Grading PolitiFact: Boxer vs. Rice

The issue:

The fact checkers:

Robert Farley:  writer, researcher
Bill Adair:  editor

Analysis:

Right out of the chute, I'll acknowledge a little surprise that PolitiFact rated this statement from Sen. Boxer (D-Calif.).

Boxer, in the midst of a campaigning for re-election, made an appearance before the editorial board of the San Francisco Chronicle and was asked about comments she addressed to then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Specifically, board member included as the premise of a question to Boxer that Boxer had criticized Rice for sending troops to war without paying "a personal price."

PolitiFact's Farley, picking up from there:

In the editorial board meeting, Boxer, a California Democrat, sought to set the record straight about her comments, but then added a bit of revisionist history, saying she was criticizing Rice because she didn't know how many American troops had died in Iraq. In fact, Rice never said that.

It's an editorial judgment to declare that Boxer "sought to set the record straight," and Farley achieves a bit of a mismatch between Boxer saying Rice didn't know the number of troops killed and Rice not saying that.  Boxer could be right that Rice didn't know the answer even if Rice didn't address the question at all.

We find Farley dealing with a pair of loosely intertwined issues, Boxer's explanation of her "personal price" remarks and Boxer's associated claim that she was asking Rice how many troops had died in Iraq.  I will subsequently treat the latter as the primary claim and conduct separate analyses.


Primary Analysis:

PolitiFact quotes Boxer at length, but for the primary analysis only the first sentence is relevant:  "I asked her how many people had died and she did not know the answer to that question."

Farley serves up an appropriate number of relevant quotations in support of the obvious conclusion:

Boxer asked Rice for a projection on how many American troop casualties might be lost in the surge, and Rice essentially answered that that was unknowable.

PolitiFact gave Boxer a "Pants On Fire" rating.  To me (and to most, I suspect) that suggests a deliberate attempt to mislead.  By PolitiFact's definition, at least, the rating seems correct in that it applies to "ridiculous" claims.  Boxer's recollection of the exchange with Rice was ridiculous regardless of whether she was out to trick people.


Secondary Analysis:

What are we to make of Boxer's comments to Rice?

I remember thinking at the time that the attacks on Boxer seemed a bit exaggerated.  It seemed like a stretch that Rice was being criticized for not having children.  What was Boxer up to?  Was she building a bridge of commonality between herself and the secretary of state?

From PolitiFact we have the judgment that Boxer was trying to set the record straight.  And Farley delivered an entire paragraph late in the story dedicated to the secondary issue:

In the editorial board meeting, Boxer made a strong argument for her initial point that she was not criticizing Rice for being single and childless. As Boxer noted, and the record confirmed, Boxer began by noting that she, herself, did not have any immediate family serving in Iraq; and she then made the point that neither did Rice.

Boxer may have made a strong argument for her own initial point, but in the process she was dancing around the question posed to her by the Chronicle editorial board:   "Do you think President Obama's daughters should have to enlist when they're older, or other people who have made votes should pay a personal price?"

The question resurfaces about halfway through the following video of the exchange:


(Transcript mine)

Boxer:  So, your question is do I think that Obama's children--?  I'm confused about that.

Chronicle:  I guess, do you feel that people who supported the war, that there's, that there's some obligation that they have children who have served and you were talking about the fact that she did not have children who had served in the military.

Boxer:  No, I didn't.  I said I don't have any children--My husband served in the military.

Chronicle:  Yes.

Boxer:  Number one.  So let's not go to that place.  Number two.  Let me say this to you:  Um, I said to her that she and I were in the same position.  I didn't have anyone who served there, and neither did she.  I used it to bring us together.  I used it to bring us together.  I said you don't have anyone as far as I know, and I don't have anyone, either.  And so therefore--

Chronicle:  Then you weren't criticizing.

Boxer:  I was criticizing the fact that she didn't know how many people died in Iraq.  Absolutely I was.  And I said it's even more on our shoulders because we don't--we're not making a personal sacrifice.  I'm not.  And she wasn't.  That we really follow this war.  And we bring troops home.  And I--I as you know did not vote for that war and therefore was very strong on the point that we owed it to our men and women in uniform to bring them home as soon as possible.

Why is it important that Rice (supposedly) did not know how many people died in Iraq?  For that matter, why is it important that Rice did not know the casualty numbers in advance?

The simplest explanation is that Boxer's bridge-building was designed to increase the contrast between her compassionate policies and Rice's uncaring policies.  That view is consistent with Boxer's opening attacks on Rice emphasizing the latter's detachment from the views of Americans and Iraqis alike.  But there's a snag:

"Madam Secretary, please, I know you feel terrible about it. That's not the point. I was making the case as to who pays the price for your decisions, and the fact that this administration would move forward with this escalation with no clue as to the further price that we are going to pay militarily. We certainly know the numbers, billions of dollars that we can't spend here in this country. I find really appalling that not even enough time was taken to figure out what the casualties would be."

Boxer says that those who have no personal stake in the war have a greater responsibility than others to bring the troops home.  Why that would be is anybody's guess, even under the assumption that bringing the troops home in 2007 was a good idea.  But Boxer also says that feeling terrible about the loss of life that results when one sends people to war is not the point, even though that feeling is presumably a key symptom of carrying the responsibility.

The only way I can interpret Boxer's remarks as a semi-coherent whole is take take her at her word that feeling terrible about it isn't enough unless one accepts Boxer's policy views on bringing the troops home.  But even that attempt at charitable interpretation leaves Boxer with an incoherent argument.

I judge it most likely that Boxer spoke disingenuously.  The point was always that Rice was uncaring; Boxer regarded herself as simply the better person for caring more than Rice despite the fact that neither had family members in Iraq.

And as for whether President Obama ought to have family members at risk in the military, no that's not the point.  The point is that those without family members at risk have a greater responsibility not to put soldiers in harm's way.  Perhaps that means that if Obama had family serving in Afghanistan he could have justified fulfilling Gen. McChrystal's troop request in full.

PolitiFact was very timid in applying basic skepticism to Boxer's explanation, though I like the willingness to assess claims that do not constitute the main focus of the story.

The grades:

Robert Farley:  D
Bill Adair:  D

When I started this evaluation I though sure I would end up giving out grades in the "B" or perhaps even the "A" range.  The grade on the main issue was essentially on target even if the reasoning was a tad mushy in spots.  It shouldn't have been that tough.  And, as noted above, the story allowed Boxer way too much credence regarding her explanation for bringing up Rice's lack of family.


Afters:

Boxer's tone and body language during the Chronicle interview are hilarious. My favorite, even above the finger-pointing during the "My husband served in the military" part:

                     "I used it to bring us together."

Yeah, OK.


Sept. 5, 2010:  Cleaned up a handful of typos.
Sept. 9, 2010:  Corrected spelling of Robert Farley's name under "The fact checkers"