And I don't recount this New Non-Partisan study simply to make myself feel good. In fact, I don't feel good about it. I think it's pretty awful that the majority of beliefs, and views, and arguments made by one particular political party in this nation are as fantastically deluded and consistently Flat Out Wrong as they are. I wouldn't mind if we actually had honest and intellectually rigorous debates over the public policy in this nation which would challenge and enrich the arguments and rationale of all involved. We used to have that. It was something.
But apparently in the name of hyper-partisanship we can't have nice things anymore. Now we have to settle for this nonsense.
In their study, 100 statements involving factual claims by Democrats (46 claims) and Republicans (54 claims) were examined, which were fact-checked by PolitiFact.com during the four month period from the start of President Obama’s second term on January 20 through May 22, 2013. In just four months worth of fact checking the GOP was found to be lying the most. Here is what they found:
PolitiFact rated 32% of Republican claims as “false” or “pants on fire,” compared to 11% of Democratic claims – a 3 to 1 margin.
Conversely, Politifact rated 22% of Democratic claims as “entirely true” compared to 11% of Republican claims – a 2 to 1 margin.
A majority of Democratic statements (54%) were rated as mostly or entirely true, compared to only 18% of Republican statements. Conversely, a majority of Republican statements (52%) were rated as mostly or entirely false, compared to only 24% of Democratic statements.
Now of course Republicans and Conservatives will dismiss all this as "Partisan Skewing" because something something Chicago something Annenberg something George Soros or whatever fliberty-gibbet excuse comes to mind fastest.
But even if you take certain amount of skewing as a given, and whose to say that skewing is to the benefit of Democrats, this differential is far more than the reasonable margin of error. It's not a problem in their rounding. The evidence here isn't even that Democrats are always right, and Republicans are always wrong - nobodies perfect - but that the majority of the time Democrats are basing their views on provable facts and Republicans are basing their views on unprovable fantasies and delusion.
That friends, is a problem. A big one. And there's more.
It seems that as the Presidency of Barack Obama has gone on - Republicans have actually grown more and more detached from facts.
Regarding Benghazi, the IRS and the Associated Press, Republicans have continued to fare worse than Democrats, with 60% of their claims rated as false so far this month (May 1 – May 22), compared to 29% of Democratic statements – a 2 to 1 margin.
And perhaps, the article offers, there's a reason for this dramatic difference.
Conservative (not necessarily Republican) thought is wrought with fear and anxiety. Their policy is to attempt to mitigate that without concern for actual accomplishments. They don’t seem to realize that the root fear they harbor is counterproductive. However, we can thank organizations like Politifact and FactCheck.org for keeping them on their feet, and grilling them when it’s necessary.
Yeah, but I don't think Politifact or Factcheck have really been able to make even a small dent in their adamantine anti-fact armor. It's just too hardened. Also I would argue that if there is any skewing going on it's actually the case that both Politifact and Fact check
bend over backwards to appear non-partisan and attribute many truthful Democratic claims as "untruthful" - while granting Republicans claims far more credit than they deserve.
There are many examples, some of whom have been pointed out by Rachel Maddow.
On last night’s program, Maddow examined PolitiFact’s fact-check of Martina Navratilova’s Sunday statement, on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” that “In 29 states in this country, you can still get fired for not just being gay but if your employer thinks that you`re gay, you could still get fired.”
Maddow:
So, the retired tennis lady says that’s true of 29 states. PolitiFact decides to fact check that statement. It finds what she said was true about those 29 states. And so then, PolitiFact, with the name fact in its name, revealed the results of their fact-check of her statement — their statement which they found to be true. They rated her statement: half true, because they checked what they said and found it was true, so then they rated her half true, because they are PolitiFact.
Politifact quibbled with Navratilova's claim because there are some companies, municipalities and government agencies within those 29 states that do offer protections for gay employees as part of their own internal policy. There are also some gender protection provisions within the civil Rights act which
might apply if you want to try a wrongful termination suit after the fact (good luck) - none of which Navratilova was addressing as her statement was made in the context of STATE LAWS. if you don't happen to be a Government employee or work for a company that has a gay friendly internal policy,
You Can be Fired for being Gay and there are
No State Laws in 29 States which would prevent that. If you happen to be one of those people, that fact is a lot more than "Half True" for you.
Need another example? Here's one.
Back in early 2012, [Marco] Rubio contended in a speech that the majority of Americans were conservatives. PolitiFact checked polling numbers, only to discover that while a plurality of Americans saw themselves as conservatives, “they don’t cross the 50 percent threshold.” The ruling? “Mostly True.” (PolitiFact later revised it to “Half True”)
Got that? Marco Rubio says the "majority of Americans are Conservative" and Politifact finds this...
For 2011, Gallup found that the largest group of Americans identify as conservative, at 40 percent. Another 35 percent identify as moderate, while 21 percent identify as liberal.
...
More Americans than ever identify as political independents, at 40 percent. Republicans don’t even come in at second -- that would be the Democratic Party, claiming the allegiance of 31 percent of Americans. Republicans get third place, with 27 percent claiming the GOP label.
Only 27% identify as GOP? That's quite a leap to "Mostly True" starting from there.
40% of people being Conservative (including both Dems, Republicans and Independents) is simply not a "Majority". If you combine the moderates and liberals using this strange thing I heard about called - uh - math (35+21=56%), then it would be fair and Totally True to say that the "Majority" are NOT Conservatives, because they're - like - not. But Politifact calls the opposite "Mostly True"? Then "Half True"? It's simply NOT TRUE, not at all.
Yeah...
So the fact is that if there really were any "unskewing" going around - it would, generally speaking, make claims made by Democrats look better than they already do, and Republicans looks worse. And that's starting from "pretty awful" and going down from there.
If you look back on the 271 ‘Pants on Fire’ claims that Politifact has measured since 2007 (the first one was from Joe Biden when he called Bush “brain dead”), 217 of them have been perpetrated by conservatives whether they be from chain emails, Facebook posts, pundits or politicians. They range from chain emails claiming the ACA will question your sex life, to President Obama being a Marxist Muslim.
Republicans have got a problem, a big problem with
Facts. Unfortunately, that's become a problem for the entire Nation. And the World.
Vyan