Grading PolitiFact: Paul Krugman compares Massachusetts with the U.S. of A

PolitiFact recognizes that there is a difference between the truth of a literal statement and the truth of the underlying argument.  But the fact check operation routinely ignores one in favor of the other or applies differing standards to each depending on the case.

The issue:

The fact checkers:

Louis Jacobson:  writer, researcher
Greg Joyce:  editor


Analysis:

It isn't hard to obtain a clue that PolitiFact will give Krugman a break on his literal statement.  Krugman says the Senate plan is "identical" to the one passed in Massachusetts.  PolitiFact goes for an underlying argument to the effect that the plans are merely similar.

Jacobson provides some background:

Grading PolitiFact: Obama on independent voting records

The Flip-O-Meter.  Meh.

The issue:

The fact checkers:

Robert Farley:  writer, researcher
Bill Adair:  editor

Analysis:

"Truth-O-Meter says"?  I thought this was the Flip-O-Meter.  Maybe the Truth-O-Meter speaks for the Flip-O-Meter.

And I suppose Robert Farley writes for the Truth-O-Meter as it speaks for the Flip-O-Meter.  Here's Farley:

Coakley concedes to Brown in Massachusetts Senate race: What does it mean for Obama?

Knowing a tiny bit about political science plus a wee bit of history, I tried my hand last January at evaluating President Obama's prospects based on his early agenda.  The president's push for health care reform had not yet occurred, but I can still claim to have done fairly well with relatively broad predictions.  I forecast that Obama's two initial priorities, economic stimulus and the closure of the Gitmo detention facility, carried substantial political risk:

Obama moved center with his proposal for economic stimulus. That was a good move. Unfortunately for the president, the Democrats in Congress have been less inclined to move center and the resulting bill (from the House, anyway) is much more partisan in character than the one Obama recommended. If the Senate increases the tax cut percentage reasonably close to his original proposal then a bipartisan bill may yet emerge. Obama gets a boost from that. Alternatively, the budget fight will help polarize conditions in the capital. The resulting bill will represent only the Democrats, and its relative lack of stimulative effect may come back to bite the party of the left.

I love it when circumstances occur that make it look like I know what I'm talking about.

My evaluation of the other issue panned out fairly well, also, if I can claim Eric Holder's decision to try some foreign terrorists in civil courts, along with Obama's other related judicial problems with terrorists, within its bounds:

Obama decided to bite the bullet and commit to closing Gitmo. The move is a sop to his base but a difficult one to pull off to the satisfaction of the electorate generally. In recognition of the difficulty, Obama fashioned his strategy by putting the resolution of the issue on a year-long timetable without any initial details.

As noted above, making this a key early issue carries substantial risk in terms of exercising his political power over time.

With the election of Scott Brown to the Senate, the political game in Washington changes.  Where Obama formerly could let liberal Democrats in Congress fashion and pass legislation agreeable to him, he will now be forced to seek a slightly broader coalition while enduring a rebuke of his policy course.

Obama might have averted the current problem if he had taken his own campaign rhetoric more seriously.  A more centrist stimulus bill with fewer pet projects stuffed inside would have diminished the GOP position as a clear alternative and, perhaps more importantly, jibed with the campaign rhetoric that so many independent voters found appealing.

Byron York had it right with regard to Brown's win in Massachusetts.  Independents and many Democrats do not like the health care reform bill, and neither do they like the way they see business conducted in  Washington.

PolitiFact opts for neutrality in Brown-Coakley race

PolitiFact nearly weighed in on the claims coming from the Massachusetts special election coming later today.

But rather than challenging any of Martha Coakley's dubious claims, including one parroted by President Obama during his campaign appearance on Coakley's behalf, PolitiFact opted to give Obama a flip-flop rating on its "Flip-O-Meter."

At least the "Truth-O-Meter" has some competition in the dopey-names-for-rating-graphic category.

