This one isn't a rhetorical question. I woke up in the middle of the night and of course I couldn't sleep. So for some unknown reason the topic of politics popped into my head.
Instead of counting sheep, I went through colleagues I've worked with and people I've met along the way in the tech startup world. It was just about impossible to come up with folks I know who are politically conservative.
True, our current President (and his neo-conservative approach to international politics) has made it really difficult for someone to try to publicly defend his Administration's policy decisions. And for all Joe Americana knows, W is a conservative even though he's far from it. So the conservative movement has taken a shot to the solar plexus and it's really out of style to be conservative today.
Maybe that has nothing to do with it -- perhaps most folks in the tech startup world are from the Bay Area or at least lived there a bit. If you live there long enough, it is just about impossible to emerge as anything but a militant liberal.
Maybe entrepreneurs are idealists who simply identify more with liberal politicians and their principles. Maybe Conservatives are quieter... it's easier to be quiet when your party has ruled for the last 28 years save the Clinton administration.
In any event, I ran through probably 50 names before I drifted back to sleep and it was almost unanimous in favor of the Left. I would have expected a few more Conservatives (or at least Libertarians, which I am).
Thoughts?
Perhaps it is about flexibility in thought. A conservative takes a very conservative/literal approach to the constitution...or bible for that matter. The liberal ponders, “what if?” Which is better for innovation?
Posted by: noah | June 12, 2008 at 08:56 PM
it's because we are right and everyone else is wrong :-)
Posted by: arnby | June 12, 2008 at 09:53 PM