CONFIDENCE IN TV NEWS DROPS TO ALL-TIME LOW

America’s confidence in television reporting has dropped to an all-time low, according to a new Gallup Poll. While last year 27 percent of adults said they had a great deal of confidence in TV news media, this year only 21 percent said they did. That is less than half of the 46 percent who expressed confidence in TV reporting in 1993. “Americans have grown more negative about the media in recent years, as they have about many other U.S. institutions and the direction of the country in general,” the Gallup survey concluded. Though conservatives often criticize TV news reporting (except for Fox News) as “liberally biased,” the poll indicates that liberals, who also often criticize the quality and bias of TV news, have less confidence in TV media than conservatives — 19 percent versus 22 percent of conservatives. Although the Gallup organization conducted the poll before the CNN and Fox debacle in reporting the Supreme Court healthcare ruling, the organization warned that such a slip-up could drive confidence in TV news down even further. The TV news media, it said, “will have to renew their efforts to show Americans that they deserve a higher level of confidence than what they enjoy today.”