FOX biggest liars

[finehoe]

In a post on the scorecards, PunditFact combined ratings of "Mostly False," "False" or "Pants on Fire." Sixty percent of Fox News statements examined by PunditFact fell on this dark side, as did 46 percent of NBC/MSNBC statements and 18 percent of CNN statements.







http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2014/07/08/punditfact-scorecards-show-false-statements-on-fox-news-nbcmsnbc/?hpid=z2

[taylormiller]

Interesting to note that the statements being examined include statements made by guests. I wonder how much of Fox News' falsehoods are attributed to their guests ala Karl Rove, Sarah Palin, Ann Coulter etc.

I'm also curious as to which programs were included for each. Anderson Cooper's AC360, Brian Williams' NBC Nightly News and Bret Baier's Special Report probably didn't have much variance in respect to factual reporting, but when you bring in Rachel Maddow, Wolf Blitzer and Sean Hannity then the numbers absolutely make sense that falsehoods and half-truths run amok.

[taylormiller]

Anderson Cooper's AC360, Brian Williams' NBC Nightly News and Bret Baier's Special Report probably didn't have much variance in respect to factual reporting, but when you bring in Rachel Maddow, Wolf Blitzer and Sean Hannity then the numbers absolutely make sense that falsehoods and half-truths run amok.

for example?

I'm referring primarily to their guests. You usually see AC360, NBC Nightly News and Special Report, often their guests are correspondents doing field reporting (though they occasionally each have idealogical guests) whereas Maddow, Hannity and Wolf frequently have ideologically driven guests such as Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Bill Maher, David Axelrod, Michelle Bachmann, Ann Coulter, etc. You usually don't see those guests on the 7pm slot for these news stations because they are impact guests for ratings on each respective network. That is not to say that the hosts themselves are all dishonest, but each network has a target demographic and guests on each network often have an agenda which is often punditry as opposed to news reporting.

But if you want half-truths in reference to those hosts, Rachel Maddow once reported that an Ohio law that Gov. Kasich signed into law required women who wanted an abortion had to undergo a "mandatory vaginal probe." The law actually does the precise opposite. Her guests are usually idealogues like Maher who aren't beholden to the same reporting ethics as she.
Wolf is usually pretty clean, but he did perpetuate a bit of Palestinian propoganda a few times: once in 2002 and again in 2012. It wasn't so much that he was conciously "lying," rather he was reporting news based on bad intel, the first being the Jenin "massacre" and the other being false outrage of Palestinians over Mitt Romney's commitment to Israel. Again, he's usually pretty clean, but he has guests who he himself routinely calls out for lying.
As for Hannity, there was a report in 2010 having to do with the ACA that examined who would be grandfathered in and how many businesses and individual's coverage would be affected. The report listed numbers, but from those numbers, Hannity reported "the government said small businesses -- 60 percent -- will lose their health care..." While the report cited some statistics, they never made that claim. Mr. Hannity made his own conclusion from the report and cited this conclusion as something the government said. They did not. Many of Hannity's guests, like Coulter, are guilty of spin which causes the fact-checker to nearly explode.

Again, I'm not calling Wolf, Maddow and Hannity outright liars and deceivers, but their respective guests have certain agendas which can muddle truths with half-truths and misrepresentations. Those guests you see on their programs are not routine guests on the networks' 7pm slots.

[taylormiller]

http://www.politifact.com/ohio/statements/2013/jul/09/rachel-maddow/rachel-maddow-says-ohio-budget-includes-requiremen/

The law actually does require an external transabdominal ultrasound, which is quite the opposite of internal probing. Needless to say, it is such a hot-button issue that it's easy to get carried away with calling it other things, as Maddow did calling it a "mandatory vaginal probe," but the fact remains that it is the opposite of a probe, it's completely external. Having said that, such a law could very easily be considered an invasion of privacy. The fact checker referenced here refers to the quote as being "pants on fire," whereas it's more of her exaggerating and getting carried away with a contentious law concering an even more controversial issue.

Its no wonder that people have such weird political ideas when their background of information is so fact free.

Now THAT is true reporting!

[Ocklawaha]

Assuming of course that one trusts PunditFact! I don't trust or watch any of the above, not due to lies, but due to spin.

Conservative (BUSINESS) magazines - 'The presidents children have armed protection in school, shouldn't we consider finding the money for that, for everyone?'

The View, NBC, etc. - 'Conservatives want to take the armed protection away from presidents kids.'

STUPID! Thus I suggest 'CLICK!'

[spuwho]

They all have issues.

PunditFact: Maddow's Koch Bros. Accusations 'Mostly False'

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/368119/punditfact-maddows-koch-bros-accusations-mostly-false-andrew-johnson

PunditFact, the branch of PolitiFact that checks statements made by political commentators, has rated MSNBC host Rachel Maddow's claim that the Koch brothers are connected to a program to drug-test welfare recipients in the state via a think tank as "mostly false."

Last week, Maddow accused the Koch brothers of pushing the law through their involvement the Florida Foundation for Government Accountability (FFGA), but Powerline's John Hinderaker detailed how the brothers weren't connected at all. They've donated a relatively insigificant amount of money to the State Policy Network, a trade association of think tanks of which FFGA is a member — and from which the FFGA hasn't received funding. The Koch brothers have said they were not even aware of FFGA. Maddow's team barely gave the Kochs any time to comment on the segment prior to airing it, reaching out to them only 45 minutes beforehand.

