Monthly Archive: April 2013

Annenberg Fact Check says Obama beats George W. Bush on jobs.

“Now that we have figures for the full four years of Obama’s first term, a surprising fact emerges: The economy added more jobs during four years under Obama than it did in the entire eight years under Bush.” —Annenberg Fact Check   Summary FactCheck.org closely imitates the methods of a typical misleading political campaign advertisement. The Facts We do not…
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PolitiFact says gun prosecutions didn’t nosedive under President Obama

“Sessions said that Obama “has allowed, each year he’s been here, the prosecutions of gun cases to go down. .. [sic] They’ve declined every year since President Bush left office.” That’s true — but the data covers only the first two years of Obama’s term, and it didn’t nosedive under Obama since it was already a tiny percentage under Bush.”…
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John Boehner and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s survey stats

“Small business owners ‘say the law makes it harder for them to hire new employees.’ ‘77% say the health care law will make coverage for their employees more expensive.’” —Infographic from Rep. John Boehner’s website   Overview Speaker Boehner accurately represents the most recent results of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s small business survey, but we sound a note or…
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Social Security, deficits and the fact checkers

On April 10 we published a fact check of a House Democrat presentation of Social Security, claiming that Social Security has never added so much as a dime to the deficit.  We found the claim false based on the Social Security Administration’s reports of revenue falling short of expenses. We’ve since surveyed the way various mainstream fact checkers treated similar…
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House Democrats say Social Security ‘has paid for itself without adding a single dime to our national deficit,’ now has $2.7 trillion surplus.

“House Democrats stand united to protect and strengthen Social Security today and for future generations, and we will fight any Republican efforts to privatize Social Security.   Although Republicans have proposed “retooling” Social Security in the name of deficit reduction, the facts are clear: the Social Security program is healthy.  Since its inception, Social Security has paid for itself without…
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Correction: The Bureau of Labor Statistics still tracks CPI-E

Contrary to what we stated in our post reviewing AARP’s description of chained CPI, the Bureau of Labor statistics continues to track an experimental version of the consumer price index intended to help account for differences in spending patterns among older Americans. The correction has no impact on the evaluation of the AARP presentation, nor does it affect our statement…
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