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This test is not detailed enough to be accurate.  Many of the questions have answers that do not really reflect my views.

1. A stimulus plan of some sort was needed in order to stave off an economic depression.  The government can spend money and thereby create a demand for goods and services which will promote economic activity.  However, the plan that was implemented in 2008 was likely more boondoggle than boon.  The government should stimulate the economy, but only by spending money on national security and infrastructure.

2. I support higher taxes for the middle class and poor.  Because of Reagan era tax cuts and tax reform something like 45% of American households have zero federal income tax obligations.  So nearly a majority of the American People can enjoy the benefits of government spending without having to pay for government spending. Making more people pay taxes will make more people willing to accept budget cuts.

3. In a post-911 world we could not take the national security risk of allowing a thug like Hussein run a country.  We should have bombed Iraq into unconditional surrender as we did Germany and Japan during World War II.

5. The United States must recognize the sovereignty of the State of Israel over all territory between the Nile River and the Euphrates River that is necessary to maintain Israel’s national security.

7. I do not like big business or big labor.  Business should not be allowed to abuse labor simply because the labor market allows it.  But labor is not entitled to a job or a retirement at the expense of business profitability.

8. I support the concept of minimum wage, but this does not mean I always support increasing it.

9. Maintain the current system for current beneficiaries, but otherwise privatize it by creating a dual system where employees have both Social Security and a personal retirement account.  When someone retires they can choose to collect either from Social Security or from their retirement account, but not both with the retirement account being inheritable by the person’s heirs.

10. I do not support fair trade.  I support unfair trade- I want trade policies designed to re-establish America’s manufacturing economy.

11. Embryonic stem cell research is murder.

12. I am opposed to any and all abortion except when a mother’s life is endangered, although for political purposes I would accept abortion in cases of rape and incest providing that persons who are convicted of rape or incest are executed for murdering the unborn human that is aborted.

14. I have no qualms about using a gun of any kind to protect life, liberty and property from loss or damage due to criminal behavior.  But nobody has any right to use armed force against the government as long as elections are held on schedule; office holders leave when their terms expire and the courts are open and operational.

15. Marijuana should not be legalized for any reason and anyone who is convicted of producing or selling marijuana should be given heavy prison terms- if not executed.

16. The health care industry should be non-profit, although I know of no practical or effective way to make it non-profit without reducing its quality. Repeal Obamacare, but don’t replace it with something that is worse.

17.  Natural resources should be preserved as much as possible for use by future generations.

18.  Arizona’s immigration laws are not stringent enough.  All illegal aliens should be rounded up and shot.  However, for practical political reasons I would give long-term illegals citizenship with heavy fines and then deploy the military along America’s international borders (and ports of entry) with the authority to use deadly force against anyone that attempts to enter the country illegally.

Supposedly I am 84% Santorum followed closely by Gingrich.  I would never vote for philandering pond scum like Gingrich, but I won’t be voting for Santorum or any other Republican either since I am sick-and-tired of settling for candidates that I cannot wholeheartedly support.

Rabid Koala wrote:

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Disagree. They should have let GM and Chrysler, at least, die and get reborn into new companies sans the UAW and their old failed management.[/quote]

Either way you are calling for government interference.  The government could loan or give these companies money that would allow them to stay in business, or the government could let these companies take advantage of the nation’s lax bankruptcy laws and thereby avoid paying most of their debt and likely all of their obligations to their employees and former employees.

The stimulus was a fraud designed to reward the wrong people, and it failed miserably to help with the economic woes.

Do you deny that government spending can increase economic activity by creating demand for goods and services?  By 1937 the U.S. GDP had returned to pre-1929 levels and this was mainly due to New Deal government spending.  But since Roosevelt was opposed to continuous deficit spending many New Deal programs were cut back or eliminated in 1936-37 and the economy tanked again because the private sector was not willing or able to demand enough goods and services to keep the economy going.

