Interesting — here’s an example of a firing rule firing even though it obviously is already blunted.

Today’s Democrat: an opportunistic prude devoted to the politics of slander.

RBC, you are a credit to your party.

I am well aware that in general IQ is reasonably constant throughout a person’s lifetime. This does not mean that there are no individuals whose mental facilities deteriorate over time. Comparing Bush’s speaking abilities over time, that does appear to be the case, possibly as a result of his drug use and excessive drinking, possibly due to other causes.

It is pretty clear from your comment that you did not actually read the Sailer article. The author explicitly states that relative IQ scores remain remarkably stable over a person’s life; thus, if two people who are approximately the same age took the same IQ test in 1965 and again in 1995, the one who scored higher in 1965 would also likely score higher in 1995. In short, your comment is informed more by prejudice than by knowledge.

I haven’t seen the strong signs of narcissim that Bill Clinton showed. I’m curious what you are cluing off of. I think a lot of politicians have more narcissim than normal.

Saddam was a malignant narcissist, about the worst thing you want in a leader.

I know that one swifties who is quite bright and in a position to have the raw observational data told me that Kerry was a sociopath, which if true is scary. I believe Samuel, who knows Kerry and is plugged into lots of high level politicos, believes the same.

Kerry is a fabulizer (what a neat word – I can thank Kerry’s existence for adding that to my vocabulary) – I don’t know if he might have one of the factitious disorders. My daughter had a true Munschausen (a bizarre factitious disorder – and also a quite dangerous one to people nearby) as a room mate, so we did a bit of studying on those.

Regarding IQ – there are several books that supposedly debunk it. They need to be debunked. IQ is a rock solid psychometric measure. It has been studied to death, and the proposed impact of other items like culture turn out to not be significant. The annoying thing about IQ is that it produces results that are significantly politically incorrect, and it can’t be changed much. Both of these factors (the first of which – group aggregate IQ differences) are unfortunate but true.

A higher IQ doesn’t make someone a better person or a “smarter” person in a practical sense. I believe it is also correlated with certain mental disorders such as bipolar distorder. It does mean that all things considered, that person will do better than a lower IQ person in cognitive areas. It does not imply increased creativity as far as I know.

Like many human characteristics, it is partly inherited (40-60%) and partly formed by other means.

I had a Kerry supporter and storm chase friend (who himself clearly has a very high IQ) bet me that Bush’s IQ was under 110. When I showed him that it was over 125, and asked for my $50, he blew me off with a “that isn’t a real IQ test” because it was derived from SAT scores. These people really have to believe their myths, and even solid evidence is something the dismiss. I was going to give his money back anyway, but oh well.

The military tests mentioned are meant to be IQ tests, they just use a different score.

In the past four years Bush has

led the country after a sneak attack that killed thousands of civilians and deepened a recession.

Leading the country happened to be his job; it is not proof that his mental facilities were not degenerating.

crushed a religious dictatorship in the Mideast.

Single-handedly? Impressive! I’d suggest to you that maybe a handful of generals, for starters, had a say in the matter.

crushed a secular dictatorship in the Mideast.

Same again. Ordering the strongest military in the world to take out a weakened foe doesn’t require a genius IQ… unlike post-war planning, where that sure would come in handy.

Produced the first free elections in Afghanistan in 3000 years.

Is on track to produce free elections in Iraq, something no European power ever attempted.

You could say that Reagan was (partly) responsible for bringing free elections to Eastern Europe and beyond. It’s not proof that his mental facilities were not degenerating at the time, which we now know they were.

Broke the Pakistani nuke ring.

This guy Bush must be a regular one-man army to do all this stuff by himself, huh? How does he find the time? Seriously, don’t you think there are a large number of other people who deserve some credit for collecting the intelligence regarding this?

Incidentally, AQ Khan was let off with a slap on the wrist.

Led Libya to give up its WMD’s.

By the same token, he led North Korea to want to double their nuclear arsenal as a deterrent.

If his trend is down, I suggest we find out what is making him stupid and send a barrel of it to everyone in Congress.

They probably have access to all the good Scotch they need.

It’s a shame she couldn’t have been an American, then made it to the top. One tough lady.

I am even smarter than Kerry. But he married money so maybe I am not all that smart after all.

The whole IQ thing kinda makes me wonder.

But Bush’s grades were better than Kerry’s and Gore’s weren’t they? I seemed to remember having read that Kerry went to Boston College because he did not have the grades to get into Harvard. I also remember hearing that Gore almost flunked out. He was probably partying.

What? And throw off the curve?