Poll: Americans Uninformed on Bush, Kerry

[indigo32]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040929/ap_on_el_pr/uninformed_americans

WASHINGTON - If matching presidential candidates to their positions on basic issues were like a "Jeopardy!" category, most Americans wouldn't earn a single dollar.

More than half of those polled by the National Annenberg Election Survey didn't know President Bush (news - web sites) alone favors allowing private investments of some Social Security (news - web sites) money. Nearly as many didn't know that only Democratic candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) proposes getting rid of tax breaks for the overseas profits of U.S. companies.

Importing drugs from Canada? That's a Kerry issue, but nearly half either didn't know or thought Bush also supported changing federal law to allow for drug imports from Canada.


Where are our priorities? Sheesh

[democrat in Tallahassee]

1. well, that explains things doesn't it? overtime pay, etc etc

The media is a total failure

[Xipe Totec]

11. Failure? Only if you think they're actually trying to be honest.

No, I think the media is another catastrophic Republican success.

Shoot me now!

[RobinA]

33. Why. Blame. The. Media.

I don't know George Bush or John Kerry personally, I've never talked to them, so they didn't tell me their positions themselves. I would have gotten every question right on this test. I got it from the media. If you don't know Bush wants to privatize SS you haven't been paying even a little bit of attention. To the media. It's not their fault people don't pay attention.

[MrBenchley]

2. Gee, you don't suppose that's because the news media sucks

do you?

[indigo32]

6. LOL

right on!

[BeyondGeography]

3. Lazy fools

Sometimes I think my biggest mistake is taking this country seriously.

[Voltaire99]

10. The media or the public, or both?

I agree with the sentiment, but only up to a point.

The trouble is that Americans are overworked, over-stressed by finances, and over-babied by their media. We can add under-educated to that mix, too.

The combination of having little time for public affairs and being fed pureed propaganda by their corporate media leads to knowing little and understanding less.

[KansDem]

13. Agreed!

The yellow-tabloid journalism of the corporate media has left many ignorant to the important issues facing this nation...

And Americans unwilling to learn or accept new facts and truths are equally responsible.

For example, when the question of whether or not Indian reservations should be permitted to have casinos operate on their lands appeared on our state ballot a number of years ago, I had an argument with someone who was dead set against the proposal. I asked her "why" and she said "Because the Indians have enough problems with alcohol. Gambling will only add to those problems." I tried to explain that the casinos will only operate on their lands with the tribes getting a part of the receipts, and that many, if not all, of the "gamblers" will be from off the reservation (think: Las Vegas). She still wouldn't vote for the measure.

That was some 12-13 years ago and I still think to this day she believes that...
:spank:Ignorance is bliss, but makes for a lousy domestic or foreign policy.

[BeyondGeography]

16. The media effect is overstated

If all Joe America can bring himself to do is watch television, he is indeed screwed. With the Internet, which lets you read the best papers in the country (admittedly, they often suck too) and not just the hometown rag, magazines such as The New Yorker, Harper's and many others, as well as BOOKS (horror of horrors), people have no excuse to be as ignorant as they are.

Insiders such as Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neill have detailed, with great intellectual integrity, the extent to which Bush/Cheney whiffed on 9/11, how Iraq guided foreign policy and national security from the get-go and how Bush is incapable of leading single intelligent policy-related conversation. Both were given plenty of publicity by the media, to no apparent effect, other than to piss people like us off even more.

Forget the over-worked, over-stressed nonsense. Americans are outsourcing THINKING to the TV set and they're getting screwed. If you keep nannying these people by saying it's the media's fault they'll never wake up and understand where the hell they live and what's happening to them.

Feeding your brain is right up there with feeding your face. If you're not happy with your lot in life, thinking on your own two feet is the only way out.

[Gelliebeans]

19. I agree let the stupidity rest

at the feet of the ignorant. It doesn't take too much time to devote to reading world and top news in a couple of different papers via internet. This can be done minimally 3-4 times. People spend more time channel surfing looking for a reality show on the TV.
I don't know how much more real you can get. In an election year there is no reason not to invest some time to decide who will run the country for 4 years. I abhor willful ignorance.

