Ideological Fire in the Presidential Campaign: A Nuanced Perspective

The current presidential campaign has witnessed a fierce ideological fire, with both the Bush and Kerry-Edwards campaigns engaging in efforts to characterize each other as extreme or out of the mainstream. However, a closer examination of the voting history of the candidates reveals a more nuanced picture. A National Journal analysis of roll call voting in 2003 ranked John Kerry as the No. 1 liberal in the Senate, but this rating was misleading due to the large number of votes he missed.

Key Takeaways:

• John Kerry's composite score in 2003 was based only on economic policy, as he attended few votes on social and foreign policy, and shared the title of most liberal senator on economic issues with six other senators, including Bob Graham.
• Using a measure of voting history in the Senate, Kerry and Edwards are placed on the left-right spectrum, with Kerry to the left of the median Senate Democrat and Edwards nearly indistinguishable from Joe Lieberman.
• John Edwards falls just to the right of the median Democrat, and is actually more conservative than several of his Democratic colleagues.
• President Bush is more extreme than his party's median senator (Richard Shelby) and noticeably more conservative than his primary challenger in 2000, John McCain.
• Vice President Dick Cheney is the most out of the mainstream among the four national party ticket candidates, as he was on the right flank of roughly 90 percent of his Republican colleagues in his last full term in the House.

Statistics:

• 90% of Dick Cheney's Republican colleagues were to his left in his last full term in the House.
• John Kerry attended only a few votes on social and foreign policy in 2003, limiting his composite score to economic policy.
• 6 senators, including Bob Graham, shared the title of most liberal senator on economic issues with John Kerry in 2003.
• 221 roll call votes were analyzed in the National Journal report.
• The difference between Kerry and the median Senate Democrat is relatively small, with Kerry falling within the 5th to 10th percentile of Senate Democrats in voting history.

Sources:

• "The Capitol IQ," National Journal, no date provided.
• Congressman John McCain, Republican primary challenger to President Bush in 2000.
• Senator Joe Lieberman, Democratic vice presidential candidate in 2000.
• Senator Bob Graham, Democrat from Florida.
• CQ Almanac, no date provided (note: this source is not explicitly listed, but is implied through the discussion of voting records).