we've got some bad news for Brian Williams Pew Research Center poll that
showed a picture of Brian Williams in the ass
what is the name of this person and unfortunately back in August only 27
percent
Americans could name him an additional 3 percent
I could say that I don't know his name but he isn't anchor/reporter
and you see there dan Rather now that information is for a long time is from
1985
and back in the day 47 percent Americans in New the big-name
in the evening news so significant drop-off in that time now look
over the course up nearly thirty years salata changes in american society a lot
of potential explanations for this
but you can't discount that obviously fewer people are watching the
traditional Evening News with information on that as well
take a look at a chart going back almost as long use in nineteen eighty there
over 50 percent Americans on an average night love you
but a sorry fifty million I should say will view the evening news on a given
night
that number down to about 24 25 million in 2010
and we can expect because I don't see any evidence to the contrary to that
trend is probably continuing over the course of the next three and a half
years afterward
so not only do they not know who Brian Williams is which is perfectly fine
but they're not watching the evening news to get their information
and the real a talk about this is not just a glow that
yea internet retired internet talk shows are winning out
it's partly that's partly things like to have the powers the Drudge Report
and things that so people getting their information from a lot of different
sources
but this is a huge trend and the chances that this is not having a significant
impact
on the sorts of information that people are getting the way they're absorbing
that information the weather using it
but later on in their political lives I find it to be unlikely
I'll continue to look that up for you but also the reason I want to talk about
this
is three-year as a the on online news network we watch
the big nude MSNBC CNN we fuck news we watch them
we comment on what they say and so too us they're very important
and perhaps because I've that the focus that we put on them
it might seem like they are objectively more important than they actually are
and you as a new robust might be led to believe that they are like
think about all Riley alright Lee regularly trounces CNN and MSNBC he
beats bother them combined in any given night in viewership
and they'll often say looking up three three and a half million viewers
on any given night which sounds a huge number and certainly in its
an entire we get well over a million views a day here on to it.
but his number much higher but how significant is that really for the
political discourse America
three million yet there's well over 300 million
Americans and see should bear in mind it's a relatively small percent
up what people are actually consuming and the the sort to people that we have
in america
now but specifically let's go to i
we've got what Americans turn to for news so where are they getting their
news
very issue television is still a big percentage 55 percent
people are say that television is where they got the news from
and you can see specifically the box is it eight-percent CNN
at seven percent we had to cut that off MSNBC I'm sorry man but you're a
one-percent there
that is shameful a healthy weight he's got to be higher than that we're
including this poll
other some bias there but Fox is that eight-percent
now we r obviously very worried about what Fox does and the damage than it
does to political discourse in this country but
eight-percent it's talked about as if it's the biggest thing in the world
eight-percent
Phil Robertson beat that every night under dynasty and we need to bear that
in mind
as important as they are as influential as they are Verde percent rush limbaugh
want to get two percent he's on the radio for god sakes
Glenn Beck he loves to talk about a subscriber numbers we know that he is
inflating those numbers
meeting point five percent have him as their primary source of information
so look we should be worried about the fact that they're having we should
continue to try to battle it
it's unfortunate that Media Matters has decided to back off declaring mission
accomplished against Fox News
but let's bear in mind that most people don't consume any possible information
at all
and when they do a lot of them increasingly thankfully are getting it
from the internet
not from Fox News