Fox News Viewers Least Informed

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One more tabloid-style thread title which, if one reads the thread, one finds it tells little or nothing.

A far left publication picking the stats it wants to report. Even so, it reveals some interesting things. For example, programs like O’Reilley seem to have a high degree of “well informed” viewers; roughly comparable to NPR. Of course, nobody much watches NPR as compared to Fox, so the figures could simply be interpreted to show that MORE well-informed people watch Fox than NPR. Also, of course, Fox is commercially viable, whereas NPR isn’t. So, people are actually willing to pay for Fox programming whereas only the government is willing to pay for NPR. You can play these games all day.

When it comes to the news magazines and regular mainstream programming, Fox, Limbaugh, etc, compare pretty well.

It might be interesting to see some unbiased, truly comparative studies, but this article isn’t a study (it’s all derivative) and is obviously a left wing advocacy source.
 
Ridgerunner said:
Of course, nobody much watches NPR as compared to Fox, so the figures could simply be interpreted to show that MORE well-informed people watch Fox than NPR.
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Is NPR on television? I get my news from the newspapers and from listening to NPR enroute to work. Are you thinking of PBS instead?
When it comes to the news magazines and regular mainstream programming, Fox, Limbaugh, etc, compare pretty well.
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Limbaugh is pure opinion; he doesn’t claim to be reading the news. FOX is a news and opinion outlet. I don’t think you can speak of them in the same breath.
is obviously a left wing advocacy source.
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Nothing wrong with that. You can read some right wing papers for balance if you want.
 
Well, if it’s on a blog, it MUST be true!

Actually the Pew Research study is interesting after looking over it, I found this:
There are substantial differences in the knowledge levels of the audiences for different news outlets. However, there is no clear connection between news formats and what audiences know. Well-informed audiences come from cable (Daily Show/Colbert Report, O’Reilly Factor), the internet (especially major newspaper websites), broadcast TV (NewsHour with Jim Lehrer) and radio (NPR, Rush Limbaugh’s program)…
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people-press.org/report/319/public-knowledge-of-current-affairs-little-changed-by-news-and-information-revolutions

Overall, Fox as an entire network scored only 6 points lower than CNN, not that it’s anything to brag about. The study pretty much paints Americans overall as pretty dim. Only 69% of adult Americans could name the VP in 2007?? For real???
 
And here is the “2009 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll” the blogger cites:
FOX vs. CNN/MSNBC: Here’s another way to look at the misinformation: In our poll, 72% of self-identified FOX News viewers believe the health-care plan will give coverage to illegal immigrants, 79% of them say it will lead to a government takeover, 69% think that it will use taxpayer dollars to pay for abortions, and 75% believe that it will allow the government to make decisions about when to stop providing care for the elderly. But it would be incorrect to suggest that this is ONLY coming from conservative viewers who tune in to FOX. In fact, 41% of CNN/MSNBC viewers believe the misinformation about illegal immigrants, 39% believe the government takeover stuff, 40% believe the abortion misperception, and 30% believe the stuff about pulling the plug on grandma. What’s more, a good chunk of folks who get their news from broadcast TV (NBC, ABC, CBS) believe these things, too. This is about credible messengers using the media to get some of this misinformation out there, not as much about the filter itself. These numbers should worry Democratic operatives, as well as the news media that have been covering this story.
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That seems pretty partisan, to me.
 
The WSJ survey “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader” violates all kinds of basic research techniques; it is a push poll with preconceived “correct” answers based on viewpoint rather than hard fact. Here’s an example question from this poll:

Q: A company with the largest market share is a monopoly
A: Unenlightened answer: agree

Not only does it depend on a predetermined “enlightened” answer (a meaningless definition in this context), but the question is misleading and confusing. A company with the largest market share CAN be a monopoly, but it isn’t always or even most of the time. A monopoly, by strict definition, has 100% share (by legal definition, it might be somewhat lower than that), but a company with 51% share - still the largest market share in a marketplace with multiple participants - is very definitely not a monopoly.

By contrast, the blog post originally cited here contains links to quantitative studies done by non-partisan organizations.

(And I would love to hear how Fox News saying the president gave part of Arizona to Mexico is good reporting.)
 
scipio337 said:
And here is the “2009 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll” the blogger cites:

That seems pretty partisan, to me.
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How so? It shows that, overall, major media sources were reporting information that was demonstrably false, but that Fox was doing it at a higher rate.
 
Claudio_Pilotas said:
How so? It shows that, overall, major media sources were reporting information that was demonstrably false, but that Fox was doing it at a higher rate.
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I would not say they are “demonstrably false”. HR 3962 could have indeed done all of the above with just a minor amount of legal wrangling, or in the case of illegal immigrants, none at all, since there was no provision for verifying legal status.
…House and Senate legislation would allow a new ‘public’ insurance plan to cover abortions, despite language added to the House bill that technically forbids using public funds to pay for them…Private plans that cover abortion also could be purchased with the help of federal subsidies. Therefore, we judge that the president goes too far when he calls the statements that government would be funding abortions “fabrications.”…
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factcheck.org/2009/08/abortion-which-side-is-fabricating/
 
Watchers of the Daily Show / Colbert report… the most educated?
Sure. None of them sit there with a smoking bong confusing entertainment with fact.
 
Claudio_Pilotas said:
How so? It shows that, overall, major media sources were reporting information that was demonstrably false, but that Fox was doing it at a higher rate.
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Fox actually won a court case with the judge ruling that the program does not need to tell the truth. So why bother when you can make things up.
 
