tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61613682431891082272012-03-08T12:22:52.797-08:00The best evidences showing PolitiFact's liberal slant.Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.comBlogger1591100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-9011705947633130592012-03-08T06:00:00.000-08:002012-03-08T12:22:52.809-08:00

Via an Emily's List email from Political Director Jonathan Parker: Remember last week when right-wing Senator Roy Blunt's amendment would have given employers power over medical decisions from birth control to vaccinations? Hmmm.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-88803093201014009782012-03-07T07:00:00.000-08:002012-03-07T09:21:13.563-08:00

We have another NTSH item concerning Sandra Fluke straight from PolitiFact's new "In Context" feature: "Forty percent of the female students at Georgetown Law reported to us that they've struggled financially as a result of this policy. "One told us of how embarrassed and just powerless she felt when she was standing at the pharmacy counter and learned for the first time that

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-3174840507759071242012-03-07T06:00:00.000-08:002012-03-07T09:21:42.971-08:00

This NTSH item come to us straight from PolitiFact's "In Context" feature.  So this one coming from newly famous Sandra Fluke is a layup for PolitiFact: "Without insurance coverage, contraception, as you know, can cost a woman over $3,000 during law school."

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-24994332246520656552012-03-05T12:40:00.001-08:002012-03-06T10:00:37.073-08:00

This invisible unmentionable comes from Timothy B. Carney of the Washington Examiner: While PolitiFact and the Washington Post Factchecker blog basically ignored the string of “they’re trying to ban contraception !!!11!!!” lies from Democrats for weeks, last Friday, the Post noted Schumer’s boatload of deception. Here’s one of his gems: This whole debate is an anachronism. Our country

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-36938795561462588702012-03-05T12:18:00.000-08:002012-03-06T09:41:10.277-08:00

To provide some contrast to the selection process PolitiFact uses to choose its subject matter, PFB introduces a new feature:  Nothing To See Here. Posts in this series will feature claims a non-liberal might find interesting enough to fact check.  While we won't be surprised if PolitiFact checks some or perhaps even many of the issues we highlight, we still anticipate a pattern of ignored

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-39524617912274558622012-03-03T17:00:00.001-08:002012-03-05T00:09:58.525-08:00

Eric Zorn of the Chicago Tribune produced an excellent column criticizing PolitiFact's (and the Washington Post's) approach to fact checking. Perhaps its biggest flaw comes from the fact that Zorn is so late to the party, like so many other critics from the ranks of mainstream journalists and the political left.  The pair of quotations near the end of his column cap it off nicely: "I've never

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-28805721361362515152012-03-01T00:45:00.001-08:002012-03-03T01:12:54.678-08:00

 Crossposted from Sublime Bloviations You have to love PolitiFact's fact-challenged statements about itself. Now: We’ve consistently ruled in the past that the economy is too complex to assign full blame (or credit) for job gains or losses to a president or a governor. Then: Our ruling Pelosi compared a select time frame in the Obama administration against the entire length of the Bush

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-37897387720534534852012-02-29T14:00:00.001-08:002012-02-29T20:42:10.266-08:00

Better late than never, we take note of Cato's Michael F. Cannon's take on PolitiFact's 2011 "Lie of the Year":  The annual unveiling of its “Lie of the Year” award garners PolitiFact more attention than anything else. Hopefully, it will garner so much attention that people will recognize this award, which is supposed to improve political discourse, instead degrades it. PolitiFact’s past

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-37346840019524907182012-02-28T02:30:00.001-08:002012-02-29T20:41:16.843-08:00

Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and  President Barack Obama had something in common last week, and Jeff Dyberg noticed. Both made statements about majorities that were graded "Mostly True" by the fact checkers at PolitiFact.  The justifications PolitiFact used for the rulings was similar.  PolitiFact cited poll data showing that pluralities rather than majorities obtained, and ruled favorably based

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-84921865260646943412012-02-22T06:30:00.000-08:002012-02-23T13:39:31.848-08:00

Columbia Journalism Review has posted online an interview with the editor of PolitiFact Ohio, Robert Higgs. Though it was tempting to quote the positive, where Higgs expressed reservations about labeling a subject as a "liar," the winner for the PFB spotlight was this cringe-worthy response by Higgs: What is your audience like? Do you have any sense of how it compares to the audience for the

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-42075754531357989062012-02-21T14:30:00.000-08:002012-02-21T21:55:20.731-08:00

Politico's media guy Dylan Byers hits and misses with his "PolitiFact without the 'Truth-O-Meter'" column. First the miss, occurring in Byers' set up based on last week's dust-up between PolitiFact and Rachel Maddow over a rating of Florida senator Marco Rubio: PolitiFact, the Tampa Bay Times fact-checking project, has come under fire this week for a ruling that seems to contradict common

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-84989357711775421602012-02-21T06:30:00.000-08:002012-02-21T20:06:30.319-08:00

Uh-oh!  Liberals are once again scandalized by a PolitiFact fact check! MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell appeared in the following political ad: PolitiFact looked into O'Donnell's claim about critics calling the GI Bill "welfare" and ruled it "Mostly False."   The fact check does have some problems. PolitiFact went easy on O'Donnell The fact check contains a huge error.  PolitiFact overlooks the

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-64952162276292910842012-02-20T06:30:00.000-08:002012-02-21T20:05:13.007-08:00

Mark Hemingway of the Weekly Standard has earned himself the reputation as perhaps PolitiFact's top critic.  As evidence of that, Hemingway beat me to the "late to the party" theme by about a month after the progressive outrage over PolitiFact's "Lie of the Year" selection for 2011. I'm sorry I missed his article before now. Hemingway: So the liberal punditry woke up today to find that

