BNV Kvetchable Moments

A recent post at Jeff Dyberg’s “BewzNewznVewz” (BNV) appears to be another baseless complaint about the PolitiFact (PF) selection machine. He needs to keep his day job as a PolitiFact Bias cheerleader and Facebook whiner (as well as the one where he gets his actual income, if he has one, since probably no one would pay him for this). His post did raise an issue with regard to PolitiFact’s being “forced”  to make the supposedly biased selection of statements in order to avoid "poor reflections on Obama.” He termed it a “teachable moment” of PF’s “subtle bias.” But is it?

As part of those  reflections, it should be noted that Obama has received 50 False and Pants on Fire rulings, 10 full flips, and 41 promises broken on the "Obameter" from PolitiFact.  That's just over 100 poor reflections.

Anyway, Dyberg begins with a listing of PolitiFact’s principles as to how it chooses statements:

Because we can't possibly check all claims, we select the most newsworthy and significant ones…..

In deciding which statements to check, we ask ourselves these questions:

Is the statement rooted in a fact that is verifiable? We don’t check opinions, and we recognize that in the world of speechmaking and political rhetoric, there is license for hyperbole.

Is the statement leaving a particular impression that may be misleading?

Is the statement significant? We avoid minor "gotchas"’ on claims that obviously represent a slip of the tongue.

Is the statement likely to be passed on and repeated by others?

Would a typical person hear or read the statement and wonder: Is that true?

He tries to make a case that recent statements by Dennis Kucinich concerning the constitutionality of Obama’s actions with regard to Libya are so “significant and noteworthy” that they should have been rated for PolitiFact’s Truth-O-Meter.

The issue is that during the same week this rating was published, Kucinich was making the rounds on news networks suggesting President Obama has committed an impeachable offense by launching military strikes in Libya without Congressional approval…

The amount of readers asking if Kucinich was being accurate when he very publicly and repeatedly accused the Commander in Chief of violating the United States Constitution by unilaterally engaging in a very unpopular and violent military action, and therefore may be subject to impeachment, was apparently nil.

The truth is that PolitiFact isn't rating the obvious Kucinich blurb because it would force them to confront an issue that reflects poorly on Obama.

First off, this issue was addressed twice, one of which Dyberg admits to: on March 23 with a “Full Flop” ruling on Obama.  It was also the topic of a ruling of Half True on Charlie Rangel who stated on Fox News “Franklin Roosevelt (was) the last president to come to the Congress to ask for permission to engage into war."

During an April 4, 2011, interview with the Fox Business network, Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., discussed the recent U.S. intervention in Libya with host Andrew Napolitano.

Napolitano introduced Rangel to viewers as "an intellectually honest, progressive member of Congress who believes that we have not followed the law and the moral rules of engagement in Libya."

During the interview, Napolitano asked Rangel, "Have you received a request from the president for authorization to use the military? Have you received a request for the president to bring about regime change? Have you received a request from the president for a declaration of war in Libya?"

Rangel replied, "No. It is true that he did send his Cabinet to brief us as to the reasoning that he made it, but you know, it's three things, the Constitution, the constitution, the constitution. And ever since Franklin Roosevelt, the last president to come to the Congress to ask for permission to engage into war, what I really don't understand … is that when you talk about -- you use the word put our young people in harm's way, what a sacrifice."

Was Franklin Roosevelt really the "last president to come to the Congress to ask for permission to engage into war"?

The answer is -- sort of.

In March, Congressman Anthony Weiner received a PF ruling of Half True which I’d bet would be the same for Dennis Kucinich—on his argument that “Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas must recuse himself from the case challenging the constitutionality of the health care law because his wife, Virginia, made more than $700,000 working for groups that oppose the law.” In other words, PF doesn’t appear to be apprehensive about doing legal issues rulings on Democrats.

Secondly, while Kucinich is a Liberal Democrat, Republicans are bringing up the impeachment of Obama every chance they get, not just for Libya, but for anything else they can think of. ( I’m not talking about birtherism, but yea, on that one too.) And apparently, PF is not checking the Republican’s statements on the same subject either.

