We welcome all suggestions for fact checks. Some of our fans on the right (we see you @redsteeze @FDRLST) have been urging fact checks of “Biden lies” and so we thought we’d take an opportunity to explains what we think makes for a good fact check….
The best fact checks are pinned on a number, uttered by a politician. We then use that number to dig into policy issues. The last president was rather loquacious, speaking or tweeting without any prior fact checking, and much of it was not worth detailed fact checking….
We rarely fact check statements by PR people like Press Secretaries. We only did that once or twice during Trump and Obama. We have a high bar for such statements because we prefer to pin the Pinocchios on a policy-maker and hold her or her accountable for their words….
We also keep an eye on possible policy flip-flops and inconsistencies. Whether Biden succeeds in getting stimulus checks that amount to $2,000 is too soon to assess…
We have no plans to start a Biden false or misleading claims tracker, just as we had no plans at this point to start a Trump tracker. The constant tweeting of falsehoods forced our hand. But we have an open mind and if the need arises we will consider one….
Here’s what we did when Obama left office. washingtonpost.com/news/fact-chec…
addendum: I was factchecked and it turns out we did 3 fact checks of Spicer. And it looks like 1 of Sarah Sanders. Still, a tiny portion of our fact checks. Maybe it was once a year for the Obama folks too. My favorite: washingtonpost.com/news/fact-chec…
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
