A common negative comment I read about Clinton is that "she doesn't vote the way I want most of the time" , or " She is the least progressive candidate " . When I first came onto this site,  I actually also believed that. I thought Clinton had a conservative voting record, closer to the right of the party then the left. I imagined a large gap between her and the liberal leaders of our party, like Boxer and Kennedy. Of course, I'd never actually looked at her record, or where she ranked. I held my opinion on faith and faith alone. And I think a lot of people here are the same way.

One day someone made a comment like "Hillary Clinton is the worst Democrat in the party". And I though, "that probably isn't quite true. Bad, but not the worst". So I looked it up. And I was wrong. She's not the worst. She's not even bad. Hillary Clinton has a liberal voting record. Now everyone ascribes whatever personal view they have to her She has been called a socialist , moderate , conservative , neo - con , leftist , fascist , ultra liberal , communist , anti - christ and I can go on for ever , its everyone's prerogative to call her whatever they wish to push their own perceived agenda ( including Clinton supporters ) and those who think the descriptions are wrong will continue to argue it , but this diary looks exclusively at the candidates "Voting Records " on progressive economic,social and political issues.So in essence this is about " Record " not " Rhetoric " ( Memo to Edwards , Clintn , Obama Supporters ) , as we know every campaign as adopted a rhetoric now that they feel is appropriate to run a winning campaign.

The other day, Alegre posted a full account of her liberal votes. http://www.dailykos.com/...

Today, I'm going to post rankings that show where she compares to other candidates. The rankings I'm using are full term ones. They encompass the total votes from when the candidate was elected to when the ranking was put together. If you have a few minutes, please look them over.

First, we have Progressive Punch.

http://progressivepunch.org/...

This scorecard currently ranks Clinton as the 14th most liberal Senator. It's still a little wonky because it includes the rankings of the newest Senators, who haven't had many votes under their belts. For example, ain't no way Casey is the 5th most liberal. Over time, that will average out to a more accurate portrait. Before the new Senators were included, I believe Clinton ranked 10th. Currently, she is ranked slightly more liberal then Obama with a 92.19% progressive score to his 91.51% (15th place) Ted Kennedy (7th) has 95.5, Dodd has 86.96% (27) Biden has 84.6 (31) and Joe Lieberman hovers down around 76.71 in 46th place.

Next, we have National Journal.

http://nationaljournal.com/...

This was a ranking put together in 2004 to refute the idea that Kerry was the most liberal Senator.

Here, Hillary Clinton is ranked 13th most liberal with a 83.9 score. The most liberal Senator has a 90.3 score. Dodd is 22nd with with a 78.9 rating. Joe Biden is 25 with 76.6. John Edwards is ranked in 27th with a 75.7 score. Joe Lieberman is down at 40 and has a 64.1.

Next, we have GovTrack

http://www.govtrack.us/...

This site "is generated through a statistical analysis of the cosponsorship of bills in the 109th and 110th sessions of Congress"

Hillary Clinton is ranked as the 5th most liberal Senator. Obama is somewhere around the 15th.  Some of this might be skewed by the fact that Clinton is a more senior, more powerful Senator and thus has had the oppurtunity to sponsor more legislation. That doesn't account for the
co-sponsorship though

Next, we have Drum Major

http://www.drummajorinstitute.com/...

In 2005, they put together a scorecard on economic votes. Clinton (who missed one vote for her husband's surgery) earns an A. Obama, who voted wrong twice, earns a C.

Finally, we have the work of our own DemocraticLuntz, an Obama supporter.
http://www.dailykos.com/...

He provides a summary of the percentage of times candidates have voted like Lieberman.

Summary (% of the time every candidate voted with Lieberman)
Joe Biden: 88.90%
Hillary Clinton: 89.08%
Chris Dodd: 90.26%
John Edwards: 89.98%
Barack Obama: 89.27%

Biden is the best, followed by Clinton, Obama, Edwards and  then Dodd.

So, I hope I've helped some people see that Clinton does not have a conservative record. That in fact she has been quite liberal. Arguably the most liberal of the realistic candidates in this election.

This is a repost of an earlier diary I had put up , however since there has been a lot of conversation about this recently , I thought it will be apt to post it again with a few additional comments.

I would like to give compliments to Algre and Tigercourse on Daily Kos for doing the hardwork of putting a lot of the information together.

Once again this is about " Voting Records " not " Campaign Rhetoric " . Someone made a comment yesterday that some supporters of another candidate have been making conflicting statements about a particular candidates ideology , while that might be true , it happens for all candidates . Nobody expects everyone to think alike on all issues ( or else we will have fallen into the trap of Groupthink ) and I certainly don't expect anyone's position to be defended by someone else on this issue , but if they choose to that's their call.