Tchotchkes: Roasted Lame Duck a l'Obama

Tchotchkes: What's under the Xmas Tree This Year?

Sidebar: Facebook PolitiFact Page Commenter of the Year (or maybe All Time?)

It’s probably very clear to most of my readers that the reason I started this blog was to counter Bryan White’s blog Sublime Bloviations. It even bothers me a bit because I don’t want anyone to think I’m obsessed with the fellow, I mean, I don’t even know him…he kind of hides under a rock. But he’s just a great antagonist that provides a lot of material for me to work with.

A lot of other Facebook commenters at the PolitiFact page argue a lot with Bryan and often say (much better) what I am thinking when I read them, or in some of the things I have said in this blog. So, here here are seven examples of people who have gone to the ropes in Facebook PolitiFact Page commentary with Bryan in the past year—are they all saying something similar? “Making [a] bunch of statements to look smart… he [Bryan] constantly talk[s] nonsense to me” (Kevin Park to Bryan); “Rational debate is impossible with the methods you use” (Kirk Klingbiel to Bryan); “Stop playing games parsing a handful of sentences” (Todd Ferguson to Bryan); “You wander off point and I can't figure if you do it purposely” (Bob Brown to Bryan); “Saying things over & over, asking for examples when the examples were already very clear to anyone else reading this, & long winded empty worded responses” (Dan Favero to Bryan); “If you could learn to get over this habit you have of mentally deleting what is inconvenient to your warped perspective” (Jim Bleikamp to Bryan) and finally “Great job of mischaracterization …. you make up what the other side is saying and then you refute it.......” (Garret Fitzgerald to Bryan).

Most of these statements were chosen on the basis of their not being “name-calling”—they are statements expressing what they think of what Bryan’s doing in his verbal exchanges within the comment threads. Nonsense, “irrational” debate, parsing sentences, wondering off point, long-winded empty worded responses, mentally deleting what is inconvenient, mischaracterization. When you read more of the comments below, you will see more overlap between posters making similar contentions about Bryan’s debate methods.

Lil White Lies: The return of Vince and Jules

Well, why did it NOT surprise me to find that Bryan White’s most ardent admirer gave his predictable slobbering approval to Bryan’s review of PolitiFact’s supposed “horrible work”(its recent "Lie of the Year" on the so-called "government take over of healthcare" in the 2010 healthcare reform)--

AFTER HOURS: As usual, Bryan White at Sublime Bloviations does a superb job addressing even more problems with the Politifact piece.

Best line:

"If dissatisfaction with the health care plan was such a big factor in the November elections then perhaps PolitiFact could have found a "Lie of the Year" that Democrats would be able to run on the passage of health care reform and/or keep control of the House of Representatives."

Oh that self-congratulatory let’s-pat-ourselves-on-the-back-over-and-over smugness raises its ugly head again! So….can either Jeff or Bryan find such a lie? Got any examples? I mean, it should be easy….shouldn’t it? Bryan does something here he accuses PolitiFact of, claiming it’s “an inaccurate claim…which suggests evidence will follow” and then not having any such evidence except to quote a survey from Bloomberg where the margin of error is enough to take the legs out of it.

Lil White Lies: Refudiating the Strategery of Takeoverism (Updated)

“The healthcare reform bill now includes a tanning booth tax of 10 percent. You know what this means? This whole thing could be funded by the cast of ‘Jersey Shore.’” – Jay Leno

“In Washington, it looks like the Senate is almost done with the healthcare bill. Otherwise known as the Joe Lieberman Insurance Company Preservation Act.” – Jay Leno

PolitiFact’s “Lie of the Year”—that the healthcare reform passed in March constituted a “government take over” of healthcare—received an ambitious, derogatory (as usual) 3,000+ word review from my conservative counterpart, Bryan White, proclaiming it “a case study in disinformation” highlighted by “opinion-drenched news analysis.”

But what is precisely meant by “government take-over” according to PolitiFact? Bryan dismissed PolitiFact’s evidence with “PolitiFact has no fact-based case for the importance of its chosen ‘Lie of the Year’”, but never really provided his own, instead, offering his own opinion: “The claim that increased government control does not constitute a government takeover amounts to Reinhardt's opinion” or “Private insurance will come under greater government control through the new legislation, and it is fair to call newly instituted regulatory powers as a taking.” Increased government control as government takeover is opinion, and it’s fair to call new regulatory powers as taking? No, it’s not fair to call new regulatory powers as taking. Takeover is not even a good term for other countries’ healthcare systems regarding the government’s role (although I'd bet Bryan would have you believe all other countries that have universal healthcare have government “takeovers” of it).

Grading PolitiFact *Liberal*-Style: Tax Break Mistakes

When my conservative counterpart *grades* PolitiFact, he occasionally employs his own version of the “slippery slope” analogy, attempting to make it appear a logical explanation for why PolitiFact’s rulings are in error. According to him, if the slippery slope is reasonable in each step of the slope, that makes it a legitimate argument. As I later noted, there should additionally be proof conclusive that these steps are indeed occurring (which in the case of “death panels” was not evident, and so failed the full test of legitimacy).

For this particular ruling on a statement by Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, the same slippery slope rationalization can be applied, and the “reasonableness” badge even more easily awarded. Using Bryan Whites’ own words:

One of the commonsense rules of charitable interpretation involves accepting a reasonable explanation from the person making the statement, at least to the point of granting the explanation the benefit of the doubt in a close contest of most plausible explanations.

Translated: Baffling with bullsh*t is perfectly reasonable! Whatever “plausible explanation” that’s buyable is acceptable. That’s how argument is done in Facebook commentary, so why not the same here.

