http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/ en-us Copyright 2008 Thu, 07 Feb 2008 06:00:00 -0400 http://www.movabletype.org/?v=3.36 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Even Bill Clinton says, [Hillary] "and John McCain are very close." Don't we need a leader who agrees with conservatives?" --"Very Close," Web ad for Mitt Romney. Mitt Romney has a new ad circulating on the web that attempts to demonstrate that there is not much difference politically between John McCain and Hillary Clinton. The sub-text of the ad, available on YouTube, is that Republican voters should stick with the former Massachusetts governor, as "the full spectrum conservative." The web ad omits a few pertinent areas where McCain and Clinton are poles apart, such as the Iraq war (McCain is ready to stay in Iraq "a hundred years," Clinton wants to start withdrawing troops within 60 days of becoming president) and whether or not to extend the Bush tax cuts (McCain says yes, Clinton says no.) It distorts McCain's positions on other issues as well. Let's look at the http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/02/no_difference_between_clinton.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/02/no_difference_between_clinton.html Ad Watch Thu, 07 Feb 2008 06:00:00 -0400 It was one of the most devastating TV ads of the 2004 presidential campaign. To the tune of the "Blue Danube" waltz, the Democratic candidate was shown tacking his windsurf board left, then right, then left again while an announcer commented sarcastically, "John Kerry, whichever way the wind blows." As the primary season comes to a climax in the 2008 campaign, the two leading GOP candidates are invoking the waltz and windsurfing images to gain some vital last minute traction. John McCain and Mitt Romney have both issued web ads, modeled on the George W. Bush 2004 ad, seeking to pin the "biggest flip-flopper" on their rival and exploit a perceived weakness. Political analysts say that both Romney and McCain are vulnerable to the "flip-flop" charge for different reasons. "Flip-flopper" has become part of Romney's political identity, with the candidate changing positions on such core issues as abortion, gun http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/02/who_is_the_champion_flipfloppe_1.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/02/who_is_the_champion_flipfloppe_1.html Candidate Watch Tue, 05 Feb 2008 06:00:00 -0400 9:30 p.m. Romney and lobbyists Romney says that one reason that he is like Ronald Reagan is that he does not have "lobbyists at every elbow." Well, he has two elbows, and two prominent lobbyists occupying key positions in his campaign. Perhaps the most prominent example of an uber-lobbyist turned Romney adviser is Ronald C. Kaufman, chairman of Dutko Worldwide, one of the leading "government affairs" companies in the country. Then there is Vincent Weber, a founder of the influential Washington consulting firm Clark & Weinstock, whose clients have included Microsoft, Edison Electric, and Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, PhRMA. Weber also serves as Romney's policy chairman. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/gop_debate_jan_30_2008.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/gop_debate_jan_30_2008.html Live Fact Check Wed, 30 Jan 2008 18:08:16 -0400 Palm Beach, FL., Jan. 28, 2008. The McCain energy bill "adds a thousand dollars a year to the cost of fuel and energy for the average Florida household. If you want that kind of liberal democrat course as a senator, then you can vote for him." --Mitt Romney, West Palm Beach, FL., Jan. 28, 2008. During the closing hours of the Florida primary, Mitt Romney pounded John McCain for legislation he has championed in the Senate, including the 2003 McCain-Lieberman energy bill, which was designed to cut back on carbon dioxide emissions in line with the Kyoto treaty. He claimed that the bill would cost the average Florida household of four around $1000 a year in increased energy costs. Romney's $1000 estimate is not supported by the most authoritative government cost-benefit analysis of the original 2003 Climate Stewardship Act promoted by McCain, or subsequent energy bills that are still http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/mitt_pumps_gas.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/mitt_pumps_gas.html Candidate Watch Wed, 30 Jan 2008 06:00:00 -0400 Romney rally, Panama City, FL, Jan. 24 It is an old advertising trick: select a few words from an article by a recognized media outlet and use them to promote your product and denigrate your opponent. Ruthlessly eliminate anything in the article that is at odds with the line that you are peddling. Use the quote to make it appear that the media outlet has endorsed your point of view. The art of the partial or distorted quote is alive and well in the 2008 presidential campaign. I would like to make "Partial Quote Alert" a regular feature of the Fact Checker blog. To get us going, here are some recent examples of the genre from the campaign trail, complete with omitted words (in italics) that provide a rather different spin on the candidate. If you come across more examples, please pass them along, and I will add them http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/partial_quote_alert.