Transparency: How to access PolitiFact's page of corrected or updated fact checks (updated x2)

Note: Page now obsolete, see Update 2 at the bottom

It has long amused us here at PolitiFact Bias how difficult PolitiFact makes it for readers to navigate to its page of corrections and updates. There are pretty much three ways to navigate to the page.


Someone could link to it by hotlinking using the page URL.

This is the method PolitiFact uses to make finding the page seem easy-peasy in tweets or other messages. Works great!



The reader could use a search engine to find it

No, not the search function at the PolitiFact website. That will not get you there.

We're talking about a search engine like Google or DuckDuckGo. Search politifact + corrections + and + updates and reaching the page is a snap.


The reader could navigate to the page from PolitiFact's homepage. Maybe. 

This is the amusing part. We've already noted that using the "search" function at the PolitiFact website won't reach its dedicated page of corrected and updated fact checks (other corrections and updates do not yet end up there, unfortunately).

And without a guide such as the one that follows, most people browsing PolitiFact's website would probably never stumble over the page.

How To Do It

Step 1: On the homepage, move the cursor to the top menu bar and hover over "Truth-O-Meter" to trigger the drop-down menu
Step 2: Move the cursor down that menu to "By Subject," click on "By Subject"
Step 3: On the "Subjects" page, move the cursor to the alphabet menu below the main menu, hover over "c," click "c"
Step 4: Move the cursor to the subjects listed under "c," move cursor to hover over "Corrections and Updates," click "Corrections and Updates"

Done! What could be easier?

The key? Knowing that PolitiFact counts "Corrections and Updates" as a category of "statements" defined by PolitiFact as Truth-O-Meter stories. The list of corrections and updates consists only of fact checks. Corrections or updates of explainer articles, promise ratings and flip-flop ratings (etc.) do not end up on PolitiFact's page of corrections and updates.

What you'll find under "c" at PolitiFact.com

Afters


When I (Bryan) designed the Zebra Fact Check website, I put the "Corrections" link on the main menu.

It's not all about criticizing PolitiFact. It's also about showing better and more transparent ways to do fact-checking.

This isn't exactly rocket science. Anybody can figure out that putting an item on the main menu makes it easy to find.

There is reason to suspect that PolitiFact is less than gung-ho about publicizing its corrections and updates.


Update Aug. 5, 2019: We do have evidence of promise ratings appearing on the list of corrected stories."Flip-O-Meter" stories have subject tags, so we assume those may appear on the list as well.

Update 2, Feb. 2, 2020: PolitiFact updated its website on Feb. 1, 2020, making our instructions obsolete. Details here.

PolitiFact editor: "Tell me where the fact-check is wrong"

Ever notice how PolitiFact likes to paint its critics as folks who carp about whether the (subjective) Truth-O-Meter rating was correct?

PolitiFact Editor Angie Drobnic Holan gave us another stanza of that song-and-dance in a Jan. 26, 2018 interview with Digital Charlotte. Digital Charlotte's Stephanie Bunao asked Holan whether she sees a partisan difference in the email and commentary PolitiFact receives from readers.

Holan's response (bold emphasis added):

Well, we get, you know, nobody likes it when their team is being criticized, so we get mail a lot of different ways. I think obviously there's a kind of repeated slogan from the conservative side that when they see media reports they don't like, that it's liberal media or fake news. On the left, the criticism is a little different – like they accuse us of having false balance. You know, when we say the Democrats are wrong, they say, ‘Oh, you're only doing that to try to show that you're independent.’ I mean it gets really like a little bit mental, when people say why we're wrong. If they're not dealing with the evidence, my response is like, ‘Well you can say that we're biased all you want, but tell me where the fact-check is wrong. Tell me what evidence we got wrong. Tell me where our logic went wrong. Because I think that's a useful conversation to have about the actual report itself.

Let us count the ways Holan achieves disingenuousness, starting with the big one at the end:

1) "Tell me where the fact-check is wrong"

We've been doing that for years here at PolitiFact Bias, making our point in blog posts, emails and tweets. Our question for Holan? If you think that's a useful conversation to have then why do you avoid having the conversation? On Jan. 25, 2018, we sent Holan an email pointing out a factual problem with one of its fact checks. We received no reply. And on Jan. 26 she tells an interviewer that the conversation she won't have is a useful one?

