Study hits war views held by Fox fans By David Folkenflik Sun Staff Originally published October 4, 2003
Heavy viewers of the Fox News Channel are nearly four times as likely to hold demonstrably untrue positions about the war in Iraq as media consumers who rely on National Public Radio or the Public Broadcasting System, according to a study released this week by a research center affiliated with the University of Maryland's School of Public Affairs.
"When evidence surfaces that a significant portion of the public has just got a hole in the picture ... this is a potential problem in the way democracy functions," says Clay Ramsay, research director for the Washington-based Program on International Policy Attitudes, which studies foreign-policy issues.
Fox News officials did not return repeated requests yesterday for comment on the study.
Funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Ford Foundation, the study was conducted from June through September. It surveyed 3,334 Americans who receive their news from a single media source. Each was questioned about whether he held any of the following three beliefs, characterized by the center as "egregious misperceptions":
- Saddam Hussein has been directly linked with the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
- Weapons of mass destruction have already been found in Iraq
- World opinion favored the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
To date, as measured by government reports and accepted public surveys, each of those propositions is false, according to the center. The Bush administration has argued that evidence will be found of the weapons in Iraq as will direct links between Saddam and the al-Qaida members who planned the 9/11 attacks. But President Bush has been forced to acknowledge that no such proof has surfaced.
Sixty percent of all respondents believed in at least one of the statements. But there were clear differences in perceptions among devotees of the various media outlets.
Twenty-three percent of those who get their news from NPR or PBS believed in at least one of the mistaken claims. In contrast, 80 percent of Fox News viewers held at least one of the three incorrect beliefs.
Among broadcast network viewers there also were differences. Seventy-one percent of those who relied on CBS for news held a false impression, as did 61 percent of ABC's audience and 55 percent of NBC viewers. Fifty-five percent of CNN viewers and 47 percent of Americans who rely on the print media as their primary source of information also held at least one misperception.
The three evening network news shows command the largest audiences, together typically reaching between 25 million and 30 million viewers nightly. But Fox News, the top-rated cable-news outlet, has steadily increased its viewership by offering a blend of hard news and opinionated talk that often takes on a patriotic sheen. Its top show draws more than 2 million viewers nightly.
"Among those who primarily watch Fox, those who pay more attention are more likely to have misperceptions," the report concludes. "Only those who mostly get their news from print media have fewer misperceptions as they pay more attention."
The PIPA study suggests a strong link between people's understanding of the news and its source. That link held true throughout different demographic segments, such as those based on education level, viewing habits, and partisan leanings, Ramsay said.
"It proves that what we're doing is great journalism," says NPR spokeswoman Laura Gross. "We're telling the truth and we let our audience decide."
More information on the study can be found at www. pipa.org
Was the first question, Are you a moron? If they answered yes then they could continue?
I didn't get those top three from FOX, what I did get was that if you thought the war was wrong in any way you were a sorry excuse for an American, even if you were French, German, or Canadian....
Posted by Veers (Member # 661) on :
I think most conservatives agree that Fox News is misleading and biased. Well, maybe not "most" of them...
Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :
While the report is rather disturbing, I would point out that just because mistaken people watch Fox News doesn't make Fox the source of their error. I'd also be interested to see what the results would be on other issues, and whether other the distribution of stupidity changes.
Posted by Harry (Member # 265) on :
FOX might not be the pinnacle of objective reporting, but very few sources were strictly objective during the war. Most shocking example was the pretty obvious anti-war reporting by the BBC.
And 'embedded' journalists weren't helping either. Being shot at probably doesn't help very much in objective reporting.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
You see, there you go, the real reason for bombing our own troops at times, keeps them objective....
It also depends on the questions asked and how they were asked, and who got the raw numbers in and how they manipulated the data to their own ends....
A study can say almost anything you want it to....
