Folks as obsessed with media personalities as us were surprised to see the three supposedly brainiac contestants on last night's Jeopardy! stumped when asked who Rachel Maddow was, while correctly answering a question about George Stephanopoulos. The category was "A Real Rhodes Scholar" (a strange foreshadowing to this story today, isn't it?) and featured both Maddow and Stephanopoulos, each recipients of the Oxford scholarship.
For $1,600, Alex Trebek's question (or we mean answer) was "This cable TV newswoman received a doctorate in politics from Oxford" with an image of the MSNBC host. None of the contestants attempted to provide the question. One explanation may be that there's little overlap between Jeopardy!'s and MSNBC's demographics. According to Quantcast, Jeopardy!'s audience skews much older than Maddow's.
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