PFB Smackdown: Lawrence O'Donnell, Rachel Maddow and Tommy Christopher

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 fact that O'Donnell is making an equivocal argument.  O'Donnell stresses that the GI Bill was an education program.  But when PolitiFact pressed MSNBC to support O'Donnell's claim, the latter responded by providing criticisms that almost exclusively aimed at unemployment benefits that were part of the bill.  O'Donnell's argument is a bait-and-switch.

PolitiFact claims to take such abuse of context into account.  Some of the "Truth-O-Meter" grades, in fact, carry clear signs of the perils of making a claim with limited context.

Rachel Maddow