Tchotchkes: Mid-terms under the Mistletoe

Sidebar: H.R. 8791--U.S. Preparing for Martial Law?

Tchotchkes: Obama must not know Texas Holdem

Grading PolitiFact *Liberal*-Style: Denying the Profiling

This most recent ruling by PolitiFact Florida concerns a remark by Tea Party (supported) incoming congress person Allen West, who as a candidate claimed he had a higher security clearance than the president, and from what I’ve heard is really into interrogation techniques as well. The statement being fact-checked was made by West on NBC's Meet the Press November 21: “after September 11, we had the opportunity with Israel coming and talking to us about improving our security screening procedures, and we turned them down.”

So PolitiFact proved we spoke with the Israelis about their security system, but could not pin down that we “turned them down” and ruled the statement Half True.

“Turning them down” implies that the Israeli’s made some sort of recommendation or request that required a yes or no—in order to “turn it down”. The fact is, however, that the U.S. was well aware of how Israel handled its airport security and weren’t required to turn them down—they could not use the major part of their system to begin with, because one factor made it too “objectionable” to Americans:

Tchotchkes: A Cartoon targeting PolitiFact's "Obameter"?

Sidebar: Blog Poll Results Oct.-Nov., 2010

The question for this most recent poll was: If a person said about you “I don't take (you) as an idiot overall. On the contrary (you) just act like an idiot on occasion.” Would you consider this a form of “ad hominem” attack or personal disparagement?

The choices were four (4): (1) Yes, both, (2) No, neither, or (3) one (an ad hominem attack but not personal disparagement) or the other (4) (personal disparagement but not ad hominem attack). The vote was unanimous: everyone voted for Number One, which was an evident choice. Admission: at least seven of the 15 votes polled were from friends and relatives who I asked to take the poll (and one from me), and I recommended they choose Number 1 (both). So, almost half the poll was rigged, ha ha! But they did not have to pick that choice and they all agreed with me as to the correct response.

Background of this question: Someone in their other (secret?) blog actually said this about me. On another occasion they argued that I didn’t know that ad hominem was not personal disparagement. This is to show that MOST people understand ad hominem as being personal disparagement directed toward whoever they are countering.  It can't be parsed.

One of my respondents said the poll seemed kind of stupid, and I have to say, yes, it was a no-brainer. It was just to show that going to these lengths just to argue, or try to show someone is wrong (according to them), is in itself kind of stupid…and what it says about the person doing it.

Grading PolitiFact *Liberal*-Style: Steele-ing a Half True from PolitiFact

According to the website Fivethirtyeight,  Sharron Angle and Ken Buck were on course to win as senators in their respective states. Mike Castle was supposedly a solid shoe-in for the Delaware general election over the Democrat, had not Christine O’Donnell upset him in the primaries. But because of tea party extremism (which should probably more appropriately be called Republican extremism), the Republican Party only won the House of Representatives and lost the Senate in the 2010 midterm elections; in otherwords, they should have won both houses -- if Michael Steele had managed the tea party side of the Republican Party correctly, particularly in Nevada, Colorado and Delaware.

That is why this PolitiFact (PF) ruling on a statement by Michael Steele on having "won more elections than any chairman since 1938" merits attention.

In addition, there is Steele’s kowtowing to Rush Limbaugh and what Rush had to say about him, shortly after Steele became chairman of the RNC. (emphasis added):

On March 1, 2009 in response to a question on CBS's Face the Nation as to who spoke for the Republican Party, President Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said it was Rush Limbaugh because "whenever a Republican criticizes [Limbaugh], they have to run back and apologize to him, and say they were misunderstood. He is the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party. And he has been upfront about what he views, and hasn't stepped back from that, which is he hopes for [President Obama's] failure. He said it. And I compliment him for his honesty, but that's their philosophy that is enunciated by Rush Limbaugh."[46][47][48]

In remarks aired by the CNN program D.L. Hughley Breaks the News on March 1, 2009, Steele said he, rather than Limbaugh, is "the de facto leader of the Republican Party. Rush Limbaugh is an entertainer. Rush Limbaugh's whole thing is entertainment. Yes, it is incendiary. Yes, it is ugly." On March 2, 2009 Limbaugh said on his radio show that Steele is not fit to lead the Republican Party, asking of him "Why do you claim to lead the Republican Party when you seem obsessed with seeing to it President Obama succeeds?"[49] After the show Steele called Limbaugh to apologize, saying "I have enormous respect for Rush Limbaugh. I was maybe a little bit inarticulate. There was no attempt on my part to diminish his voice or his leadership. I went back at that tape and I realized words that I said weren't what I was thinking. It was one of those things where I thinking I was saying one thing, and it came out differently. What I was trying to say was a lot of people want to make Rush the scapegoat, the bogeyman, and he's not."[50] Steele later issued another statement to say that Limbaugh "is a national conservative leader, and in no way do I want to diminish his voice. I truly apologize."[51]

Tchotchkes: That Sticky Wiki (Updated 2X)

Note: I don’t know if I agree with this cartoon, because I believe that exposure of confidential information can put individuals in danger. This Assange guy is from Rupert Murdock country, and my solution would be to start a “Aussi-Ass-Leak” website disclosing everything personal about Assange. Like his birthday (7-3-71), Aussie version of his social security number, his credit card numbers along with their expiration dates and three digit codes on the back, medical records, and best of all, photo-shopped pics of his teeny tiny private parts. And when he complains say “Hey, now you know how it feels. How do YOU like it??????” Hack that, Julian.

Tuesday, December 14:  Here is another take on it.