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-10331493739228686952012-02-20T06:00:00.000-08:002012-02-21T20:03:40.998-08:00

Thanks to the Charleston Daily Mail and columnist Don Surber, a little reminder that PolitiFact's "Lie of the Year selection for 2011 isn't the first to receive well-grounded criticism: The liberal apologists at the Tampa Bay Times’ PolitiFact have denied for more than 2 years that Obamacare has death panels. How it could assure us in 2009 of just what was in a law that was not finalized until

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-61949925135838262622012-02-19T08:00:00.000-08:002012-02-19T18:46:38.259-08:00

A bit of optional background, first. Keeping up appearances at PolitiFact PolitiFlub: Mike Pence/Medicare/How deep the memory hole? (Updated x3) PolitiFact's Ucci correction/update Probing PolitiFact's mostly useless corrections policy (Updated x3) On Feb. 7 of this year, PolitiFact announced the addition of a corrections page. It's about time, better late than never,

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-82826279667320215622012-02-17T21:28:00.000-08:002012-02-18T21:03:44.583-08:00

Yesterday PolitiFact rolled out a CYA article in response to the blowback to the oft-floated claim that 98 percent of all Catholic women use contraception.  PolitiFact rated that claim from an Obama administration official on Feb. 6, finding it "Mostly True."  PolitiFact's treatment of the issue provided little evidence of earnest journalistic curiosity and left its readers with no real means of

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-53995737779704447712012-02-15T16:30:00.000-08:002012-02-21T08:41:17.868-08:00

We agree with Rachel Maddow up through about the 55 second mark.  Yes, PolitiFact is bad, and PolitiFact is so bad at fact checking that it doesn't deserve frequent citations as a trustworthy source.  After that, our level of agreement starts to drop. Sen. Rubio (R-Fla.) stated that most Americans are conservative and went on to argue the point based on attitudes toward the labels "

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-2614748887624069672012-02-15T12:49:00.000-08:002012-02-17T21:43:16.351-08:00

Jeff and I hugely appreciate bloggers who delve into the more complicated PolitiFact-related issues. Lydia McGrew of the "What's Wrong With the World" blog gives a proper dressing-down to the Obama administration, the Guttmacher Institute and our beloved PolitiFact over the supposedly "Mostly True" claim that 98 percent of Catholic women use birth control. As is our wont, we'll focus primarily

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-31341137444324035512012-02-13T12:30:00.000-08:002012-02-15T22:26:00.418-08:00

Don Surber notices the same connection between the actions of the Obama administration and PolitiFact's 2010 "Lie of the Year" that I pointed out last week.  We highlight it here at PolitiFact Bias because Surber makes the criticism of PolitiFact so effectively and directly: On December 17, 2010, as part of its continuous support and defense of Obamacare, PolitiFact boldly declared as its Lie

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-69584818514862574732012-02-13T09:00:00.000-08:002012-02-13T22:30:17.399-08:00

National Review's Reihan Salam amplifies (December 2011) the criticism of PolitiFact by Mark Hemingway and published in the Weekly Standard from the same month: I’ve often noticed that the “fact-checkers” in question are often obtuse, misleading, or both, and Hemingway makes the case in systematic fashion.Salam quotes Hemingway's article extensively and adds his hearty agreement to Hemingway's

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-67732962486752567682012-02-13T06:00:00.000-08:002012-02-13T06:00:02.550-08:00

If, in "What the Fact-Checkers Get Wrong" the Columbia Journalism Review only mentions the tip of the iceberg, we can at least take solace in the fact that this PolitiFact-related story is a step up from at least one previous effort. Sure, the new item hints at liberal bias in that the piece appears to take for granted that only one of PolitiFact's last three "Lie of the Year" awards went to a

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-6608549920243310082012-02-10T01:26:00.000-08:002012-02-15T22:26:33.477-08:00

We're way overdue recognizing Don Surber's ongoing commentary regarding PolitiFact, but his "PolitiFact Fisked" is as good a start as any: There is an old saying in the newspaper trade that if you are taking it from both sides, you must be doing something right. The reality is that you definitely are doing something wrong and in the case of PolitiFact, editor Bill Adair and company are doing

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-66252749929813854952012-02-10T00:44:00.000-08:002012-02-13T22:28:56.354-08:00

The Weekly Standard has some subscriber-only content criticizing PolitiFact Oregon. Fortunately there's a preview: PolitiFact Oregon—which works in partnership with the state’s most influential media outlet, the -Oregonian—has been trying and failing to play referee in the race by evaluating the candidates’ statements. First, PolitiFact gave Cornilles its “Pants on Fire” rating for an ad

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-38065192282433226322012-02-09T09:56:00.000-08:002012-02-13T22:27:46.324-08:00

Power Line blog directs us to free online content from the Claremont Review of Books.  CRB reviewer James Q. Wilson reviews Tim Groseclose's "Left Turn:  How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind" and its place in media bias studies. We're following Power Line's lead by not including any excerpted material.  Go.  Read.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-27719522215532542912012-02-07T21:28:00.000-08:002012-02-07T21:28:31.257-08:00

Matthew Hoy is back at it with his usual biting commentary on PolitiFact. This time he shares his thoughts on the current debate about the effect of PPACA mandates on institutions of the Roman Catholic Church. Hoy deals broadly with the controversy, but we'll highlight his mention of PolitiFact. At issue is PolitiFact's treatment of Newt Gingrich's statement that the PPACA requires religious

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-44017670950364253052012-01-31T21:30:00.000-08:002012-02-01T19:54:38.302-08:00

