Liechart — Methodology

Version 0.2 · April 23, 2026

Liechart is an evidence-based framework for evaluating individual U.S. public officials on two independent dimensions: ideology and democratic-norms posture. This document defines the framework in enough detail that a new contributor can profile a new subject and a reader can audit any score against its underlying evidence.

1. Purpose and scope

Liechart exists because most public-facing "extremism" scores collapse two distinct things into one number: where a politician stands on policy, and how they relate to the institutions of constitutional democracy. A politician can be very conservative (or very progressive) and fully committed to pluralism and the rule of law. A different politician can be moderate on policy and openly willing to subvert elections, courts, or the rights of disfavored groups. These are different facts. Liechart keeps them on separate axes so the reader can see both.

Liechart is descriptive, not predictive. It summarizes the public record. It does not forecast behavior, recommend votes, or assert that any subject will or will not do any future thing.

Liechart covers U.S. federal officials and candidates — members of Congress, cabinet officials, senior appointees, and nominees. The framework is extensible to state-level officials but has not been validated there.

2. The two-axis model

Every subject has two scores that are scored independently:

Ideology — a vector of per-issue scores from −10 (progressive) to +10 (conservative), anchored at the median U.S. senator (0). A typical Republican senator scores roughly +4 to +7 across most domestic issues; a typical Democratic senator roughly −4 to −7. The scalar ideology summary used in the scatter view is the simple arithmetic mean across covered issues.

Democratic-norms posture — a composite index from 0 (strongly pluralist / institutionalist) to 100 (strongly illiberal), derived from eight weighted sub-axes described below. This axis draws on the mainstream comparative-politics literature on democratic backsliding: the V-Dem Institute's Liberal Democracy Index, the Bright Line Watch expert panels, Levitsky and Ziblatt's four warning signs, Robert Paxton's "mobilizing passions," and Jason Stanley's ten pillars of fascist politics. See Section 11.

The two axes are displayed together on the scatter panel but are computed entirely separately. A high ideology number does not elevate the democratic-norms score, and vice versa.

3. The eight democratic-norms axes

Each axis is scored 0–100. The rubric for each axis is below; contributors should pick the band description that best matches the public record and nudge within ±5 for intensity.

3.1 Election legitimacy (weight 1.5)

Does the subject accept the legitimacy of elections they or their party lost?

• 0–20: consistently affirms outcomes, including losses.
• 21–40: occasional procedural criticism but accepts results.
• 41–60: declines to affirm specific results, echoes "irregularities" framing without endorsing fraud claims.
• 61–80: explicitly questions specific adverse results, opposes certification, or endorses "stolen election" claims on rhetorical grounds.
• 81–100: participates in active efforts to overturn certified results (fake electors, blocking certification, etc.).

Anchor: Levitsky & Ziblatt, How Democracies Die, warning sign 1 ("rejects, in words or action, the democratic rules of the game").

3.2 Political violence stance (weight 1.5)

Does the subject condone, minimize, or encourage political violence?

• 0–20: consistently condemns political violence regardless of target.
• 21–40: condemns violence but with occasional both-sidesing or whataboutism.
• 41–60: minimizes violence by aligned actors; declines to condemn specific aligned incidents.
• 61–80: characterizes aligned political violence as legitimate protest, calls for pardons/compensation for convicted offenders, or uses "patriot" framing for rioters.
• 81–100: explicitly encourages violence against officials, judges, reporters, or outgroups.

Anchor: Levitsky & Ziblatt warning sign 3 ("toleration or encouragement of violence").

3.3 Minority rights and pluralism (weight 1.5)

Does the subject accept the equal standing of out-groups under law and in civic life?

• 0–20: explicit defense of equal rights; no targeted denial of civic standing.
• 21–40: policy disagreements on rights expansions but no denial of fundamental equality.
• 41–60: supports policy rollbacks that disproportionately burden a specific group (abortion access, trans participation, voting rights in majority-minority districts).
• 61–80: supports legal disabilities targeting a specific group; rhetorical framing depicts them as threats.
• 81–100: supports removal of civil rights protections; rhetoric treats group as fundamentally un-American or alien.

Anchor: Levitsky & Ziblatt warning sign 4 ("readiness to curtail civil liberties of opponents"); Stanley pillar 2 ("propaganda"); V-Dem Civil Liberties Index.

3.4 Institutional respect (weight 1.0)

Does the subject respect the independence and function of the judiciary, civil service, free press, and independent agencies?

• 0–20: defends institutional independence even when inconvenient.
• 21–40: policy criticism of institutions but no calls to subordinate or punish them.
• 41–60: advocates for political control over nominally-independent functions (civil service, inspectors general, prosecutors).
• 61–80: characterizes specific institutions (press, courts, intelligence, a named agency) as illegitimate; supports mass firings to achieve political alignment.
• 81–100: openly calls for prosecution of adversaries, dismantling of specific agencies, or defiance of court orders.