Tchotchkes: Spreading Christmas Holiday Hate

Somebody named Mark in Hayden, Idaho, made up this snowman with a noose...he's also displayed Aryan Nation and SS flags, and passed out bullets at Halloween.

I think it's safe to say he didn't vote for Obama; in fact I'd bet he might even be in the Tea Party!

Tchotchkes: Atlas Ducked

For all you Ayn Rand Libertarians, Rand Paul fans and Jeff Dyberg types out there.

Lil White Lies: Explain (before you Express) Yourself

When I first began my Politi-Psychotic posts, I realized that there were some journalistic rules that should be followed, to provide an appropriate framework and order for readers to understand what I was talking about. For example, putting a cropped screenprint of the actual graphic of the PolitiFact ruling at the top of the post. Even my tables breaking down Bryan White’s Grading PolitiFact critiques are part of this; providing a link to the PolitiFact article, identifying who wrote it, etc.

Sometimes the way I might do a post is to find some links, write some comments, and then try to connect the dots to tie it all together. Sometimes I give up because it doesn’t tie together very well, and looks too disjointed. Sometimes, I do my best with it and publish it anyway, especially if I know I’ve adequately addressed the crux of whatever I am writing about.

This recent post by Bryan on a ruling by PolitiFact Virginia exemplifies that point. But it’s not Bryan I’m talking about. The writer/researcher, Warren Fiske, needed to provide more explanation. Some of the writing seemed disjointed. Unfortunately, it provided a veritable feast of errors and slips and omissions for which Bryan White made a proverbial glutton of himself. In doing so however, Bryan missed the heart of the ruling itself, and appeared to shoot himself in the foot with his reliance on boilerplate Republican talking points.

So let’s take a hard look at Bryan’s laundry list of the God "awful journalism" (quoting him) of this particular ruling by PolitiFact:

Grading PolitiFact *Liberal*-Style: John Boehner and Finance Reform

In the “Lil White Lies” category, I have been giving structured criticisms of another person’s criticisms of PolitiFact’s ruling write-ups. The assumption is that the purpose of these criticisms (being critiqued), blogged in a very professional style by a conservative, of what he has asserted many times is a liberally biased fact-checking website, helps prove anecdotally its liberal bias.

But perhaps a different approach is warranted. That approach is to use the identical logic to prove what could be conservative bias on the part of PolitiFact. What does that prove? This is what the critiqued critic, Bryan White, might say, coming directly from a comment he posted at the PolitiFact Facebook page very recently (emphasis added):

@ Carol Ahrens, who wrote:

***Politifact is doing a great job! why else would both sides be accusing them of bias?!***

Well, both sides *could* accuse them of bias because they make mistakes--mistakes that sometimes favor one side and sometimes favor the other. But if you throw logic entirely out the window then I guess you can conclude that criticism from both sides simply means that PolitiFact does a great job.

(November 28, approx. noon EST)

Of course, Bryan fails to explain or elaborate (which is typical of his commentary) on “throwing logic entirely out of the window” except to take a jab at Carol Ahrens by implying she is not thinking logically.

Politi-Score: Elections 2010 Final Observations

There are some who claim that my Politi-Score is far too generalizing, and there’s some truth to that, particularly from an individual viewpoint. Bryan White has recently written that unfortunately, PolitiFact (PF) does not include a “Disclaimer: These ratings should not be taken as a reliable guide to the subject's truthfulness.” Perhaps I should be including that in my Politi-Score.  As Bryan stated:

Many are tempted to look at the collected data and draw ill-founded conclusions, perhaps like "Kay Bailey Hutchison is just as likely to lie as to tell the truth!"

If this is true, then I would point out that Obama  received 268 PF rulings as of November 1, the largest number of all, and my Politi-Score says the same about him—he averages just over Half True, which means he, like Kay Bailey Hutchinson, is just as likely to lie as to tell the truth. It seems the higher the number of rulings for an individual, the more the Truth-o-meter as an average (Politi-Score) becomes a generalizing, middling, gray, almost equivocating measure, and basically doesn’t tell you much.

On the other hand, I think an example supporting “a reliable guide to” individual truthfulness might be his favorite anecdotal example of PolitiFact’s bias, Michele Bachmann. While I have found that PolitiFact has eased up on the "snark" factor he has so lamented since late 2009, she still is the biggest liar with pants on fire (has the lowest Politi-Score) among those individuals with a large number of rulings, whether by selection bias or not. Often her statements are re-confirmed as false or misrepresentations by more objective sources such as Factcheck.org. Now I wonder, after looking at the infant state-by-state ruling compilations, that if there was a Republican or Independent-leaning “PolitiFact Minnesota” Bachmann might get a fairer shake. In the meantime, yes, she looks to be a “chronic liar”….although it doesn’t seem to bother her constituency, since she keeps getting re-elected.

Politi-Score: Elections 2010 Part Four

Data Analysis by News Source (State)

When compiling the data for this Politi-Score analysis through PolitiFact, I found that the “national” rulings page did not include those of the states. Therefore I had to go through each of the states’ rulings as well (which took a while!). I decided to include state affiliation in the data compilation because I wondered what the “political leanings” (and its affect on the rulings) of these other newspapers were as compared to the St. Petersburg Times, which is often accused of liberal bias by its detractors on the Facebook page.

To get a feel on their political leanings, I looked at who they recently endorsed politically, particularly for president in the last two election cycles. The following table shows the results: some blue (Democrat), one red (Republican), and some mixed (purple).

