Q: Is Oklahoma as defiantly conservative as a chain e-mail says? A: The state is one of the most Republican in the nation, but the message exaggerates Oklahoma’s laws on religion, immigration and guns. Click to Read the Full Post Read More →
Q: Was H.R. 1388 passed "behind our backs"? A: This latest e-rumor is a double-header. It recycles one false claim and alludes to another. We’ve debunked both before. Click to Read the Full Post Read More →
Summary There’s no dispute that thousands of handguns, military-style rifles and other firearms are purchased in the U.S. and end up in the hands of Mexican criminals each year. It’s relatively easy to buy such guns legally in Texas and other border states and to smuggle them across. But is it true, as President Obama said, that "[m]ore than 90 percent of the guns recovered in Mexico come from the United States?" Government statistics don’t actually support that claim. The... Click to Read the Full Post
We saw more aggressive fact-checking by journalists in this election than ever before. Unfortunately, as a post-election Annenberg Public Policy Center poll confirms, millions of voters were bamboozled anyway. More than half of U.S. adults (52 percent) said the claim that Sen. Barack Obama’s tax plan would raise taxes on most small businesses is truthful, when in fact only a small percentage would see any increase. More than two in five (42.3 percent) found truth in the claim that Sen. John... Click to Read the Full Post
A new McCain ad, “Original Mavericks,” repeats the claim that Gov. Sarah Palin “stopped the Bridge to Nowhere” last year. We’re here to tell you that no matter how many times she and McCain say it, it’s still misleading. We refer you to our story of last week, GOP Convention Spin, Part II, in which we explain: Congress actually knocked out the earmark for the bridge, which was projected to cost $398 million. The state instead received funds that weren’t... Click to Read the Full Post