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
So this study went by three misperceptions:
1. US troops found close links between al-Qaida and Iraq. 2. Troops found WMDs. 3. World public opinion favored the war.
Now, the whole study bases itself on these 3 misperceptions. Notice how all of them favor anti-war people, since all of these misperceptions point to the war being a bad thing.
For example, an anti-war person would automatically say no to all of these things, whether or not they had watched any news at all. A pro-war person might believe in #1 without watching the news.
What would have happened if they went with these misperceptions:
1. Bush said that Iraq tried to get uranium from Niger. 2. Bush said that Saddam was involved with 9-11.
Most Democrats or anti-war people would fail on these misperceptions.
Thus, this whole study is a sham. If these three misperceptions were used, one would get completely different results.
Posted by Saltah'na (Member # 33) on :
1. Bush said that Iraq tried to get uranium from Niger.
Says who? That theory is taking a beating since day one. And no further proof to substantiate it other than hearsay.
2. Bush said that Saddam was involved with 9-11.
Any concrete evidence other than a supposed meeting between Mr. Atta and a supposed Iraqi official?
Posted by Daryus Aden (Member # 12) on :
Before the four horsemen start the next war (whenever that will be) I think I'll start taping fox news reports, just so that we can ram them down peoples throats every time the story changes.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
You're going to tape Fox News? Surely we haven't started exporting that filth overseas? If we have, I can't apologize enough...
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Sadly, yes, Fox is available on satellite channels. It really is crap; makes Chinese state Television (for some reason they have a English language version) look fair and balenced. Well, almost.
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Honestly Wraith, your second post speaks volumes, and is a little more balanced than the first...
FOXNews does provide one thing that the others don't, true entertainment, as long as the facts don't get in the way.....
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Well, I never said Fox news (and the Commie channel) weren't entertaining.
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
quote:Originally posted by Saltah'na: 1. Bush said that Iraq tried to get uranium from Niger.
Says who? That theory is taking a beating since day one. And no further proof to substantiate it other than hearsay.
2. Bush said that Saddam was involved with 9-11.
Any concrete evidence other than a supposed meeting between Mr. Atta and a supposed Iraqi official?
You misread my statement. The above opinions are misperceptions. That is, Bush never said either of those things. But a large number of the antiwar people believe he did, and often argue from that mistaken belief.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:You misread my statement. The above opinions are misperceptions. That is, Bush never said either of those things. But a large number of the antiwar people believe he did, and often argue from that mistaken belief.
Yeah, because Mr. Bush actually said:
quote:The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.
Hussein sought to buy this uranium from what Africa country counsel?
Why reports have that country being Niger.
Well, well.
Posted by Tora Regina (Member # 53) on :
They get Fox news in Britain on Sky, too. I remember seeing it once. It was about a survey they did in response to BBC's "What the world thinks of America" survey. The survey was pretty misleading, too, actually.
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jay the Obscure:
quote:You misread my statement. The above opinions are misperceptions. That is, Bush never said either of those things. But a large number of the antiwar people believe he did, and often argue from that mistaken belief.
Yeah, because Mr. Bush actually said:
quote:The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.
Hussein sought to buy this uranium from what Africa country counsel?
Why reports have that country being Niger.
Well, well.
Untrue. There have been reports from several different countries.
I should also indicate that while the Niger documents were shown to have been forgeries (of possible French origin), and while former ambassador Wilson's disputed report says otherwise, no credible source has disproved, or even disputed, British Intelligence's claim that Hussein attempted to acquire said uranium.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Stupid French.
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jay the Obscure: Stupid French.
quote:The Roland anti-aircraft system is a short-range air defense missile in service with at least 10 countries, including France and Germany.
But of course these ones came directly from France. They must have. And, when it turns out they didn't, will there be a retraction? Nope. The spin is complete.
quote:But Iraq managed to circumvent the arms trade ban in the 1990s through shadowy deals with various arms traders and kept its military equipment functioning.