Crossposted from Bewz, Newz, 'n' Vewz. "I've given you a decision to make, Things to lose, things to take, Just as she's about ready to cut it up, She says:   "Wait a minute, honey, I'm gonna add it up."-Violent Femmes One of the more common methods of using PolitiFact's findings is to add up total ratings and form a conclusion based on the data. In its simplest form, this is when someone looks

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-62405424663638772972012-01-31T01:00:00.000-08:002012-01-31T20:10:25.052-08:00

Does the truth have a shelf-life? Jeffrey H. Anderson, writing at the Weekly Standard, takes the fact-finding DeLorean all the way back to 2007 to highlight PolitiFact's conflicting ratings on RomneyCare's coverage of abortions. Before you read Anderson's article, check out the graphics for the remarkably dissimilar PolitiFact articles: In 2007, PolitiFact says RomneyCare covers abortions:

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-27987300406280436522012-01-29T22:16:00.000-08:002012-01-29T22:16:12.663-08:00

Unfortunately it remains far easier to locate poor criticism of PolitiFact than it is to locate good criticism. First up for PFB Smackdown, "Hunter" from the Daily Kos. Hunter thinks that PolitiFact blew its rating of Mitt Romney's claim that he never voted for a Democrat if a Republican was on the ballot. Hunter: (P)eople had a wee bit of a problem with this, because the context was Romney's

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-11589009840771777582012-01-27T12:59:00.000-08:002012-01-31T22:10:03.303-08:00

Micah Cohen, in a piece appearing at Nate Silver's portion of the New York Times, provides an excellent example for PolitiFact to follow in presenting its candidate report cards. Cohen's summary of PolitiFact data on the Republican field of candidates very prominently featured the following (from a post Cohen wrote back in September of 2011): PolitiFact only looks at statements that pique its

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-78796755951010090772012-01-27T00:33:00.000-08:002012-01-27T00:59:35.724-08:00

As expected, PolitiFact's 2011 "Lie of the Year" selection did a good bit of damage to PolitiFact's reputation on the left.  President Obama's 2012 State of the Union speech produced a claim that again has some liberals crying foul.  The Daily Kos and the Huffington Post both published entries condemning PolitiFact's "Half True" ruling on Obama's claim that the private sector jobs increased by 3

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-8283918145471631322012-01-25T00:08:00.000-08:002012-01-26T23:10:06.629-08:00

 Crossposted from Sublime Bloviations. This. just. doesn't. look. very. easy. to. reconcile: (link to story at PolitiFact.com) That's President Obama from yesterday's State of the Union Address. (clipped from PolitiFact.com) The latter rating came from PolitiFact Virginia almost a full year ago. On the face of it, one can imagine a reconciliation of the two rulings.  But it's

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-16079677149848050542012-01-22T00:34:00.000-08:002012-01-29T15:59:40.221-08:00

We've noted before, along with Eric Ostermeier, that PolitiFact's self-described methods of choosing stories amount to a recipe for selection bias.  The Parker Report recently published an interview with PolitiFact editor Bill Adair that describes more of the same: How do you decide which reporters take on which claims? How many people check PolitiFact’s facts before publishing? In other words,

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-23079004218136955512012-01-21T14:25:00.000-08:002012-01-21T14:25:56.930-08:00

Big thanks to Right Wing News and Ace of Spades for the links this week. John Hawkins provided a link to us on his site Right Wing News, and Ace Re-Tweeted a mention from one Wayne Austin. Highlighting the bias and flawed standards at PolitiFact hasn't always been as popular as it is now. When we started PFB we did so in order to offer readers a collection point of disconnected and hard to

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-13690905781880239032012-01-21T11:15:00.000-08:002012-01-23T10:48:07.315-08:00

PolitiFact doesn't just entertain with its incompetent and unfair fact check stories.  It also entertains with its response to criticism.  The most popular response of all is the "turtle."  Just don't respond and wait for the criticism to die off. The second method involves acknowledging the criticism, followed by ignoring it as though it makes no difference. PolitiFact editor Bill Adair uses

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-86459547439556712052012-01-21T02:12:00.000-08:002012-01-22T11:01:25.999-08:00

Another PolitiFact-cited expert has joined Tom Bruscino in dumping on PolitiFact over a recent fact check on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. This time it's Ted R. Bromund, writing in Commentary magazine.  Like Bruscino, Bromund pans PolitiFact for using leading questions and for issuing a ruling with which he cannot agree.  But Bromund goes further in noting that PolitiFact

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-30074418612029058752012-01-19T12:43:00.000-08:002012-01-19T23:59:32.216-08:00

I'm a regular reader of Ira Stoll's Future of Capitalism, though it's not where I typically troll for PolitiFact rebukes. So I was surprised last week to catch a brief mention of our factastic friends in the otherwise non-PolitiFact related piece. At issue is the announcement that the Obama administration seeks to reduce the number of armed services personnel by 490,000 troops over the next

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-23052990848756415702012-01-19T12:37:00.000-08:002012-02-11T01:09:13.867-08:00

Blogger and PolitiFact-cited expert Tom Bruscino supplies a partial insider's look at the PolitiFact process along with a critique of the finished work of which he was a part in his post "A PolitiFact Example." PolitiFact writer Louis Jacobson asked Bruscino for his assessment of Mitt Romney's claim that the U.S. Navy is at its smallest since 1947. Bruscino found Jacobson's questions leading:

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-55344511189295313302012-01-12T10:44:00.000-08:002012-01-18T22:57:37.389-08:00