Location	Newpaper(s)	Endorsements
National	St. Petersburg Times	Obama (08); Kerry (04)
Florida	St. Petersburg Times/Miami Herald	Obama (08); Kerry (04); Miami Herald endorsed Marco Rubio (R) for Senate & Sink (D) for Gov. (10)
Georgia	Atlanta Journal-Constitution	Obama (08); Kerry (04)
Ohio	Cleveland Plain Dealer	Obama (08); no one endorsed 2004; Kasich (R ) for Gov. (10)
Oregon	The Oregonian	Obama (08); Kerry (04)
Rhode Island	Providence Journal	Obama (08); Bush (04)
Texas	Austin American-Statesman	Obama (08); Bush (04)
Virginia	Richmond Times Dispatch	McCain (08); Bush (04)
Wisconsin	Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel	Obama (08); no one endorsed 2004; Walker (R ) for gov. and Feingold (D) for Senate (10)

Politi-Score: Elections 2010 Part Three

Data Analysis excluding Organizations, Blogs and Chain e-Mails

In this analysis, the lower overall ratings of organizations, bloggers and chain e-mails were removed from the Politi-Score averages to see what effect it would have between Republicans and Democrats. When PolitiFact made a Facebook request early in the election season for more liberal chain e-mails from its fan base, I thought perhaps there were a lot more right-wing e-mails, and that this might weigh the averages down for the Republicans thereby favoring the Democrats , since the blogs, etc., have already been found to be, on average, less truthful than the candidates themselves. But as noted in the previous analysis, the patterns were comparable, and although there were more right or Republican rulings, they weren’t enough in number, not too unfairly balanced with the Democrats (43 Republican versus 34 Democrat rulings), and their pants weren’t on fire enough, so to speak, to move the Politi-Score up substantially for the Republicans. In fact, the effect was almost nil, overall raising the "truthiness" scores for each party roughly five percent, using the wide measure. It was a miniscule under-one-percent using my previous grading scale.

Note:  There were twenty additional rulings which could not be identified with either party.  They were included in the total average (#Rulings and Overall columns) but are not broken down.

So far, similar pattern. Looking at the news sources (PolitiFact states) might yield more results worthy of note. That’s next. 

Tchotchkes: Just in Time for Thanksgiving

Lil White Lies: How to Blow Up Blowing It (!)

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I’ve called Bryan White the Word Warden…..I’ve joked about his always having to have “more cowbell”—I’ve written about his “monolithic certitude”—but this one really takes the cake. Well, it just keeps confirming everything, in one orgy of narcissistic, unbending, not-so sublime bloviations.  I’m sure Bryan's aware of what happens when someone submits posts on Facebook; he’s “sharing” them.

Facebook Statement of Rights and Responsiblities: ...

This Statement of Rights and Responsibilities ("Statement") derives from the Facebook Principles, and governs our relationship with users and others who interact with Facebook. By using or accessing Facebook, you agree to this Statement.  ...

Sharing Your Content and Information

...

2.  When you publish content or information using the "everyone" setting, it means that you are allowing everyone, including people off of Facebook, to access and use that information, and to associate it with you (i.e., your name and profile picture).

When writing opinion letters to the editor of a newspaper in anticipation of their possibly being published, I assume that most all of them will tell you that your letter becomes its property and “may be edited”—

All submissions become the property of The Flint Journal; submissions may be edited and may be published or otherwise re-used in any medium.

So recently PolitiFact issued one of its occasional “mailbag” pieces, publishing comments from its Facebook fans and e-mailers, and entitled it “PolitiFact blew it again!” in what appeared to be a partial quote of a Facebook comment posted by Bryan. Of course, when he saw this he immediately went ape sh*t crazy over the fact that PolitiFact had “grafted an exclamation point on the end.”

Tchotchkes: Proposed TSA Checkpoint Sign

Politi-Score: Elections 2010 Part Two

Data Analysis of Organizations, Bloggers and Chain e-Mails

Imagine this conversation in a Bill Adair PolitiFact Staff meeting circa late August this year: “Now this is how I want our rulings to work on anyone other than the candidates for the upcoming campaign season….they should be about 20 percent of all rulings..and try to keep it equal between the Republicans and Democrats if you can. Overall, they should probably be less truthful than the candidates, so don’t be surprised if you have a lot of Pants on Fire……hmmm…. maybe 3/8 False and Pants on Fire, about half in the middle, and the rest True or Mostly True?” Well, I can imagine him making every part of that statement (to get to an ultimate "Barely True") except the last one, after the thoughtful “hmmm.” 

At least that’s how it worked out, almost with an uncanny precision: Of the 414 PolitiFact rulings posted between September 1 and November 1, 80 of them, about 20%, were by organizations (ranging from Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS to “Blue Oregon”), blogs (one simply called “Bloggers”), and chain e-mails (one also simply called “chain emails”). A little over half were from Republican groups. Ten percent of the rulings were equally divided between True or Mostly True, 52.5% were equally divided Half True or Barely True, and the rest (3/8 or 37.5%) equally divided between False and Pants on Fire.

Tchotchkes: Variations on Lisa Murkowski's Name

Lil White Lies: Parsing Ponzi 2.0

Well here we go again with the social security system as a Ponzi, this time with Texas Governor Rick Perry of the “secessionist crowd”, just after PolitiFact scored him on his most recent book's tales of the indescribable horrors of the government holding a gun to your head and forcing you to buy a more efficient light bulb.

Social Security has a single similarity in common to Ponzi schemes: that is the “pay-go” or “zero balance” (ZBA) feature. As noted in the PolitiFact piece, many other journalists and pundits point to that single “Ponzi” identifier (emphasis added);

In a December 1995 op-ed article for The Washington Post, James K. Glassman (of late, executive director of the George W. Bush Institute at Southern Methodist University) wrote: "Workers think that they are investing for their own accounts, but actually their payroll taxes go straight to current retirees. … In a 1996 article posted on the Slate website, liberal commentator Michael Kinsley agreed that Social Security "is a Ponzi scheme. Payments from later customers finance payouts to earlier customers. The ratio of retirees taking money out to workers putting money in is rising, due to 1) people having fewer children, and 2) people living longer."

