re: #354 Obdicut

I’d say it’s because people cite factcheck a lot more often. It’s become really trendy. I’d also say it’s because Media Matters makes no pretense at being unbiased or non-judgmental.

I’d have a great deal more patience with factcheck or politifact or whatever if they did not attempt to slot each statement into a number-of-Pinocchios Falsity Rating (TM). Rare is the claim whose veracity can be reasonably distilled and divorced from context to that degree, and the grand pronouncement of such ratings does a profound disservice to the reader.

Give me a few paragraphs of facts and context. Let me decide what they mean, and to what extent that politician was being truthful literally, figuratively, and so on. Don’t give me something cute and retweetable, because fuck Twitter in the ear.