An independent experimental fact-checking site, exploring and advocating ways to make fact-checking better.
On Jan. 4, 2016, we sent the following message to PolitiFact Missouri writer Adam Aton. Though we included editor Mike Jenner in the salutation, we neglected to list Jenner as a recipient. Dear Mr. Adam Aton, Mr. Mike Jenner I’m a fact-checking journalist preparing an evaluation of PolitiFact MIssouri’s fact check of Will Kraus. Your fact check faults Kraus for asserting…
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Email interview questions posed to PolitiFact writer Linda Qiu and PolitiFact editor Angie Drobnic Holan through their published email addresses. Note neither replied to the messages, which is common with PolitiFact staffers. If we receive any reply on this subject we will add the reply to this page. Nov. 5, 2015: Dear Linda Qiu, Angie Drobnic Holan, The Facebook version…
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We sought the opinion of Zbiegniew Mazurak on defense issues. Mazurak’s “About Me” page says “I’m a defense analyst with 6 years of experience in the field, specializing in the defense budget, nuclear weapons strategy, and missile defense.” We wanted to see how Mazurak would approach the fact check issue without our leading toward a particular angle. As a follow…
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On July 24, 2015, PolitiFact Wisconsin published a fact check piggybacking on a recent BuzzFeed criticism of a political ad. On July 23, 2015 BuzzFeed published a story about a political ad aired by Restoration PAC in support of the re-election campaign of Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.). The BuzzFeed story, by Ilan Ben-Meir, focused in part on one of the…
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We were not among those who initially discovered Washington MOM had Photoshopped a photograph of White House Press Secretary Jay Carney’s family We felt we could add a bit to the existing analysis of the Photoshop. A Daily Mail analysis claimed to find 12 separate Photoshop edits. Our analysis of the altered photo indicates that a vertical slice (bounded above…
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We were recently reminded of the allegation that tea party members don’t understand that Medicare is a government insurance program. The reminder came with photographic evidence: an early tea party rally featuring a person holding a sign that read “Keep government out of my Medicare! You damn socialists!” The sign didn’t look quite right. Suspecting a Photoshop job, we looked…
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