19adc/32.png) [@Uvula\_Donor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uvula_Donor)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/33 "2003-10-07T19:20:31Z")
Damn! I scored a 25, which I thought was a little too high for most of my actual opinions. I agree with many of the other Dopers in saying that the questions are too simplistic or present false dilemmas: AIDS vs. heart disease? Strict gun control or harsher sentencing? FBI vs. IRS? Joint Chiefs vs. _Peace Corps_??? ---
**Author:** ![chorpler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chorpler/32/2888_2.png) [@chorpler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorpler)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/34 "2003-10-07T19:25:43Z")
I got 9. And I agree that the test has some irritating forced choices. Sports teams? What the…? ---
**Author:** ![UrbanChic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9dc877/32.png) [@UrbanChic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UrbanChic)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/35 "2003-10-07T19:27:14Z")
> [@](#): > > Joint Chiefs vs. Peace Corps??? That question made me laugh aloud when I was taking the quiz. ---
**Author:** ![SanibelMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e4f/32.png) [@SanibelMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanibelMan)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/36 "2003-10-07T19:29:03Z")
1. Booyeah! I’m the most liberal of all! Actually, I didn’t like most of the questions, and I don’t think I’m asmuch of a granola-hippie-pinko-commie-liberal as the test makes me out to be. ---
**Author:** ![Algernon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a183cd/32.png) [@Algernon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algernon)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/37 "2003-10-07T19:33:16Z")
14 here. Theoretically, right between the Clintons. ---
**Author:** ![Psycho\_Pirate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Psycho\_Pirate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Psycho_Pirate)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/38 "2003-10-07T19:41:13Z")
36! Go Republicans! ---
**Author:** ![Mehitabel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Mehitabel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mehitabel)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/39 "2003-10-07T19:42:15Z")
1. WTF?? Very weird and dated test. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2003, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087/40 "2003-10-07T20:24:09Z")
17 here…I had know idea that I’d be rubbing shoulders with Powell and Clinton. I’d like to say that’s accurate and also give another WTF to the sports questions… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/short-political-quiz-for-american-dopers/206087.md?page=3)