World's second dumbest political quiz

The Columbia Journalism Review has a short quiz to test your political knowledge. (If you want to take the quiz, do so now, because spoilers are ahead). Here are the first two questions:

1) In what magazine were the Bush twins recently featured wearing formal gowns?

2) John Kerry wants to increase the minimum wage to what level?

Like I said, there are spoilers ahead.

The odd-numbered questions concern the celebrity side of politics. The even-numbered questions concern the hardcore policy side of politics.

Now, here's my quiz. Besides the celebrity/policy angle, can you spot the difference between these questions and, in fact, between most of the other two sets of questions?

Yes, that's right. The celebrity questions only require you to have seen something once and have made an association. The second set are much more specific. Someone might know that John Kerry wants to raise the minimum wage, but how many people have committed to memory that it's $7/hour?

Likewise, I'd imagine most people know that Bush's No Child Left Behind act requires testing, but few people have memorized that the testing occurs in grades three through eight.

Perhaps we should reconsider our sources for quizzes.

(Via TalkLeft)

Politics · Tue, 08/03/2004 - 16:44 · · Importance: 1