Who do you trust?
I found this Harris Interactive Poll online about which sources Americans trust for news and I found it intriguing. Specifically, Democrats trust the news more than Republicans. Here’s an excerpt (bold mine):
ROCHESTER, N.Y.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–During this political primary season, the media, especially cable news networks, have seen a large increase in viewers, listeners and/or readers. But, with all this do people actually trust the media? The answer is not really. Looking at the press in general, over half (54%) of Americans say they tend not to trust them, with only 30 percent tending to trust the press. Just under half (46%) of Americans say they do not trust television, while one-third (36%) do trust them. Somewhat surprisingly, Internet news and information sites do slightly better as a plurality of Americans (41%) trust them while just one-third (34%) tend not to trust them. And, radio tends to do best among Americans as 44 percent say they tend to trust it and one-third (32%) tend not to trust radio.
These are some of the results of a nationwide Harris Poll of 2,302 U.S. adults surveyed online between January 15 and 22, 2008 by Harris Interactive®.
Partisan Attitudes towards the Media
Overall, Democrats are more likely to trust the media than Republicans, even with regard to radio. Just over half of Democrats (51%) trust radio compared to 45 percent of Republicans, and 45 percent of Democrats tend to trust Internet news and information sites compared to 40 percent of Republicans.
Why is this? Could it be because Democrats are more likely to be creating the blogs to begin with? Or are we just more trusting by nature? Could it be that the Internet is more likely to be truthful (see Exile’s post below) and the truth hurts Republicans? Nah, that couldn’t be it. Maggie Brooks and pals love it when we ask for details, the truth, that sort of thing, right?
The more open government is, the more truthful it is. Democrats want open government so therefore we are more trusting of the Internet-based news, since it is less filtered.
Just my take.
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