But we can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block.

Mormons have more bachelor degrees than average: Yes.

Mormons are more conservative than average: Yes.

We can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block: No.

That's not what this shows. The two facts, together, are not enough to show a correlation between education and conservatism or to show a lack of correlation between education and liberal/leftist attitudes. To make a claim about correlation, as you are trying to do, you have two options:

1. Show a correlation or lack of correlation within this block,
2. Show a correlation or lack of correlation between average education level and average political leanings, using voting blocks as data points.

I have a perfect analogy:

I claim that smoking will decrease your life expectancy.

You claim that the smoking rate in the United States is 9.6%. The smoking rate in Japan is 16.4%. Life Expectancy in the United States is 79.8. Life Expectancy in Japan is 85.2. Therefore "we can see very definitively that a higher rate of smoking does nothing to decrease the life expectancy of the country".

No. That doesn't show that. Because if you look at data within Japan, you will still see a lower life expectancy among the people who smoke, and if you look at data globally, using countries as data points, you will also see lower life expectancy among the countries that smoke the most.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/smoking-rates-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/life-expectancy-by-country

When you take broad averages like this, you very often lose useful information. In this case, just being “educated” in the abstract carries a weak correlation to political beliefs.

That's true, but unfortunately, once you started trying to create a more complex model, you started making mistakes. And you aren't even an idiot. Imagine your dumbest neighbors trying to make sense of this conversation.

No. I start off by giving you one variable correlated with one other variable. Once someone understands that, THEN we can start talking about nuance.