What’s wrong with this picture?

Math was never my strong suit, but come on! Even I know there’s something outta whack here.

This, folks, is what happens when Fox News compiles figures from a Rasmussen poll. Surely I’ve mentioned what I think of Fox, and I haven’t trusted Rasmussen since the 2008 election cycle, when their polls were so often out of line with the others.

At any rate, this outstanding example of accuracy in reporting appeared on Fox News December 4th during a Gretchen Carlson interview with a global warming skeptic.

According to Media Matters, this is how the how the little snafu came about:

The Rasmussen poll asked respondents: ‘In order to support their own theories and beliefs about global warming, how likely is it that some scientists have falsified research data?’ According to the poll, 35 percent thought it very likely, 24 percent somewhat likely, 21 percent not very likely, and 5 percent not likely at all (15 percent weren’t sure).

Fox News’ graphics department added together the ‘very likely’ and ‘somewhat likely’ numbers to reach 59 percent, and called that new group ‘somewhat likely.’ Then, for some reason, they threw in the 35 percent ‘very likely’ as their own group, even though they already added that number to the ‘somewhat likely’ percentage. Then they mashed together the ‘not very likely’ and ‘not likely at all’ groups, and threw the 15 percent who were unsure into the waste bin. Voila — 120 percent.

This from an organization convinced the East Anglia boys played fast and loose with the numbers in order to prove a point … hmm.