Patrick Laverty and the Anchor Rising blog give us yet another quality criticism of PolitiFact. PolitiFact just makes it way too easy. Ok sure, the funding level was "close". It was in the 90s and it was more than the previous administration. However, as Politifact themselves often say, that isn't what Cicilline said. He said it was at 100% all but two years. It was there for all but six years.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-83107238985913073532012-01-11T23:05:00.000-08:002012-03-05T00:23:19.012-08:00

Mark Hemingway, who wrote a key critique of modern fact-checking operations back in December, appeared with the Washington Post's fact checker, Glenn Kessler, for a radio interview on NPR.  It's worth either listening to it or reading the transcript, but one particular section deserves special attention: CONAN: Here's an email from Noreen(ph). I don't understand that the - that since - excuse

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-80410058424302672402012-01-04T01:17:00.000-08:002012-01-05T18:50:26.859-08:00

The Wall Street Journal once again weighs in on PolitiFact following its "Lie of the Year" selection. This cycle, James Taranto hits PolitiFact for its wrongheaded approach to fact checking: We're not as troubled as Ponnuru is by the effect of PolitiFact, and the "fact checking" genre it exemplifies, on politics. We'd argue instead that it has a baneful effect on journalism.Taranto's complaint

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-18670006676013831702012-01-01T23:10:00.000-08:002012-01-05T18:49:25.860-08:00

Crossposted from Sublime Bloviations. PolitiFact Bias has now spent approximately a full year highlighting criticisms of the PolitiFact fact checking brand. Our hopes that PolitiFact would improve its performance in light of outside criticism have gone largely unfulfilled.  Perhaps the biggest improvement was the reconciliation of two differing definitions of the "Half True" rating, but that

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com58tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-78355299398279019622011-12-25T00:12:00.000-08:002011-12-31T20:19:09.151-08:00

The Weekly Standard has a follow up to Mark Hemingway's story earlier this month focusing on the foibles of fact checking (link to our review). The update, under the title "Damned Lies and 'Fact Checking' (cont.)," is mostly subscriber-only content, though the whole of it is available for preview at present on the Standard's "The Scrapbook" main page.  Without giving too much away, this nugget

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-86190348825488806282011-12-25T00:00:00.000-08:002012-01-27T17:00:24.091-08:00

PolitiFact's recent spat with its liberal readership base has led to the publication of quite a few stories that echo criticisms recurrent in the posts we publish and link at PolitiFact Bias. Slate's Dave Weigel, famously/formerly of the Journolist, has another such: After this week, plenty of pundits are well and done with the national version of PolitiFact. The local versions? They're great. I

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-55301205179130805062011-12-24T06:30:00.000-08:002011-12-24T09:51:40.007-08:00

After a focused effort to publish my own response to Bill Adair's thin defense of PolitiFact's choice for its "Lie of the Year," I ran across a similar item in Forbes by John McQuaid. McQuaid and I found two key areas of agreement. First, the response story from PolitiFact editor Bill Adair was born of conceit: The whole PolitiFact ruckus has the feel of traditional newspaper journalism (

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-77661229131190765752011-12-24T06:00:00.000-08:002012-01-27T17:06:04.732-08:00

PolitiFact editor Bill Adair served up some delicious irony with his recent defense of PolitiFact's 2011 "Lie of the Year" selection. That selection was Democrats' claim that Republicans voted to end Medicare.  Liberals and progressives far and wide have condemned the selection, and we at PolitiFact Bias share a degree of sympathy with offended liberals since there is some (not much) truth in

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-20938462345504896872011-12-24T05:30:00.000-08:002012-01-27T16:59:10.123-08:00

That massive popping sound you heard on Tuesday was the collective hearts and minds of liberals across America bursting as they witnessed their favorite source of smug validation betray them. PolitiFact editors played their pre-selected card and announced the Democrats' claim that Republicans voted to "end Medicare" as the Lie of the Year for 2011. What could go wrong? The wrath unleashed on

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-10474677281040517072011-12-21T02:24:00.000-08:002011-12-23T15:49:44.070-08:00

I wonder whether this award will have those conservatives blasting politically-motivated “fact check” operations rethinking that criticism? --Ed Morrissey, Hot Air blogFact check critics who base their criticism on a completely consistent pattern of wronging only one party or ideological position should take Morrissey's argument to heart. As I have written repeatedly, a significant ideological

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-286150133427010112011-12-16T11:30:00.000-08:002011-12-23T15:50:08.303-08:00

Jeff and I continually run across cases where PolitiFact applies its standards unevenly, contradicts them or simply ignores them.  But simply mentioning it on a case by case basis doesn't quite carry the impact to the reader as we might hope.  After all, most readers don't happen to look at every case we mention. To help communicate the degree to which PolitiFact fails to keep to its principles

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-29350528962201989872011-12-16T10:30:00.000-08:002011-12-24T09:50:51.257-08:00

It's gratifying to see journalists and pundits piling on PolitiFact for all the reasons PFB preaches.  The latest to jump on is Forbes magazine with a story by John McQuaid titled "How to Fix Fact-Checking." McQuaid uses the recent Weekly Standard story by Mark Hemingway as his jumping-off point: The Weekly Standard deplores fact-checking – the journalistic efforts, by PolitiFact and others, to

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-68517572126209012602011-12-14T23:54:00.000-08:002011-12-16T07:21:34.100-08:00

We were slow to notice a fresh PolitiFact item by Ed Walker at his blog "Engineering Thinking" from October. Walker swiftly skewers PolitiFact's treatment of a Herman Cain claim about his 9-9-9 tax plan: 1. The first major problem with PolitiFact’s analysis is that it was not shown to be objective. PolitiFact selected three tax accountants to provide an opinion, but since Cain’s 9-9-9 plan —