Like, Jeffrey Kuhner of the Washington Times on March 24: “… Since entering office, he has engaged in a massive, almost unprecedented power grab. He thinks he is above the law, that he can cavalierly circumvent the limits imposed by the Constitution. Only one remedy will teach him that he cannot do so: impeachment.”

And there’s other constitutional claims, such as DOMA, for which New Gingrich implied Obama could be impeached,  on Fox News in February:

In an interview with Newsmax TV, then-Fox News contributor Newt Gingrich asserted that Obama "is breaking his word to the American people over the Defense of Marriage Act. When the host asked, "Is what he's doing impeachable in your view?" Gingrich replied: "I think that's something you get to much later. But I think clearly it is a dereliction of duty, clearly it is a violation of his constitutional oath, and clearly it is something which cannot be allowed to stand." Gingrich also warned of a "constitutional crisis."

Thirdly and most important, there’s a lot of statements that PolitiFact passes up on (besides those already mentioned above). PF already admits that “[it] can't possibly check all claims.” For example:

Here’s Lou Dobbs and a numbers claim concerning jobs and the economy, which is usually PolitiFact’s favorite fact to check:

Fox Business host Lou Dobbs claimed that "very few jobs have been lost" at the local and state levels in the last few years. In fact, state and local governments have shed more than 500,000 jobs since July 2008 -- while the private sector is in its 12th month of job growth.

Or this very recent (April 12) rich-as-victims claim from Fox N Friends host Brian Kilmeade:

I just want to go through some things. Before people raise taxes on the somewhat so-called fortunate people in this country, because that's how they were labeled over the weekend, let's take a look at this chart: 97.11 percent of the taxes comes from 50 percent of the wage earners. There's a lot of people not paying taxes. And also, about who pays taxes, only 2.7 percent of taxes come from the bottom 50 percent of wage earners. So of course they're not -- the burden's not going to be on them. It's going to be on the people that are paying most of it anyway.

Maybe a "charitable" Half True?

[V]ast Majority Of People Who Escape Federal Income Taxes Still Pay Other Taxes." In an April 7, 2010, article, The Associated Press cited a Tax Policy Center (TPC) statistic finding that "47 percent of tax units [owed] no income tax in 2009," but went on to note: "The vast majority of people who escape federal income taxes still pay other taxes, including federal payroll taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare, and excise taxes on gasoline, aviation, alcohol and cigarettes. Many also pay state or local taxes on sales, income and property.

I think these would be great “False” and “Half True” claims for PolitiFact not to ignore and use to make the Republicans look bad, no?   Maybe these are not significant enough for Jeff.  So how about an even bigger name than Gingrich, Kucinich or Dobbs? How ‘bout Sarah Palin on her Facebook page (3/30): 

It's unbelievable (literally) the rhetoric coming from President Obama today. This is coming from he who is manipulating the U.S. energy supply. President Obama is once again giving lip service to a "new energy proposal"; but let's remember the last time he trotted out a "new energy proposal" -- nearly a year ago to the day. The main difference is today we have $4 a gallon gas in some places in the country. This is no accident. This administration is not a passive observer to the trends that have inflated oil prices to dangerous levels…”

The above was a follow up to a post on March 15, when Palin wrote: "His war on domestic oil and gas exploration and production has caused us pain at the pump, endangered our already sluggish economic recovery, and threatened our national security."

No worry, Factcheck.org answered this one on March 24 while PF ignored it:

Also on imports, Palin claimed in that same March 15 Facebook post that the administration's inaction on drilling permits is "allowing America to remain increasingly dependent on imports from foreign regimes in dangerously unstable parts of the world."…There is no question that the U.S. for a long time has relied on importing oil from dangerously unstable parts of the world. But has Obama allowed us to become "increasingly dependent"? No.

Dyberg states that PolitiFact’s “bias is evident in the specific claims and specific people they choose to rate as well as the things they choose to ignore.” Yet, like Bryan, he has only limited anecdotal evidence. One statement by Dennis Kucinich...for which there's plenty of reason to doubt, as I have shown above, that it is evidence of "subtle bias" by PolitiFact.

Maybe Dyberg should add his little missive to the PFB anecdote-o-meter. If he really wants evidence, he will need to add many, many more.  Good Luck with that.