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The thoughts and theories of a guy who basically should have gone to bed hours ago.

I know, I know - what's the point? But look at it this way - I stayed up late writing it, but you're reading it...

Let's call ourselves even & move on, OK?


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Friday, August 18, 2006

More Evidence that 1 in 3 Americans is Completely Clueless


In this post, I marvelled at the fact that 1 in 3 Americans thought our government was somehow involved in the 9/11 attacks and could also not name the year the attacks occurred. And now, here is even more evidence that just about one third of us are off the deep end:


Poll Question% Agree
The government was directly responsible for the assassination of U.S. president John F. Kennedy40%
The government is withholding proof of the existence of intelligent life from others planets38%
The government either assisted in the 9/11 attacks or took no action to stop the attacks because they wanted to United States to go to war in the Middle East36%
The collapse of the twin towers in New York was aided by explosives secretly planted in the two buildings16%
The Pentagon was not struck by an airliner captured by terrorists but instead was hit by a cruise missile fired by the U.S. military16%
Muslims living in the United States are sympathetic to al-Qaeda34%
U.S. Muslims are not loyal to the United States.51%
Muslims in the U.S. should be required to carry special ID39%
Cannot say in what year the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks against New York's World Trade Centre and the Pentagon in Washington took place30%
Approve of the job George W. Bush is doing (8/13/06)36%
Do Not Recommend Sugarless Gum to Their Patients Who Chew Gum20%

So, here's what I suggest: Look around the room. If you see two other people that aren't crazy, well, you know....

posted by Brian at 10:59 AM


4 Comments:

  • I used to work with a guy who was a genuine conspiracy theorist. Former NASA consultant, swore to god that most the storylines on The X Files were gleaned from real events. Lovely guy. I have no point in telling you about him, other than this reminded me of him.

    I think the item that scares me the most on this list is "cannot say in what year the September 11 attacks took place." Um, it wasn't that long ago, people!

    By Anonymous jason, at 11:49 AM, August 18, 2006  


  • Polling is something we covered extensively back in my Former Life As A Communications Grad Student. You gotta be careful about stuff like this -- basically, you can write a poll to get *anyone* to say *anything*, so it's important to check the methodology of the poll being used.

    That being said, yeah, people can be idiots.

    By Anonymous Jeff Porten, at 5:34 PM, August 18, 2006  


  • Agreed, but with this many questions & (what we'd consider "strange" answers), I'm also wondering if there's anything to the theory that roughly 1/3 of people will say "yes" to just about any question.

    Anything like that ever come up at Annenberg?

    By Blogger Brian, at 12:47 AM, August 20, 2006  


  • Jason:
    I think the item that scares me the most on this list is "cannot say in what year the September 11 attacks took place." Um, it wasn't that long ago, people!

    Well, obviously, these folks don't know that, now do they?!? :-(

    By Blogger Brian, at 12:56 AM, August 20, 2006  


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