DC Trawler

Most Americans don’t know who Brian Williams is

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The mainstream media is a cesspool of corruption and Democratic Party talking points, but at least nobody’s paying attention.

Rob Suls, Pew Research Center:

In an online survey about Americans’ knowledge about the news conducted last summer, just 27% of the public could correctly identify Brian Williams, anchor of the top-rated NBC Nightly News. Respondents were shown a picture of Williams and asked to name the person in the photo. While 3% were able to identify Williams’ profession (anchor or reporter), fully seven-in-ten either did not know (53%) or named someone other than Williams (18%). (3 percent thought the photo was of former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw and 2% thought it was Vice President Joe Biden.)

Ouch. That last one’s gotta hurt. But then, Williams is prone to some Biden-like behavior:

Poor Brian. All those years of striving, and nobody wants his autograph. But it’s not really his fault. Americans today have so many more choices than they did when network news actually mattered. We get blatant liberal bias pretty much everywhere we look, 24 hours a day. Why sit through a boring half-hour newscast every night for it?

Our moral, ethical, and intellectual betters in the media do it to themselves, and that’s what really hurts:

Update: The best part of this Poynter story is the correction at the end.

Update: Nets give ‘Bridgegate’ 17 times more coverage in 1 day than IRS scandal in 6 months. And yet nobody watches them anymore. What a coincidence.

Tags : treacher
Jim Treacher