[RhodaGrits]

21. Someone just started reading one of the 3 copies of Clarke's book

I've been passing around. He remarked that he thought that Clarke was just an anti-republican partisan that was not to be taken seriously and that the book was a real eye-opener. The mass media is very effective in suppressing the truth.

[BeyondGeography]

23. Most of the media never painted Clarke as anti-Republican

I mean, how could you? He worked for Reagan and Bush before he worked for Clinton, and then Bush 43 invited him to stay. He is an independent, national security professional. Yes, the Murdoch wing of the media cast doubt on his motives, supported by the Rush and Rove echo chamber, but the rest of the media played it fairly straight. He got airtime on 60 Minutes, NBC and ABC, where he more than held his own. Even Tweety showed respect. His testimony at the 9/11 Comission was aired uninterrupted by all the major cablenews stations. And his book resided at #1 for a week or two. The truth, as told by Clarke, was not suppressed.

Separately, I'm glad you're passing the book around. Clarke's admiration for Clinton is unshakeable, as is his disdain for the distractions of the right-wing political machine and the disaster that was the decision to go to war in Iraq. It's a heroic effort on his part.

[llmart]

29. Well said!

I'm tired of all the "but I'm so busy, blah, blah, blah," response of today's populace. Busy, my ass. Lazy maybe. You have plenty of time for watching endless hours of nonsense TV, but not to read?

[JohnOneillsMemory]

31. Men know USELESS FUCKING SPORTS, but not matters of life and death.

Sports are the big DON'T THINK, BE LIKE THE PACK influence that absorbs people who should know more than they do, mostly men.

I don't relate to people who know sports but not history and civics.
They are infantilized and irrelevent to democracy except as mob fodder for fascism.

They are blocking the exits for all of us trying to survive.

[llmart]

40. Very, very true......

and it also shows in the "sports mentality" we have about everything, evidenced by the us vs. them aspect of politics and discourse today. Just look at how the idiot-in-chief reacted to Sept. 11th with his blustery bullhorn speech at Ground Zero and the mob's reaction. Life is not a friggen' football game.

[Demonaut]

4. not these patriots on DU, we know the issues and if we need

more info we research

[deaniac123]

28. but

No one can disagree? Isnt that the DU way. We know everything unless we are wrong or someone dissents. Then we just knock them off our site?

Very open minded............



.........hmmmmm

[Demonaut]

34. true, thats the DU way.......because most that dissent have their heads

up thier asses

[RoundRockD]

5. But I thought we all knew where George Bush stands.

I thought John Kerry was the only one who was failing at getting his message out to the American people.

[Guaranteed]

7. Rate it up!

Let these idiots know what they don't know!

[SammyWinstonJack]

8. Gee, I guess what one doesn't know can hurt .

Is there really any excuse to be uninformed, non-informed or ill informed? Question everything!

[otohara]

9. Finally A Poll I Can Believe

sheesh

[freeplessinseattle]

12. no shit (eom)

[deutsey]

15. Exactly...Amuricans can sure tell you all about who's on Survivor

though.

Entertained to death.

[catzies]

17. It's all going according to (their) plan

They don't want voters, they just want consumers.

[grytpype]

14. Dunces for Bush

[Skittles]

18. gawd, people really are f***ing stupid

no wonder Bush has so many supporters; I have long felt that if the American people knew the truth - the REAL TRUTH about what Bush Inc is all about, they would riot in the streets with pitchforks.

[ChrisK]

20. When I see a poll like this I begin to think ...

it's a little bit of everything...people that can't care to be more informed then they are now, a media industry that is worried more of the bottom line then how well it informs its viewer/reader/listener, a government that is right now trying to keep its people as disconnected as it can so they will not see the mess that is happening around them.