2) "Every year in December we look at all the things that we fact-check, and we say, ‘What is the most significant lie we fact-checked this year’"

Huh? In 2013, PolitiFact worked hard to make the public believe it had chosen the president's Affordable Care Act promise that people would be able to keep plans they liked under the new health care law as its "Lie of the Year." But PolitiFact did not fact check the claim in 2013. PolitiFact Bias and others exposed PolitiFact's deception at the time, but PolitiFact keeps repeating it.

3) PolitiFact's "extreme transparency"

Asked how the media can regain public trust, Holan mentioned the use of transparency. We agree with her that far. But she used PolitiFact as an example of providing readers "extreme transparency."

That's a laugh.

Perhaps PolitiFact provides more transparency than the average mainstream media outlet, but does that equal "extreme transparency"? We say no. Extreme transparency is admitting your politics (PolitiFail), publishing the texts of expert interviews (PolitiFail, except for PolitiFact Texas), revealing the "Truth-O-Meter" votes of its editorial "star chamber" (PolitiFail) and more.

PolitiFact practices above-average transparency, not "extreme transparency." And the media tend to deliver a poor degree of transparency.

We remain prepared to have that "useful conversation" about PolitiFact's errors of fact and research.

You let us know when you're ready, Angie Drobnic Holan.

Flub & Scrub: Mitch McConnell edition

[Also see "Flub & Scrub:  Mitch McConnell edition Part II"]

On Friday May 24 PolitiFact posted a fact check of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).  I won't quote from it because PolitiFact, perhaps only temporarily, has scrubbed the story from its website with apparently only an announcement on Twitter in explanation:

We're revising our fact-check on Sen. McConnell's claim on health insurers. New item will be posted later today.

PolitiFact later tweeted that it would publish the revised item next week.  We'll see.

So what happened?

PolitiFact rated "Mostly False" a claim from McConnell that HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius had forbidden insurance companies from sending information to policyholders about the effects of Obamacare.  Then Michael F. Cannon happened.  Cannon sent out a tweet of his own:

You forgot this ow.ly/lmRNK MT @politifact: Ins co's told not to tell about Obamacare impact. Mostly False ow.ly/lmS5U
— Michael F. Cannon (@mfcannon) May 24, 2013

Cannon's URL led to his 2010 article "Secretary Sebelius Slips on the Brass Knuckles," where he detailed Sebelius' demands that insurers not communicate to policyholders information about the Affordable Care Act she considered false or misleading.

I ran across the McConnell rating on PolitiFact's Facebook page that afternoon, well after Cannon had tweeted about it.  I spot-checked the story as I sometimes do.  The story claimed a GAO report said the HHS office "in general" acted properly in responding to what it regarded as a misleading taxpayer-funded message the insurer Humana sent out to Medicare Advantage policyholders.

I looked at the report.  I confirmed that PolitiFact reported more-or-less accurately that the report "in general" found nothing amiss in the handling of situation.

But I also found a significant caveat PolitiFact failed to mention (bold emphasis added):

Although CMS’s actions generally conformed to its policies and procedures, the September 21, 2009, memorandum instructing all MA organizations to discontinue communications on pending legislation while CMS conducted its investigation was unusual. Officials from the MA organizations and CMS regional offices that we interviewed told us they were unaware of CMS ever directing all MA organizations to immediately stop an activity before CMS had determined whether that activity violated federal laws, regulations, or MA program guidance. When asked about this directive, officials from CMS’s central office stated that, given the degree of potential harm to beneficiaries, the action was appropriate for the circumstances.

A source PolitiFact cited provided information supporting McConnell's claim.  And PolitiFact didn't mention it.

I posted this evidence to PolitiFact's Facebook page, arguing that PolitiFact's story was more misleading than McConnell's statement.

As it happens, PolitiFact scrubbed its Facebook page of the link to the scrubbed article at its main website.  So those Facebook comments are gone along with PolitiFact's wall post about its McConnell article.  Mostly gone, that is.  We have a few screen captures.

