> It's not a good way of accurately gauging the political spectrum but I'm not sure I'd say it doesn't work at all.

As it fails in such a modest charge, I'm comfortable saying that it doesn't work. The only variable that it would come close to measuring is individual freedom vs collective comfort. A multidimensional representation would do a better job, but it would quickly become so complex that it would be useless - as most people hold contradictory ideas.

That is why far-right does not accurately describe alt-right, think of it as a second dimension on the traditional spectrum.