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?