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-83409206602836332632011-12-11T22:02:00.001-08:002012-01-29T16:01:02.588-08:00

The Weekly Standard and Mark Hemingway add yet another effective critique of PolitiFact to the growing set: They call themselves “fact checkers,” and with the name comes a veneer of objectivity doubling as a license to go after any remark by a public figure they find disagreeable for any reason. Just look at the Associated Press to understand how the scheme works.Yes, Hemingway first uses the

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-24366650862459680702011-12-11T01:04:00.001-08:002011-12-11T10:44:06.097-08:00

Karl, blogging at Patterico's Pontifications, published some comments about PolitiFact's upcoming "Lie of the Year" award.  Though Karl's post isn't exactly an evidence of PolitiFact's left-leaning bias, his opinion of PolitiFact is neatly phrased: I think this year’s merely “False” claims have to be discounted.  Interestingly, of the five ”Pants On Fire” claims, three are by Democrats.  Only

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-65311439017112477112011-12-08T06:00:00.000-08:002011-12-11T23:31:17.177-08:00

Back in late October, PolitiFact was publicly wringing its hands over a story it published that was out of step with fact checks of the same material by Annenberg Fact Check and the Washington Post's "The Fact Checker" column by Glenn Kessler. It's hand-wringing time again as Kessler writes about a Mitt Romney ad that PolitiFact found outrageous ("Pants on Fire") while Kessler and the Annenberg

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-35830084002177711902011-12-07T14:00:00.000-08:002011-12-07T10:58:18.033-08:00

"Anchor Rising" contributor Patrick Laverty gives us yet another anecdote illustrative of PolitiFact's bias, thanks to PolitiFact Rhode Island: This one was just too easy. First Politifact accuses Terry Gorman of RIILE of issuing a "Mostly False" statement, and then they actually explain how their own ruling is wrong! RIILE is Rhode Islanders for Immigration Law Enforcement, and the issue is

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-39934833517678358452011-12-01T01:33:00.001-08:002011-12-12T20:36:11.800-08:00

Pete Sepp, vice president for communications and policy for the National Taxpayers Union, usually interacts with PolitiFact as an expert source.  This month, however, the NTU ran an ad that received the PolitiFact treatment, and Sepp ended up as NTU's spokesperson in defending it.  The ad called the federal government's proposed rebate program for drug purchases a "tax." Sepp did not publish a

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-12216977857257252742011-11-23T10:28:00.001-08:002011-11-23T13:13:01.660-08:00

PFB associate Jeff Dyberg has posted a magum opus questioning how PolitiFact Florida could reach its finding of "Mostly False" that President Obama's administration extended half a billion in loans to its friends at Solyndra. No, really: (clipped from PolitiFact.com) A snippet of Jeff's take from his blog Bewz Newz 'n' Vewz: PolitiFact reviews an Americans for Prosperity ad and helpfully

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-4559804954613860182011-11-21T23:38:00.001-08:002011-12-12T20:40:50.547-08:00

Crossposted from Sublime Bloviations  I keep hoping that criticism will influence positive change at PolitiFact, the fact checking arm of the St. Petersburg Times (soon changing its name to the Tampa Bay Times). Well, a positive change occurred at PolitiFact recently. Unfortunately, it was of the "one step forward, two steps back" variety. For some time I've carped about PolitiFact's

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-64885563959563601782011-11-16T01:08:00.001-08:002011-11-19T00:46:10.602-08:00

Recently the media watchdogs Media Trackers published a five part series on PolitiFact. Intro: Media Trackers Announces Series on PolitiFact Part 1: PolitiFact and the Political Parties Part 2: PolitiFact and Third-Party Organizations Part 3: PolitiFact and Talk Radio Part 4: PolitiFact and Governor Scott Walker Part 5: Conclusion on PolitiFact  We were unimpressed with the start of the series

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-42947952454570525502011-11-09T01:36:00.000-08:002011-12-16T12:08:27.521-08:00

Could the cure for world hunger be as simple as picking the low hanging fruit from PolitiFact? Sometimes it seems that way. PFB editor Bryan White was quick to spot the latest gaffe from our facticious friends. Check out PolitiFact Florida's rating of state Senator Alan Hays (R-Umatilla): Image from PolitiFact.com Now check out what Hays actually said: "...I'm not aware of any proof of

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-44367802404286214502011-11-03T23:25:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:10:17.306-08:00

Given the recent news about California's impressive high speed rail cost overruns, it seems like a good time to call attention to Reason.com's pushback against PolitiFact's defense of the high speed rail system proposed for Florida. The chief evidence of bias comes from PolitiFact's attempt to discredit Reason.com on ideological grounds--an intriguing move for an organization known to

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-59040360851192973982011-11-03T03:21:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:13:23.379-08:00

Ordinarily we highlight Matthew Hoy's criticisms of PolitiFact via the posts at his blog, Hoystory.  But this time we catch Hoy at his pithy best while blasting PolitiFact over at Facbook for its "Pants on Fire" rating of Herman Cain's supposed claim that China is trying to develop nuclear weapons.  PolitiFact took Cain to mean China was developing nuclear weapons for the first time, you see.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-39129692709800466412011-11-02T02:55:00.000-07:002012-02-19T09:48:31.151-08:00

(crossposted from Sublime Bloviations with minor reformatting) To assess the truth for a numbers claim, the biggest factor is the underlying message. --PolitiFact editor Bill Adair The issue: (clipped from PolitiFact.com) The fact checkers: Angie Drobnic Holan:  writer, researcher Sue Owen:  researcher Martha Hamilton:  editor Analysis: This PolitiFact item very quickly blew up in