I argue that a reporter's background knowledge and ideology predispose the reporter to make mistakes of this type--missing obvious evidence mentioned in a source document--in cases where that ideology is threatened or attacked.  This applies even if journalists otherwise keep their ideology secret.

This was a big mistake.  Journalistic organizations do not lightly pull entire articles from a website.  Count it as yet another evidence helping to show PolitiFact's liberal bias.

And now we'll get another opportunity to gauge PolitiFact's transparency as it deals with a big mistake.  The past record isn't particularly good.


Addendum 5/27/2013

J.D. points out something that helps cinch the stink factor on PolitiFact's move to unpublish.

The article I provided about unpublishing stories includes quoted material from Craig Silverman.  Silverman works for the Poynter Institute, which owns the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact.

Here's Silverman in his Poynter Institute "Regret the Error" column dealing with issue of pulling a story offline (leading off with a quotation from the Washington Post):

* We should never “unpublish” stories from the Web. Once a story is up, however, the content can be removed with the approval of a senior editor. In those rare cases when we remove the content of a story from the page, it must be replaced with an editor’s note explaining the reason for the deletion. For example if an embargo has been broken, the note would read: “Editors’ Note: This article was published inadvertently and has been removed.”

This is the right standard when it comes to unpublishing. First of all, you try to never unpublish. But if you do have to remove content, be sure to publish an explanation/apology at the same URL.

Why doesn't PolitiFact follow Poynter Institute-recommended standards for unpublishing a story?

Here's what I don't want to see:  "We did follow our guidelines.  We published an explanation/apology to the same URL.  A few days after we unpublished."


Meh.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/may/24/mitch-mcconnell/mitch-mcconnell-says-hhs-put-gag-order-insurers-ab/

Edit 5/28/13: Corrected "Friday May 25" to "Friday May 24"-Jeff

Media Trackers: "At PolitiFact Ohio, Democrats Outnumber Republicans 4 to 1"

Media critics continue to identify bias in the political affiliation of fact checkers at PolitiFact.

Jason Hart of Media Trackers (Ohio) published a report today indicating a solid majority of the PolitiFact Ohio staff shows as registered Democrats according to election records.

Hart:

Records indicate the following twelve Plain Dealer employees assigned to PolitiFact Ohio are registered Democrats:

• Robert Higgs, PolitiFact Ohio editor
• Jane (Murphy) Kahoun, Plain Dealer deputy metro editor
• Tom Feran, Plain Dealer reporter
• Henry J. Gomez, Plain Dealer reporter
• Aaron Marshall, Plain Dealer statehouse reporter
• Reginald Fields, Plain Dealer statehouse bureau chief
• Jo Ellen Corrigan, Plain Dealer librarian
• James Ewinger, Plain Dealer reporter
• Laura Johnston, Plain Dealer reporter
• Peter Krouse, Plain Dealer reporter
• James McCarty, Plain Dealer reporter
• Robert Schoenberger, Plain Dealer reporter

We at PolitiFact Bias are on record defending the potential ability for a Democrat (or Republican) to report news or even perform news analysis fairly, so we take reports like this one with a grain of salt as supposed proof of a reporting bias.

Clearly, though, Hart's report exposes a failure of disclosure.  PolitiFact presents itself as non-partisan.  Part of PolitiFact's strategy for conveying an image of neutrality is to hide the political affiliations and leanings of its staff members.

In practice, the high proportion of Democrats on the PolitiFact Ohio staff can easily exert an ideological influence on its reporting.  It is a team of three editors who vote on the "Truth-O-Meter" ratings.  Hart identifies no Republican editors at PolitiFact Ohio.  So a Democrat is likely to do the reporting and a majority of Democrats will vote on the "Truth-O-Meter" rating.   Yet people will still criticize PolitiFact Bias compared to PolitiFact because Jeff and I admit we're personally biased against liberalism.

We're the ones exhibiting honesty, inviting readers to take our bias into account when they consider what we write.

If there's one secret the mainstream press is unwilling to divulge to its audience under any circumstances, personal ideology is it.  But it's dishonest to pretend to an objectivity of viewpoint that doesn't exist in reality.

The circus inside PolitiFact's "Star Chamber"

I suspect that many people think, as I originally did, that PolitiFact selects its "Truth-O-Meter" ratings through something like an objective process.