To be fare, no one makes you "stupid", you choose to be that way unless your born with a disfuction....before I came to this site I was a person that knew very little about politics outside of a few bits and pieces, thanks to George Bush(and Mr Moore but in a good way) I have been driven to learn more of whats happening around me in this country and thats sad, sad that a man my age (36) is only NOW coming to know how his country really works and what it is doing to the people in this state and beyound...truly sad and I have really no one to blame but myself, sure the media was a bit lacking on some issues but I was the one not looking to dig deeper and see what the heck was happening, I was the one content to leave it to the "other" person to pay attention to what was wrong and let them fix it...Not any more, I have been "dumb" too long and will not ignore what is happening around me because its takes an effort to open one's eyes and stop letting the wrong people lead this country astray.

We as Americans have a duty to learn all we can and not be zombies in this country, to finally take back what is ours...We are this country, we are its people and WE bear the heaviest burden if we fail to stop this man in November.

[info being]

25. Well said

I was the same as you until the Clinton impeachment and then the election "debacle". My awakening was slow, but then after the economic collapse, 9/11, loss of a job, and a war based on lies...I really don't understand how my countrymen continue to choose ignorance.

[Eurotrash]

26. Better late than never, ChrisK

Your story sounds like a lot of people I know--except that some of them STILL haven't seen the light. Me, I was in my late 20's when the light went on, so don't be too hard on yourself for being 36 when it happened. An uninformed populace is just begging to be abused, and we can see that happening all around us right now. Our task to get * out of the White House is truly daunting, given the media avalanche and general willful ignorance all around us, and is going to require every drop of energy in a fight of historic proportions. But we can win. Keep fighting with us!

[featherman]

22. But the media has made sure that the public knows that

Kerry is a flip flopper who windsurfs and that Bush is a down home guy who cuts brush on his ranch. That much they know.

Issues? What are issues? Starting wars for no particular reason? Who cares? Blowing the deficit to record proportions? What's a deficit? Gutting the Constitution and Bill of Rights? Huh...what are those?

Who is likeable and who is more of a pal? THAT'S what the media knows the public wants to know.

(I'm not TOO bitter, am I?)

[reprobate]

24. Bitter? No, but sometimes reality has a slightly acidic taste.

[deaniac123]

27. register

where do i go to register to vote?

[Career Prole]

30. I wonder how many of these nimrods could tell you in a snap who the

last "American Idol" was or where the last "Survivor" contest was staged. I weep for the future.

[Amigust]

32. We're not a nation of smarties

When you look at the IQ distribution of an ordinary population, half have an IQ below 100 and half are above, with the majority hovering in a range from 75 to 125.

Add to this, most people are not self-motivated to tackle what they find hard to understand.

Add to this all the GOP college educated me-first crowd, too selfish to vote for the good of the whole population.

Sad reality.

The GOP expertly plays to all these folk by playing off people's ignorance, bias and selfishness.

The corporate media make little attempt to tell the story right, but their distorting sound bites are very effective in misleading anyone who doesn't look (or want to look) closely.

[LibDemAlways]

35. When I was a kid, "current events" were

discussed daily in school. I remember bringing newspaper articles to 6th grade to be discussed each morning in class.

I am now the parent of a 6th grader who gets no - and I emphasize no- exposure to current events in school. The state of California sets "standards" for teaching social studies that mandates 6th graders be taught ancient civilizations - and nothing else. Last year in 5th grade U.S. history was covered. That was a joke because they never got beyond the Revolutionary War, and won't get back to U.S. History until 8th grade, two years from now. The curriculum is all screwed up and utterly without any continuity. No wonder people don't know anything.

At home we discuss politics and what's going on the world, so my daughter probably knows more than most kids, but it's a shame that schools have completely let this go.

[goodboy]

36. I was at Ohio Dem Party HQ making phone calls tonight...

I can totally vouch for this story:

Example: 20YO male, unemployed, has serious concerns about the draft-Says he's voting for Shrub

68YO female, on Medicare, cannot afford prescription drugs, or premium payments--voting for bush.

43YO female, with kids, says Kerry's "wishy-washy" but when I told her about bush's flip=flops, she said, you can't believe what Kerry says.

Now what??

[54anickel]

37. ARRRRGH!!! :beatsheadagainstwall: n/t

[bogey18]

38. What can I say?

Read my quote

[are_we_united_yet]

39. Uhhh I have a question:

How can you be so effin stupid?