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December 22, 2010 07:07 PM UTC

Misinformation--2010's Biggest Winner

  • 18 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

A fascinating report from the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, that might confirm something you’ve been thinking the whole year:

Following the first election since the Supreme Court has struck down limits on election-related advertising, a new poll finds that 9 in 10 voters said that in the 2010 election they encountered information they believed was misleading or false, with 56% saying this occurred frequently. Fifty-four percent said that it had been more frequent than usual…

Equally significant, the poll found strong evidence that voters were substantially misinformed on many of the key issues of the campaign. Such misinformation was correlated with how people voted and their exposure to various news sources.

Voters’ misinformation included beliefs at odds with the conclusions of government agencies, generally regarded as non-partisan, consisting of professional economists and scientists…

Those who watched Fox News almost daily were significantly more likely than those who never watched it to believe that most economists estimate the stimulus caused job losses (12 points more likely), most economists have estimated the health care law will worsen the deficit (31 points), the economy is getting worse (26 points), most scientists do not agree that climate change is occurring (30 points), the stimulus legislation did not include any tax cuts (14 points), their own income taxes have gone up (14 points), the auto bailout only occurred under Obama (13 points), when TARP came up for a vote most Republicans opposed it (12 points) and that it is not clear that Obama was born in the United States (31 points). The effect was also not simply a function of partisan bias, as people who voted Democratic and watched Fox News were also more likely to have such misinformation than those who did not watch it–though by a lesser margin than those who voted Republican.

According to this report, it wasn’t a phenomenon purely restricted to FOX News and other conservative-leaning outlets: MSNBC and NPR audiences were apparently more likely to believe it had been proven, as opposed to merely suggested, that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce was spending foreign contributions on American elections.

So there’s that. You can stack that up against the finding that only 8% of voters agreed with the CBO estimate of job creation from the stimulus bill, or the 54% of voters who wrongly believe the stimulus contained no tax cuts, or only 10% even being aware that their own taxes went down in 2009, not up. There are the 40% of voters who say Obama bailed out the banks (Bush did), and the 53% who say Obama is the one bailed out the auto industry (Bush did). And no list of 2010 election misinformation would be complete without the 64%–64%–of 2010 Republican voters who told this poll “it is not clear that Obama was born within the United States.”

We’re forced to conclude that such a laundry list of utter falsehoods is a bit worse than not wanting to take the U.S. Chamber’s word for where they get their money.

Once you get past the consolation that Democrats should rightly feel after reading something like this, a devastating indictment of the message underlying GOP successes this year, and exposure of the bulk of the partisan mythos fueling voter angst in 2010 as deeply fraudulent–what do you do about it to ensure that this isn’t repeated? For Democrats who wish to regain the majority in Congress they enjoyed in the last couple of years–ever–there is no more important question.

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18 thoughts on “Misinformation–2010’s Biggest Winner”

  3. How do you get people to believe the nonpartisan, fact-based information and distrust sources who continue to spew inaccuracies?

    The American people are fed so much crap that, at some point, they shut down the critical listening and turn on the passive listening skills.  Eventually some of that crap sinks in to their skulls as “the truth”.

    How do you counter that?

  4. to do what Rupert Murdoch did.  Rupert was willing to sustain years of losses to build his rightie spin empire. Of course one of the accomplishments of that machine has been to paint Soros, among so many others, as a lefty villain Dems should distance themselves from. So first step would be for Dem leadership to grow a pair, stop being intimidated and do whatever it takes to compete on the message front. You don’t see Rs  embarrassed by anything that comes from their right wing and you don’t see them apologizing and denouncing. Why are Dems such weenies?  Even when polls are on their side?

    And, as to that, here’s one that might surprise happy dancing Rs and scaredy cat Ds

    In a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll released Wednesday, 56 percent of Americans said they support how Obama has handled the lame-duck session that’s expected to end this week. Forty-one percent said they disapprove.

    Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle didn’t do as well. Republicans have a 42 percent approval rating for their work during the lame duck, while 44 percent approved of the work by Democrats.

    Conducted Dec. 17-19, the poll surveyed 1,008 adults. The margin of error is 3 percentage points

    http://www.politico.com/news/s…

    In general, the accomplishments of this lame duck congress, especially if they do manage to get both START and help for 9/11 responders passed, kind of makes you wonder:  If Obama and the Dem leadership had been this full court press  into it all along, maybe Dems wouldn’t have lost the House and a big chunk of our majority in the Senate.  

    2. kind of makes you wonder:  If Obama and the Dem leadership had been this full court press  into it all along, maybe Dems wouldn’t have lost the House and a big chunk of our majority in the Senate.  

      Can you go ‘full court press’ for a solid 2 years and survive?  It would be very difficult.

      President Obama is 20+ years younger than Pelosi and Reid and look at how he has aged in 2 years!  Check closeup pictures from the campaign and current closeup pictures.  

      This is what they, the Dems – House, Senate and President got done in less than 2 years!

      http://obamaachievements.org/list

      Give them a break!  They did a lot!

      http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com…

      (Tends to hang up a little for me)

      http://www.vanityfair.com/onli…

      http://www.npr.org/templates/s…

      http://voices.washingtonpost.c…

      Maybe you could give them all a well deserved break for the Holidays?  They have earned it!

      1. After all, if no one knows, then it didn’t happen come election time.

        And when the giant issue on most people’s mind is the depression and unemployment rate, then successes elsewhere tend to be uninteresting.

          1. David is about the most negative person I know of.  He will only agree with you if you are bashing something/someone!

            I don’t think that anyone would disagree that the message has not been good.  President Obama has never been one to brag on himself much.  In fact, he has often said that he doesn’t have any pride of authorship.  Meaning that, if an idea is good, he will take it, regardless of where it came from, or who it came from.

            It is exactly because President Obama doesn’t brag about his accomplishments much and the Dems in Congress and State parties etc, are exceptionally terrible about communicating with the Dems that they represent, let alone get any bragging out into the media and down to others in the voting public, that I think that Dems on sites like this should at least acknowledge the successes, by President Obama and by the Dem congress in the last, almost, two years.

            And in spite of David’s constant refrain “if you aren’t talking about recession or unemployment, then you might as well not talk” attitude, things actually are better than they were in Jan of 2009.  

            However, things may get worse … I am afraid that the people who elected Republicans to congress and state houses and as Governors, are in for a VERY rude surprise at how bad these Republicans can make it for them, and us and our country!

            However, this could be some strong messaging!

            http://voices.washingtonpost.c…

            1. But the full court press I’m mainly concerned with is the one in the messaging department that sets the Rs apart and puts them in charge of what people know for a fact, whether it’s true or not. If people think Obama raised taxes, for instance, and that they paid more in taxes than before what good does it do that that isn’t true? The same goes for all kinds of common knowledge that is wrong, harmful to the Dem agenda but widely accepted.  And whose fault is it that Dems don’t successfully challenge R “marketing”.

              Also don’t worry about poor old Harry.  He was the driving force behind getting much of this passed, not Obama, especially on DADT.

              1. It would seem to me that the messaging should basically be the responsibility of the DNC.  Maybe they did more than I realize but I barely saw Kaine on the Sunday shows or cable.  If he was on Fox I would have missed it and also probably CNN since I no longer have cable & I don’t watch FOX on the internet and CNN is frustrating to try to watch just what you want so I don’t see much of CNN either.

                I would think that the DNC, DSCC, DCCC etc and the White House should all get together & come up with their messaging.  Most Dem organizations seem to think it is a sin to work together, on anything.  Why, I have no idea.

                However, they are up against a pretty vast machine with 90% of radio and FOX.  And none of those ‘message machines’ caring anything about “facts”.

