The Newsweek quiz: who was buried in Grant’s tomb?
Lincoln? Princess Diana? Elvis?
It’s a joke of a question, so easy almost no one could miss the answer. And yet some of the sample questions on Newsweek’s citizen quiz were just about as easy, and an astounding number of respondents failed to come up with the correct answer.
Take Question 2, for example, “What happened at the Constitutional Convention?” The answer (drum roll, please): the Founders wrote the Constitution (correct variant: the Constitution was written). Only 35% of respondents got it right. Even guessing should have yielded a much higher correct percentage than that.
More of the quiz’s depressing statistics:
80% did not know who was President during WWI.
73% did not know that the Cold War involved fighting communism.
On the other hand, I’m surprised that as many as 14% knew that there are 435 voting members in the House. I didn’t know the exact number of representatives. And 41% knew John Boehner is Speaker, a level of recognition that surprised me as well. Did Jon Stewart make fun of him or something?
Well, I’m embarrassed…I forgot about fighting Italy in WWII. Did we ever actually engage them in combat? Only films I’ve seen about Italian military at that approximate time was them taking over Ethiopia.
It explains the 52%.
Also Newsweek‘s continued existence, such as it is.
Only a paranoid person would think this level of ignorance is a deliberate policy by Democrats and their teachers’ union allies. Only a paranoid person would think that by keeping the people ill-informed they cement their grip on power.
Because that would mean the Democrats are more interested in power and personal gain than in the welfare of the nation.
And that’s just crazy talk.
I liked it better when most everyone was older and smarter than me. No wonder childhood was so fun.
Texexec-
I don’t know if we fought the Italian military directly, but my Grandfather was in one of those groups that skied all over Italy and SOMEONE tried to sink the boat his patrol was in!
(We only got that much detail because the LT freaked out, and “Sarge” had to take over– his guys liked to tell the story, apparently….)
I “re-learned” during the past two years that the number of Representatives in the House is 435, so I got that one right. However, if someone had asked me that question prior to the Obama/Pelosi Reign of Error, I would not have answered it correctly.
I missed the question asking how many amendments there are to the Constitution. I knew it was in the mid 20-something area. I “guessed” 26. The answer is 27.
I also missed the question asking what our primary “concern” was during the Cold War. My response was preventing nuclear war with the Soviet Union. The correct answer is “communism”. Had the question been phrased differently, such as “what political or economic system were we most concerned with during the Cold War?”, then of course I would have answered “communism”. So, either my mind did a poor job of processing the question or the question was poorly framed. Probably a bit of both.
Embarrassingly, I missed Susan B. Anthony.
It’s what we call a brain fart. I did learn about her sometime in grade school, but after that she just flew off of my radar. Even when I saw the answer – she “advanced women’s rights”, or something to that effect – I still couldn’t recall exactly what she did.
Honestly, some of the questions were so obvious that one would be liable to get them wrong because they seem like trick questions. Steve mentioned getting the Cold War questions wrong, which I might have as well had I not seen neo’s post first.
But anyway, I thought my missing the Anthony question might be a small data point on the difference between early civics education today and in the past. Or maybe not. Sometimes we just have blind patches where knowledge should be.
Wait, wait… I haven’t cheated…. but I’m starting to remember something about a quilt? Did Anthony sew something?
I forgot about fighting Italy in WWII. Did we ever actually engage them in combat?
Yes, in North Africa, and in Sicily. By the time the Allies invade Italy, the Italian government had signed a cease fire with the Allies and deposed Mussolini. It is unknown to me during that time of confusion if Allied forces where engaged with Italian units or not.
Also, at the beginning of US involvement in North Africa, the British troops called the inexperienced Americans our Italians.
The Italian army in North Africa didn’t acquit itself very well, which is why Hitler sent Rommel and Afrika Korps to save his erstwhile ally’s butt.
But the Americans learned and got better.
Makes you wonder how many people never get aired on Cash Cab because they’re three strikes and out before they get their seat belts on good. Any more Cash Cab fans here?
