When the Department of Agriculture inspected my garden one year, I told them I had earwigs, they said that they were beneficial because they ate debris.
I find them a pest, they eat holes in the buds, once the flower opens, they live inside and eat the pollen stems and flowers. They'll just chew the flowers to shreds.
I don't think there is any relationship to earwigs and the ants-aphids situation.

I have heard that earwigs can eat aphids but they do like to snack on flowers as well (I've seen them, feasting at night on whatever is blooming at the time). I suspect they'll eat any aphids they find while they are eating flowers.

Get the ants under control, they guard aphids and make it harder for natural predators to get to the aphids. I've had good luck with using 'Terro' liquid bait stations.

Thanks Randy and Melle, for your thoughts and suggestions. I'll keep squishing earwigs and I will try some ant bait. This is probably a good time to start: I hope at least a few ants drowned in the deluge we've been having, so the population is probably as low as it ever could be.

[Although I hear our argentine ant colony is one huge colony running from Baja to British Columbia.]

Terry