The fact-checkers also spoke with a Notre Dame professor and nonprofit advocacy expert who said it was "a stretch" to say the Kochs' affiliation with the State Policy Network tied it to FFGA. A Mother Jones journalist who wrote a book on the Kochs echoed those sentiments, saying the link was "tenuous" and that he hadn't seen any evidence suggesting they were linked to the group. PunditFact found other falsehoods in Maddow's claims: For instance, FFGA did not exist until after the drug-testing law was signed, though "it clearly supported the drug-testing law after it passed."

But Maddow has refused to back off her original charges, using time on a follow-up show to object to the brothers' request she correct the record, while promisng her viewers that she takes great care to correct errors. She defiantly rejected a statement from their lawyers about the inaccuracy of her reports, stubbornness that earned her kudos from her left-wing audience. Maddow has highlighted her "devotion to facts that borders on obsessive," but the revelations from PunditFact, Powerline, and others suggest otherwise — at least when it comes to her Koch habit.

[spuwho]

Even PunditFact has had issues defining what is "mostly false" and what is "mostly true". It never ends. So we need a truth checker for the fact checker. All to serve what point?

PunditFact/PolitiFact: Media Bias Strikes Again — At Me

http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/larry-elder/punditfactpolitifact-media-bias-strikes-again-at-me/

When PunditFact — the new offspring from the folks at PolitiFact — contacted me, they wanted sources for "all of the claims" in the following statement I made Nov. 4 on CNN's "Crossfire":

"In 1900, at all three levels of government — federal, state and local — government took less than 10 percent of the American people's money. Now, we're talking about 35 percent, and when you add a dollar value to mandates, we're talking almost 50 percent."

What's the problem? PunditFact rated the statement as "mostly false." For added measure, PunditFact called the assertions "eye-popping."

No, I was not "mostly false." At worst, I was "mostly true." Broken down, "all" of my "claims" consist of three assertions. They are:

1) On size of government in 1900: "Less than 10 percent." PunditFact doesn't bother to even mention their findings on this "claim" — no doubt because the number I gave is accurate. In essence, PunditFact admits I'm right.

2) On amount government now takes: "Now ... 35 percent." PunditFact admits I'm right.

3) On amount government takes at all levels when you "add a dollar value to mandates": I said, "Almost 50 percent." This requires judgment and assignment of value to things that are difficult to quantify. But there is a cost, even by the Elder-was-wrong experts PunditFact cited — and the cost is north of zero.

Yet PunditFact determined that since a) it is difficult to quantify the cost of mandates, and b) experts disagree, my entire statement — all three "eyepopping" assertions — are scored "mostly false"?! This is nonsense.

For added measure, PunditFact quoted one tax professor: "Mr. Elder's statement is too vague to be useful for any purpose other than generating 'hallelujahs!' from the choir he is preaching to." Nice touch.

So I challenged PunditFact on my radio show, and to PunditFact's credit, the editor agreed to an interview. After our interview, I sent him the following letter:

"Thanks again for coming on. You're a stand-up guy.

"I respectfully and formally request that you re-visit your rating — in hopes that I will get a fair one. I made good arguments this evening in our interview — and you knew it.

"My quote consisted of three factual assertions.

"You've admitted that the first two were correct, leaving us with the 'cost' of mandates as our only unresolved issue.

"Katie's letter (Katie Sanders is the reporter who wrote the piece) spoke of fact checking 'all' my 'claims.'

"In the 'mostly false' fact check, you call my assertions — plural — 'eye-popping.' Plural, of course, means you not only found my 'almost 50 percent' claim 'eye-popping,' but you had to have found at least one of my two other assertions 'eye-popping,' as well.

"Katie said 'all,' not 'both.' 'All,' to me, means three claims — not one, not two.

"Two of my 'eye-popping claims' were true, but I still get 'mostly false.'

"You essentially said that it was the most 'eye-popping' of my claims — so you gave it more weight. That is also unfair.

"First, PunditFact switched the goal posts from being concerned about 'all' my assertions, to ignoring the two that check out.

"Second, why do you think the 'almost 50 percent' part was the most 'eye popping' assertion? I don't. I'm willing to bet, as I said in our interview, that Katie was gob-smacked when she heard that in 1900 government took less than 10 percent and now it takes 35 percent! But this 'eye-popping' (and truthful) assertion checks out and gets ignored. Suddenly, you focus only on the 'almost 50 percent' part. Unfair.

"Finally, you say 'you could find no expert' to corroborate the 50 percent number. Really? I offered Grover Norquist's organization, and it assigns an even higher number to the cost of mandates. You rejected that. Nobody at the American Enterprise Institute? Nobody at the libertarian Reason Foundation? Nobody at Heritage? Nobody at the Competitive Enterprise Institute?

"I won't even bring up the lenient grade you gave Ed Schultz when he exaggerated the number of teachers Gov. Chris Christie supposedly 'fired' by over 30 percent — and still got a 'half truth.'

"Soft on lefties, hard on conservatives?

"Please reconsider. I take my credibility quite seriously, and you've slammed my character and integrity. Stuff like this affects one's stature and even career. You should have been more considerate and respectful.

"I treated you with courtesy and respect tonight. I hope you will do likewise.

"Larry."

Media tells us that the lost and "schizophrenic" GOP cannot decide between the tea party and "more mainstream candidates." But if liberal media bias didn't exist, it wouldn't matter whether they nominated Texas' Sen. Ted Cruz or New Jersey's Christie. UCLA Professor Tim Groseclose, author of the media bias book "Left Turn," says that in presidential elections, liberal media bias gives Dems an 8 to 10 point advantage out of the gate. Were the media truly "fair and balanced," the voting electorate, writes Groseclose, would resemble red state Texas.

The old line goes, "You're entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own set of facts. Yet leftwing fact-checkers give us leftwing "facts."

[acme54321]

All to serve what point?

Ego stroking of course!