We need more metrics in politics

"[Sarah Palin] already has more executive experience than the entire Democratic ticket combined"

• Rudy Giuliani, RNC 2008

What does this mean? Does Giuliani actually believe it is true? In some sense it doesn't matter, because it resonated with Republican voters everywhere, and received thundering applause from the convention audience. It seems that people actually believe this, and don't bother to question it. But in reality it is a shallow statement, devoid of any real facts. And most political speeches, it seems, are full of these types of remarks.

The terms 'experience' and 'executive experience' have been thrown around since the beginning of the campaign season. Obama has been bashed, time and time again, for his lack of 'experience', and McCain's main platform is his many years in the Senate. Yet by Giuliani's metric, the mayor of Oswego, New York has more executive experience than Mccain, and all the legislative branches combined.

That's why we need metrics for certain things in Politics. But not everything can be measured. When Giuliani says crap like "Change is not a destination and hope is not a strategy", nothing in that statement can be counted. But things like experience, to some degree, is quanititive. It can be a simple weighted sum. Weights are different for certain levels of service, and multiply then by time in office. Time wouldn't be measured linearly, because the difference between 12 years and 18 years in the Senate, in my opinion, is negligable. The weights would increase for each level of office, and the population of the state or district would also play a large role (I'd wager any day that becoming a Senator in California is more difficult than becoming a Senator in Kansas).

A similar metric could be created for 'executive experience'. It would take into account time spent in an executive office. Maybe with metrics like these in place, it would be harder for politicians to spend their whole speeches talking about the lack of experience of candidates. The most they could do is cite the number. And they could save rhetoric for actual issues, which I think is more reasonable.

Another thing that I'd like to measure: is McCain really a maverick? How many times did he actually vote in opposition to his party? That would be fun to measure. Anyone know any good political databases?