Anchor: Levitsky & Ziblatt warning sign 4 restated institutionally; Stanley pillar 6 ("law and order").

3.5 Personalist loyalty (weight 1.0)

Does the subject position their public role in service to a specific political leader rather than to an institutional mandate?

• 0–20: institutional identity predominates; policy disagreements with party leader are visible.
• 21–40: partisan loyalty normal for a caucus member; no cult-of-personality signals.
• 41–60: recurring loyalty signaling to a specific leader; "only X can fix this" framing.
• 61–80: public role framed as delivering on one leader's agenda; dissent from leader is absent even on matters of evident fact.
• 81–100: explicit subordination of institutional duty to leader's wishes (loyalty oaths, public declarations of fealty, refusal to execute lawful orders contrary to leader's preference).

Anchor: Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism, on charismatic leadership; V-Dem "Personalism" sub-index.

3.6 Restoration rhetoric (weight 1.0)

Does the subject frame politics around restoring a lost or stolen national essence?

• 0–20: forward-looking framing; improvements proposed without nostalgic loss-narrative.
• 21–40: standard partisan "we've gone off track" framing.
• 41–60: recurring "decline" narrative; specific enemies identified as having taken something from the real America.
• 61–80: "invasion," "replacement," "destroyed by X," or "make Y again" framing is central and sustained.
• 81–100: rhetoric explicitly demands reversal of demographic, cultural, or political change by force or emergency measures.

Anchor: Griffin's "palingenetic ultranationalism"; Stanley pillar 1 ("mythic past"); Paxton mobilizing passion 2.

3.7 Dehumanizing language (weight 1.0)

Does the subject use rhetoric that strips out-groups of full humanity, moral standing, or civic legitimacy?

• 0–20: no documented instances.
• 21–40: heated rhetoric but no sub-human or animal metaphors; disagreement frames opponents as wrong, not illegitimate.
• 41–60: recurring characterizations of groups as "invaders," "parasites," "animals," "vermin," or as existential threats.
• 61–80: sustained pattern; multiple groups targeted; rhetoric recycled across venues and campaigns.
• 81–100: explicit calls to treat a group as outside the protection of law or civic life.

Anchor: Stanley pillar 9 ("sexual anxiety," extended to out-group language generally); Paxton on mobilizing passions.

3.8 Official conduct (weight 0.5, rising to 1.5 with tenure)

How has the subject exercised official power in roles they have actually held?

• 0–20: no documented abuses; routine or exemplary administration.
• 21–40: ordinary partisan use of discretion; occasional controversy within norms.
• 41–60: politicization of ostensibly non-partisan functions; retaliatory personnel actions against career staff.
• 61–80: documented pattern of targeting political opponents with regulatory or prosecutorial tools; interference with oversight.
• 81–100: willful defiance of court orders, Congress, or inspectors general; obstruction of lawful transition.

Weight caveat: official conduct starts at 0.5× in the composite because most subjects have a thin in-office record relative to their rhetoric. As a subject accumulates roughly 18 months of sustained governing record, this axis weight should rise to 1.5× and the rhetoric-vs-action weighting (Section 7) should shift from 70/30 rhetoric-weighted to 30/70 action-weighted.

4. Ideology (per-issue)

The issues array holds one entry per issue domain. Scores are integers from −10 to +10, anchored at the median U.S. senator (0). The following issues are canonical; contributors may add subject-specific issues but should include the canonical set where the public record permits:

elections, abortion, lgbtq, immigration, education, workforce, energy, healthcare, guns, spending, ukraine, israel, trade, china.

Score to the subject's actual record, not to party median. A Republican senator who supports codifying Roe would score lower on abortion than the caucus median; a Democrat who opposes Ukraine aid would score higher on ukraine than theirs. Use note strings tied to specific evidence.

The scalar ideology value plotted on the scatter is the arithmetic mean across all entries in issues. When adding or dropping issues, note that this shifts the composite — prefer keeping the canonical set to enable cross-subject comparison.

5. Evidence typing

Every evidence item declares a type. This is what distinguishes Liechart's scoring from partisan opposition research:

Characterizations are included because readers do encounter them in campaign coverage, and excluding them entirely can make Liechart look naive about how the subject is framed politically. Including them lets the reader see whether partisan framing tracks the primary record or exceeds it.

6. Source tiers

Liechart ranks sources by primary-evidence value, not by political orientation:

1. Primary — subject's own book, website, speech transcript, official filing, vote record, signed questionnaire. Preferred whenever available.
2. Encyclopedia — Wikipedia, Ballotpedia, government biographical directories. Useful for undisputed biographical facts.
3. Mainstream news — reporting outlets with editorial accountability (AP, Reuters, NYT, WaPo, WSJ, NPR, major regional dailies).
4. Public media — PBS, NPR stations, state public media.
5. Trade press — industry-specific outlets with subject-matter depth (Breaking Defense, USNI News, DefenseScoop for military figures; Inside Higher Ed for education figures, etc.).
6. Advocacy coverage — outlets with an explicit advocacy posture but factual reporting (LGBTQ Nation, The 19th, Reason).
7. Partisan — campaign committees, PAC research documents, state party trackers. Useful for sourcing specific claims back to primary material; not used as primary scoring inputs.
8. Context — academic papers, think-tank reports, historical background.
9. Academic — peer-reviewed political science, including the frameworks cited in Section 11.

