I think some spectrums may be useful in describing certain parties' general positions as long as the spectrum puts two truly opposite factors at the opposite ends. No false dilemmas, like liberty------equality, but actual mutually exclusive terms, like liberty-------tyranny or equality-------inequality.

Even such spectrums, though, are only useful in distinguishing the extremes. They are useless in distinguishing the "qualifying" positions - that is, the positions in between. For example, take the liberty-tyranny spectrum. Both modern liberals and olde-tyme conservatives would be somewhere in the middle, but they are different in their advocacy of tyranny - the former advocates the tyranny of the mixed economy, while the latter advocates moralism. We can split the liberty axis into a Nolan-style diamond, but then we would also need property axes, democracy axes, and a bunch of other axes to put all consistent ideologies as points.

So ultimately, to effectively reduce politics to spectrums, we will need crazy five or six-dimensional models that cannot be imagined by sane people.

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How many socialists does it take to change a lightbulb?

Answer: Why should they have to change it? The government should provide this essential service for free! And anyone opposed to this is opposed to changing light bulbs and advocates that poor people should sit in the dark!