This wasn't on Reagan, rather blame it on pandering to the poor and inflation caused bracket creep.

Bracket creep was something that Reagan ended by indexing taxes to inflation.

I favor big business (or any business) over organized labor. I have been on both sides, both labor and management. If my company were to go union, I'd shut it down.

So you have no qualms about being a Walmart- a big company that makes obscene profits while paying its labor force so little that much of that labor force is eligible for public assistance.

I am opposed to any minimum wage.

Again, you would willfully take advantage of people in the name of profit.

Many aren't worth it, they are being shut out of the job market and can't get experience.

If they are not worth minimum wage, what makes you think they would willingly work for less?  A minimum wage job’s ability to impart experience to a worker comes as much from that worker learning to show up for work on time as anything else.  By and large you don’t need experience to do OK at a minimum wage job.  What you need is a work ethic- something that doesn’t come from the amount of pay you get. Bad workers will be bad workers no matter how low minimum wage is.

I tend to agree, but reform the tax structure to make outsourcing manufacturing unappealing,

How would you do this?  And why would you do this?  If a company can increase its profits by sending jobs to India or Red China, who are you, a libertarian, to tell them not to?

and weaken the death grip of unions.

Very little union labor works for the private sector anymore.  Unions do not have the death grip on business and industry that you seem to think they do.

All states should be right to work states.

Florida is a right to work state.  Unemployment here as of April 2011 is 10.8%.  A lack of unions does not guarantee a good economy.

And this one, as I am more concerned with economic issues.

Typical libertarian attitude.  You measure everything in terms of money.

I love my guns, and agree with that statement.

Over the course of their collective lifetime my mother’s father and 2 brothers likely traded well over a million dollars’ worth of guns.  I inherited much of one brother’s collection, but sold all of it except for a long gun from the late 19^th century.  Hunting for food is not really necessary, and hunting for sport or fashion is immoral.  And right now I couldn’t shoot a gun if my life depended on it due to arthritis.

Disagree, it should be decriminalized for personal use.

Do you want the driver in the semi-tractor trailer barreling down on you on the interstate to be smoking pot at the time?  What about your doctor or your child’s school teacher or the forklift driver at Home Depot?

Alcohol is decriminalized for personal use and alcoholism is this nation’s biggest drug problem.

The profit motive is a great motivator, let the market straighten out this mess that is partially caused by the government.

The market is what caused the mess in the first place.  Your profit motive has prompted various insurance companies to tell my mother to tell her doctor to prescribe cheaper medications instead of what he (the doctor) thinks are the best option.  Don’t preach to me about profit when people’s lives are at stake.

Energy should be plentiful and reasonable in cost,

But it is neither because most energy comes in a finite form while consumer demand is insatiable.

I would not advocate shooting, but a good deportation followed by much more severe punishment for illegally entering the country a second time works for me.

We cannot round all of them up now, so what makes you think we could do a better job the second time around?

Go after employers as well.

Why?  Employers are simply hiring the cheapest labor they can get so they can maximize their profits.  I thought this is what you libs want.

I know that I will not ever find the perfect candidate, so I will have to just keep voting against the leftist one,

Which means nothing will ever be changed. Suppose your choice of candidates was Obama and Hillary Clinton.  Which one would you vote for?

Susansve wrote:

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1. A stimulus plan of some sort was needed in order to stave off an economic depression. The government can spend money and thereby create a demand for goods and services which will promote economic activity. However, the plan that was implemented in 2008 was likely more boondoggle than boon. The government should stimulate the economy, but only by spending money on national security and infrastructure.


This statement is incorrect. The stimilus was enacted in 2009, TARP was enacted in 2008. Very different legistlation.

The stimilus package has failed on all counts. TARP may or may not nhave been necessary, very hard to prove either way. I was against both.

Both pieces of legislation had the same purpose.  And just how do you define failure?  What kind of shape would the economy be in now if we didn't have TARP or the Stimulus?