How would you describe Joe Biden's ideology?

[MarkD]

I rate the ideology of members of Congress according to the approval scores they get from the Americans for Democratic Action and the American Conservative Union. I don't just use one or two scores from the recent past, but a member's average score for their entire congressional career. To me, a liberal Democrat gets at least 80% average from the ADA; a moderate Democrat gets between 80% and 50%, and conservative Democrats get less than 50% average. (Likewise, a conservative Republican gets at least 80% average from ACU, and so on.)

Joe Biden served in the Senate for 36 years. ADA does not make his score from the year 1975 available on its website, and he was very sick for a majority of the year 1988, so he was absent so much that he got an unusually low score that year. So not counting the years 1975 or 1988, I averaged together his scores for the rest of the 34 years. He averaged 81.29% - close to the borderline between being a liberal and a moderate, but still basically liberal. (His average approval score from ACU is 11.8%.)

(Here are his ADA scores every year: 1973 - 80, 1974 - 81, 1975 - ?, 1976 - 75, 1977 - 70, 1978 - 50, 1979 - 53, 1980 - 67, 1981 - 80, 1982 - 80, 1983 - 85, 1984 - 85, 1985 - 75, 1986 - 80, 1987 - 70, 1988 - 15, 1989 - 90, 1990 - 83, 1991 - 90, 1992 - 100, 1993 - 80, 1994 - 80, 1995 - 95, 1996 - 80, 1997 - 70, 1998 - 85, 1999 - 95, 2000 - 80, 2001 - 100, 2002 - 80, 2003 - 75, 2004 - 95, 2005 - 100, 2006 - 100, 2007 - 75, 2008 - 80.)

What is he to you? Do you need more nuance than just the terms "liberal" or "moderate"?

[MarkD]

I disagree whether "[party] platforms matter." Party platforms aren't worth the toilet paper they're printed on. They are the phoniest kind of campaign promises out there. Nobody can ever make all members of the party support every plank in the platform.

[MarkD]

I am probably the only one here who finds it fascinating to look at the ideological scores from the two groups -- Americans for Democratic Action and American Conservative Union.