The pay-go feature was part of Social Security’s initial setup back in 1935. Other than that, nothing is the same. Consider these three most common “red flags” that a potential investment is a Ponzi scheme other than the fraud component:

Tchotchkes: The Grim Reaper is Here

The last time I discerned the Reaper's presence was two months ago, the last time I saw my father alive, the day before he passed.  As much as I didn't like Cheney's politics, seeing him like this is very sad.  I'd much prefer to see him as his former snarling self.

How Dummies Show Off Their Boehner

Tchotchkes: I voted Republican and all I got was this lousy TEA shirt

Politi-Score: Elections 2010 Part One

Data Averages Overall

PolitiFact (PF) recently published its own evaluation of the recent mid-term election campaign, calling it, in Truth-o-Meter terms, a "Barely True."  So, was it?

Well, a bit of time was spent was going through the ratings one by one from September 1 through November 1 (the day before the election) to see if I could validate Bill Adair's calculations.  My numbers came out a bit different than his.  Since he published his evaluation on October 27, I probably counted additional rulings that slightly changed the percentages that he calculated.  I counted 414 rulings in total.  This was a bit different from the way I had initially surveyed, which was by selecting only those individuals who had over five (5) rulings by going through the list as shown under PF's "People" tab.  This time it was a total cross section of two months of all rulings, including organizations, bloggers and chain e-mails.

The result was an agreement with PolitiFact on "Barely True" in total.  But further dissection of the numbers to divide them between Democrats and Republicans revealed who was, as judged by PolitiFact, more than Barely True.

Tchotchkes: On one Issue, There's Bi-Partisanship

The Vince and Jules of PolitiFact Detractors

Reading Jeff Dyberg’s Bews, News N Vews posts is much easier than Bryan’s dry and detailed Grading PolitiFact or Bashing Blumner blog series. As a Bews (booze) accompaniment, Bryan does twisted pretzels proud while Jeff just goes for simple pretzel sticks with a lot more salt (here's my first post on some of Jeff's commentary). Jeff is so easy, I’m probably only going to do a few more posts on his write-ups, because it’s getting boring already.  One of his particular blog posts stands out, however, because not only does he make his usual feeble, fabricated arguments along with bashing PolitiFact, he uses the post to give free false advertising for Sublime Bloviations.

The subject of Jeff’s post a PolitiFact (PF) ruling on RNC Chairman Michael Steele, where he alleged Obama was a hypocrite when it came to undisclosed foreign campaign contributions:

When President, then candidate, Obama was asked to disclose some of his donors because there was suspicion of their being the foreign source of money into his campaign, they refused to do it. So don't give me this high-and-mighty, holier-than-thou attitude about special interests flooding the political marketplace.

Bryan would call this a classic tu quoque argument (although now that I’ve said this, if he ever reads this, he will disagree just for the sake of disagreeing, and claim it’s some other fallacy). In other words, two wrongs don’t make a right. That certainly doesn’t stop Jeff, but that’s okay, he’s prepared to, in the same way he accused PF, go into *cheerleader* mode to make PolitiFact look like it’s on an underhanded mission to reward Democrats and punish Republicans.

Lil White Lies: One Dim Bulb

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists:

CAFE standards were effective in increasing new car and truck fuel economy by 70 percent between 1975 and 1988. In 2000 alone, CAFE standards saved American consumers $92 billion, reduced oil use by 60 billion gallons of gasoline, and kept 720 million tons of global warming pollution out of our atmosphere.

In terms of light bulbs, there are lots of “Energy Savings” calculators available on line to show you how much you save with the new CFL’s over regular bulbs. I now have, at last count, eight 75-watt CFL bulbs in my home. According to one energy saving calculator available on line, over the life of those bulbs, I’ll get $538 in energy savings, prevent 6,496 pounds of CO2 from being added to the air, which is the same as taking half an average car off the road.

But who cares when it is the equivalent of forcing you to choose what kind of car or, in this case, light bulb to buy, as Bryan White claims in his latest grading of a PolitiFact ruling on a claim made in a book by Texas Governor Rick Perry about the reach of the Federal government extending to telling consumers what kind of light bulbs they can buy.

Sidebar: Sugar in Disguise

It is well known that there are often conflicts in drug maintenance.  I found this out all too well  in the past year as I experienced my father going through failing health, hospice, and finally, in September, myocardial infarction (heart attack) from which he could not be revived.  He was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes (controlled with pills) in 1995; found to have a blood clot in his leg in late 2009 for which he was treated with Cumadin, a blood thinner (which in turn so adversely affected his blood that he quickly went to a Type 1 Diabetic--daily injections).  The prolonged treatments caused him to develop HIT--Heparin Induced Thrombocytopenia, or extremely low blood platelet count, which could not be reversed.   His arms had to be bandaged up from his hands almost to his armpits because the blood pooled under his skin there so severely, which is a typical symptom of leukemia (also stemming from the HIT), for which he was diagnosed in the last two weeks of his life.   Drugs have *contra-indications*--negative side effects, and to be blunt, the Heparin basically slowly killed him.  A friend of mine who does health advocacy told me not long after his death, that he could have been treated with daily aspirin and chelation therapy, which would not have caused thrombocytopenia.  That's what I get for not staying in touch with her, but I don't know if I could have gotten that changed for him.

