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A just-out poll from the Pew Research Center finds that the VA scandal continues to be the news story the largest share of Americans are following, with 28 percent of respondents saying they follow the story "very closely." After that are the violence in Iraq (25 percent), the IRS email imbroglio (21 percent), and the World Cup (17 percent).
But the cross-tabs are where things get really interesting. As you'd expect, there are some partisan splits in who's following what. Thirty-three percent of Republicans follow the IRS story very closely, compared to only 16 percent of Democrats; Republicans are also more likely to follow the news out of Iraq and the VA. But, as the Huffington Post's Ariel Edwards-Levy notes, there's no partisan divide on following the World Cup:
Source: Pew Research Center
There are, however, age and racial gaps. While every other news story listed is better-followed by older respondents (especially the VA story, which makes sense), 24 percent of 18-29 year olds follow the World Cup compared to 9 percent of people over 65. And Hispanic respondents were more likely than white or black respondents to say they were following the World Cup; 55 percent of Hispanic respondents said they were following very or fairly closely, compared to 32 percent of white and 33 percent of black respondents.
You can read more in Alec Tyson's blog post at Pew. Confused about what the fuss is all about? Check out Joseph Stromberg's World Cup explainer for non-soccer fans, and then check out the 22 maps that explain the World Cup.