Good and Better: Why Roger Ailes' Fall from Grace Couldn't Happen at a More Appropriate Moment

by Nomad

Rarely has there been much good news to report of late. Here's one item I've found.

According to reports, CEO of FOX News, Roger Ailes, will soon be forced to resign after allegations of workplace sexual harassment. 

The former anchor Gretchen Carlson alleged that Ailes made it crystal clear that if she had sexual relations with him her problems (which included among other things "ostracizing, marginalizing and shunning") would magically disappear.  

Office hanky-panky was the suggested cure-all for what ailed Roger Ailes. 

In the court records, Carlson claimed that Ailes told her :

I think you and I should have had a sexual relationship a long time ago, and then you'd be good and better and I'd be good and better.

That's about as logical as anything else presented on Fox News, I guess. Good and better was not a standard that Roger Ailes generally aimed for.
Bad and worse was closer to the truth. 

Academic Studies about Right-Wing and Tea Party Voters Reach Interesting Conclusions

by Nomad

Several   academic research studies about the minds of right-wing supporters, the power of fear to warp our thinking and the intelligence of the Tea Party offer some surprising insights to the present state of US politics. 

If accurate, the studies also provide some depressing news about the possibility that the great divide between left and right can ever be bridged.

Canadian Study: Are Right Wingers Naturally Less Intelligent?

A newspaper article in the UK Daily Mail, has information, which might- or might not surprise you:

Right-wingers tend to be less intelligent than left-wingers, and people with low childhood intelligence tend to grow up to have racist and anti-gay views, says a controversial new study.

According to Canadian academics, conservative politics work almost as a 'gateway' into prejudice against others. The Canadian study reviewed large studies from the UK which made a comparison between childhood intelligence and political views in adulthood across more than 15,000 people.

Their conclusion? People with low intelligence gravitate towards right-wing views because these views make them feel safe. In addition to that, children with low intelligence tend to grow up to be prejudiced.

Both educational level and social status seem to play no role in whether a person is prejudiced or racist. It is, they insist, related to innate intelligence, rather than acquired knowledge.

The study, published in Psychological Science, claims that right-wing ideology forms a 'pathway' for people with low reasoning ability to become prejudiced against groups such as other races and gay people.

There are good reasons for this. Cognitive ability-that is, the ability to think - allows us to form impressions of other people and to be open-minded, say the researchers.

'Individuals with lower cognitive abilities may gravitate towards more socially conservative right-wing ideologies that maintain the status quo. The status quo is a more friendly environment to those with less cognitive abilities. 'It provides a sense of order.'

Those right-wing ideologies are all about order, not diversity. Such ideologies generally stress hierarchy and resistance to change, attitudes that can contribute to prejudice, said lead researcher Gordon Hodson, a psychologist at Brock University in Ontario.   

Iraq Invasion: What it Feels like to be Ahead of Your Time

This is what it feels like to be a decade ahead of your time. 

Look at that crowd; all those smug looks, smirking at the loudmouth fat guy. Listen to all that booing. Wasn't Hollywood supposed to the bastion of bleeding heart liberals?

The real question is: how many of us could have stood there on that stage and said the same things at that time? Keep in mind, Michael Moore was receiving death threats for voicing his opinions on the war. Wouldn't it have been easier and safer to remain silent?