History is a terrible thing to waste. Civics likewise. The bell curve rules, 50% will always be on the left and not much can be done to educate them beyond a 6th or perhaps 8th grade level. (This doesn’t mean they are worthless or have no place in society, far from it.) Instead, IMO, this means it is important to educate those on the right side of the bell curve about the history of our nation and civilization at large, and drill into their heads the criteria of the system of governance we are SUPPOSED to live under. (Supposed is in all caps because we no longer adhere to the concept of a republic.)
BTW, the quiz is poorly worded, but I still scored 100%. Now can I fly around in AF1?
I’d love to just blame teachers’ unions and the systematic destruction of quality public school but I suspect our ‘elites’, who’ve gone primarily to private academies, probably know as little. I have no studies to prove it but its a feeling based on their utterances, both Democrat and RINO Republicans. Not everyone is as knowledgeable about history as Allen West seems to be. All the history I know comes primarily from my own reading and extracurricular studies.
As I R A notes, we were slow learners in NA but then we got the ball rolling in Sicily and gradually our soldiers turned into a fearsome fighting machine. Look up the Anzio landing and the subsequent campaigns as our forces fought in the rugged Italian topography to drive the Germans out of the peninsula.
Pop quiz: The forces of which nation first fired upon US troops in the Africa/European theatre during WW2?
I got both the Cold war question, and the WWI president wrong. In the case of the latter, I didn’t know. But the question about the Cold war is:During the Cold War, what was the main concern of the United States? I answered Nuclear Weapons. I missed several not because I didn’t understand the history, but because the wording of the questions was a bit weird. I also would have missed the Susan B. Anthony question. It reads:What did Susan B. Anthony do? I knew that she had something to do with women’s rights in the early 1900’s, but I had no idea what she “did”.
T
The Italian army in North Africa didn’t acquit itself very well, which is why Hitler sent Rommel and Afrika Korps to save his erstwhile ally’s butt.
Most of the troops under Rommel’s command were in fact Italians, not Germans, IIRC.
Where is the quiz? All I saw were questions followed by comments.
Scott asked: “…The forces of which nation first fired upon US troops in the Africa/European theatre during WW2?”
The answer to that one, believe it or not, is France.
The Vichy French regime still controlled that part of western North Africa. There were ongoing negotiations, but the Vichy regime kept foot-dragging in order to try and keep the Germans from occupying the Vichy territories of southern France.
The first shots, by the way, were exchanged by the US battleship USS Massachusetts and the French battleship Jean Bart. Jean Bart was inside the port of Oran at the time and was sunk with much loss of life.
It’s true that the very first encounters with the Germans in North Africa didn’t go so well for the Americans, but as others have said, we learned and became one of the most formidable fighting machines the world has ever known.
But for those who think the USA were the allied “Italians”, consider this: The invasion of North Africa was staged from…
Norfolk Virginia
Does anyone think the Italians – or Germans, for that matter – could have done that in 1942?
The painfully low percentage (12% when I took it) that didn’t know even *one author* of the Federalist Papers is actually the most telling question in there. Well that, and “name one federal power” — which I was tempted to answer: how about name a power they *don’t* have?
Er, that’s the percentage that *did* know … it’s late here.
Roy,
I asked the question, but you do have the correct answer: Vichy France.
The shenanigans we & the British went through (which at first failed) to prevent the Vichy French from resisting Operation Torch were, in hindsight, amusing except for the loss of life.
“… we learned and became one of the most formidable fighting machines the world has ever known.”
Americans are reluctant to fight, but once we commit ourselves to the fray everyone else had better watch out.
When is revolution justified?
Consider the following bozo:
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/03/22/former-seiu-official-demanded-action-to-destabilize-banking-system-overthrow-capital/
Now consider Abraham Lincoln:
We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.
Don’t interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.
Let us then turn this government back into the channel in which the framers of the Constitution originally placed it.