Andrew Phelps of the Nieman Journalism Lab recently sat in on PolitiFact's formerly private deliberations and produces much the picture I have come to expect (pun not intended) during my years of increasing skepticism.

Adair doesn't reveal his politics.  Who put that Obama cutout back there?

Phelps:

WASHINGTON — PolitiFact’s “Star Chamber” is like Air Force One: It’s not an actual room, just the name of wherever Bill Adair happens to be sitting when it’s time to break out the Truth-O-Meter and pass judgment on the words of politicians. Today it’s his office.

Three judges preside, usually the same three: Adair, Washington bureau chief of the Tampa Bay (née St. Petersburg) Times; Angie Drobnic Holan, his deputy; and Amy Hollyfield, his boss.

"Star Chamber" aptly describes the secretive nature of the judges' meeting. PolitiFact staffers sometimes talk about what goes on in the meetings, but PolitiFact readers get no "report card" on the voting records of the fact check judges.

Jeff and I have repeatedly criticized PolitiFact's process for its institutionalization of PolitiFact's group ideology. Phelps' descriptions and transcripts bring our worst nightmares to life as the judges make their decisions with no apparent grounding in objective data. Phelps featured the following transcript early in his story:

Hollyfield: Is there any movement for a Pants on Fire?

Adair: I thought about it, but I didn’t feel like it was far enough off to be a Pants on Fire. What did you think, Lou?

Jacobson: I would agree. Basically it was a case I think of his staff blindly taking basically what was in Drudge and Daily Caller. Should they have been more diligent about checking the fine print of the poll? Yes, they should have. Were they being really reckless in what they did? No. It was pretty garden-variety sloppiness, I would say. I don’t think it rises to the level of flagrancy that I would think of a Pants on Fire.

Adair: It’s just not quite ridiculous. It’s definitely false, but I don’t think it’s ridiculous.

1. Hollyfield tests for support of the "Pants on Fire" rating she apparently wishes to promote.
2. Adair didn't "feel" the claim went that far. How far is too far?
3. Writer Jacobson (not one of the judges) also offers his vote in terms of opinion: He doesn't "think" it's flagrantly false. What's the objective measure for "flagrant"?

Perhaps editor Angie Drobnic Holan, whose opinion was missing from this exchange, carried the torch for objective standards during the meeting. But don't bet on it. The portion of the conversation Phelps provides smacks of exactly the type of subjectivity hypothesized in PolitiFact Bias' initial research study into PolitiFact's bias.

Phelps:

Like the original Court of Star Chamber, PolitiFact’s Truth-O-Meter rulings have always been secret. The Star Chamber was a symbol of Tudor power, a 15th-century invention of Henry VII to try people he didn’t much care for.

...The site’s basic idea — rate the veracity of political statements on a six-point scale — has modernized and mainstreamed the old art of fact-checking.

Granted, I put together statements from Phelps a few sentences apart, but regardless of that one is still struck by the segue from PolitiFact's parallel to the 15th century "Star Chamber" to the praising of PolitiFact for modernizing fact checking. Indeed, the abandonment of transparency occurs as one of PolitiFact's most distinctive innovations in the fact checking business.

The secret voting serves the same purpose as the secrecy about staff members' voting history. PolitiFact does not want its readers taking the fact checkers' biases into account. The fact checkers doubtless assure themselves of their neutrality as nearby two-dimensional cardboard Obamas smile approvingly at their work.

Phelps:

The truth is that fact-checking, and fact checkers, are kinda boring. What I witnessed was fair and fastidious; methodical, not mercurial. (That includes the other three (uneventful) rulings I watched.) I could uncover no evidence of PolitiFact’s evil scheme to slander either Republicans or Democrats. Adair says he’s a registered independent. He won’t tell me which candidate he voted for last election, and he protects his staff members’ privacy in the voting booth. In Virginia, where he lives, Adair abstains from open primary elections. Revealing his own politics would “suggest a bias that I don’t think is there,” Adair says.

