Fifty shades of "Half True"

PolitiFact's founding editor, Bill Adair, has said the truth is often not black and white, but gray:

Our Truth-O-Meter is based on the concept that the truth in politics is often not black and white, but shades of gray.

With this post we'll look at an example of PolitiFact shading the truth with its middle-ground "Half True" rating.

Justice Roy Moore, conservative: "Half True"

The first example comes from Feb. 13, 2015. Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore said Alabama hadn't changed its mind about gay marriage since passing a law in 2007 defining marriage in heterosexual terms. Moore was answering a claim from CNN host Chris Cuomo that people in Alabama had changed their views on gay marriage. PolitiFact reported the key exchange:

"Times have changed as they did with slavery," Cuomo said Feb. 12 on New Day. "The population no longer feels the same way. And even in your state, people no longer feel the same way."

Moore held firm that marriage was defined as between a man and a woman, and said, "81 percent as recently as 2006 said it was the definition. They haven’t changed their opinion."

PolitiFact framed its fact check in terms of a contest between the statements from Cuomo and Moore. If support for gay marriage had changed in Alabama, then Moore's claim was not plainly true.

PolitiFact flubbed its interpretation of Moore's response. Moore was not arguing that no change had occurred in opinion polls. Moore referred to the percentage of Alabama voters who approved the heterosexual marriage definition in 2006. The voters had not changed their minds in that the people of Alabama had not moved to change the law they overwhelmingly approved. PolitiFact noted that Moore was referring to that vote, but somehow failed to put the pieces of the puzzle together. Moore's Truth-O-Meter rating: "Half True."

Even if PolitiFact's wrong interpretation was correct, Moore would be off by a scant 14 percent. Democrat Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse once received a "Mostly True" rating for a claim that was off by 27 percent.

Rep. Pete DeFazio (D-Ore.): "Half True"

Our second example comes from a PolitiFact fact check published on Feb. 17, 2015. Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) blamed genetically modified crops for the impending extinction of the monarch butterfly.

PolitiFact quotes DeFazio:

"We certainly know there is going to be secondary harm to the environment," he said. "In fact, monarch butterflies are becoming extinct because of this sort of dumping, (the) huge increase in pesticides’ use because of these modified organisms."

DeFazio got a thing or two wrong. Monarch butterflies aren't going extinct. The causal connection between the increased use of herbicides and the decreased wintering population of monarch butterflies has not yet been scientifically established. And, though PolitiFact kindly ignored this mistake, DeFazio referred to "pesticides" instead of "herbicides."  Update Aug. 17, 2018: In fact "pesticides" can encompass plant pests as well as animal pests./update The expert PolitiFact cited mentioned the effects of herbicides on the monarch caterpillar's favored food, milkweed. PolitiFact apparently didn't investigate the effect of pesticide dumping on monarch butterfly populations.

So DeFazio got nothing right, but PolitiFact accepted his extinction claim as a mere exaggeration of the declining wintering population of monarch butterflies. The final ruling: "Half True."


It almost takes a masochist to read PolitiFact's fifty shades of gray.

PolitiFact, the fact checker that makes stuff up

PolitiFact, PolitiFact, PolitiFact.

What can you say about a fact checker that makes up facts out of whole cloth?

The pictures tell the story (albeit the pictures have words embedded).

The PolitiFact fact check:

A capture of the relevant portion of the McConnell ad:

PolitiFact simply invents a straw man argument for Sen. McConnell, suggesting his ad claims the Republican alternative to the Democrats' version of the Violence Against Women Act offered stronger protections for women overall.  But that wasn't the argument in the ad.  The ad simply says "McConnell voted for stronger protections for women than Obama's agenda will allow."  Using that wording allows the ad to refer to select features of the Republican bill that Obama's agenda wouldn't allow.  And PolitiFact confirms it (bold emphasis added):

For starters, Republicans proposed mandatory minimum sentences — ranging from 5 to 15 years — on certain sexual assault crimes.

However, advocates of domestic violence awareness were specifically against the inclusion of these provisions.

So McConnell was right.  Democrats wouldn't support mandatory minimum sentences for certain crimes involving violence against women.  Presumably Democrats opposed longer minimum sentences because allowing people with a history of committing violence against women out of jail sooner presents no threat to women.  Or maybe it gives lawyers more work.

This wasn't just the misleading headline that we so often see in mainstream journalism.  PolitiFact fact-checked the ad as though it was comparing the new VAWA of the Democrats to the Republican alternative.  It's obvious in the fact check's conclusion:

Perhaps McConnell could argue that the mandatory minimum sentences Republicans required in their alternative made for a "stronger" bill, but advocates of domestic abuse awareness opposed this measure as unnecessary.

And the Republican measure was absent several protections for certain groups that were included in the bill Obama signed. McConnell is within his right to oppose those provisions, but it makes it hard for him to prove that he supported "stronger" legislation.

We rate the claim Mostly False.

These fact checkers do not give the facts.  They make them up.

Guest post: Another wrongheaded heading

We present another guest post by JLG:

Attack ad by Democrat on McConnell "False", but...

PolitiFact caught once again using deceptive subheadings favoring Democrats

Last Thursday, Politifact reviewed the latest ad by Mitch McConnell's Democratic challenger Alison Lundergan Grimes in the Kentucky Senate race. Lundergan Grimes claimed in the ad that "Mitch McConnell voted to raise Medicare costs for a current Kentucky senior by $6,000." Politifact ruled the claim "False":

Image from PolitiFact.com, red oval added for emphasis

The line circled in red will appear false to many readers, positioned as it is under a "Truth-O-Meter" graphic blaring the message "False." But it's only false, PolitiFact's presentation implies, because the bill wouldn't have taken effect now but in the future. That reading impugns McConnell along with his Democrat attacker.  Worse, it isn't even accurate.

The PolitiFact article makes each of the following points:

∙ Her figure was based on the Paul Ryan budget plan.

∙ There have been several incarnations of the Ryan budget over the years and Lundergan  Grimes chose to go all the way back to the 2011 version.

∙ Every version of the Ryan budget since then was re-tooled to eliminate that $6,000 cost.

Now here are the three points that really tell the tale:

∙ Don Disney, the man in the ad who claimed McConnell "voted to raise my Medicare costs by $6,000" is 75 years old, so no version of the Ryan plan would saddle him with $6,000-plus in additional out-of-pocket costs.

∙ That bill wouldn't have gone into effect until 2022 and would not have affected people like Disney who were seniors when the bill was passed.

∙ McConnell voted for a motion to proceed on the Ryan budget.  That allowed it to proceed to the Senate floor for debate and amendments.  But McConnell never voted on the final passage of the bill.

Summary

There was no bill passed to raise Disney's Medicare costs by $6,000, McConnell never voted for the passage of any bill that would have raised Disney's costs by $6,000, and McConnell didn't vote for the passage of any bill that would have cost any senior on Medicare $6,000 in extra expenses. 

The content of the article confirms this summary, yet PolitiFact mentions nothing about the fact McConnell didn't actually vote for the passage of the bill. On top of that, the graphic on the main page gives people the impression that McConnell voted to raise costs to seniors by $6,000, with those costs inflicted on seniors at a later date.  That's false.

Conclusion

Liberal bias leads to another "Politifact fail"

JLG