A study by Fairleigh Dickenson University researchers has found that frequent viewers of Fox Cable News are worse informed than people who watch no news at all!It is not that Republicans (more likely to watch Fox) are less informed. The researchers took that possible source of bias into account in their finding. No, it is watching Fox itself that makes people more ignorant.
The discrepancy showed up in a question on whether the Egyptian protests last February managed to unseat Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak. Among respondents over all, 21% said that the movement had failed, and 26% said they just don’t know! I don’t know whether it is more unsettling that a fifth of Americans may think Mubarak is still president of Egypt or that a fourth of Americans has no idea whether he is or not!
A bare majority of 53% gave the correct answer that Mubarak was overthrown.
But Fox Cable News viewers were less likely by a full 18 points to get the right answer than people who said they never watched the news at all!
(I’ll bet some of the latter watch Comedy Central’s Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert’s Colbert Report, which are in fact better at informing the public on news than Fox, since they not only cover issues but also teach audiences to be skeptical of political spin in the news).
Fox viewers were also 6% less likely than others to know that the uprising in Syria has not yet succeeded in unseating president Bashar al-Assad.
The best informed consumers of news media were those who listen to National Public Radio or read a daily newspaper such as the New York Times or USA Today.
Friday, December 9, 2011
And we wonder why Fox News views are less informed?
FOX News Caught Using Fake Video Of Riots
And we wonder why Fox News views are less informed?
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Body Imaging Screening.
ReplyDeleteDuring consideration of the Transportation Security Administration Authorization bill (H.R. 2200), Rep. Jason Chaffetz (RUtah) offered an amendment that would prohibit the use of Whole-Body Imaging (WBI) as the primary method of screening at airports. The amendment would allow passengers the option of a pat-down search rather than being subjected to a WBI search that shows extremely intimate details of one’s body. The Chaffetz amendment would also prohibit TSA from storing, copying, or transferring any images that are produced by WBI machines. Since its creation, TSA has become infamous for its meddlesome searches and disregard for an individual’s right of privacy. Evidence shows that corruption and mismanagement have been commonplace within the relatively new federal department for years. The Chaffetz amendment would do very little to scale back the power held by the TSA, but it does offer some hope that our representatives are not wholly unaware of how the TSA and its policies would threaten the privacy of American citizens through a process that has been called a “virtual strip-search.” The House adopted the Chaffetz amendment by a “Committee of the Whole” on June 4, 2009, by a vote of 310-118 (Roll Call 305). Such technology is obtrusive for American citizens and violates our right of protection against unwarranted searches and seizures.
Marsha Blackburn voted AGAINST this bill.