Monday, December 19, 2011

"Misinformed" != "Doesn't Agree With Me"

I like to rag on Fox news' morning program, Fox and Friends, for the way it just positively sucks the IQ right out of the room. I mean, sure, all the little people in my TV do nothing but lie to me, but at least most of them have the courtesy to do it polysyllabically.

And I'm not a big fan of most of the Fox stable of talking heads, but I also don't love to hate them the same way I do with the far-left Axis of Smug, Matthews, Maddow, and Olbermann, and so I don't watch them in the same picking-at-scabs way I do the pinkos. That and Fox doesn't run them at cock's crow of a weekend morning, which is about the only time I actually watch the TeeWee. (Instead they run an extra-vacuous version of their regular morning show, if such a thing can be imagined.)

But as far as actual news-type-news goes, they're much of a muchness with other news channels. The bias has a slightly different tilt, that's all.

So I found this article to be side-splittingly funny, but probably not in the way they wanted it to be:
The study also found that Fox News viewers were less likely than MSNBC viewers to be able to identify Mitt Romney as the GOP's leading presidential candidate (although to be fair this might be the fault of this year's underwhelming Republican talent pool).
That's because the only places where Mitt Romney has been the GOP front runner so far in this race have been in the polls taken inside Chris Matthews' head. Romney's record in actual surveys of real live people who aren't MSNBC television commentators looks like the Atlanta Braves' record in the World Series: An awful lot of second-place finishes. Hell, there is a good chance that Romney will be trounced by Ron Paul (R-Kashyyyk) in the upcoming Iowa caucus!

As a bonus, the graphic isn't even from Fox News Channel, but from a local Fox affiliate. (The Fox network doesn't even have a national news department.) This would be like me putting some local broadcast Channel 13 guy's gaffe on the air and using it to prove that cable news channel MSNBC was a mess. I understand that it takes a little bit of knowledge to understand that the Fox network, your local Fox affiliate, and Fox News Channel aren't the same thing, but isn't part of being a liberal being really, really smarter than me?

23 comments:

Mark Alger said...

Hell, you know liberals. They'd probably have the vampire-to-holy-water reaction to the old Doors song "Twentieth Century Fox" just on the basis of the name. After all, these are people capable of making a racial slur out of the adjective niggardly.

M

God, Gals, Guns, Grub said...

Wasn't it Mark Twain who said, "there are lies, damn lies, and then there are statistics"... or something to that effect...

Dann in Ohio

Noah D said...

Well, given the quality of this years slate of candidates, I'm thinking 'feature', not 'bug'.

Bubblehead Les. said...

Keep in mind, that the United States only exists from Washington to Boston, then turns into a Vast Desert full of Sand Worms, then Magically reappears when one gets to Rodeo Drive and Fisherman's Wharf when one is headed to visit the Land of the Anointed One for the "Ignore the Fact that the only reason we have a Holiday is because of that Jesus Dude's Birthday" Holiday Season.

At least that how it looks in what passes for the Mind of your Typical Leg Tingler, so naturally, they ignore all Data coming out from the Wasteland. Besides, Romney is almost one of them. He's from Massachusetts, after all!

Larry said...

I wasn't going to try to add anything, but the word verification of "blogenam" was just too good to pass up.
Polls. Piffle. The only poll that matters is the one in November.

Anonymous said...

re the "Obama bin Laden dead" graphic

See

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KNpn-XGM04 at 5 min. 25 sec. or

/www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KNpn-XGM04#t=5m25s direct link

Anonymous said...

And then there's this video

www.youtube.com/watch?v=APx2YJ-_jos

of Senator Kennedy referring to Obama as Osama.

Anonymous said...

The same study cited by TakePart also reports that:

"According to the latest results from Fairleigh Dickinson University’s PublicMind Poll, some news sources make us less likely to know what’s going on in the world.... Just 47% are able to identify the Occupy Wall Street protesters as predominantly Democratic: 11 % think they are Republicans. Viewers of cable news on MSNBC are the most likely to think the protestors are Republicans. Watching the left-leaning MSNBC news channel is associated with a 10-point increase in the likelihood of misidentifying the protesters."

source: "Some News Leaves People Knowing Less"

Cato, the American said...

"Let the wookie win."
--- C3PO

Shrimp said...

"...but isn't part of being a liberal being really, really smarter than me?"

Nope, it just involves a holier-than-thou smugness, which you already pointed out above. Sort of like an inverse side-view mirror, actual levels of smartness may be smaller than they appear.

Panamared said...

I know that I've seen studies that show that a four year education at your favorite liberal arts college leaves you less informed. Similarly a constant diet of liberal news leaves you well indoctrinated. At least since Rush, most conservative commentators admit there bias.

Cincinnatus said...

Almost all attacks on Fox News via its audience involve making up some "fact" that isn't, and then polling its audience to see if they "know" this "fact" to be true.

Bizarre.

The left spends more time trying to convince itself that its smarter than Fox News viewers ... and failing ... than actually thinking about and defending its positions.

wv: cormobso - the next dish Roberta makes for breakfast

ADS said...

"Ron Paul (R-Kashyyyk)"

aaaaaand there goes another keyboard, DOA from a coffee ND through my nose.

staghounds said...

What percentage are able to correctly identify Barack Obama as the hope of the world?

caleb said...

Kashyyyk

I'm not sure who's nerdier - you for putting that reference in there or me for getting it instantly.

Tam said...

Caleb,

I thought about using (R-Endor) to double down on the nerdiness with a South Park reference, too. :D

perlhaqr said...

Tam: He's not that short... :D

Caleb said...

Now that would have been pretty impressive to say the least.

Rick C said...

"As a bonus, the graphic isn't even from Fox News Channel, but from a local Fox affiliate."

Rather than your example, I think the example of the German news channel that flashed a (Maquis) Seal Team Six logo during the "we got Osama" days is more apposite.

Sigivald said...

I understand that it takes a little bit of knowledge to understand that the Fox network, your local Fox affiliate, and Fox News Channel aren't the same thing, but isn't part of being a liberal being really, really smarter than me?

That one's always amused me; the idea that "Fox!!!!" is "any affiliate anywhere". If one local station does something, it is The Network, for purposes of mockery, blame, and Other-ing.

It would be far more acceptable if they were evenhanded in it and took the same sort of analysis for the flubs of "friendly" sources, but naturally, they don't. (And to be fair, it's not like Their Opposition is consistently any better.)

They always seem surprised, when such things come up, to find that I don't watch or read Fox News. Because plainly only People Brainwashed By Evil Murdoch could ever not be leftists? Still working on understanding that one.

the pawnbroker said...

Larry said, "The only poll that matters is the one in November."

Wherein one last "second-place finish" awaits the loyal opposition...just as planned and masterfully played by Matthews et al.

And I don't even know how I feel about that.

Anonymous said...

Methinks ye doth project too much.

Tam said...

Anon 4:35,

It took you three days to come up with that?