Lil White Lies: A Review of *Grading PolitiFact* (15 of Them!)

Some time ago, I made a comment on a Facebook PolitiFact page comparing Bryan White’s debate methods to Chinese food. It seems tasty and filling at the time, but a short time later one is hungry and has a headache from all the MSG. His  blog's Grading PolitiFact series has a similar *nutrition.* It sounds good, but later you say to yourself, after thinking about it…"Hey, wait a minute….that isn’t quite right…” and you're feeling a bit empty and kind of sick.

Or you might say, "…something smells here, and I don’t know what it is.” Keeping that *odor* in mind, at this point, 15 of Bryan White’s “Grading PolitiFact” series’ analyses have been evaluated in my blog. I’ve given (most of) them my own grade (I started out with peanuts, but found this much more demonstrative), namely anywhere from one to five of that famous cartoon skunk Pepé LePew. Why Pepé? Because of the strong whiff of Bryan’s personal “selection bias”, the reek of his incredibly subjective opinion passed off as “reason” and “logic”, and the overwhelming stench of his excessive use of logic fallacies. Because once past that, Pepé LePew’s initial charm is understood to only be the bait of the sting.

Out of this fifteen, there have been three cases where I’ve actually agreed with Bryan’s analyses. The best example of the three is a recent PolitiFact (PF) ruling on a statement made by perennial political candidate Christine O’Donnell, the loser in the Delaware senate race, in a debate with Chris Coons, concerning the increase in the unemployment rate in (one county in) Delaware from 2008 to 2010. I agreed with Bryan to the point that I made a comment at PolitiFact’s Facebook Page for this particular ruling, supporting his contention that PF did not thoroughly look at the unemployment statistics. The rate had indeed doubled from 2008 to 2010 as O’Donnell had claimed. It had doubled in the way Bryan had measured it , and in the way I thought it should be measured, which was slightly different than his, and totally different than PolitiFact’s, which was unwittingly (or wittingly? sayeth Bryan) too precise.

Tchotchkes: Sports Edition

Wolverines: 67, Fighting Illini: 65

Judging from the score, I thought this was a basketball game.....

Views Stewd n Skewd

There’s a new and *oh so exciting* link headlined at the Sublime Bloviating blog called Bews News n Vews, just another Blogspot published by *JD* aka Jeff Dyberg, who has partnered up with Bryan White to collectively stew up misrepresentations and aspersions of all things liberal, including even more unremarkable contemplations of their view(s) that PolitiFact is skewered left in its fact-checks.

But before getting to Jeff’s PolitiFact *skewered* left bias allegations, let’s see what I’ve learned about him since observing him debate on the PolitiFact (PF)  Facebook Page. Although he looks like a college-kid-in-his-dorm-room in his avatar, unshaven with that goofy green tuque and yellow T-shirt, he seems to like all things “fifties”—Ayn Rand, Lawrence Welk, and having sex with Golden Girl Blanche. But I’ve witnessed his behaving like a "kid" in one respect—if a debater is too hard on him, for example, PF commenter Garret Fitzgerald, Jeff will rat them to PolitiFact. So go easy on the little guy.

Along with that, he seems to conveniently appear in PolitiFact Facebook threads whenever the tough gets going for Bryan White, or vice versa. It’s “tag-team obfuscation” (as Bryan terms it) at its finest.

Sidebar: Notes on the 2010 Election

U.S. "Personhood" Party:  As I voted yesterday, I noticed a party on my ballot which had candidates in every category, called the U.S. Taxpayers’ Party (USTPM). That day, a friend of mine told me she had voted for their candidates because they actively promoted a “fair and flat tax" on individuals as well as corporations.   I thought I’d look into it, but I found that it appears my friend has the wrong party or has them confused with somebody else. All that the U.S. Taxpayers’ Party of Michigan says with regard to taxes is “The USTPM and the Constitution Party opposes any taxes in excess of the minimum needed to fund the enumerated functions of government.” That’s it--one sentence. But the Constitution Party, with whom the USTPM is affiliated, states with regard to taxes (italics added):

We are opposed to the flat-rate tax, national sales tax, and value added tax proposals that are being promoted as an improvement to the current tax system. The Sixteenth Amendment does not provide authority for an un-apportioned direct tax.

Moreover, it is our intention to replace, with a tariff based revenue system supplemented by excise taxes, the current tax system of the U.S. government (including income taxes, payroll taxes, and estate taxes.)

Tchotchkes: On Voter Enthusiasm This Voting Day

Tchotchkes: Happy Halloween 2010

Sidebar: More on Self Belief

The following quote is about something called self-belief which I posted about earlier: It is from a blog by George Monbiot about Christopher Monckton, a skeptic of global warming:

To dismiss an entire canon of science on the basis of either no evidence or evidence that has already been debunked is to evince an astonishing level of self-belief. It suggests that, by instinct or by birth, you know more about this subject (even if you show no sign of ever having studied it) than the thousands of intelligent people who have spent their lives working on it. Once you have taken that leap of self-belief, once you have arrogated to yourself the authority otherwise vested in science, any faith is then possible. Your own views (and those of the small coterie who share them) become your sole reference points, and are therefore unchallengeable and immutable. You must believe yourself capable of anything. And, in a sense, you probably are.

To be continued.

Tchotchkes: New Design for Secure U.S. Currency?

Lil White Lies: On Boiling Frogs

A poll done last July by the Kaiser Family Foundation on seniors’ view of the new healthcare reform as it relates to Medicare revealed:

…a large shares of seniors mistakenly believe the law includes provisions that cut some previously universal Medicare benefits and creates “death panels.” Half of seniors (50%) say the law will cut benefits that were previously provided to all people on Medicare, and more than a third (36%) incorrectly believe the law will “allow a government panel to make decisions about end-of-life care for people on Medicare.”

