09.18.07 5:00 AM CDT
• Letters
• Chip Rowe
Raw Data is one of the most popular features in the magazine—and one of the most challenged. For example, Merle Norris of Columbus, Ohio, finds it hard to believe that Bill O’Reilly “calls some person or group a derogatory name once every 6.8 seconds,” as we reported in September. “This left-wing propaganda has long since been disproved,” he writes. “Please do some research next time.” That statistic, based on a study of 115 O’Reilly editorials, comes from a report at the Indiana University School of Journalism.Jim Lanave of Flint, Michigan is unhappy about an item that appeared in the August issue. "Dumb Like a Fox [the headline on the item], or dumb like a Playboy editor? The "quiz" that supposedly found Fox News viewers to be more ignorant of current events than people who watch The Daily Show and The Colbert Report is actually a Pew Research Center study. In fact, it revealed the two groups to both be about the national average. This is why normal folks hate politics, a.k.a. 'creative lying.'"
As part of a larger study, Pew gave respondents a 23-question current events quiz. Viewers and listeners of the comedy news shows, major newspaper sites, NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, O’Reilly Factor, NPR and Rush Limbaugh’s radio show got 18 answers right, on average. Viewers of the network morning shows, local news and Fox News got eight right, on average. See "Public Knowledge of Current Affairs Little Changed by News and Information Revolutions" at the Pew Center site.
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Comments on this entry:
'For example, Merle Norris of Columbus, Ohio, finds it hard to believe that Bill O’Reilly “calls some person or group a derogatory name once every 6.8 seconds,”'
I agree with Merle. There's no way Falafel Boy can hold out that long. Even if he gets to hold a loofah the whole time.