Because once the blogosphere latches on to an issue, it becomes too important to be ignored:

The article reports on research showing that as gas prices have risen, blog postings about gas prices have increased too. Who’d have thunk it?

Rising gas prices fire up bloggers [CNN]

• Short week, short review. First thing you need to know is: on Friday, Wal-Mart tried to answer the questions, “Why you acting shady? Why you ain’t callin’ me baby?”, by having Beyonce and Taylor Hicks perform at their shareholder meeting. CostCo admits they were served.

• In its infinite wisdom, DHS slashed the terror prevention budgets for DC and NYC, redirecting the money towards protection of the nation’s critical booze-producing infrastructure.

• When one slow news day turns into two, you start a slow news streak, and once you’re there, you have to start either making **** up or codifying the obvious.

• 700 million dollar man Hank Paulson was nominated for Treasury Secretary. Everyone is still waiting for the big “Sike!” regarding his love of nature and all God’s creatures.

• After they finished the “rock paper scissors” tournament, the Maryland jury in the “Sniper” case figured enough time had passed to make it look real, and convicted John Allen Muhammad.

• No, Al Gore is not running for President — he’s running for Earth.

• A week without Katherine Harris is like a week without air. Luckily, she’ll never be too far away, regardless of how much it costs.

They are also more likely to wax their chest hair, shop at Whole Foods, and vacation in Costa Rica.

Study: College Grads Are Fussier Dads [CNN]

Sometimes they go for the richest one. Anna Nicole Smith, where are you?

Darwin Revisited: Females Don’t Always Go for Hottest Mate [WSJ]
Earlier: Bonos: Hot!

Most Americans are pretty ignorant about world affairs:

According to this survey, 6 out of 10 Americans could not locate Iraq on a map of the Middle East.

But they’re not completely without a clue:

Meanwhile, a poll of Wonkette readers conclusively establishes that Dana Milbank is a publicity whore.

Boy do we love polls and surveys!

Study: Geography Greek to young Americans [CNN]
Poll: Vast majority believes Iraq mission not accomplished [CNN]
Earlier: Dana Milbank Is…

We love all the weird scientific-studies-with-political-implications that are Richard Morin’s stock-in-trade (see links collected below). In today’s Post, citing a study conducted by researchers at the University of Texas at Austin, he informs us:

Forget the Swift boat ads, the economy or international terrorism. Here’s what really may have decided the last presidential election: President Bush and Vice President Cheney sounded more presidential than their Democratic counterparts. Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) seemed the most depressed or suicidal. And Kerry’s running mate, Sen. John Edwards (N.C.), sounded the most like a “girly man.”

Perhaps the Texas-based researchers were biased in favor of their native son. But hey, can you really argue with findings like this:

Cheney easily sounded the smartest of the four, while Edwards and Bush favored the least sophisticated language patterns…. When it came to sounding presidential, both Bush and his running mate scored considerably higher than Kerry or Edwards. Bush was the oldest-sounding candidate. Edwards also was the most likely to use feminine speech patterns and “female” words (Bush was a close second), while Cheney sounded most like a man’s man.

Cheney as a man’s man, and Edwards as a girly man? We’ve been saying this all along. The article continues:

The vice president sounded the most honest of the four, and Kerry the least. Kerry’s language also was most like that of a depressed person, followed by Edwards.

Guys, you didn’t need to squander perfectly good grant money to tell us that John Kerry is depressed. If you had lost the 2004 election (and were married to Teresa), you’d be pretty depressed too.

Smart Talk and Girly Talk on the Campaign Trail [WP]

Earlier: ‘Post’ Celebrates Whacking Day
John McCain: Proven Scary By Science

Shankar Vendantam — that byline rings a bell…

Brain Development and Intelligence Linked, Study Says [WP]

Earlier: Puke With Your Head, Not Over It
Breaking News: Hidden Biases Affect Political Views

Churning out scientific studies connecting personality traits with political views — e.g., conservatives are happier, or secretly racist, or just plain scary — has turned into a veritable cottage industry. And the studies just keep on coming.

Here’s what the latest research says:

Remember the whiny, insecure kid in nursery school, the one who always thought everyone was out to get him, and was always running to the teacher with complaints? Chances are he grew up to be a conservative.

At least, he did if he was one of 95 kids from the Berkeley area that social scientists have been tracking for the last 20 years. The confident, resilient, self-reliant kids mostly grew up to be liberals.

But who needs studies when we have GQ? According to GQ, Republicans are better in bed for at least ten reasons. Here’s the first:

NO CONSCIENCE! A Republican man will never whine in the middle of the night — let alone in the middle of screwing you — about the girlfriend-wife-whatever he is “devastating” by sleeping with you. He just does it. It’s all about him — he needs to be the best you ever had, and that can be a good thing if your getting off is contingent on his. He doesn’t even stay for breakfast. (Though if you do make him breakfast, he is eternally grateful and will go down on you for another several hours.) One word: pancakes!

We’re with GQ on this one; it’s the liberals, not the conservatives, who are the whiners. The “conservatives are whiny” study is dubious (or, in the words of one social psychologist quoted in the article, “biased, shoddy work, poor science at best”).

Consider this: If you grew up as a conservative kid in Berkeley, where the entire sample population was taken from, would you be wrong in thinking that “everyone was out to get [you]”? If you were always “running to the teacher with complaints,” maybe some of them might be justified? Wouldn’t you end up “whiny” and “insecure,” after years of cafeteria mockery for the non-organic peanut butter in your PB&J?

How to Spot a Baby Conservative [Toronto Star]
The Elephant in the Bedroom: 10 Reasons Why Republicans Are the Best Party in Bed [GQ]

Earlier: Happiness Is the Right to Keep and Bear a Warm Gun
Breaking News: Hidden Biases Affect Political Views
John McCain: Proven Scary By Science

The latest scientific research confirms the assumption we’ve been operating under for years: there really is no point to maintaining a healthy diet.

And even if eating fatty foods did lead to health problems — which it doesn’t, as this study shows — our analysis remains unchanged. By the time we start developing said health problems, there will be some pill we can eat or some surgical procedure we can undergo to fix everything.

So go ahead, indulge in that second Krispy Kreme. It’s Wednesday!

Low-Fat Diet’s Benefits Rejected [WP]
Low-Fat Diet Does Not Cut Health Risks, Study Finds [NYT via Althouse]

This article sits atop the most e-mailed articles list on the Washington Post website this afternoon. Shankar Vedantam reports on groundbreaking psychological research revealing that “partisans stubbornly discount any information that challenges their preexisting beliefs.” Here’s a discussion of the study’s methodology:

Emory University psychologist Drew Westen put self-identified Democratic and Republican partisans in brain scanners and asked them to evaluate negative information about various candidates. Both groups were quick to spot inconsistency and hypocrisy — but only in candidates they opposed.

Brain scans? Geez, you didn’t need to go to all that trouble. Just listen to the conversation during a Republican-sponsored SOTU watch party, eavesdrop on some Democratic SOTU festivites, and compare.

Study Ties Political Leanings to Hidden Biases [WP]
State of the Union Watch Parties: Isn’t that a contradiction in terms? [Slate]