Via_Dolorosa said:
Fox actually won a court case with the judge ruling that the program does not need to tell the truth. So why bother when you can make things up.
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Chicago, Chicago, Chicago.
Political corruption captiol of the US. - - And then transporting them to DC. Obama, Hillary, Rohm, Burris, etc.

When you make statements like yours, provide the “Court Case link”.
 
WatchingMedia said:
Chicago, Chicago, Chicago.
Political corruption captiol of the US. - - And then transporting them to DC. Obama, Hillary, Rohm, Burris, etc.

When you make statements like yours, provide the “Court Case link”.
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To your first statement I don’t know whether I should :rotfl: or :crying: because it’s so true.

To your second statement 👍
 
Via_Dolorosa said:
Fox actually won a court case with the judge ruling that the program does not need to tell the truth. So why bother when you can make things up.
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That is a blatant misrepresentation.
New World Communications of Tampa, Inc., d/b/a WTVT-TV, a subsidiary
of Fox Television, challenges a judgment entered against it for violating Florida’s private
sector whistle-blower’s statute, section 448.102, Florida Statutes (Supp. 1998). We
reverse.
In December 1996, WTVT hired the appellee, Jane Akre, and her
husband, Steve Wilson, as a husband-and-wife investigative reporting team. Shortly
after Akre and Wilson arrived at WTVT, they began working on a story about the use of
synthetic bovine growth hormone (“BGH”) in Florida dairy cattle. Their work on this
story led to what could be characterized as an eight-month tug-of-war between the
reporters and WTVT’s management and lawyers over the content of the story. Each
time the station asked Wilson and Akre to provide supporting documentation for
statements in the story or to make changes in the content of the story, the reporters
accused the station of attempting to distort the story to favor the manufacturer of BGH.
Code: 
  In September 1997, WTVT notified Akre and Wilson that it was exercising
its option to terminate their employment contracts without cause. Akre and Wilson
responded in writing to WTVT threatening to file a complaint with the Federal
Communications Commission (“FCC”) alleging that the station had “illegally” edited the
still unfinished BGH report in violation of an FCC policy against federally licensed
broadcasters deliberately distorting the news. The parties never resolved their
differences regarding the content of the story, and consequently, the story never aired.
In April 1998, Akre and Wilson sued WTVT alleging, among other things,
claims under the whistle-blower’s statute. Those claims alleged that their terminations
had been in retaliation for their resisting WTVT’s attempts to distort or suppress the
BGH story and for threatening to report the alleged news distortion to the FCC. Akre
also brought claims for declaratory relief and for breach of contract. After a four-week
trial, a jury found against Wilson on all of his claims. The trial court directed a verdict
against Akre on her breach of contract claim, Akre abandoned her claim for declaratory
relief, and the trial court let her whistle-blower claims go to the jury. The jury rejected all
of Akre’s claims except her claim that WTVT retaliated against her in response to her
threat to disclose the alleged news distortion to the FCC. The jury awarded Akre
$425,000 in damages.
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Code: 
   While WTVT has raised a number of challenges to the judgment obtained
by Akre, we need not address each challenge because we find as a threshold matter
that Akre failed to state a claim under the whistle-blower’s statute. The portion of the
whistle-blower’s statute pertinent to this appeal prohibits retaliation against employees
who have “[d]isclosed, or threatened to disclose,” employer conduct that “is in violation
of” a law, rule, or regulation. § 448.102(1)(3). The statute defines a “law, rule or
regulation” as “includ[ing] any statute or . . . any rule or regulation adopted pursuant to
any federal, state, or local statute or ordinance applicable to the employer and
pertaining to the business.” § 448.101(4), Fla. Stat. (1997). We agree with WTVT that
the FCC’s policy against the intentional falsification of the news – which the FCC has
called its “news distortion policy” – does not qualify as the required “law, rule, or
regulation” under section 448.102…
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2dca.org/opinions/Opinion_Pages/Opinion_Page_2003/February/February%2014,%202003/2D01-529.pdf

In essence, the court ruled that the FCC guideline did not fall under the category of “law”, in regards to FL whistleblower law.

It didn’t say “Its not illegal to falsify news”.
 
Rich_Olszewski said:
Is NPR on television? I get my news from the newspapers and from listening to NPR enroute to work. Are you thinking of PBS instead?
**I don’t know for sure, as I don’t watch all that much television. **

Limbaugh is pure opinion; he doesn’t claim to be reading the news. FOX is a news and opinion outlet. I don’t think you can speak of them in the same breath.** It was not my point that Limbaugh is a news outlet. Limbaugh was one of the sources named in the article. Perhaps the writer considered him a news source. I will admit that there were a lot of “news” sources that could hardly be considered “news sources”. **

Nothing wrong with that. You can read some right wing papers for balance if you want. That isn’t the point. The question is whether an obviously left wing source, which appears to be a blog rather than a news source, and is not, itself, a primary source, is likely to be reliable, such that it is appropriate to inform viewers of a Catholic site who might reasonably expect better. Since its whole accompanying commentary was extremely partisan, and since it did not produce any information itself, the whole thing was pretty dubious. And, of course, I will confess that I don’t generally favor threads that have that “Political tabloid” kind of title. I suppose if someone quoted something from Glen Beck on here with a title like “Democrats have lower IQs”, containing nothing but secondary information presented the way he wanted it to be presented, it might be considered comparable. But it would hardly be considered an informative item in and of itself.
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