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-68412803580332335412011-10-23T09:48:00.000-07:002011-12-12T20:37:52.527-08:00

Welcome Hoystory readers! Big thanks to Matthew Hoy for the mention on his site. PolitiFact is currently engaged in full damage control after their recent favorable rating of a Joe Biden statement upon noting the sharp contrast with the conclusions at two other well known fact-checking outfits. We're working on a more detailed review of the issue but for now Hoy has a succinct account of the

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-64767346662770108572011-10-17T23:57:00.000-07:002012-01-21T12:10:00.617-08:00

Michael F. Cannon of the CATO Institute, in the past used by PolitiFact as an expert source, started boycotting PolitiFact based on its weighing in on opinion. Cannon gave us an update on July 8 indicating that PolitiFact had called on him for expertise and he had declined to provide it. On Oct. 12 Cannon posted a similar message clarifying his statement that he "declined to help" PolitiFact:

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-22157301157745970432011-10-15T00:40:00.000-07:002011-12-12T20:37:32.484-08:00

It's not often PolitiFact alters their standards so quickly on the exact same topic, but it happens.  We spotted it right away and PFB editor Bryan White was on the case with his latest update regarding the recent flurry of tax related campaign flyers factchecks PolitiFact's been writing. This one is pretty obvious. Let's see if our readers can spot it. Here's PolitiFact's standard for

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-29875934514298486032011-10-06T00:28:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:26:40.094-08:00

Matthew Hoy of Hoystory has an excellent piece up regarding the same PolitiFact rating we mentioned here yesterday. Hoy's take: Like magic, Politifraud sets aside all of the additional taxes that would make Obama’s lie even more obvious and will only concern itself with the one that can bump the lower-income tax rate closer to the upper-income one. Why? Because it’s hard. And they’re lazy. And

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-6493377600376785242011-10-03T23:31:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:27:51.819-08:00

Daryl Hannah once taught us that mermaids can only survive in the water. In a similar fantastic vein, the "fact" that Warren Buffett pays a lower tax rate than his secretary can only exist in the murky world of PolitiFact.  They've dealt with a few statements relating to Buffett's now infamous op-ed, and you don't need to be Carnac to divine which way the Truth-O-Meter fell. But our

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-6041507057971910492011-09-28T02:08:00.000-07:002012-01-15T19:37:09.816-08:00

Red State's Erick Erickson is all over PolitiFact for its grading of a recent claim by Texas governor and presidential hopeful Rick Perry. Erickson works quite a few angles against the PolitiFact effort.  We think Erickson perhaps shorted the basic obvious criticism that Perry's statement was never intended to hold up tort reform as the sole explanation for Texas' increase in physicians, but

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-70105350474360514522011-09-27T20:32:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:58:03.056-08:00

Georgia's Peach Pundit, from Jan. 27: On Tuesday, PolitiFact weighed in on a statement made by House Ethics Committee Chairman Joe Wilkinson. Politifact declared Wilkinson’s statement that Georgia’s Ethics laws are among the toughest in the nation is “false.”Peach Pundit went on to publish an answering message from former Georgia state senator Dan Moody.  Moody makes a great point that

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-36701435514625527812011-09-16T23:39:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:42:10.035-08:00

If there were a New Coke Award for fact-checking websites the all-time champion would have to be President Obama's AttackWatch.com: Image from Twitter The website itself has gotten much more publicity for conservative mockery than it has any actual debunking. But what does this have to do with PolitiFact? As it turns out one of its "sources" for getting out the facts is none other than our

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-15708034660870138192011-08-25T00:04:00.000-07:002011-12-23T15:57:56.159-08:00

Massive hat tip to Power Line.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-47375951648577440862011-08-23T00:04:00.000-07:002011-12-12T20:35:44.128-08:00

For a second there I thought PolitiFact editor Bill Adair was going to do it.  He was going to admit that PolitiFact "report cards" are pretty much worthless because of selection bias. Not quite.  He dropped a few hints but avoided the confession.  Check it out: The almost-confession is drowned out by Adair's language hinting that the main problem with the individual truth ratings comes from

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-62491517656180631022011-08-21T22:27:00.000-07:002012-01-29T16:01:48.052-08:00

Blogger Jeff Dyberg of the PFB team wishes PolitiFact a happy birthday as only he can, sending a birthday message akin to one of those television episodes made up of memorable clips from past episodes. Give it a read. It'll make you laugh.  It'll remind you of PolitiFact's ideological bias.  And the latter might make you cry even if the former doesn't.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-8037387008452949612011-08-16T13:27:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:44:53.886-08:00

Jeffrey H. Anderson may have a Ph.D., but it's not in mathematics. So when he's faced with the daunting task of taking one number and dividing by another number, he should just leave it to the rocket surgeons over at PolitiFact. This is especially important if old math doesn't produce PolitiFact's desired result. Anderson sums up the numerical details while answering a PolitiFact analysis:

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-9940406522356408962011-08-04T11:05:00.000-07:002011-11-13T20:47:31.431-08:00

"Stormin Mormon" of the Kiriath-Arba site brought back some nostalgic memories of PolitiFact and the 2008 election with a 2008 post titled "Lipstick on a Pig." Many will remember how the McCain campaign whined about then-candidate Barack Obama calling Sarah Palin a pig by analogy not long after the Republican convention.  How silly of him, right? "Stormin Mormon" puts the pieces together

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-58659676093425537522011-08-01T11:05:00.000-07:002011-11-13T21:01:03.807-08:00

