In the wake of Joe Biden's nomination, Fred Barnes drags out the National Journal 2007 Senate ratings to argue that Obama and Biden are the first and third most liberal sentors:
Once regarded as a centrist, Mr. Biden was rated by the National Journal in 2007 as the third most liberal member of the Senate. Mr. Obama was rated the most liberal. Neither has a record of bucking the wishes of liberal interest groups or promoting bipartisanship.
However, as I pointed out back in February, the National Journal ratings are seen as simplistic by political scientists who study voting in Congress. The far more respected ranking produced by UCSD's Keith Poole and UCLA's Jeff Lewis places Obama and Biden as the 11th and 10th most liberal senators (respectively) in the first half of the 110th Senate (2007) and as the 21st and 29th most liberal in the 109th Senate (2005-2006).
By contrast, Poole and Lewis rate the "maverick" McCain as the eighth most conservative senator in the first half of the 110th and the second most conservative in the 109th, so the comparison isn't actually as flattering as Barnes thinks (though see my previous post on the methodological problems posed by his inconsistent voting record).
I wonder what it will do to McCain's rating that he hasn't cast a vote in the Senate since April 8?
Posted by: Noumenon | August 25, 2008 at 04:20 PM
"[Biden's] presidential campaign took a nosedive in 1987 after he adopted part of the autobiography of British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock as his own in speeches."
I think it would be more accurate to say he used a rhetorical phrase that had been used by Kinnock.
It was a very minor infraction, and probably played a very small part in his dropping out of the race.
It was also 20 plus years ago, but Barnes seems to need to reach back that far to find a put-down of Biden.
Posted by: Howard Craft | August 26, 2008 at 10:01 PM