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/partial_quote_alert.html Ad Watch Tue, 29 Jan 2008 06:00:00 -0400 Shaking hands in Boca Raton, Fl., Jan. 24, 2008 "Gov. Romney wanted to set a date for withdrawal [from Iraq] similar to what the Democrats are seeking, which would have led to a victory by al Qaeda in my view." --John McCain, rally in Fort Myers, Florida, Jan. 26, 2008. John McCain is trying to shift the debate back to Iraq from the economy. He lumped Mitt Romney with the Democrats, saying, "if we surrender and wave a white flag, like Senator Clinton wants to do, and withdraw, as Governor Romney wanted to do, then there will be chaos, genocide, and the cost of American blood and treasure would be dramatically higher." The former Massachusetts governor has hit back, accusing his rival of "dishonesty," and distorting his position. So who is telling the truth? http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/mccain_attacks_romney_on_iraq.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/mccain_attacks_romney_on_iraq.html Candidate Watch Mon, 28 Jan 2008 06:00:00 -0400 GOP debate in Florida, Jan. 24 Last night's GOP debate from Boca Raton, Florida, was a generally civil affair. The candidates avoided challenging each other's records directly, and did not get involved in factual disputes. Nevertheless, they still made a number of questionable statements, particularly on foreign policy. A sampler: http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/the_gop_debate_in_florida.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/the_gop_debate_in_florida.html Candidate Watch Fri, 25 Jan 2008 12:20:57 -0400 Arriving in Detroit, Jan. 13, 2008. "Governor Romney says he supports the [auto] industry, yet when he was running for the governor of another state he wanted to raise the tax on SUVs." --John McCain, campaigning in Michigan, Jan. 13, 2008. "Absolute nonsense...Senator McCain has abandoned the facts for his own brand of hypocrisy." --Romney spokesman Kevin Madden, responding to McCain, Washington Post, Jan. 14. 2008. With one day to go to the GOP primary in Michigan, Republican candidates are competing against each other to depict themselves as champions of the beleaguered American auto industry. Mitt Romney has accused Sen. John McCain of contributing to the "overregulation" of the industry. But he is on shakier ground when he attempts to fend off charges that he favored higher taxes on gas guzzlers while running for governor of Massachusetts. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/mitts_memory_lapse.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/mitts_memory_lapse.html Candidate Watch Mon, 14 Jan 2008 13:45:28 -0400 GOP presidential debate, Myrtle Beach, S.C., Jan. 10, 2008. "I have created a nine point immigration policy that says there is a 120 day period in which people go to their home country and start the process from the back of the line." --Mike Huckabee, Republican Debate, Myrtle Beach, S.C., Jan. 10, 2008. "Huckabee has a new immigration plan out, and it's way, way better than anyone would have expected from him.". --Mark Krikorian, National Review Online, Dec. 6, 2007. It is hardly surprising that Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington D.C. thinktank, should approve of Mike Huckabee's new immigration plan. Seven of the nine points in the Huckabee plan were copied, in some cases almost verbatim, from a plan that Krikorian outlined nearly three years ago in the National Review. Rather than hammer out its own immigration policy, the cash-starved Huckabee campaign http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/huckabees_cutandpaste_job.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/huckabees_cutandpaste_job.html Candidate Watch Sat, 12 Jan 2008 06:00:00 -0400 Diplomatic reporter Glenn Kessler joined me for a live fact check of Thursday night's Republican debate on Fox News from Myrtle Beach in South Carolina. We were backed up by researcher Alice Crites and editor Tim Curran. This was our second live fact check. We inaugurated this new feature with the back-to-back Republican and Democratic debates from Saint Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., last Saturday. You can read the Saint Anselm transcript here. Since this was a live fact check, we did not issue any definitive rulings. Our aim was more modest--to flag questionable statements and contribute to a more informed discussion. