Washington Post Hammers Politifact (Indirectly)

Washington Post Hammers Politifact (Indirectly)

If Rex Nutting wants to embarrass himself shilling for the White House with the absurd claim “Obama’s spending binge never happened,” that’s a problem between him and Market Watch. It becomes a very serious problem, though, when left-wing mainstream media enablers like Politifact use shameless deceit to validate these lies in order to give the media the cover it needs to turn fiction into fact — which is exactly what has happened. With Politifact as cover, both the White House and parts of the media have begun an Orwellian crusade to trumpet Obama’s spend-thrift ways. Today, however, the Washington Post cried foul.

For the record, I detest all media fact checking, and that includes Glenn Kessler’s work at the Post. For anyone, especially the media, to puff themselves up as arbiters of truth is the very antithesis of what journalism should be about. In fact, whenever someone on our side cites a media fact-checker in their own defense, I die a little inside knowing the short-term gain isn’t worth the long-term cost that comes with the validating of such irresponsible partisan hackery.

If, however, these politically craven fact-checkers want to go at one another, I am more than happy to take a side.

Kessler didn’t hit Politifact directly. The media policing the media simply isn’t done. Ultimately, they’re all on the same side. But by extension, the three out of four Pinocchios Kessler awarded to White House spokesman Jay Carney also landed right in the lap of Politifact:

Nutting basically takes much of 2009 out of Obama’s column, saying it was the “the last [year] of George W. Bush’s presidency.” Of course, with the recession crashing down, that’s when federal spending ramped up. The federal fiscal year starts on Oct. 1, so the 2009 fiscal year accounts for about four months of Bush’s presidency and eight of Obama’s.

 In theory, one could claim that the budget was already locked in when Obama took office, but that’s not really the case. Most of the appropriations bills had not been passed, and certainly the stimulus bill was only signed into law after Obama took office.

And finally, Kessler adds:

Politifact might do better next time than cite an article Politifact plucked off the Web, no matter how much it might advance Politifact’s political interests. The data in the article are flawed, and the analysis lacks context — context that could easily could be found in the budget documents released by the White House.

Okay, you caught me, I added “Politifact” to the paragraph above in exchange for references directed at Carney.  But in the end, the rebuke is exactly the same.

Anything that undermines and marginalizes Politifact is a service to America and democracy — even if it is the work of another dishonest MSM “fact” checker.  

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC 

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