Is www.factcheck.org a reliable unbiased site?

[prayin4rain]

Does anybody know?

[stray cat]

1. One of the better sites out there - both sides of the spectrum get mad at them

[prayin4rain]

3. thanks!

I have a lot of republican friends (i live in plano, tx) I honestly feel like if they could really read the truth on their own time... it might AT LEAST get them thinking. But I wanted to check before I publicized the site to them.

[ingac70]

2. No.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200609220002

[prayin4rain]

4. oh :(

[ingac70]

5. When they are biased, it leans right...

like that stuff with George Allen I linked to.

[prayin4rain]

7. Do you know an unbiased factcheck site

that I can sort of direct my friends to?

[stray cat]

8. I still don't know of a better site - like I said no side is totally happy with them

[prayin4rain]

10. yeah....i might have to go with it if i can't find a better one.. thanks again! n/t

[provis99]

6. No. Republican front funded by former Nixon crony Walter Annenberg.

[endthewar]

9. They do assemble good facts, but you should be the ultimate judge on the final veracity.

Doesn't make sense to let someone else think for you, right? I think you'll find that you agree with some of their conclusions and disagree with others. It's more important to understand how they reach them.

[riverdeep]

11. I wouldn't call them purely objective, but they're better than most.

I don't know if there could ever be ONE site you could go to that THE site for truth. There would have to be an amalgam.

I assume you're talking about it because someone directed you to 'clean up' the scandalous rumors about Palin? There's an entire thread about it here. Somewhere in there toward the end I put my take on what it means if everything factcheck is true.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=3953424

On a different note, notice how diligently the news outlets are now about checking facts and going over everything carefully and parsing every word? They let Obama rake over the coals for goddamn months by letting someone make any claim and shrugging their shoulders and saying, 'well, we gave two points of view'. Bastards.

[prayin4rain]

13. i just need a place to tell my friends to go to...

I started graduate school this fall and I just don't have time to research enough to argue with them ALL. As I said earlier, I am a democrat but I live in a very republican area and almost everyone I know is republican (yeah it sucks). I think I would be better off right now finding a site that I could direct them to that would at least give them some facts. Most of them are not stupid just ignorant and I think if they knew some facts they at least wouldn't be so damn arrogant.

[Bob Dobbs]

12. If they ARE reliable then every slam that has been brough out on Palin is WRONG.

So she didn't do any of the things we are claiming?

Somewhat hard to believe.

[riverdeep]

14. They don't address every slam, about five.

Also, most of the claims aren't all right or all wrong. They have quite a bit of truths to them. What they do is set up expectations for terrifyingly outrageous lies, and they only turn out to be lies, or partial truths. Only one of them according the site has total lack of merit, the one about Palin slashing funding.

[wtmusic]

15. They ignore the truth behind the book censorship controversy

and address only lies and distortions.

Fact: Palin asked the Wasilla librarian outright if she "could live with censorship of library books" and "if she would object to censorship, even if people were circling the library in protest about a book".

Nowhere do those verified facts appear on FactCheck.org.

[many a good man]

16. They are probably the most reputable out there

It is run by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. That's the same Annenberg that sponsors many liberal PBS shows like Bill Moyers, Now, and Frontline. Their director, Kathleen Hall Jamieson is a frequent contributor to the Bill Moyers Journal. He has a lot of respect for her.

That said, I still think it is slightly biased against Dems in subtle ways. IMO they exaggerate it when Dems "stretch the truth" a little bit make it sound almost as bad as the Republicans outright lies and distortions. Objectively they get their facts right most of the time but I think their tone is a little deceiving. They also fail to address any criticisms of their sometimes very brief pronouncements.