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/live_debate_fact_check_1.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/live_debate_fact_check_1.html Live Fact Check Thu, 10 Jan 2008 19:40:24 -0400 On the campaign trail, N.H. "I don't have years and years of favors to repay, lobbyists who have raised all sorts of money for me." --Mitt Romney, Nashua, N.H., Jan. 7, 2008. Over the last week, Mitt Romney has retooled his campaign to present himself as the outsider who can fix Washington. Borrowing from Barack Obama's winning playbook, he depicts himself as a "change" agent who can go head to head with the insiders. While it is true that he has financed his campaign partly out of the millions he made as a management consultant, it is not true that he has no "favors to repay." In fact, some of his key supporters in his 2008 presidential run happen to be Washington lobbyists. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/lobbyists_for_mitt.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/lobbyists_for_mitt.html Candidate Watch Wed, 09 Jan 2008 06:00:00 -0400 UPDATED Monday 11:30 a.m. I am at Manchester airport, on my way back to Baltimore, after a fascinating four days in the Granite State. I will file a wrapup report tomorrow. There have been lots of statements to fact check, several of which will take a little more time. Here are a couple of quick ones that caught my attention from Clinton's Town Hall meeting in Peterborough and a Mitt Romney "Ask Mitt anything" meeting in Salem. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/offbase_on_nafta_and_hillary_c.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/offbase_on_nafta_and_hillary_c.html Candidate Watch Mon, 07 Jan 2008 18:37:05 -0400 Monday, 9 a.m. I'm still in New Hampshire. Here are a couple more fact checks on Saturday's Republican debate in Manchester that we did not get around to posting in our live debate fact check. I am off to listen to Bill Clinton in Peterborough, and then Mitt Romney this afternoon. "I supported the president and the war before you [Mitt Romney] did. I supported the surge when you didn't". --Mike Huckabee. Huckabee was simply wrong on this, as the Romney campaign was quick to point out. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/nh_one_day_to_go.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/nh_one_day_to_go.html Candidate Watch Sun, 06 Jan 2008 10:36:25 -0400 We assembled a team of crack fact checkers to truth squad the Republican and Democratic debates at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, and call the candidates out for any inaccuracies. Environmental reporter Juliet Eilperin was sitting next to me in the media filing center. She is also an expert on Congress, having covered it all her life. We were joined in Washington by John Solomon, a veteran political reporter for the Associated Press and now the Post, and diplomatic reporter Glenn Kessler. Prior to the foreign policy beat, Glenn covered economics. I was a foreign correspondent for the Post for more than a decade, and also covered education, so I hope we will be able to weigh in quickly on most factual disputes. Backing us up In Washington were ace researcher Alice Crites and editor Steve Ginsberg. Since this was a live fact check, we are not going to issue http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/live_debate_fact_check.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/01/live_debate_fact_check.html Live Fact Check Sat, 05 Jan 2008 22:44:14 -0400 Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Columbia University, September 24, 2007. Winner of the 2007 Pinocchio awards Congratulations to all the contestants for a splendid showing in 2007. The competition for the top places has been intense, but after due consideration, I have finally managed to narrow the field down to the top five fibs in two categories, "Presidential Candidates" and "Best of the Rest." Obviously, many of you will disagree with some of my choices. I have accepted advice from colleagues, friends, and readers but, in the end, this is a selection of personal favorites that makes no pretense to scientific accuracy. In the "Presidential Candidates" category, I am also handing out a special Geppetto truth-telling award. For a year-end wrapup on the "Fibs of 2007," see my front-page article in Sunday's WaPo here, accompanied by this graphic. On to 2008! Keep those suggestions coming. A Happy New Year to all. http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2007/12/the_pinocchio_2007_awards.html http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2007/12/the_pinocchio_2007_awards.html Candidate Watch Mon, 31 Dec 2007 06:00:00 -0400