With the caveats that its’ an “Axios Vibes Survey by The Harris Poll,” combining two of the leading brands in political media douchebaggery, the finding by the survey asking Americans what they see as the top sources of mis- and disinformation nowadays is still pretty interesting, as 51 percent of respondents listed “Politicians spreading misinformation” as the most concerning origin.
Tied for second place on the non-exclusive multi-choice list were “Social media companies failing to stop misinformation” and “AI being used to deceive people” at 35 percent. A close third at 34 percent was “Media personalities spreading revisionist history.” Surprisingly “Foreign governments spreading misinformation” ranked only fifth at 30 percent. Not sure what that says about Americans after almost a decade of Russian propaganda ops on the internet. Maybe it’s just a given at this point and that the finding reflects a recognition of domestic bullshit as more salient.
Harris Poll CEO John Gerzema seems to see it that way. “It’s like, ‘The call is coming from inside the house. In past elections, there was always fear of misinformation and election interference coming from abroad. But here we see the most likely source of concern is America’s own politicians spreading misinformation. It used to be, we were worried about China or Russia, fake ads or Facebook. Now, no, it’s coming from the campaigns,” said Gerzema. Of course he didn’t single out any particular political campaign that might be a little more reliant on falsehoods than others.
On another finding, Axios writes “In one noteworthy partisan difference, however, Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to dismiss information that conflicts with their own views if it comes from a source they don’t know,” as if that’s somehow surprising or that it actually matters whether or not it’s from a source “they don’t know.” Try taking a look at the Fox News comments under the article on their own poll showing Kamala Harris up 2 percent over Trump.