This supports Angie Drobnic Holan’s conclusion in her recent PolitiFact ruling on an ad televised by Indiana Republican running for Senator Dan Coats about his opposition Brad Ellsworth : “The ad is capitalizing on confusion about the nature of the Medicare program and making a ridiculous claim.”

Coats makes sure that the mistaken belief found in the Kaiser Poll is perpetuated. And Bryan White is here to explain why it’s not a mistaken belief … and to keep the myth alive about death panels as well. Let's answer a few of the questions Bryan posed in his review:

Mock the Dummies: How To Play Dummies For Fools (Florida Style)

Lil White Lies: Bucking Bias Selection Again!

Lately I’ve been in agreement with more of Bryan White’s PolitiFact analyses. I thought perhaps his “selection bias” might have gotten better, choosing PolitiFact (PF) rulings more carefully, where he stood a better chance of making more substantial counter arguments. But it didn’t take him very long to really politi-flub it up with this recent review on a PF ruling on a statement by Democratic candidate William Bennet about his opponent, Republican Ken Buck, on his position on abortion.

The sublimely bloviating pattern comes up again: parse the statement (to his favor), then argue selection bias. Bryan’s contention is opposition to abortion is not the same as wanting to outlaw it, then follows up with what looks like straw man argument that “it simply isn't realistic to anticipate an abortion ban even if Buck were elected president.”

Bryan frequently faults PolitiFact for “selection bias” in its rulings; certainly, if there’s a defect in the selection method that Bryan can show isn’t valid, he has some room for argument, but there isn’t any to speak of here.

So, did Ken Buck just oppose abortion, or did he want to ban it? For starters, Buck chose not to answer David Gregory’s question in the Meet the Press interview, which was (emphasis added):

Tchotchkes: Pumpkin Carving Time

Artistic carving of Dick Cheney.

Sidebar: Tortilla Trolling

From the What a CROCK Files

When you come across a repeating comment in a thread, it tends to make you wonder if the person posting is "for real" or just a troll. One poster on the PolitiFact Facebook page, by the name of Al Diaz, who I have long thought to be a bit trollish, recently repeated a comment about his heritage. He wants everyone to know, apparently, that poor Al came from an impoverished background, picked himself up by the bootstraps, and now is a successful (Republican, of course).....well, he doesn't say anything about his degree of success here. He just seems to think his meager beginnings somehow allow him to ridicule anyone else for having that infamous "entitlement mentality"--even when the other comments don't even allude to it.

On October 16 he proclaimed: “As you can see, my name shows I am hispanic. I wasn't born in this country. You want to see ...poor people? I'll take you to the mountains of Northern Mexico. You will see what is like to eat rotten beans, old tortillas and animal crackers."

Sidebar: Small Talk at the Tea Party, too!

Click on picture to enlarge for closer viewing.

Tea Party Nationalism is a website which has an extremely interesting, downloadable 94-page study on the origins, history, membership and sources of funds of the Tea Party.  On page 79 it has a breakdown (shown above) by gender of each of the best known tea party factions:  most of these are two thirds for the males too!  What could be going on here?  I thought we were over half the population!

Sidebar: Small Talk

Something I discovered during my 30 years of working among more men than women, is that they are BY FAR bigger gossips than women…contrary to the traditional “women as gossiper” lore.   If I wanted to find out what *dirt* was going on in the office, the go-to person who knew and would be more than happy to tell me, was almost always a male.  That part of my life over, recently I visited a friend who somehow found herself elected president of her 360-unit condo association. As we sat in her living room there was a knock on the door. It was a fellow who regularly ran around the condo grounds, and was coming to report everything he saw. He did that every day, and wasn’t paid or given any other incentive than just to tell my friend who had noisy parties or parked in violation of condo rules, even though the adjacent neighbors made no complaints.  That’s just one more example to show it wasn't just where I had worked.

Sidebar: Vampire Vegetarians

Some PolitiFact commenters who are ardent conservatives like to label all Democrats as having an *entitlement mentality.* I do not believe that. I know more successful business owners who are Democrats and even more life long union members who are Conservatives. One would think it should be the other way around.

I love this toon!

As a committed stock market investor since about 1985, one would think I was Republican. Personally, I could be if the party accepted moderates or socially liberal Republicans. Even now being retired, my 401K, IRA and outside investments have (obviously) become much more….conservative. I still get a lot of emails from different investment websites I’ve (somehow) given my email address to, just to see what they have to say. Many so-called investment advisors put their conservative leanings out there, such as this email from Gary Shilling of Forbes. Nevertheless, they still have compelling things to say.

The sentence that jumped out in this letter was “By 2018, 67.3% of the population will be financially dependent on government.” As of 2007, according to Shilling, 58.2% of “Americans…are dependent on the government for major parts of their income.” Shilling offers no solutions to this criticism, however, only to use it to make the claim he can make me money “hand over fist” with his for-fee-only investment advice…well, as a conservative investor, I’m not touching that.

Sidebar: Bludgeoned by Essay

On Saturday, October 16, PolitiFact posted a TV video being shown by PolitiFact Rhode Island on its Facebook page. The video shows Tim Murphy, the Editor, who said:

“Campaign promises, political attacks—how many times have you heard a politician make a statement and wonder, is that really true? The Providence Journal’s PolitiFact Rhode Island Team will help you find the truth in politics: researching, going to the original sources of claims, and when we are finished, you will know if the political statement is True, Half True, or Positively Ridiculous Pants on Fire. On the record fact-checking from the Providence Journal’s PolitiFact Rhode Island team, see us on line at projo-politifact.com.”