When a claim appears in a partisan tracker, locate and cite the underlying primary source where possible.

7. Rhetoric-vs-action weighting

A subject with a long in-office record should be scored primarily on what they have done, not what they have said. A subject who has only campaigned should be scored primarily on what they have said, because that is their public record. Liechart's convention:

• Thin governing record (< 6 months in-office): 70% rhetoric weight, 30% action weight on composite.
• Moderate record (6–18 months): 50/50.
• Substantial record (18+ months): 30% rhetoric, 70% action. Axis 8 (official conduct) weight rises from 0.5× to 1.5×.

This is applied implicitly through axis weights rather than as an explicit multiplier. The conduct axis weight is the primary lever.

8. Composite formula

composite = round( Σ(axis.score × axis.weight) / Σ(axis.weight) )

The composite is recomputed at render time from democraticNorms so that editing any axis score propagates without hand-updating the composite number. Classification bands:

• 0–19: Low concern
• 20–39: Mild concern
• 40–54: Moderate concern
• 55–69: Moderate-to-high concern
• 70–84: High concern
• 85–100: Severe concern

Band descriptions are analytic labels, not political verdicts. "High concern" means the subject's public record shows a recurring pattern on multiple academically-defined warning signs — it does not mean the subject is guilty of any specific future act.

9. Authoring a new profile

1. Copy template_dashboard.html into People/<SubjectName>/<Subject>_dashboard.html.
2. Fill the PROFILE constant: metadata, democraticNorms axes, issues array, and evidence array.
3. Every axis note and every issue note must summarize specific items from the evidence array. If you cannot tie a score to evidence, reduce the score or remove the axis entry.
4. Prefer primary sources. Wikipedia and partisan trackers are useful as indexes into primary sources but should not be the sole basis for any non-trivial score.
5. Scale first from the rubric bands in Section 3, then fine-tune within ±5 for intensity.
6. Run the profile past one person with different partisan priors before publishing. Scores that survive that review are usable; scores that don't survive it need evidence work, not argument.

10. Known limitations

• Construct validity. There is no ground-truth composite score for individual politicians. Liechart produces a structured summary of a public record, not a measurement of an innate property.
• Recency bias. Compiled profiles reflect the evidence available at compile time. Revisit profiles quarterly or on major events; stale profiles should be clearly dated.
• Rhetoric-action gap. A subject can be rhetorically extreme and institutionally restrained once in office, or vice versa. The 70/30 → 30/70 shift partly addresses this but does not eliminate it.
• Anchor dependence. Ideology is anchored at the median U.S. senator. A different anchor (electorate median, GOP caucus median, historical average) produces visually different charts without changing underlying positions.
• Cherry-picking risk. With 30+ evidence items a contributor can construct almost any narrative. The rubric bands in Section 3 and the requirement that every score tie back to specific evidence are the primary defenses. Peer review is the second.

11. Academic foundations

The democratic-norms axes and rubric bands draw on the following literatures. Contributors are strongly encouraged to read at least one from each group before authoring:

Democratic backsliding / comparative politics. Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, How Democracies Die (Crown, 2018) — the four-warning-signs framework underpins axes 1–4. V-Dem Institute, "Varieties of Democracy" annual reports (v-dem.net) — the Liberal Democracy Index and Personalism sub-index. Bright Line Watch, expert surveys on U.S. democratic performance (brightlinewatch.org).

Fascism studies. Robert Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism (Knopf, 2004) — "mobilizing passions" mapped to axes 6–7. Jason Stanley, How Fascism Works (Random House, 2018) — ten pillars, especially "mythic past" (axis 6) and "law and order" (axis 4). Roger Griffin, The Nature of Fascism (Routledge, 1991) — "palingenetic ultranationalism" underpins axis 6. Umberto Eco, "Ur-Fascism," New York Review of Books (1995) — early taxonomic work.

Rhetorical violence. Scholars at the Western States Center and the ADL on "invasion" and "replacement" framing. Academic work on stochastic terrorism and manifesto citations of political rhetoric (El Paso 2019, Buffalo 2022).

Ideology measurement. Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal, DW-NOMINATE (voteview.com) — for calibrating ideology against a longitudinal Senate baseline.

12. Versioning

This methodology is versioned. Breaking changes to axis definitions, weights, or the schema bump the major version; tuning of rubric band cutoffs bumps the minor version. Subject profiles should pin schemaVersion to the version they were authored against so readers can tell whether a published score was computed under the current framework.

Current: v0.2. Changelog maintained in the repo once published.