And Thereby Fox News Is Explained

Several studies lately casting doubt on, well, the intelligence of conservative types. Here's another, with some more depth. Actually, while it affirms that "[p]olitical conservatism is associated with less openness to experience . . . , and highly positively correlated with fear of uncertainty," it's more about the average conservative's lack of creativity. The correlations between three measures of creativity and conservatism were between -.15 and -.21, not large but highly significant statistically in the study (meaning that the two variables were inversely related). What was especially interesting was that the gap between the two widened as aging was taken into account--the older conservatives were even less creative.

Now, for an organized system to balance on that creative edge of chaos, conservatives are needed to pull back on the levels of creativity that threaten to push the system over that edge. But the danger for that system comes when they have too much influence and pull the system toward inertia. The balance is the key, and we're clearing tipping too far the other way right now in a world of US economic precariousness, foreign adventures, and global warming (water, energy). Right now we need more creativity, not less, less conservatism, not more. This study helps to explain why, and, frankly, why conservatives produce such mindless crap (although the Gibsons, Limbaughs, and Stallones certainly haven't impoverished themselves selling to those folks). And it explains why Fox News and its copiers are so relentlessly one note and incapable of taking on Stewart, Colbert, and Mahers.

Sorry, have to go compose a few symphanies, finish that novel, and invent something now.