Investigative Issues: The Troubling Fact Is That the Media's Fact-Checkers Tend to Lean ← Left
Keeping this in mind, the biggest inherent flaw with efforts to fact-check information may lie in the qualifications, bias, and conflicts of interest among the ranks of the fact-checkers themselves. One example is the fact-checking nonprofit First Draft, started by Google at the beginning of the 2016 election cycle. Google is owned by Alphabet, Inc. Alphabet executives and employees comprise a politically active group that ranks among the largest political donors to Democrats in the country. During the 2016 campaign, Alphabet was led by an ardent Hillary Clinton supporter and campaign volunteer, executive chairman Eric Schmidt.
First Draft is also supported by an array of liberal companies and nonprofits, including the Ford Foundation and George Soros’ Open Society Foundations. First Draft tends to fact-check topics in a vein that’s consistent with its major donors’ opinions and interests. This is particularly true when it comes to controversies about vaccine safety and climate change, where First Draft appears to give little consideration to opposing scientific views and information. In April, First Draft uncritically referred readers to an article perpetuating the false story that President Trump had literally encouraged “people to drink bleach.” Among the group’s original organizers is its digital director, Alastair Reid, who has frequently tweeted and retweeted anti-American rhetoric and progressive positions.
For its part, First Draft says “certain projects and initiatives may be guided in part by the specific requirements of our funding partnerships” but “our donors understand that First Draft retains operational and editorial independence. Our decisions are driven by the organization’s mission and values.”
Similar issues surround NewsGuard, an Internet browser tool that rates the trustworthiness of news sources on search engines and social media sites. Created in 2018, it is funded in part by one of the largest PR, advertising, and data collection firms in the world: Publicis Groupe. Publicis is active on the progressive side of major issues and controversies from gender to race and climate.
Sharyl Attkisson Exposes So-Called 'Fact Checkers' for Who They Really Are
So-called fact-checking has become so pervasive, Democrats have urged former Vice President Joe Biden to refuse a debate with President Trump unless his statements are fact-checked in real-time.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/ellie...-ability-test-n2573758?utm_campaign=inarticle
"Biden should insist that a real-time fact-checking team approved by both candidates be hired by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates — and that 10 minutes before the scheduled conclusion of the debate this team report on any misleading statements, phony numbers or outright lies either candidate had uttered. That way no one in that massive television audience can go away easily misled," notoriously leftist New York Times columnist Tom Friedman recently argued.
Most of the time, fact-checkers are simply an extension of a leftist media claiming to have a monopoly on the truth.
Keeping this in mind, the biggest inherent flaw with efforts to fact-check information may lie in the qualifications, bias, and conflicts of interest among the ranks of the fact-checkers themselves. One example is the fact-checking nonprofit First Draft, started by Google at the beginning of the 2016 election cycle. Google is owned by Alphabet, Inc. Alphabet executives and employees comprise a politically active group that ranks among the largest political donors to Democrats in the country. During the 2016 campaign, Alphabet was led by an ardent Hillary Clinton supporter and campaign volunteer, executive chairman Eric Schmidt.
First Draft is also supported by an array of liberal companies and nonprofits, including the Ford Foundation and George Soros’ Open Society Foundations. First Draft tends to fact-check topics in a vein that’s consistent with its major donors’ opinions and interests. This is particularly true when it comes to controversies about vaccine safety and climate change, where First Draft appears to give little consideration to opposing scientific views and information. In April, First Draft uncritically referred readers to an article perpetuating the false story that President Trump had literally encouraged “people to drink bleach.” Among the group’s original organizers is its digital director, Alastair Reid, who has frequently tweeted and retweeted anti-American rhetoric and progressive positions.
For its part, First Draft says “certain projects and initiatives may be guided in part by the specific requirements of our funding partnerships” but “our donors understand that First Draft retains operational and editorial independence. Our decisions are driven by the organization’s mission and values.”
Similar issues surround NewsGuard, an Internet browser tool that rates the trustworthiness of news sources on search engines and social media sites. Created in 2018, it is funded in part by one of the largest PR, advertising, and data collection firms in the world: Publicis Groupe. Publicis is active on the progressive side of major issues and controversies from gender to race and climate.
Sharyl Attkisson Exposes So-Called 'Fact Checkers' for Who They Really Are
So-called fact-checking has become so pervasive, Democrats have urged former Vice President Joe Biden to refuse a debate with President Trump unless his statements are fact-checked in real-time.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/ellie...-ability-test-n2573758?utm_campaign=inarticle
"Biden should insist that a real-time fact-checking team approved by both candidates be hired by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates — and that 10 minutes before the scheduled conclusion of the debate this team report on any misleading statements, phony numbers or outright lies either candidate had uttered. That way no one in that massive television audience can go away easily misled," notoriously leftist New York Times columnist Tom Friedman recently argued.
Most of the time, fact-checkers are simply an extension of a leftist media claiming to have a monopoly on the truth.