Friday, July 09, 2004

Just in case you missed it, an excellent study came out last October by PIPA at the Univ. of Maryland, titled "Misperceptions, The Media & The Iraq War." In a nutshell, it delves into how and why so many Americans believe three key "facts" about the Iraq war:

1) There is a link between Iraq/Saddam and Al Qaeda (& 9/11).
2) WMD have been found.
3) World public opinion towards the U.S.

The study is just 21-pages long, but if you're short on time skip to page 13 and observe the graphic in the upper-left corner. A whopping 80% of those categorized as FOX News viewers (where FOX was deemed their primary news source) held at least one or more of these misperceptions, as compared to just 23% for PBS-NPR viewers. Put another way, 77% of PBS-NPR folks believed none, zero, of the three misperceptions, as compared to just 20% of FOX folks.

Astonishing. The power of the media cannot be overstated.

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