Fact Checking

Now’s the Time to Take a Stand against Haters

Hatred of any person, especially an entire race, can poison an otherwise healthy mind. Any dialogue about racism is good. My last blog wasn’t specifically about the president, but my references to him were primarily about his failure during this crazy campaign season to stand up against hate groups and white supremacist violence. For the record, my fact-checking confirms three distinct times he did behave presidentially in the aftermaths of two violent events that resulted in the [...]

READ MORE

Looking for Dirty Harry to Make Our Day

If only we could go back to the days when a guy was master of his own man cave. Last week’s blog was supposed to be a take-off of a Dr. Seuss children’s story— “Marvin K. Mooney Won’t You Please Go Now!”— and the talents the president supposedly has that could carry him on to another career and continued fame. Playing off the “please go now” was obviously a satirical device about the upcoming election and, yes, [...]

READ MORE

By |2022-01-24T09:09:57+00:00October 7, 2020|COVID-19, Dirty Harry, Donald Trump, Extremes, Fact Checking, Wild West|

Curbing Bearers of False Witness in Politics

Separate truths keep Americans at odds. I’ve always been a devotee of fact checking, especially in the political climate that has overwhelmed us since the political campaigning that prefaced the 2016 presidential election. It wasn’t just the presidential candidates themselves, but the congressional races where everything was divided into us-versus-them rhetoric and the campaign ads were replete with exaggerations and lies. Social media was a traffic jam of people who didn’t know what they were talking about [...]

READ MORE

Curdling the Milk of Human Kindness

Sometimes it takes some digging to get to the truth I guess you might call this the era of fake news, so our biggest challenge as informed citizens is to get real and not live life like a reality show. It’s about exploiting our biases with adulterated or downright phony stories that get passed along until they amass hundreds of thousands, even millions, of believers. The 21st Century version is nurtured and promulgated by social media and [...]

READ MORE

How Fox Changed the Integrity of Our News

Keeping up with the virus on Fox News. I believe that the public journal is a public trust; that all connected with it are, to the full measure of their responsibility, trustees for the public; that the acceptance of a lesser service than public service is betrayal of this trust… I believe that a journalist should write only what he holds in his heart to be true. — Part of The Journalist’s Creed by Walter Williams (1914) [...]

READ MORE

Drawing Line between Patriotism and Nationalism

When Uncle Sam wants you, make sure history is on your side. I might have to write and run here, because Mary and I will soon be abandoning our cozy little hideaway along the bay front in St. Petersburg, FL. We’re exiting for home in the wee hours tomorrow morning to escape the horrendous traffic through Tampa. Then, after vegging out in Asheville, NC, we’ll embark on a more leisurely drive along about 400 miles of the [...]

READ MORE

By |2022-01-24T09:10:30+00:00February 19, 2020|Baby Boomers, Civil War, Education, Fact Checking, Fairness, History, Patriotism, Slavery, Truth|

Trying to Stem an “Epidemic of Lying”

Staying ignorant of the truth is literally a no-brainer. We live in an epidemic of lying. Research shows that about 60 percent of adults lie at least once in a ten-minute conversation. About 40 percent lie on their resumes, and 90 percent lie on their online dating profiles. — Dr. Amit Sood, Director of Research, Mayo Clinic’s Complementary and Integrative Medicine Program I’ve been thinking a lot lately about why people lie, and why some seem incapable [...]

READ MORE

Fact-Checking More Important Than Ever to Voters

I didn’t get out much the last half of February and much of March so, as I recovered from my surgery. I watched a lot of television, read a lot of news and opinions. Much of it was fueled by people campaigning for president, and its tough to sort through the bombardment so many self-serving lies and exaggerations. It’s as if politics itself has become reality television, which means it isn’t real at all. Two of Donald Trump’s adult [...]

READ MORE

By |2022-01-24T09:10:39+00:00June 8, 2016|Discrimination, Elections, Fact Checking, Fairness, Politics|
Go to Top