Breitbart’s Big Government: Not Strong on Fact Checking
Here we go again.
Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government blog has a story on the release of another batch of White House visitor records, and they’ve found sinister evidence that Barack Obama is in cahoots with the dreaded demons of ACORN: White House Visitors Log: ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis In Obama Residence Week Before Sting Videos Launched - Big Government.
According to the visitor logs, on September 2nd Bertha E. Lewis made an appointment on to visit the White House on September 5th at 12:30. (We usually need to plan further ahead to get our hair cut.) On the evening of the 4th, that appointment was cancelled so Bertha could move her appointment earlier, to 10am. …
In addition, the record notes that she was to receive a STAFF TOUR, which are different-and more special-than the regular Group Tours available to others.
Ms. Lewis doesn’t seem to have returned to the White House after this visit. Of course, just 5 days after this visit, James O’Keefe would release the first video of his undercover journalism on the systemic corruption within ACORN.
After the firestorm that erupted from O’Keefe’s reporting, President Obama was asked by Fox News for his opinion on the scandal. Despite long-standing ties to ACORN, Obama acted almost as if he’d never heard of the group.
Of course, at that point, it had been…several…days…since ACORN’s CEO was in the Residence at the White House. Who can keep up?
Of course, it is possible that this isn’t ACORN’s Bertha Lewis. After a previous dump of visitor records listed the name, Jeremiah Wright, the White House said, ‘oh, that was a different Jeremiah Wright.’ The media, of course, said, ‘okay,’ and never followed up. So, maybe the Bertha Lewis listed here isn’t the CEO of ACORN. Just another Bertha Lewis who gets special weekend access to the White House Residence, complete with an extra-special staff tour. Sure, possible, but we’d love to see a bookie’s odds on that.
Of course, one way to find out whether this is the same Bertha Lewis would be to Google her name and see what comes up — but when you’re in a rush to publish a smear piece, who bothers checking facts?
And guess what? ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis’s full name is not “Bertha E. Lewis.” I spent those precious 10 seconds on a Google search that Andrew Breitbart’s blogger “Publius” couldn’t be bothered to do, and look what turned up: Cityfile: Bertha M. Lewis.
This is really getting pathetic. What happened to the idea that blogs were supposed to be good at fact checking?
The post has been up at Big Government for two days, without a retraction.