It's nice that Phelps didn't see any obvious bias, but who is he kidding? The PolitiFact staff knew he was observing them, didn't they? I think probably PolitiFact doesn't deliberately slant its fact checks, but Phelps offers the thinnest of reassurances on that count, particularly since the tone of his story suggests he shares the port side slant so common in modern journalism.

We could probably mine Phelps' story for a week's worth of material.  Maybe we will.

All credit to Jeff for spotting the President Obama cardboard figure in Adair's office that turns the statement about staffers' voting history into an absolute howler.

But don't get the idea that Adair is biased or anything. We wouldn't want that.


Jeff adds:

This ode to the majesty of PolitiFact's Echo Star Chamber is jaw-droppingly awful. Phelps' inability to untangle the contradictions in front of his own eyes was painful to read. For example, he describes the Truth-O-Meter as "simple, fixed, unambiguous." Unfortunately, Phelps never reconciles these concrete terms with the subjective nomenclature of the actual ratings. He writes:

“Pants on Fire,” a PolitiFact trademark reserved for claims it considers not only false but absurd.

Phelps never shares PolitiFact's unequivocal, dispassionate standard for "absurd." And the ratings process Phelps describes as "fair and fastidious; methodical", ultimately boils down to "What did you think, Lou?"

But fear not PolitiFans. PolitiPhelps assures us that he "could uncover no evidence of PolitiFact’s evil scheme to slander either Republicans or Democrats." This is the same Andrew Phelps who once asked "[W]hy is George Bush such a flaming moron?" The man who described Maureen Dowd as "The person who best captures my feelings about our miraculously awful [Bush] administration" is confident Bill Adair gives it to us straight.

It's worth noting that Phelps, despite mentioning the left's outrage over the recent LOTY rating, as well as Rachel Maddow's outbursts, was unable to link to the any of the persistent, and numerous PolitiFact rebukes from the right. It's been our experience that PolitiFact's attacks from the left are very often lame, but they get the links in Phelps' piece.

If there are actual scientific, objective standards applied to PolitiFact's ratings, Phelps failed to report them. Phelps' flattering prose aside, the article shows that PolitiFact's system is really just a bunch of coworkers asking each other if they are having a "movement."

The trouble with the disappearance of the original "Julia" fact check

Earlier this week, PolitiFact published a fact check of the Medicare portion of the Obama campaign's "Life of Julia" Web ad.

Hours later, PolitiFact scrubbed the fact check from its website.   A message appeared on PolitiFact's Facebook page saying that the article was "unpublished" so that PolitiFact could address reader criticisms.

PolitiFact took a big step backward this week with its transparency.  In past instances PolitiFact archived the flawed version of a story.  That was a good policy.

The new approach is puzzling.  It isn't hard at all to find guidelines for journalistic ethics strongly discouraging the removal of a whole online story.

What happened? 

Did PolitiFact institute a new policy?  Did a person handling Web content act without approval from up above?  The former appears more likely given the Facebook announcement.

PolitiFact's actions did mitigate some of the ethical black clouds.  The story was not permanently deleted.  The new version carries a "CORRECTION" notice in keeping with PolitiFact's statement of standards and it explains the differences between the old version of the story and the new version (just trust 'em!).

However, the new policy is not likely to assist PolitiFact in building an image of reliability.

As for the "Julia" fact check itself, a review will appear before long at Sublime Bloviations.

PolitiFact unpublishes "Julia" fact check (Updated)

Whoa, Nelly.

PolitiFact today took the unusual step of taking down a fact check of the Obama campaign's "Julia" Web ad.

This is about the only Web evidence left from the story after it was scrubbed from the PolitiFact website:

The link goes to one of PolitiFact's clever bad link pages for now.

PolitiFact's Facebook page had this to say:

Some readers have raised questions about our latest item on Medicare and Julia. We've unpublished it while we look at them.

Jeff and I put forth a few digs on the issue of journalistic ethics on the Facebook page.  Other than that we're pretty much holding our fire until we see where this goes.


Update May 23, 2012:  PolitiFact's Twitter feed contains a bit more information:

Would @MittRomney replace Medicare with "nothing but a voucher"? That's not what his plan says. False: http://ow.ly/b5hah

 This looks like a rating that some felt was too harsh on President Obama.  The explanation for unpublishing (if we even get one) may prove more entertaining than the new version of the story.

