-
-
Viral Spiral
FactCheck Mailbag
FactCheck Mailbag, Week of May 7-13.
See letters from previous weeks“ Why is that worth noting? Does it change the facts? ” -
-
2012 Players Guide
Author Archives: Lori Robertson
Congress and an Exemption from ‘Obamacare’?
Q: Is it true that there are bills in Congress that would exempt members and their staffs and families from buying into “Obamacare”? A: No. Congress members and staffers will be required to buy insurance through the exchanges on Jan. 1. But reportedly there is concern about whether federal contributions …
More >>
Zuckerberg-backed Group Spins Immigration
A group with ties to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg hijacks the credibility of news organizations in a misleading ad that supports a bipartisan immigration overhaul bill. The ad, featuring Sen. Marco Rubio, attributes several quotes to media outlets, but the quotes come from opinion pieces written by backers of the …
More >>
Posted in The FactCheck Wire
Tagged Americans for a Conservative Direction, immigration, Mark Zuckerberg
Comments Off
Seniors and the Chained CPI
On Connecticut Public Broadcasting, Managing Editor Lori Robertson explains the “chained” Consumer Price Index proposal in President Obama’s budget. Critics of the change in Social Security cost-of-living calculations say seniors’ medical costs cause their cost of living to rise more quickly than that of other consumers. But economists haven’t found …
More >>
NRA Misrepresents Police Survey, Legislation
On the day the Senate voted down a series of gun control bills, the National Rifle Association made false and misleading claims in opposing a measure to expand background checks. Online ads from the NRA wrongly claimed that “80% of police say background checks will have no effect” on violent …
More >>
Health Insurance Premium Spin
A new analysis on the Affordable Care Act prompts Republicans and the White House to trade misleading claims about the law’s impact on insurance premiums. Predictably, one side says they’ll go up; the other says they’ll go down. But both are stretching the facts, just as they’ve been doing since …
More >>
Posted in The FactCheck Wire
Tagged Affordable Care Act, health care, insurance, premiums, White House
Comments Off
Bloomberg’s Obesity Claim
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg told David Letterman that “for the first time in the history of the world, more people will die from overeating than under-eating this year.” After Letterman expressed surprise, Bloomberg added: “It’s all happened in the last 20 years.” So, is obesity going to lead to …
More >>
Palin’s Constitutional Stretch
At the Conservative Political Action Conference, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said that the Senate was “in violation of Article I, Section 9, Clause 7 of our U.S. Constitution” by failing to “pass a budget.” She’s referring to a budget resolution. But that constitutional clause doesn’t mention a budget or …
More >>
Seniors and Video Games
Managing Editor Lori Robertson tells Connecticut Public Broadcasting about House Republicans’ misleading Twitter claims that the Obama administration is spending $1.2 million “paying people to play video games.” The money in question went to university research on how video games can stimulate the cognitive abilities of seniors. For more on …
More >>
FactChecking the GOP Response
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul made misleading or exaggerated claims in their responses to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address. Rubio claimed that the federal health care law was causing people to lose “the health insurance they were happy with,” but that glosses over …
More >>
Posted in The FactCheck Wire
Tagged health care law, Marco Rubio, Obama phone, Rand Paul, SOTU
Comments Off