So if there are French weapons in Iraq, then these arms dealers must have been French, right? Because everyone knows arms dealers only sell weapons from their own country, it's a point of professional pride with them.
quote:Among others, Russia, Britain and France all sold arms to Iraq in the 1970s and 1980s. In Iraq's arsenal were Soviet-built Scud missiles, British Chieftain tanks and French Mirage fighters.
Oh, how wonderfully, deliciously coy! Do we think these others could possibly include the United States of America? I think we could!
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Hey, only for the chemical weapons and protection gear...
Lee, with that attitude you would have us beleive we were pro-Saddam when he was at war with Iran... Oh, um, ahhh, never mind....
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
I don't know why, but skimming through that link made me think I should call my brother....
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Rummy: Is that a WMD in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me?
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Now, we can call them the Saddam loving Fox News!!
quote:The second-in-command at the information ministry, who spent his days reading the reports the minders wrote about visiting foreign journalists, has been employed by Fox News.
quote:The Roland anti-aircraft system is a short-range air defense missile in service with at least 10 countries, including France and Germany.
But of course these ones came directly from France. They must have. And, when it turns out they didn't, will there be a retraction? Nope. The spin is complete.
To play devil's advocate, I'd like to point out that if the report is accurate and the missiles WERE made in France in 2003, that leaves barely a three-month window of opportunity to get those missiles from the factory to the Iraqi desert before Dubya finally chewed through his leash and started the actual attack.
Considering that short a time span, the shorter the route, the better.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Re: Fox News - misleading? Study says DUH. Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
quote:To play devil's advocate, I'd like to point out that if the report is accurate and the missiles WERE made in France in 2003
They weren't made in 2003- there was just confusion over the serial numbers painted on them- there was an article in the paper (Telegraph- hardly pro-Frog) about it. The Roland missiles haven't been manufactured for a number of years, apparently.
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
AFAIK, the problem with Roland was that it *couldn't* be sold to two-bit governments and assorted counterinsurgents, due to the excessive price. Even NATO countries found it too expensive. The Franco-German consortium had placed its bets on the US buying the system, as US Army theater air defense by then had a long tradition of being in shambles, and their Sergeant York fiasco had eroded faith in domestic products. US Army wasn't interested, though, so the price went skyrocketing while the missiles did not. (Today, there are eleven operators, mostly in Europe. The Roland project has been merged with Thompson-CSF's more successful Crotale, so that Crotale NG and Roland 3 use the same missile. The Iraqi find did not feature this modern version, though, AFAIK.)
Iraq of the late eighties would probably have been a good second option for the Roland. Iraq of the nineties would not, since you need a rich buyer for these kinds of weapon systems - you get him hooked on the product, then you sell maintenance, spares and reloads. For poor and desperate folks, you dump something from the lower price range, in a single package.
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
[Embarrassed edit]
Actually, the eleven operators are mostly outside Europe: Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany, Iraq, Nigeria, Qatar, Spain, and Venezuela. Oil money features heavily in this selection... Interestingly, both Iraq and Argentina had a chance to use the systems against the RAF, without success.
quote:Chirac fumes over claims that France sold missiles to Iraq By Philip Sherwell and Kim Willsher
An angry President Jacques Chirac of France yesterday forced the Polish government to withdraw claims that its troops had found four French anti-aircraft missiles, manufactured earlier this year, at a weapons dump in Iraq.
Poland's defence ministry expressed "regret" last night over the reports, first made on Friday evening, that it had uncovered missiles which could only have been supplied to Iraq in breach of the United Nations weapons embargo.
However, the statement released in Warsaw did not assuage President Chirac's fury at suggestions that France may have supplied Saddam Hussein's regime with weapons in the months before the US-led invasion.
"I believe that the Polish soldiers have created confusion that could have been avoided with thorough verification," he said.
The controversy arose from the markings on the Roland-type missiles discovered last week near Hilla, south of Baghdad. In photographs released in Warsaw, the markings included the coding: 07-01 KND 2003.