Hope 'n' change at PolitiFact

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 inconsistent standards, and in particular its publishing of two different standards for its "Half True" position on the "Truth-O-Meter."

The recent change probably stemmed from a message I sent to an editor at the paper's city desk (sent Nov. 9):

PolitiFact has created a problem for itself through inconsistency.  During the site's earlier years a page called "About PolitiFact" gave information about how the "Flip-O-Meter" and the "Truth-O-Meter" supposedly operate.  The page includes a description of each of the "Truth-O-Meter" rating categories.

More recently, editor Bill Adair posted an item called "Principles of PolitiFact and the Truth-O-Meter."  The problem?  The definition for "Half True" is different than the one PolitiFact posted for well over a year prior.  Compounding the problem, PolitiFact has kept both versions online through now.

1)  The statement is accurate but leaves out important details or takes things out of context.
2)  The statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details or takes things out of context.

I'll be interested to see the eventual remedy.  Which items over PolitiFact's history went by which definition? Was a change made in Feb. 2011 or before without any announcement?  How can PolitiFact legitimately offer report cards and "Truth Index" ratings if the grading system isn't consistent?  Those are questions I'd imagine readers would have if they realized PolitiFact is using two different definitions for the same rating.  I don't expect you to answer them for my sake (not that I would mind if you did). 

Good luck to all sorting this one out.

The eventual remedy is apparently to simply change the longstanding definition at "About PolitiFact" to match the newer one at "Principles of PolitiFact and the Truth-O-Meter" without any fanfare--indeed, without any apparent notice whatsoever.  I detect no admission of error at all and no acknowledgment that PolitiFact changed its standard.

The move seems consistent with the desire of the mainstream press to avoid doing things that "undermine the ability of readers, viewers or listeners to believe what they print or broadcast."

Sadly, I'm not at all surprised.

On the positive side, the definitions are now consistent with one another.

On the negative side, PolitiFact either created a past illusion where Truth-O-Meter ratings used the old system or else created a fresh illusion that past ratings follow the new system.  And went about it in about the least transparent way possible.


Update:

Good luck to PolitiFact retroactively changing the dozens (perhaps hundreds) of places on the Web that republished the original definition of "Half True."

(Clipped from PolitiFact.com; click image for enlarged view)

Contact PolitiFact Wisconsin.  They didn't get the memo yet.  And PolitiFact Texas has the same problem.


It's not the crime, it's the coverup.


Update 2:


It's also worth remembering PolitiFact's agonizing decision to change "Barely True" to "Mostly False."

"It is a change we don't make lightly," wrote Bill Adair.

How do you like that?  A change in the wording of a rating gets a reader survey prior to the change and an article announcing the change.  A change in the definition of a rating--a much more substantial change--gets the swept-under-the-rug treatment.



11/22/11-Added PFB link in update 2-Jeff

"It is a change we don't make lightly"

(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 four years ago, and we were reluctant to tinker with it.

If the powers that be at PolitiFact show such reluctance in making this minor cosmetic change then it sends a strong signal that PolitiFact will remain unwilling to make the substantial changes it would have to make to avoid its ongoing branding as the mainstream cousin to the partisans at Media Matters.

And I can't help but react with a wry smile when PolitiFact makes this change while leaving intact a long-running discrepancy in the descriptions of its ratings.  The "Principles of PolitiFact and the Truth-O-Meter" page describes "Half True" as  "The statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details or takes things out of context."  At "About PolitiFact" another version of "Half True" reads "The statement is accurate but leaves out important details or takes things out of context."

Between the new definition of "Half True" and the change from "Barely True" to "Mostly False" where both have the same definition, which is the more significant change?

But don't look for PolitiFact to reconcile its differing definitions with any fanfare.  There is still a reputation to protect.  Look for PolitiFact to (again) break the pledge it made about what it would do when it makes a mistake:

We strive to make our work completely accurate. When we make a mistake, we correct it and note it on the original item. If the mistake is so significant that it requires us to change the ruling, we will do so.

