Friday, December 17, 2010

FOX News, The More You Watch It, the Dumber You Get

And it's not coincidence and it sure as hell isn't accidental either.   A study by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland found Fox News viewers far more misinformed than those who got their news elsewhere and, better yet, the more viewers watched Fox, the more misinformed they became.

That's because Fox has precious little to do with information and almost everything to do with manipulating the gullible with misinformation.   Misinformation is what they convey and they do it quite deliberately to achieve a result - badly misinformed, hence easily manipulated, followers.  From AlterNet:

This study corroborates a previous PIPA study that focused on the Iraq war with similar results. And there was an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll that demonstrated the break with reality on the part of Fox viewers with regard to health care. The body of evidence that Fox News is nothing but a propaganda machine dedicated to lies is growing by the day.

In eight of the nine questions below, Fox News placed first in the percentage of those who were misinformed (they placed second in the question on TARP). That’s a pretty high batting average for journalistic fraud. Here is a list of what Fox News viewers believe that just aint so:
  • 91 percent believe the stimulus legislation lost jobs
  • 72 percent believe the health reform law will increase the deficit
  • 72 percent believe the economy is getting worse
  • 60 percent believe climate change is not occurring
  • 49 percent believe income taxes have gone up
  • 63 percent believe the stimulus legislation did not include any tax cuts
  • 56 percent believe Obama initiated the GM/Chrysler bailout
  • 38 percent believe that most Republicans opposed TARP
  • 63 percent believe Obama was not born in the U.S. (or that it is unclear)
FOX is pernicious and ought to be investigated.  A great amount of money and power lies behind its campaign to warp the minds of Americans for the direct and specific advantage of those FOX serves.  We can mock the stooges gullible enough to fall for the FOX gang's transparent lies but we should see them as victims of a genuinely evil organization.

13 comments:

  1. I was going to write about this too!
    We almost need a co-blog, haha.

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  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  3. "91 percent believe the stimulus legislation lost jobs "

    Since the US unemployment rate is higher today then when the stimulus legislation was brought in is it not obvious to say that the stimulus legislation did nothing to help workers. What are you smoking?

    “72 percent believe the health reform law will increase the deficit “

    Since the US health reforms will increase the US government role in the health care of millions more of Americans in the most expensive medical jurisdiction in the world it is only logical that the US deficit will increase. Are you on drug?

    “72 percent believe the economy is getting worse”

    Duh! It is getting worst! Unemployment up, more Americans use food stamps to feed themselves then ever before, housing prices in a freefall over the last 3 years. If these are not all signs of a worsening US economy then I don’t know what is? You sure can’t grasp the obvious can you?

    “60 percent believe climate change is not occurring”

    No, 60% do not believe in AGW not climate change, since this planet has been much warmer in the past and much colder in the past, there is absolutely no evidences that the small amount of warming the planet has gone through since the little ice age is anything but normal climate variation. By the way AGW is one religion that I have very little tolerance for. If you are looking for kooks just talk to an AGW thumper.


    “49 percent believe income taxes have gone up”

    They have! Tax rates are higher today in virtually every municipality and state in the country. So for most Americans this is true. Man did you miss your meds today?

    I am no fan of the Republican Party. I know both the Reps and the Dems are bought and paid for by the US and European bankers, but to use the statements above as proof that Fox News manipulates the news when all those statements are true is just proof that the left is all about lies and miss information themselves.

    Does Fox News have a conservative bias? Yes!

    Watch ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN and in Canada, CTV and Global if you want to watch news with a mild to strong liberal bias. Watch MSNBC and the CBC for a extreme left bias. All news organizations are bias it just depends on which side of the spectrum they are. There is one thing for sure, there are a lot more on the left side then the right.

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  4. Deno, do yourself a badly needed favour. Look up "epistemic closure" and then try to parse your profoundly stupid remarks for the glaring lapses in logic. They're there, loads of them. You take an argument to a point, assume facts not in existence to fill in the gaps, and pronounce your victory. Sad, Deno, very sad. Now scuttle off.

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  5. I'm not sure about about the health reform law not increasing the deficit.

    Everything I've read says that it will.

    But the law would increase the deficit much more slowly than what would have been the case (bending the cost curve, or stopping the acceleration of health care spending). This is a very good thing. The deficit will be loads smaller than it would have been if nothing had been legislated.

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  6. The Congressional Budget Office initially estimated cost savings of $143-billion from 2010 to 2019. Earlier this year the CBO increased its estimated costs for the decade by $115-billion. The savings aren't as great as initially projected but they're still positive, particularly given the expanded coverage the reform provides to individuals previously spurned by the HMO system.

    In a private healthcare regime in which the first 30-cents of every healthcare dollar is consumed in administration (far greater than any other industrialized nation), expanding coverage and reducing costs isn't that much of a struggle. If they'd gone for the private option, they could have saved far more.

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  7. Nice for a Fox News viewer to stop by for the demo.

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  8. Yeah, this character's logic is brilliant. He casts FOX News as "conservative" instead of rabidly and delusionally uber-rightwing. By that stupid device he can then frame every other news organization as a pawn of the Lefties. This Deno character is a halfwit.

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  9. "You take an argument to a point, assume facts not in existence to fill in the gaps, and pronounce your victory."

    Since Obama signed the act at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science on Feb 17 2009 umemployment in the US has risen from 8.2% in Feb 2009to 9.8% last month.

    Here the proof

    http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?data_tool=latest_numbers&series_id=LNS14000000

    Food stamps recipients at record 41.8 million Americans in July 2009

    http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-05/food-stamp-recipients-at-record-41-8-million-americans-in-july-u-s-says.html

    Here is my definition of free falling house prices.

    http://www.globalpropertyguide.com/North-America/United-States/Price-History


    The difference between you and I is I use facts when making an argument, all you use is lies and misinformation.

    Sad Mound, very very sad!

    I win

    Deno

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  10. Yes, shit for brains. You twist facts out of context and then attribute blame to the current administration as thought these horrible outcomes could possibly have been contrived by a Democratic president in less than two years. Deno, I mean it, you have shit for brains. I am not remotely interested in discourse with infantile minds. Fuck off and go back from whence you came.

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  11. Where is your proof that I “twist “the facts or take them out of context? Your whole premise of this particular blog post is Fox News watchers were misinformed by Fox News and you gave examples of this so-called misinformation. I proved to you that most of the examples of your so-called misinformation that Fox views believe were in fact true and all you can do is vent and insult like you are a five year old child having a temper tantrum. Do you even understand how to make a rational argument for or against any issue?


    Then you twist what I wrote and state that I am blaming Obama. This is not true. In my first post I do not even mention Obama, in my second post I only refer to him that he signed the stimulus package bill in Feb 2009. For your info I don’t blame Obama for anything wrong with the US economy today. Other then his misguided health care bill Obama has inherited all of the current problems with the US economy as did Bush Jr.
    The fact that you twisted and lied about what I wrote proves to anyone reading this blog that it is fact people like you that are guilty of misinformation and lies not Fox News.
    The fact that you call them out on something you do on a regular basis just again prove to all people is you are nothing more then a hypocrite with a temper.

    By the way, how old are you again?

    Deno

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  12. 'Study' Claiming Fox News Viewers 'Misinformed' Is Fraught With Errors


    http://newsbusters.org/blogs/lachlan-markay/2010/12/20/study-claiming-fox-news-viewers-misinformed-fraught-errors


    Oops!


    Deno

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  13. Is it even worth looking at NewsBusters for facts? Answer: No.

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