Polish forces apparently took this to indicate the date of manufacture, but France insisted that it has produced no Roland missiles since 1993. Defence officials said the significance of the code was not immediately clear, and a Pentagon official said the style of markings did not correspond to those usually used by France.
Further investigation has been hampered as the Polish troops destroyed the missiles last week. It is standard procedure for former Iraqi ordnance to be blown up by Coalition forces.
Mr Chirac is particularly prickly about accusations that French weaponry had reached Iraq as recently as this year, even if via a third country, as France has a poor reputation for selling arms to dubious regimes.
At the European Union summit in Rome, Mr Chirac rejected the reports out of hand and said he had made his point "in a friendly but frank and firm way" during two meetings with Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller.
The French Foreign Ministry has emphasised that France has not authorised the sale of weapons, or even spare parts, to Iraq since 1990.
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
quote:France has a poor reputation for selling arms to dubious regimes.
Except with the dubious regimes themselves, presumeable, with whom France has a very good reputation. As does the US.
quote:Interestingly, both Iraq and Argentina had a chance to use the systems against the RAF, without success.
Good. Pity the Exocet worked; the frogs basically sold 'em to Argentina so they'd get a chance to demonstrate them against us. So much for European union.
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
Popeye Doyle in da house!
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
Well, arming Argentina was a hobby for the British as well. They sold anything from destroyers to helicopters to aircraft carriers to the Argentine Navy, which then went on to use French and US aircraft and French missiles and thus diverted attention from the British elements...
As for Exocets, those were a very typical weapons sale, with built-in obsolescence. The engines for the MM.38 model in widespread use expired in the late eighties or early nineties, and the manufacturer won't provide new ones. The French and Germans still have working Exocets, of the MM.40 model, but everybody else still using the weapons risks a high likelihood of them blowing up in the launch canister. Ditto for most of the SAMs Saddam had - it's a wonder he got as many of those airborne as he did.
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
NOt that Saddam was real concerned about his troops getting blown up. Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Either he kills them or we do, the end result is the same, although the lowered expenditure on us is preferrable.....
The USAF had some Rolands at one point in time, used in the UK as airbase defense....
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
quote:The USAF had some Rolands at one point in time, used in the UK as airbase defense...
Lee Response: Oh, gee, thanks a lot. Everyone else gets Patriots, we get Frog missiles. Except a Frog missile is totally different from a Roland missile, which rather ruins that joke.
Rob Response: So the Iraqis must have got the missiles from the UK! Let's bomb them!
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Mind you, Patriot's fairly crap as well; based on past form the RAF would spend half it's time trying to avoid the damn things.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Lee, USAF Airbases..... They were on a modified M109 self-propelled howitzer chasis....
Wraith, well, they would have the home turf advantage there.....
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Yeah, but it's still insulting. I suppose your airbases on British soil aren't as important as your other airbases, hmm? Well, fine! be like that! We don't care, we didn't want your airbases protected with Patriots anyway, so there! It's my ball, I'm going home! 8)
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Well, the RAF Regt. do have Rapiers, and are actually trained to use them. Which does help, contrary to US doctrine... Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
In any case, the M-109-chassis Rolands were probably intended as a rapidly air-redeployable force, with base protection as a side job... They are for point defense, while Patriots are more of an area defense system - and the preceding-generation Hawk system (which is closer to area than point defense) would also have been used to protect the RAF bases, right? (Or did you still have Bloodhounds?)
Neither Hawk nor Patriot is as air-mobile as Roland (or tracked Rapier, or some comparable system), which basically requires nothing more than the launcher vehicle. Area defense missile systems are veritable circuses of vehicles. You should see a SA-3 battery on the move! It's got everything, from an animal act (the MP dogs) to trapeze artists (the poor saps who get to erect the radar) to clowns (the people who insist the system is mobile)...
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
Warfare as circus... Never thought of that before.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Oh, but Timo is soooo right it is scary....
