Grading PolitiFact: President Obama and violence in Iraq

Fact-checking the fact checkers

The issue:

During a press conference, President Obama answered a question about the impact of increased violence on his current Iraq policy with the assertion that violence in Iraq is down from last year.

The full exchange:

Q Thank you, Mr. President. One of the biggest changes you've made in the first 100 days regarding foreign policy has had to do with Iraq. But due to the large scale -- this large-scale violence there right now, does that affect the U.S. strategy at all for withdrawal and could it affect the timetable that you've set out for troops?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, first of all, I think it's important to note that although you've seen some spectacular bombings in Iraq that are a legitimate cause of concern, civilian deaths, incidents of bombings, et cetera, remain very low relative to what was going on last year, for example. And so you haven't seen the kinds of huge spikes that you were seeing for a time. The political system is holding and functioning in Iraq.

Part of the reason why I called for a gradual withdrawal as opposed to a precipitous one was precisely because more work needs to be done on the political side to further isolate whatever remnants of al Qaeda in Iraq still exist. And I'm very confident that with our commander on the ground, General Odierno, with Chris Hill, our new ambassador having been approved and already getting his team in place, that they are going to be able to work effectively with the Maliki government to create the conditions for an ultimate transfer after the national elections.

But there's some serious work to do on making sure that how they divvy up oil revenues is ultimately settled; what the provincial powers are and boundaries; the relationship between the Kurds and the central government; the relationship between the Shia and the Kurds; are they incorporating effectively Sunnis, Sons of Iraq into the structure of the armed forces in a way that's equitable and just. Those are all issues that have not been settled the way they need to be settled. And what we've done is we've provided sufficient time for them to get that work done. But we've got to keep the pressure up, not just on the military side, but on the diplomatic and development sides, as well.

The fact checkers:

Robert Farley: Writer, researcher

Bill Adair: Editor

Analysis:

PolitiFact:

We checked with the Department of Defense and other sources to see if Obama was correct about declining rates of civilian deaths and bombings. The short answer is that he is.

We don't grade for the short answer. Farley's analysis tells us whether or not the facts have been properly checked.

The number of civilian deaths and bombings in Iraq peaked during 2007, and has steadily decreased since a surge of forces was approved by President Bush.

Obama specifically said civilian deaths and bombings have decreased "relative to what was going on last year." So we compared recent numbers with early 2008.

1) According to numbers from Iraq Coalition Casualty Count (icasualties.org), the number of civilian deaths peaked in 2006. That agrees with the graph on page 21 of the government report cited by Farley. He was half right, since the number of "high profile attacks" did peak in early 2007 (graph on page 22).

2) President Bush approved the surge in January of 2007. That creates an immediate discrepancy with Farley's reporting unless he just happens to be claiming that the violence peaked in Jan 2007 and decreased after that. That is not what happened, however.

3) Why did Farley decide to compare current numbers with "early 2008"? Farley does not say, so I will explain for him. Obama did not specify early 2008, in spite of his omnipresent artfulness. Farley makes the comparison with early 2008 because it is more favorable for Obama. It is, in terms of interpretation, offering the president's words their most charitable interpretation. There is nothing wrong with charitable interpretation, but a fact checker ought to mention when charitable interpretation was employed.

At this point in his narrative, Farley is essentially finished grading Obama's accuracy.

But context ought to be important. Take a look again at the context of Obama's statement. The reporter asked a question premised on a recent increase in violence. And the reporter was not wrong about the recent increase in violence. Civilian casualties in April were higher than for any recent month as far back as September of 2008 (344 to 366).

The reporter was asking whether that real increase in violence would affect administration policy.

Obama used the (charitably interpreted) decrease in casualties from early 2008 as a distraction in helping to dodge the question. The reporter gets no answer to his question other than the implicit "no" stemming from Obama specifying no particular response to the recent increase in violence.

PolitiFact vacillates between treating the literal truth of a statement and the underlying argument. By all means, charitably interpreted, the literal meaning of the president's statement was perfectly true. Without the charitable interpretation, Obama's statement was also literally less than true, for the totals for a number of months in 2008 had civilian casualty totals less than for April 2009.

But what about the underlying argument?

What was that argument? Apparently, that since the current level of violence is less than it was at this time last year, there is nothing to worry about. And since it is nothing to worry about, therefore the administration plans no steps to deal with it other than what was already planned over the long term.

While it may be true that the current violence is nothing at all to worry about, this underlying argument offers no easy answer for a Truth-O-Meter graphic rating, except perhaps in retrospect.

The cynic might have some justification in questioning this underlying argument. Suppose that a civil war gets reignited in Iraq. Gen. Petraeus demonstrated that counterinsurgency tactics can quiet that type violence. Would Obama ignore the problem in favor of the political expediency of pushing through his promised withdrawal from Iraq? At the expense of thousands or even millions of Iraqi lives?

Inquiring reporters want to know. Artful Obama appears to have kept one in the dark.

As for Farley, Adair and PolitiFact, Obama speaks true, and let's just ignore the underlying argument this time, shall we?

The grades:

Robert Farley: D

Bill Adair: D