When PolitiFact makes a mistake

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 unusual near the start of the latter third:

(PolitiFact Editor Bill Adair responds: You're right that we have not always been consistent on our ratings for these types of claims. We've developed a new principle that is reflected in the Axelrod ruling and should be our policy from now on. The principle is that statistical claims that include blame or credit like this one will be treated as compound statements, so our rating will reflect 1) the relative accuracy of the numbers and 2) whether the person is truly responsible for the statistic.)

If an admission of the inconsistent application of standards is not an admission of error then what is it?  Yet something tells us that Adair and company will not venture into the PolitiFact archives in an effort to apply this "new principle." 

The supposed "new principle" is actually an old principle inconsistently applied.  Adair himself described it in a story called "Numbers game" back in 2008:

To assess the truth for a numbers claim, the biggest factor is the underlying message.

When an ad says "Governor X was in charge while the state lost 10,000 jobs" it is sending the message that the governor was responsible.  It's not rocket science.  But now we get a "new principle."  And you folks who got burned from the failure to apply that principle?  Tough luck, most likely.  It would not look good for PolitiFact to put correction notices on any substantial number of fact check items.  Plus somebody might notice that one party received more harm than the other based on which stories received a correction.

Let's not go there.

In truth, admitting the need for a "new standard" by itself serves as an admission of one of the problems of subjectivity PFB was created to expose. If PolitiFact improves its performance then we accomplish part of our mission. Unfortunately we have little reason to expect any improvement at PolitiFact. After all, the "new standard" is really a restatement of a standard Adair proclaimed in 2008.

While PolitiFact and Adair tease us with the promise of new appropriate rating standards, we get another fact check like this one.  Try to find any mention of the underlying point.

Hurray for the new standard.

PolitiGaffe: Of barrels and gallons

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 barrels a day in the Gulf of Mexico would mean an additional 130,000 gallons a day from imports." (Emphasis added is mine.) Notice, you cannot replace a barrel of oil with a gallon of oil! Please, before you show disrespect for a person, please make sure that you have all of the "PolitiFact"s correct, otherwise it just another example of media bias without cleaning up after yourself.

That's a good catch--130,000 barrels a day means 130,000 gallons per day to make it up in imports? And while that may seem like an easy gaffe to make, remember that the underlying PolitiFact article hinged on Palin's use of the word "day" versus "year".

The PolitiFact story now reads "barrels" in both instances.  Perhaps "oregondriver" was mistaken?

Not according to Google cache (click to enlarge; highlights are a product of the phrase-specific search):

PolitiFact made no mistake, however.  We know this because when PolitiFact makes a mistake they correct it and place an editor's note in the story:

When we find we've made a mistake, we correct the mistake.

• In the case of a factual error, an editor's note will be added and labeled "CORRECTION" explaining how the article has been changed.
• In the case of clarifications or updates, an editor's note will be added and labeled "UPDATE" explaining how the article has been changed.
• If the mistake is significant, we will reconvene the three-editor panel. If there is a new ruling, we will rewrite the item and put the correction at the top indicating how it's been changed.

With no such editor's note inserted into the article, we know PolitiFact is above the type of honest mistakes and "gotcha"-type flubs they chronicle.


Note: Bryan deserves credit for the research and the bulk of the writing for this post-Jeff
Update 6/10/11: Added day/year clarification in second paragraph-Jeff

James Wigderson: "We rate it a full flip for Politifact"

Wisconsin's James Wigderson serves up a potent shot at PolitiFact at his Library and Pub.  After noting PF's correction of a "Flip-O-Meter" piece offered no hint of the rationale for changing the rating, Wigderson makes a helpful recommendation:

Perhaps after reversing this Politifact review the newspaper will take the opportunity to look back at some of the other “Politifacts” to test their accuracy. Some of them, written about candidates on both sides of the aisle, were just awful examples of bias. (The Politifacts on Charlie Sykes and Jim Sullivan spring to mind.)

PolitiFact's penchant for stuffing failed stories down the memory hole represents a disturbing trend for an outfit that is already stingy with its transparency.  In the midst of 2010 PolitiFact revised a flawed story but kept the old version archived.  That seems better in terms of transparency.  Was it a change of policy or the same old chaos we're accustomed to seeing from PolitiFact?

Do stop by Wigderson's Library and Pub to savor the entire (brief) post.