Fox News: Leading the Lambs

A new University of Maryland study found that Fox News viewers are significantly more likely than others to believe false information about American politics.  The study judged how likely consumers of a number of different news sources were to believe misinformation about a wide range of political issues.  Specifically, Fox News  viewers were "significantly more likely" to believe the misinformation disseminated by Fox News, such as: most economists estimate the stimulus caused job losses; most economists have estimated the health care law will worsen the deficit; the economy is getting worse; most scientists do not agree that climate change is occurring; the stimulus legislation did not include any tax cuts; most Republicans opposed TARP at the time Congress voted on it; and that it is not clear that Obama was born in the United States.  Also according to the study, increased viewership of Fox News led to increased belief in such false stories. 

Anecdotally, many of us have known this for years.  You will note that I discussed this issue specifically with regard to members of my own family in my September 2, 2010 post.  It is nice to have some independent, scientific research to cite to now.

This is America . . .

. . . where Sarah Palin has the constitutional right to graphically encourage the shooting and killing of her political foes. It is now more than a day following the tragic, right wing inspired shooting of Representative Giffords, and Palin continues to promote her graphic map with the gun targets trained on Democratic politicians around the country.