Reminds me of a divisoinal HQ trying to move....
Roland is a divisional unit ADA system, while the Patriot is a Corps or EAC ADA system, although none will ever have a name as nice as HAWK...
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Something to go with Snay's first post.
quote:Fact-Free News
Ever worry that millions of your fellow Americans are walking around knowing things that you don't? That your prospects for advancement may depend on your mastery of such arcana as who won the Iraqi war or where exactly Europe is?
Then don't watch Fox News. The more you watch, the more you'll get things wrong.
Researchers from the Program on International Policy Attitudes (a joint project of several academic centers, some of them based at the University of Maryland) and Knowledge Networks, a California-based polling firm, have spent the better part of the year tracking the public's misperceptions of major news events and polling people to find out just where they go to get things so balled up. This month they released their findings, which go a long way toward explaining why there's so little common ground in American politics today: People are proceeding from radically different sets of facts, some so different that they're altogether fiction.
In a series of polls from May through September, the researchers discovered that large minorities of Americans entertained some highly fanciful beliefs about the facts of the Iraqi war. Fully 48 percent of Americans believed that the United States had uncovered evidence demonstrating a close working relationship between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. Another 22 percent thought that we had found the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And 25 percent said that most people in other countries had backed the U.S. war against Saddam Hussein. Sixty percent of all respondents entertained at least one of these bits of dubious knowledge; 8 percent believed all three.
The researchers then asked where the respondents most commonly went to get their news. The fair and balanced folks at Fox, the survey concludes, were "the news source whose viewers had the most misperceptions." Eighty percent of Fox viewers believed at least one of these un-facts; 45 percent believed all three. Over at CBS, 71 percent of viewers fell for one of these mistakes, but just 15 percent bought into the full trifecta. And in the daintier precincts of PBS viewers and NPR listeners, just 23 percent adhered to one of these misperceptions, while a scant 4 percent entertained all three.
Now, this could just be pre-sorting by ideology: Conservatives watch O'Reilly, liberals look at Lehrer, and everyone finds his belief system confirmed. But the Knowledge Network nudniks took that into account, and found that even among people of like mind, where they got their news still shaped their sense of the real. Among respondents who said they would vote for George W. Bush in next year's presidential race, for instance, more than three-quarters of the Fox watchers thought we'd uncovered a working relationship between Hussein and al Qaeda, while just half of those who watch PBS believed this to be the case.
Misperceptions can also be the result of inattention, of course. If you nod off for just a nanosecond in the middle of Tom Brokaw intoning, "U.S. inspectors did not find weapons of mass destruction today," you could think we'd just uncovered Hussein's nuclear arsenal. So the wily researchers also controlled for intensity of viewership, and concluded that, "in the case of those who primarily watched Fox News, greater attention to news modestly increases the likelihood of misperceptions." Particularly when that news includes hyping every false lead in Iraq as the certain prelude to uncovering a massive WMD cache.
One question inevitably raised by these findings is whether Fox News is failing or succeeding. Over at CBS, the news that 71 percent of viewers hold one of these mistaken notions should be cause for concern, but whether such should be the case at Fox because 80 percent of their viewers are similarly mistaken is not at all clear. Rupert Murdoch, Roger Ailes and the other guys at Fox have long demonstrated a clearer commitment to changing public policy than to reporting it, and an even clearer commitment to reporting it in such a way as to change it.
Take a wild flight of fancy with me and assume for just a moment that one major goal over at Fox is to ensure Bush's reelection. Surely, anyone who believes that Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda were in cahoots, that we've found the WMD and that Bush is revered among the peoples of the world -- all of these known facts to nearly half the Fox viewers -- is a good bet to be a Bush voter in next year's contest. By this standard -- moving votes into Bush's column and keeping them there -- Fox has to be judged a stunning success. It's not so hot on conveying information as such, but mere empiricism must seem so terribly vulgar to such creatures of refinement as Murdoch and Ailes.
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