PolitiFact

A Viral Video About McDonalds Fries Is Completely Wrong

Published by Papa Giorgio

“A very common defect of Russet Burbank potatoes is called net necrosis,” Pollan says in the clip. “And you see potatoes with little brown lines sometimes, or spots that comes through it. Well, McDonald’s won’t buy them if your potatoes have that. And the only way to eliminate that is to eliminate an aphid and the only way to do that is with a pesticide called Monitor that is so toxic that the farmers who grow these potatoes in Idaho won’t venture outside into their fields for five days after they spray.” — Michael Pollan

The only question to ask, is, “is this true?” Or, as a layman — “is there at least some reasonable ‘counter’ to this?” Quickley:

  • Bayer requested the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cancel its product registration of Monitor in 2009, and the U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention said all use ended that September. By the time Pollan gave his talk in 2013, the pesticide hadn’t been used for four years. (POLITIFACT)

I found something:

…. In the comments, people claiming to be potato farmers were quick to point out that this is false information.

“I can confirm this is false information as a farmer in Idaho who grows potatoes,” user Sheena Rush wrote.

Even those who claimed to know McDonals’s potato farmers jumped in.

“My friend grows McDonald’s potatoes in Idaho,” user Bradly Cook wrote. “This is not the case at all.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the use of Monitor insecticide was voluntarily canceled in the U.S. in 2009. This means that it was no longer in use even at the time Pollan gave his lecture.

McGill University also says that Monitor was discontinued by McDonald’s in 2009, writing that “while Pollan doles out the good ‘eat food, mainly plants, not too much’ advice, his attacks on processed foods are, often times, overzealous. Such is the case of Pollan and McDonald’s fries. ….

(DAILY DOT)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Politifact Tells Whoppers! 2012 Lie of the Year

Published by Papa Giorgio

Via Breitbart’s article, “Reuters Debunks Politifact; Fiat Will Build Jeeps in China”

On Sunday, Reuters reported Fiat and Chrysler, which Fiat owns, are on the verge of signing an agreement to produce Jeeps in China, and they may make the announcement as early as Monday at the Detroit Auto Show: 

Italian carmaker Fiat and its U.S. unit Chrysler are set to sign a new agreement with Guangzhou Automobile Group Co to produce the Jeep vehicle for the Chinese market, Il Corriere della Sera said on Sunday.

In an unsourced article, the Corriere said the head of Fiat and Chrysler Sergio Marchionne could announce the agreement at the Detroit auto show, which kicks off on Monday.

Under the agreement, off-road vehicles under the Jeep brand will be produced at GAC’s Canton factory, the paper said.

This report debunks the supposedly neutral fact-checking organization Politifact’s claim that Mitt Romney’s campaign advertisement during the 2012 that alleged Obama sold Chrysler to Italians “who are going to build Jeeps in China” was 2012’s “Lie of the Year.”

Politifact announced that Mitt Romney’s “Jeep” ad was its “2012 Lie of the Year” even though the ad was factually true. 

Romney slightly misspoke on the stump about Fiat’s intention to produce Jeeps in China, but reports about Fiat, which owns Chrysler, building Jeeps in China surfaced as early as 2010. And the campaign ad simply stated: 

Obama took GM and Chrysler into bankruptcy and sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China. Mitt Romney will fight for every American job.

Even liberal publications like Mother Jones and mainstream newspapers like the Washington Post conceded the advertisement was factually true or true on the merits. 

This is not the first time Politifact’s “lie of the year” has been completely debunked after the fact. 

In 2009, Politifact announced that former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s claim about “death panels” in Obamacare was its “Lie of the Year.” After Palin revealed what Rush Limbaugh said was a “hidden truth,” the Obama administration removed the so-called “death panels” from its initial Obamacare bill. And three years later, former Obama adviser Steve Rattner, in a New York Times op-ed, said the country actually needed “death panels” to ration health care.

…read more…

Here are some FACTS about death panels from an older post: Kirsten Powers says in this interview/debate that Bush made this law, Gateway Pundit has this correction:

Republican analyst Matt Schlapp corrected this latest lie [right around the 6:40 mark] by the Obama Administration. Bush vetoed the end of life provision that went into law in 2008.

[….]

RedState has more.

What The Hill’s Jason Millman forgot to mention in his article was that President Bush VETOED the 2008 bill and the Democrats, along with some “good-willed” Republicans OVERRODE Bush’s veto forcing him to sign the legislation into law. The bill dealt with doctors’ reimbursements and more, but the Democrats slipped in the end-of-life planning by opening up the Social Security Act, which I have stated many times is dangerous, because once changed, it is difficult to amend again and allows for tinkering with the Medicare fee schedule and covered services definitions and requirements.

The fact that the Obama Administration claimed that the Bush Administration supported the end of life provision is a complete lie. And, they know it.

`Lies, and Damn Lies!` Politifact Labeled Dem Rhetoric 2011 `Lie of the Year`

Published by Papa Giorgio

Breitbart has a great story that shows that all the rhetoric used over the weekend was Politifacts “Lie of the Year” last year. I have added just a tad to a small portion from it… I suggest reading the whole post at Breitbart.

Politifact, of all places, already dismantled Democrats’ scare tactic rhetoric concerning Medicare, labeling their claims that the GOP would have ended it as “false.” In fact, the very attack that Democrats are using now was branded Politifact’s “Lie of the Year” for 2011.

The Above is Obama’s tweet, below the DNC Chairwoman, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, responds to Wolf Blitzer pointing out the rhetoric in how the Democrats are framing the debate:

Here is GBTV taking on many of the generalizations and specifics in the Democratic attacks:

-And the Lie of the Year is (*drumb roll please*)

Published by Papa Giorgio

Via Gateway Pundit:

The left leaning Politifact released it’s “lie of the year” today. This year the group decided that, “Republicans voted to end Medicare,” was the biggest lie beating out Barack Obama’s laughable line, “We’re better off today than when I took over.” Democrats even made horrible dishonest ads showing Rep. Paul Ryan pushing grandma off a cliff over the lie.

Jon Stewart Is the One Who Is Consistently Wrong

Published by Papa Giorgio

“I’m a comedian first. My comedy is informed by an ideological background, there’s no question about that. But the thing that you will never understand…is that Hollywood, yeah, they’re liberal, but that’s not their primary motivating force. I’m not an activist. I am a comedian.”

Newsbusters has this correction of Jon Stewart:

There are certainly going to be a lot of very disappointed Jon Stewart fans when they hear the fact-checking folks over at PolitiFact found their hero to have been false when he accused Fox News watchers of being “the most consistently misinformed media viewers.”

Before we get there, here’s what NewsBusters’ Rich Noyes wrote on this subject just hours ago:

In his June 19 appearance on Fox News Sunday, Comedy Central’s Daily Show host Jon Stewart fiercely denounced the Fox News Channel as uniquely biased, and slammed those who watch Fox News as “the most consistently misinformed media viewers….Consistently — every poll.”

Unfortunately for Stewart, he was relying on a methodologically-flawed survey from the University of Maryland’s Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) that in December trumpeted how “those who watched Fox News almost daily were significantly more likely than those who never watched it to believe….” and then listed a series of supposedly false statements.

PolitiFact strongly agreed with Noyes:

[W]e have three Pew studies that superficially rank Fox viewers low on the well-informed list, but in several of the surveys, Fox isn’t the lowest, and other general-interest media outlets — such as network news shows, network morning shows and even the other cable news networks — often score similarly low. Meanwhile, particular Fox shows — such as The O’Reilly Factor and Sean Hannity’s show — actually score consistently well, occasionally even outpacing Stewart’s own audience.

Meanwhile, the other set of knowledge surveys, from worldpublicopinion.org, offer mixed support for Stewart. The 2003 survey strikes us as pretty solid, but the 2010 survey has been critiqued for its methodology.

The way Stewart phrased the comment, it’s not enough to show a sliver of evidence that Fox News’ audience is ill-informed. The evidence needs to support the view that the data shows they are “consistently” misinformed — a term he used not once but three times. It’s simply not true that “every poll” shows that result. So we rate his claim False.

………