Blogger "Elena" at My Domestic Church (mydomesticchurch.com) notices the bias at PolitiFact: This recent article on Politifact about the Poverty Rate is a good example of its liberal bias.  First of all, they are taking apart a comment made by Bill O'Reilly made on the Fox News Channel.During the O'Reilly Factor segment, Bill O'Reilly claimed that President Johnson's "Great Society" programs

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-30545790350006994182011-07-27T23:28:00.000-07:002011-12-23T15:54:42.598-08:00

(crossposted from Sublime Bloviations) Big news came down from PolitiFact today.  The fact checking organization will change its "Barely True" rating on its "Truth-O-Meter" to "Mostly False." PolitiFact editor Bill Adair explains: Today, Barely True becomes Mostly False. It is a change we don't make lightly. The Truth-O-Meter has been the heart of PolitiFact since we launched the site

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-34232850514849702232011-07-24T12:49:00.000-07:002011-07-24T12:49:27.203-07:00

Power Line blog has published some excerpted material from a new book,  "Left Turn: How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind."  We find the material relevant in helping explain the liberal bias manifest at PolitiFact. Find the excerpts here: Part 1 (the Introduction) Part 2 (Forward) Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 The book's author, Tim Groseclose, co-published a study of media bias back in

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-52256111512393745272011-07-23T21:12:00.000-07:002011-11-13T21:10:50.602-08:00

It's always a good time to review the perfidious PolitiFact treatment of the Democrats' attempted government takeover of healthcare. This Dec. 2010 item from a Heartland Institute blog ("Somewhat Reasonable") by Jim Lakely makes its point largely through items we have already highlighted, but it's worth a read on its own: PolitiFact holds itself up as an objective arbiter of “truth” and “lies”

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-14659063484421247472011-07-20T11:24:00.000-07:002011-12-12T21:51:08.619-08:00

Red State, thanks to Leon H. Wolf, has another excellent criticism of a PolitiFact fact check. Wolf takes PolitiFact Texas to task over its rating of RedState Co-Founder Josh Treviño. Treviño cited a poll on an MSNBC program. PolitiFact subjected (pun intended) the statement to its Truth-O-Meter. And that gets Wolf to wondering: Politifact was forced to concede that Trevino’s characterization

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-65078369236559621422011-07-17T09:46:00.000-07:002011-07-17T09:47:06.816-07:00

Sometimes, PFB editor Bryan White laments, he can't believe his eyes when he reads various PolitiFact stories. Thus begins his latest review of PolitiFact's most recent "Obameter" rating. PolitiFact's latest gift to our 44th president came in the form of the coveted "Promise Kept" rating regarding Obama's campaign promise to "...establish a 10 percent federal Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS)

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-77205147733338740832011-07-16T14:35:00.000-07:002011-07-16T14:35:07.363-07:00

Red State blogger "Flagstaff" published a survey of PolitiFact's fact checking in early July.  Though the survey was limited in scope and lacked any apparent scientific construction, the conclusion is solid: In the end, we can’t trust a newspaper service to grade the truthfulness of politicians for us.  The grades turn on the political bias of the paper, and you can imagine where that is.  We

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-87049405024841121142011-07-11T12:39:00.000-07:002011-07-12T12:24:04.958-07:00

Patrick Poole of Pajama's Media's PJ Tatler feature shows what happens when GOP figures turn PolitiFact-approved factoids into GOP talking points. Mitt Romney's campaign did exactly that with a fact-checked claim originally from Eric Cantor (R-Va.). When PolitiFact went to fact check Romney, it ended up fact checking its own work and finding it wanting. Poole summarizes: So we find that “

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-46448176734918676822011-07-09T21:47:00.000-07:002012-01-21T12:09:22.225-08:00

Short and to the point, Cato Institute's Michael J. Cannon reminds us that his boycott of PolitiFact continues.  As he notes in his title, PolitiFact sometimes seeks his services as an expert source.  Follow the links to see why Cannon no longer cooperates with PolitiFact.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-44529183255468465242011-07-08T23:50:00.000-07:002011-07-08T23:50:37.865-07:00

Conservative website Media Trackers recently took a look at a PolitiFact Wisconsin rating dealing with Gov. Scott Walker's budget. A liberal group, One Wisconsin Now, made the claim that Walker’s budget "includes tax breaks for corporations and the rich that will cost the state of Wisconsin taxpayers $2.3 billion over the next decade." Media Trackers explains: In typical fashion, Politifact

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-39978163663818328452011-07-07T02:31:00.000-07:002011-07-07T02:31:43.186-07:00

Jonathan Chait of The New Republic blasts PolitiFact for a story unfair to Republicans. Chait's story is notable because he and TNR lean decidedly left. Chait: Politifact slams the Republicans: The important point in each examination is that $500 billion -- the figure confirmed by the NRSC's citations -- are not taken out of the current Medicare budget and are not actual cuts. Nowhere in the

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-75933576748077708232011-07-06T09:38:00.000-07:002011-12-12T20:48:39.504-08:00

When we make a mistake, we correct it and note it on the original item.--Principles of PolitiFact and the Truth-O-Meter This past Sunday, PolitiFact published yet another one of those mailbag stories--the kind where readers claim PolitiFact has made a mistake for thus-and-such a reason, and PolitiFact notes the complaint without comment and then we all move on. But this latest one had something

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-52966744939679668992011-06-29T09:07:00.000-07:002011-06-30T11:07:03.123-07:00

We at PFB noticed something amiss with the Romney rating on jobs recovery, but eagle-eyed Matthew Hoy of the Hoystory blog takes note of a mind-boggling inconsistency regarding the rating: Here’s Mitt Romney: "It’s been a failure in the last several years to get America back on track again. It’s taken longer to get Americans back to work than it took during the Great Depression. This is the

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-17438993617443154222011-06-28T13:29:00.000-07:002011-10-22T09:46:53.267-07:00

Matthew Hoy of Hoystory points out PolitiFact's flawed rating of Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.). PolitiFact gave West a "Mostly True" for his statement that the Libyan operations cost $115 million in the first 36 hours. What's so wrong with a Mostly True? As Hoy explains, West was absolutely correct. Even PolitiFact acknowledges this. But not content with simply "sorting out the truth" of West's

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-59038616432196957792011-06-21T20:52:00.000-07:002012-01-29T16:02:27.090-08:00

Traffic stats here at PolitiFact Bias suggest that liberals outraged at PolitiFact's recent rating of Jon Stewart are ending up here as they search for confirmation of their suspicions regarding PolitiFact's conservative bias, or at least PolitiFact's pathetic attempts to attract a conservative audience by going harsh on Jon Stewart. The bad news is that you won't find anything here that helps

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-28515491396100071042011-06-17T11:11:00.000-07:002012-01-29T16:05:13.467-08:00

Jeff tipped me off to a blog post at Inside Milwaukee's "Pressroom Buzz."  At first I thought it was fodder for a PFB Smackdown feature.  But with respect to any kind of credible charge of a bias against the left at PolitiFact Wisconsin there's just no "there" there. The blog post, by Erik Gunn, discloses the decision of some Democratic Party politicians in Wisconsin to stop cooperating with

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-52345039433151836402011-06-07T11:19:00.000-07:002011-12-12T20:40:33.304-08:00

OregonLive.com published the following letter (or e-letter) from alert reader "oregondriver": While you are so quick to find fault with Sarah Palin, you seem to have your facts mixed up in the "PolitiFact.com" article on page A2 of this Sunday's Oregonian: "Palin claim about Obama and oil isn't real, baby, real! In the fourth column you printed: "So a drop in oil production of 130,000

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-41375966166834143222011-06-04T23:01:00.000-07:002011-12-12T20:46:37.757-08:00

DrewM. at Ace of Spades HQ gives us an excellent skewering of PolitiFact, complete with the side-splitting humor one expects of Ace's place: The bigger question is the business about the US economy being, "inches away from ceasing to be a free market economy". Dear Politifact...this is called a rhetorical device. It's not a literal statement that can or can not be proven. Economies do not exist

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-80766581626911086432011-06-03T14:22:00.000-07:002011-10-22T09:47:38.797-07:00

Matthew Hoy of the Hoystory blog blasted two recent PolitiFact stories in a recent post. The first of the two we have already highlighted.  The second had PolitiFact finding "Half True" a Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) claim that the Bush administration turned the $5.6 trillion surplus it inherited from the Clinton administration into an "$11-plus trillion debt." Hoy: Normal people might conclude that

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-11326915069886773822011-06-02T02:05:00.000-07:002011-06-02T02:06:35.458-07:00

Lachlan Markay from NewsBusters hits PolitiFact over the same story Joshua Treviño critiqued recently: This just in, by way of St. Petersburg Times fact-checking website Politifact: when considering irrelevant and misleading employment statistics, Texas has not, in fact, created more jobs in the past five years than the rest of the country combined. Sure, when considering the relevant numbers

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-501911637194578932011-06-01T10:42:00.000-07:002011-06-01T10:42:14.377-07:00

Writing at Red State, the Texas Public Policy Foundation's vice president of communications Joshua Treviño provides a perfect take-down of PolitiFact's perfidious fact checking, this time touching the issue of job creation. PolitiFact graded an ad touting Texas' job creation numbers "Half True" because the ad used the standard metric of net jobs created to laud Texas' performance with job

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-32737025522469758012011-05-31T01:31:00.000-07:002011-06-05T01:40:25.504-07:00

The lights are on but the facts aren't home. Ed Walker over at Engineering Thinking points out a common tactic employed by PolitiFact. Just as they claim ObamaCare is not a government takeover of healthcare because the government doesn't "own the hospitals and the doctors are [not] public employees.", PolitiFact has determined that the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 doesn't ban

Jeff Dyberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16256347579300904884noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-30510765757976717852011-05-23T10:08:00.000-07:002012-01-29T16:07:47.789-08:00

On May 16, 2011 PolitiFact published a fact check of Laura Ingraham's claim that RomneyCare is "wildly unpopular" in Massachusetts. Just one problem.  Ingraham didn't say it. Ingraham was on the O'Reilly Factor for her regular "Week in Review" segment.  O'Reilly brought up Romney's May 12 speech defending his RomneyCare plan, a state health care reform in Massachusetts notable for its

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-78514796782986196002011-05-19T11:39:00.001-07:002011-05-19T13:13:39.231-07:00

Crossposted from Sublime Bloviations. Push polls are not really polls at all; their object is not to measure public opinion, but to manipulate it by providing as many “respondents” as possible with hypothetical, sometimes blatantly false information, about candidates, political parties or initiatives.Election Law Journal The third-rate fact checkers at PolitiFact published a push poll yesterday.

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6161368243189108227.post-19730548148229252422011-05-15T21:17:00.000-07:002011-05-15T21:17:01.481-07:00

The political blog "Drawnlines Politics" serves up a sizzling observation about PolitiFact Florida's recent rating of a campaign ad by Republican candidate for Senate George LeMieux: Politifact Florida recently rated Senator George LeMieux's claim that he never sought an earmark only "half true", while at the same time calling the individual parts of his claim "true." LeMieux maintains a

Bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07608604859044029293noreply@blogger.com0