THE TWO PARTY SYSTEM IS SO MUCH LESS CONFUSING:

Lot of Folks Can’t Tell Left From Right (Rachel Marsden, 1/20/06, Toronto Sun)

[A] Harper victory might also indicate that a lot of Canadians have held those “scary conservative values” all along, but just didn’t know it until now. I’m serious.

In fact, a 2002 Compas poll found that over half of Canadians are oblivious to the differences between the political “left” and “right”. Some 18% thought the Canadian Alliance precursor to the Conservative Party was on the left. Another 32% admitted outright to not having a clue.

This campaign has spotlighted some of the tangible differences between the two ideological camps...

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Algorithm detects Canadian politicians' spin (Stu Hutson, 20 January 2006, NewScientist.com)

With the most fiercely fought Canadian election in more than a decade taking place on Monday, the crossfire of political rhetoric between the incumbent prime minister and his Conservative Party challenger is becoming heated – but which one is more trustworthy?

According to a new computer algorithm, Prime Minister Paul Martin, of the Liberal Party, spins the subject matter of his speeches dramatically more than Conservative Party leader, Stephen Harper, and the New Democratic Party leader, Jack Layton.

Spin, in this case, is defined as “text or speech where the apparent meaning is not the true belief of the person saying or writing it”, says the algorithm’s developer, David Skillicorn at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada.