Matt Porter, Broadcast and Digital Journalism Grad Student '12, The Newhouse School at Syracuse University
The hours of post-debate commentary from political pundits on CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC will have viewers believing that the most important factors are subjective qualities “Who won the debate? Who looked presidential? Who reached out to which political bases?” My biggest pet peeve about political pundits is they treat political debates like a basketball game. If I only cared about a candidate’s performance, I’d rather see them recite Shakespeare or something more interesting than their political talking-points.
As a journalist, I look at debates differently. I want to know what the candidates said, and whether their claims are accurate, a half-truth, or just plain misleading. The purpose of these hour-long “rhetora-thons” is for the public to hopefully get a better understanding of what these candidates believe and want for our country. It’s not enough just to hear these candidates speak, because well, candidates sometimes exaggerate, soft-pedal, and frankly lie during debates. The public depends on a robust performance by journalists to fact-check candidate claims. Since the political pundits who follow these events don’t typically do this, I’m providing some of my favorite “fact-checkers” that you can turn to after a debate, a major speech, or anytime you want to dig beyond the “play-by-play” commentary of the US election cycle.
- Politifact.com – Since 2007, this off-shoot of the St. Petersburg Times has been fact checking statements from politicians, political groups, and even public figures (now including those pesky pundits!). Politifact won a Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of the 2008 Election. My favorite parts of Politifact include its easy to read “Truth-O-Meter” which rates statements as: True, Mostly True, Half True, Barely True, False, and Pants on Fire. Politifact also tracks political flip/flops. Additionally, it checks the promises made by President Obama and the Republican leadership. Since its beginnings, Politifact has opened new local sites for Florida, New Jersey, Georgia, Oregon, Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
2) The Fact Checker (Washington Post) – Run by veteran political reporter Glenn Kessler, the Washington Post’s “Fact Checker” has been running since the 2008 Election. Kessler has been fact checking elections since 1992 when he was the Chief Political Correspondent for Newsday. Kessler rates statements from 1-4 “Pinnochios” (1 being some discrepancies to 4 being completely false). If a candidate makes a completely true statement, he’ll label it with “The Geppetto Checkmark.”
3) Factcheck.org – The “first” fact checking organization began in 2003 as a project run by journalist Brooks Jackson and the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania. Before then, fact checking was left to individual reporters working for individual papers. Now, the public had a single source to go to for their fact-checking needs. Jackson blazed the trail creating the “adwatch” and “fact check” stories on CNN. Jackson now works with a cadre of veteran reporters and researchers to set the record straight in campaign ads, speeches, debates, and news releases. You can also take the weekly “fact check quiz” to see if you’re up to date.
4) Ontheissues.org– On The Issues is not a “true” fact check organization, but I’m including it because it is a great “one-stop shop” to learn the details of each candidate’s positions from abortion to welfare. The site becomes more active as the election cycle moves forward. The site doesn’t just cover presidential candidates, but you can look up any member of Congress. The website is run by Dr. Naomi Lichtenberg, an academic, and is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The group seems to be fairly non-partisan, and the site at the very least, is a good place to start when looking at candidates.
For more from Matt Porter, visit his blog, The Daily ((SOT)).
Follow him on Twitter @MPReports
Do you agree with Matt?
What is the point of debates? Did you learn anything from the recent republican debates?
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