The commentary which followed was some of the best I’ve seen, and of course, there was Bryan White dominating the thread. I put in a few “likes” in (as in the title of this post, from a comment by Cheryl Layos), but this post by him really caught my attention:

Lil White Lies: Double Bubble Bias Trouble

In his latest PolitiFact critique, Bryan White brews up what appears to be a pretty open and shut case about “selection bias” at PolitiFact. In a televised debate, Delaware Democrat Senatorial candidate Chris Coons disagrees with a statement by his opposing Republican candidate Chris O’Donnell that unemployment in New Castle County (one of Delaware’s three counties) has doubled in the last two years. PolitiFact finds that Chris Coons' assertion that it has not doubled is True (despite Bryan’s claims that wasn’t exactly what he said).

But Bryan's words are poisoned with the essence of snark and pinch of paranoia (too many pinches, which almost spoils his brew) towards PolitiFact. “PolitiFact has selection bias on hand to guide us through this difficult process…” “There's nothing wrong with a little garbling, is there?” “Precisely why was the comparison kept to August in the first place? Other than to explicitly benefit Coons, of course.” “Whether by accident or not, PolitiFact cherry-picked to Coons' benefit.”

Tchotchkes: Every Debate with a Creationist Ever

Sidebar: Uh, Hold That Thought (Updated)

In the latest of Bryan White’s Bashing Blumner series, he argued that it was not possible for extremism to be mainstream, because electoral politics “cannot succeed at the national level through the appeal to any brand of extremism which a majority strongly opposes.”  Please see my response in the previous post.

Now, after seeing this post, I’m distinctly getting the impression that he thinks his conservatism is not extreme, and he sees himself in the “mainstream” majority.



Arnold DID follow in steps of Reagan--he exploded government debt.  See link from his name below.



Sidebar: Clone Wars

From the What a CROCK Files

Jeff Dyberg is a regular Facebook PolitiFact (PF) commenter and one of Bryan White’s attack rats (4-b), a more humorous, casual, self-revealing Ayn Rand Libertarian /Objectivist . He seems to appear at opportune times on behalf of Bryan, when he comes up against solid debate opposition in a thread, and often will link to Bryan’s blog in his comments, one time even posting that if you are new to the PF Facebook page, Bryan’s Sublime Bloviations is its “instruction manual.”

A few days ago he made some comments to the effect that PF’s rulings were “inconsistent” on ruling claims that had “No evidence.” However, taking a good look at these rulings, one can see that PF’s conclusions were all reasonable, had some basis in fact, and were not inconsistent.

He first took issue with a Half-True ruling on Obama’s statement that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce was receiving foreign contributions.

Mock the Dummies: Countdown To Judgment Day

More on the beheadings in Arizona (and a humorously honest view of why the governor of Arizona's claims on this are rated "Pants on Fire" by PolitiFact).  To see more Mock the Dummies (or Mock the Dummy!), click here.

Lil White Lies: Those were the Days

Campaign messaging is different today, and Bryan White is here to first explain how it was different prior to this, in another blog entry critical of a recent column by Robyn Blumner :

“Barack Obama rode popular sentiment to his election as president of the United States. Obama ran on the unpopularity of Republicans and a message of bipartisan change that transformed shortly after election day to a message of partisan change.”

Is this a joke?! The Republicans themselves were NOT unpopular, George W. Bush was unpopular. Bryan then implies that Obama changed message from bi-partisan to partisan change once he became president. So, who’s called the Party of NO right now? Well, according to idealist and conservative *Bryan White, always Right*:

“Electoral politics is about forging coalitions. It cannot succeed at the national level through the appeal to any brand of extremism which a majority strongly opposes.”

Mock the Dummies: How To Rally Dummies

Lil White Lies: Parsing Ponzi

The core argument of Bryan White’s analysis of the above PolitiFact "False" ruling (of the statement "Social Security is a Ponzi scheme" by candidate John Loughlin, Republican running for Congress in Rhode Island) is mostly found in these comments:

“Is fraud an absolutely critical component of a Ponzi scheme? The government, as noted above, can compel participation in the program. There's no need to dupe people into participation because they're forced to participate…Fraud is not an essential aspect to the Ponzi scheme. It is an optional element used by entities unable to force participation in their financial/insurance products. Regardless, the government has arguably misled its citizens about the financial soundness of their social insurance program.”

So let’s see if that holds up in court: “…uh, Judge, my client couldn’t force participation in his Ponzi scheme like the government does with social security, so he elected to use the optional element of duping them by promising exorbitant returns....therefore his using the funds for personal purposes, not being up front about the investment, and the plaintiff  losing everything invested, can't be fraud either.”

Sidebar: More Dabbling by O'Donnell

Politi-Score: Suggestions

Recently a commenter named Joanne Libby queried on the Facebook PolitiFact discussion board that she'd "Would like to see a Republican vs. Democrat Scoreboard."  So I commented to her about this blog and my Politi-Score category.  She did the link, and commented to me "I don't get the scoring system - to me it would be 100, 75, 50, 25, 0, -25. Getting 90 for mostly true and 60 for false seems too close for the difference."

I can understand that.  My initial thought was PolitiFact's rulings should be graded the way grades are done the way most of us are familiar with, A-F, with A being 100 points for True (Passed Perfect Score), down to 50 points (less than Flunking) for Pants on Fire.  But Joanne's comments have a point. If you start at 100 points for True, 50 points is "Half True," logically.  She posed a negative number of -25 for Pants on Fire.  So I applied her point system and came up with the following: