Sunday, July 13, 2014

Nothing To See Here: David Alameel edition (updated)

We picked up on a rating of a Texas Democrat, David Alameel, that looked a tad harsh at first blush.  PolitiFact Texas rated Alameel "False" for saying he had once lived in "La Colonia" since that claim produced the impression he lived in a colonia--a subdivision often lacking electricity or plumbing.  Alameel's "La Colonia" wasn't nearly that bad.  It just happened to share the name.

We figured where one correctly names a place he used to dwell, there's got to be some truth to it.  PolitiFact Texas didn't see it that way for some reason.

Hold the Presses

We were nearly ready to start on a short article recounting how PolitiFact had unfairly treated Alameel when we reviewed, for context, the speech Alameel was delivering when he uttered the statement PolitiFact examined.

We had to change the main focus of the story to "Nothing to See Here."  Alameel's speech is stuffed full of preposterous partisan claims.  Why did PolitiFact focus on the colonia issue when Alameel offered such a smorgasbord of superior fact-check opportunities?

There's nothing to do but simply recount some of the things Alameel claimed (chronological order, many of them consecutive).

"John Cornyn decided to dodge the draft simply to go to college."

"(Our company) was 95 percent managed by women."

"Wall Street has taken over Washington to push their globalization and outsourcing at the expense of the American people."

"Today we have 100,000 lobbyists in Washington who spend $9.2 billion a year to buy Washington and buy our ruling class."

"That's how they managed to give us 35 years of trickle-down voodoo economics that outsource(d?) every industry we have and destroyed our middle class."

"That's why inequality's the highest since the Great Depression."

"That's why the American people are suffering, because they are forced to live on minimum wage."

"John Cornyn helped destroy our economy."

"He's the one who shipped our jobs overseas."

"He's the one who got trillions of our tax dollars to Wall Street and big corporations."

"We're going to send John Cornyn to an early retirement and see how he survives on minimum wage."

"He's anti-Latino."

"John Cornyn blocked immigration reform."

"John Cornyn is a career politician who's been on our tax dime for 30 years."

"He never had a job.  Never had to build business.  Never had to meet payroll."

"He declared war on the poor by voting against raising the minimum wage."

"He declared war on women by refusing to accept equal pay for equal work."

"He declared war on female soldiers by voting against a bill that would protect them from sexual assault in the military."

"He declared war on veterans by voting repeatedly and for many years against increasing veterans benefits unti (recording dropped)"


"He declared war on the middle class by shipping their jobs overseas."

"When I was working in the fields, we lived in La Colonia."


Ding-ding-ding-ding!  We have a winner! Nothing else to see here.



Update Aug. 1, 2014:

In the "better late than never" department, PolitiFact Texas opted yesterday to publish a fact check of one of Alameel's more controversial claims--one mentioned on our list of twenty.  PF Texas gave Alameel a "Pants on Fire" rating for saying Cornyn dodged the draft to go to college.

The timing's interesting.  Alameel gave his speech in late June.  PolitiFact struck while the iron was hot, publishing its "La Colonia" fact check on July 2.  The Austin American-Statesman published a story on Alamee''s draft dodger charge on July 4.  The Statesman serves as PolitiFact's franchise partner in running PolitiFact Texas.

We published our "Nothing To See Here" article on July 13.  About two weeks later, on July 31, PolitiFact Texas publishes its ruling on the draft-dodging charge.

We're supposing it was hard for PolitiFact Texas to ignore the validity of our observation given that the Statesman devoted space to one of the statements we suggested PolitiFact might have found worth rating.

Now we're wondering if the Statesman likewise published anything about Alameel's charge that Cornyn "is a career politician who's been on our tax dime for 30 years."



Edit 11/16/2014: Added link to PF Texas PoF rating to first graph of 8-1-14 Update - Jeff

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