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About this quote

What does it mean?
Vidal notes that half of Americans neither read newspapers nor vote for president, questioning if these are the same people.
In plain terms
Half of Americans do not read news or vote.
What can you take from it?
Many citizens are disengaged from news and politics.

Where it applies

  • civic education
  • political reform

Putting it to work

  • read news
  • vote
  • engage community

Questions to consider

  • Why do people disengage?
  • How to increase participation?

Another view

It treats non-readers and non-voters as identical groups without evidence.

More from Gore Vidal

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  2. Lonely children often have imaginary playmates but I was never lonely; rather, I was solitary, and wanted no company at all other than books and movies, and my…

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  3. The corporate grip on opinion in the United States is one of the wonders of the Western World. No First World country has ever managed to eliminate so entirely…

    Permalink to quote #26

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