–July 10, 1858 Speech at Chicago
Don’t interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties. And not to Democrats alone do I make this appeal, but to all who love these great and true principles.
–August 27, 1856 Speech at Kalamazoo, Michigan
I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence.
–February 22, 1861 Address in Independence Hall
That I am not a member of any Christian Church, is true; but I have never denied the truth of the Scriptures; and I have never spoken with intentional disrespect of religion in general, or any denomination of Christians in particular.
–July 31, 1846 Handbill Replying to Charges of Infidelity
Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable – a most sacred right – a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world.
America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.
Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another, but let him work diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built.
A silly riddle that everyone gets wrong.
Q: Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb
A: Nobody
Since you’re a New Yorker, I expect that you already know this, Neo, but that riddle is totally misunderstood by so many people these days that they lost sight of the actual joke.
Or did you know the answer? 😉
“A silly riddle that everyone gets wrong.
Q: Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb
A: Nobody”
You don’t have to be a New Yorker to get that one. It’s easy.
Nobody is buried in Grant’s Tomb because Ulysses and Julia Grant lie in sarcophagi – above ground level.
“Who is buried in Grant’s tomb?”
I’ll go with the classic:
Your mom.
You might like the Civic Literacy Test from 2008. Fast to take & fun to compare.
http://www.isi.org/quiz.aspx?q=FE5C3B47-9675-41E0-9CF3-072BB31E2692
nolanimrod,
Took the test, scored 90.91%. Can I now fly on AF1?
Took the test, scored 90.91%. Can I now fly on AF1?
No. Your score is too high.
I do wonder about how accurate the percentage for the communism question. If 73% got it wrong, I’m guessing people that answered the Soviet Union, like myself, would be part of that 73%. Given the wording of the question, it seems like there are more valid answers than just communism.
I R A Darth Aggie Says:
“… But the Americans learned and got better.”
Yes they did. So much so that many German soldiers stated after the fact, they preferred facing anyone else on the battlefield (including the Russians). I read one account stating that, while the French, English and Russians attacked either singing, shouting, or screaming. The Americans always attacked in total silence. It unnerved the Germans more than anything else.
The Italians did better under Gen. Messe (who in fact led the Axis Army in North Africa after Rommel, and caused some embarrassing setbacks to the British) – but considering the equipment they had to work with, the fact that their “allies” the Germans treated them with contempt (stealing supplies, not notifying them of withdrawals, etc.), their constant supply problems, and a completely dysfunctional upper echelon, they did fairly well.
Wow..
almost everyone turned this back to themselves rather than consider the implcations of 70 percent voting for communism because they dont know it.
or that these are the people who would treat you when sick… or make policy… or strategize war and defend us.
wake up…
i knew this way way way before, which is why i said what the outcome woudl be, and no one, cared to accept the implication that a population too dumb to function, cant function. to be made whole or seemingly so the population of parasites needs to be told what to do.
and yet… we only care we were stand on the test..
the end is a fait accompli if such doesn’t even cause the dissonance necessary to perceive the looming threat…
we have a technologically advanced military in which the common man cant function. this means in any war, the result is a dumber population who stay home and dont get exterminated as cannon fodder as i the past. where did german competency and all that go? it was murdered on the feild of battle as we send our competency out to do the work, and when they lose, we lose that genetic legacy. so apply that knowlege as a outcome and you have a nice way to accelerate social engineering ends periodically.
the idea that one can beat a con artist is almost global, and yet, the only ones i see beat them, and not get caught are not the ones with the idea that they cant get caught. ie… as the president of intel pointed out “only the paranoid survive”…
I’m rather disappointed that no one knew about Susan B. Anthony’s campaign to substitute coins for dollar bills. She wanted to save environment by reducing our use of paper.
expat: I played Susan B. Anthony in a fifth-grade play. It wasn’t even really a play; I just had to stand up in front of the assembly in some sort of old-fashioned skirt and describe what I (Susan B. Anthony) did.