                The Dems always seem relaxed, too relaxed, and end up letting the GOP talking points take hold before they even get out of the gate.  

                I guess I pretty much have the same reaction to your comments as I had to David’s comments.  Complaining but no solutions advanced.

                I think that one of the things that we could do is give our President a little respect.  When we have radio hosts belittling the President or calling him “this guy” or “this fella”  or just Barack or just Obama, sometimes spitting out the words and then spend all of their time ranting and screeching about their differences with the President it is not conducive to those even barely center right to be convinced of those of us on the left being even a little bit correct with the “facts”!  Screeching is screeching whether you are listening to the left side or the right side of the dial.  Some people, like me, change the channel to NPR because the negativity gets to be really old and even depressing.  When ‘pushing’ becomes ranting in the eyes of others, it just gives the far-right lots of excuses to push their misinformation.

                I don’t always agree with the President but he is a Democrat, I am a Democrat and I think that if Democrats don’t show respect for him, even if they disagree some or even most of the time, then they are guilty of doing only negative messaging.  

                If Democrats don’t show respect for a Democratic President, we can’t complain about anyone on the ‘right’ not respecting ‘our’ President.  

                There is already a huge juggernaut of negativity, not only against the President but about Democrats in general but I think we could each fight back a little on that by being respectful to not only each other but also to the President.

                Am I worried about “poor old Harry?”  If so I didn’t realize it.  Harry worked really hard the last couple of years.  Just keeping his temper in hand with all the obstruction from his ‘friend’ Mitch surely was wearing.  And while I know he worked hard on DADT, I don’t think that it could have happened if President Obama had not gained the respect and confidence of both the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chief.  Knowing that they also thought that DADT should be repealed was not enough.  The President knew that they had to do their polling and research for their report in their own time frame.  That time frame also gave the rest of the military time to get used to the idea, and in the end most of them were positive toward the idea.  If ‘poor old Harry’ had brought it to the floor without all of that preparation, it would never have passed.

                We also know that the President was very active with START.  If must have been worrisome for it to languish in the Senate from September to December with R opposition growing with every day even after 18 (I think that is the number) hearings and answering about 1000 questions and having passed out of committee.  (Passed out of committee Sept 16th, http://thecable.foreignpolicy…. )

                I am sure that his National Security staff did most of the question answering but the President would have kept himself well informed of the questions and answers and the status in general.

                “Poor old Harry” deserves a lot of credit for a lot of hard work but not all of the credit!

                We can’t really know how much President Obama does behind the scenes since he isn’t generally a braggart, but I doubt if he gets more than 4 or 5 hours of sleep a night and keeps some of his staff up for most of that time also. He looks relaxed and ‘cool’ most of the time but I suspect that sometimes he is like Michelle described herself once, I believe when getting ready for a State Dinner or something, that she looked cool on the outside but she was like a duck who looks like he is relaxing sitting on the water but in reality he is furiously paddling to keep afloat.

                Ok, this got a little out of hand.  I do that sometimes.  

  5. I signed up for the CDP mailing list several weeks ago.  I did not receive any acknowledgement.  Finally I got an e-mail on Dec 13th from Ms Waak inviting me to a dinner I couldn’t aford to go to.  Since then nothing.  Is this an example of the CDP messsage machine?  Just asking?

    1. It is a hard earned rest following the election. Never fear, the frequency of what you receive will increase though much of it will always be invites to dinner, receptions, etc that most of us can’t afford. I am glad they have these affairs, even though I can’t go, because they are successful in raising $ for our Dem candidates.  

  7. Many times they are not misinforming, it is outright lies.  It is one thing to have a different view of the data, but another to look at it and just make up stuff.

    In other news, the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell has Canada contemplating a full-scale attack in 2011….

  8. from someone heard on 760 am this am. He said that his concern was that those who checked the Obama box in the election thought their work was done.

    Somewhere, they got some misinformation.

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