People Are Stupid

With 24 hour news programs and flashing news stories when logging on to e-mail, how do people not even know who is the country's VP?! A Pew Research Center poll shows that on average, people today are about as able to name their leaders, and are about as aware of major news events, as nearly 20 years ago. The new survey includes nine questions that are either identical or roughly comparable to questions asked in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In 2007, somewhat fewer were able to name their governor, the vice president, and the president of Russia, but more respondents than in the earlier era gave correct answers to questions pertaining to national politics.

In 1989, for example, 74% could come up with Dan Quayle's name when asked who the vice president is. Today, somewhat fewer (69%) are able to recall Dick Cheney. Okay, so people don't know the VP but know that the chief justice of the Supreme Court is generally considered a conservative and that Democrats control Congress than knew these things in 1989. That seems ironic to me, but maybe that indicates the country is more politically divided? Also odd to me is that people who watch the Colbert Report or John Stewart show know more about current events (54%) than those who watch CNN (41%)!

A majority of people know who Barack Obama is (61%) but more know Arnold Schwarzenegger as the California governor or a former action-movie star (91%) and football player Peyton Manning (62%). Sad.