NOT FROM THE ONION. A poll finds ten percent of college graduates think Judge Judy is on the Supreme Court:
Nearly 10% of college graduates surveyed in a poll believe Judith Sheindlin, aka “Judge Judy,” serves on the Supreme Court.
Sheindlin is an American lawyer made popular as the judge on a court show by the name of “Judge Judy.” The show features Sheindlin handling small disputes in a courtroom, but Sheindlin does not serve on the Supreme Court of the United States.
The poll, conducted by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni in August 2015 but released in January 2016, concluded from the 1,000 surveyed that college graduates “are alarmingly ignorant of America’s history and heritage.”
The survey also found 28.4% of college graduates correctly identify the father of the Constitution as James Madison. About 59% of college students surveyed believe the father of the Constitution was Thomas Jefferson, who was actually the principal writer for the Declaration of Independence.
It also found that almost 60% of college graduates couldn’t correctly identify a requirement for ratifying a constitutional amendment and 40% of college graduates didn’t know that Congress has the power to declare war.
I’m sure this 10 percent also knows the name of the first President of the United States: Santa Claus.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.