[politics] labels left and right are relatively meaningless

Fascinating debate going on right now over at Chris Dillow’s. He gave numbered reasons why he’s leftist and concluded: rationality, then, isn't the cause of my political beliefs. And I doubt it's the cause of anyone else's. Various people have weighed in and my contribution was: What about a model a bit like the solar system ellipse, instead of a linear left/right continuum? Then the dictatorship of the proletariat meets the fascists at one point on the ellipse. Along the other points are an increasing tendency to deregulation, free market ethics, small government, less shop steward mini-gods, no political correctness, redistribution according to market policies rather than regulation and so on. Seems a more realistic model, for mine.