The layout of the PolitiFact page (this will change with time, hence the partial screen capture) will surely draw the attention of those interested in the Brown-Coakley race:

Pardon my sarcasm above.  Not much to enable the reader to connect this rating to the special election, is there?  And the treatment of the Coakley campaign's claims about Brown's voting record showed PolitiFact's reluctance to let their ratings mar Coakley's chances in the election:

In September, the Coakley campaign commissioned an analysis of Brown's voting record from Insta Trac, a nonpartisan Massachusetts legislative bill tracking service. As the Coakley campaign has hammered often, the firm found that since 2007, Brown has voted with the Republican Senate Minority Leader Richard Tisei 96 percent of the time. But Brown has been in the Massachusetts Senate since 2004, and he voted with Tisei's predecessor, Brian Lees, 82 percent of the time. We verified those numbers with Insta Trac president Michael Segal.

Also, Brown served for six years in the Massachusetts House, and according to Insta Trac statistics, he voted with Republican leadership there about 92 percent of the time. We tallied all of Brown's votes in the state House and Senate (3,104 votes in all) and confirmed the Coakley campaign's claim that he has voted with Republican leadership 90 percent of the time as a state legislator. We think that probably would be a fairer number for Obama to cite, unless he qualified that he was just talking about Brown's voting record over the past two years.

But our aim here is not to quibble with Obama's number. Rather it's that Obama was citing these voting records to dispel Brown's claims of independence.

Coakley not only cherry-picked the numbers, but allowed her campaign to cook them.  And though PolitiFact keeps Coakley out of trouble by careful omission, her campaign used the numbers to make the same claim Obama made about Brown's independence:

BOSTON – Scott Brown has touted himself as an “independent voter” throughout this campaign, but a review of his votes during his career as a state legislator demonstrates that he has actually been a lockstep, robotic Republican vote.

I like how Coakley's people provide a dateline location ("BOSTON") while showing nary a clue about AP style, by the way.  Nice touch!  Makes it look like news!

Though PolitiFact cites the page I quoted from, they never connect Obama's flawed argument to Coakley.

Watch for an evaluation of this PolitiFact item later in the week.



1/19/10:  Added some helpful URLs.

Fact check in order for President Obama, Martha Coakley campaign Web site (Updated)

In the Massachusetts special election for the Senate, Democratic candidate Martha Coakley has portrayed Scott Brown as a Republican "in lock step" with the Republican Party.

President Obama, during his remarks supporting Coakley at a campaign appearance yesterday, repeated the Coakley charge:

So I hear her opponent is calling himself an independent. Well, you've got to look under the hood -- (laughter) -- because what you learn makes you wonder. Now, as a legislator, he voted with the Republicans 96 percent of the time -- 96 percent of the time. It's hard to suggest that he's going to be significantly independent from the Republican agenda. When you listen closely to what he's been saying, it's very clear that he's going to do exactly the same thing in Washington.
(Chicago Sun-Times, yellow highlights added)

Scott Brown allegedly votes with "Republicans" 96 percent of the time.  Is it true?

Martha Coakley's Web site provided additional detail on a page called "Rhetoric vs. Reality":

Brown On lockstep Republican Voting Record

Rhetoric:

Brown:  The allegation that I vote 96 percent of the time with Republicans is inaccurate." (Boston Globe, 1/14/10)

Reality:

Brown has voted with the Minority Leader of the Massachusetts Senate, Richard Tisei, 546 times from 2007-present.  During that same period Brown voted against the Minority Leader only 25 times.  In other words, Brown has voted with the current Republican Minority Leader 96% of the time from 2007-present [Insta-Trac/The Advance Research Group Database]
(Web site style faithfully reproduced)

Two questions ought to immediately occur to the would-be fact checker.  First, why or how does Richard Tisei represent "Republicans"?  Second, given the potential for votes that are neither "yea" nor "nay," does the math add up?


Was Tisei properly representative of "Republicans"?

Insta-Trac's description of its service offers some insight into the choice of Tisei:

• See a legislator’s votes on all law enforcement votes
• Or a sub-set of the law enforcement cluster, such as a member’s votes just on guns and weapons
• How one legislator voted with or against one or more other legislators
• The missed votes of a legislator
• How a legislator voted with and/or against the leadership of his/her party

The Coakley campaign, then, had a number of options open when it came to comparing Scott Brown's voting record.  The best way to determine how Brown voted compared to "Republicans" would have involved using the third option listed above.  Take all the Republican votes on a given issue, and determine whether Brown voted with or against the majority of Republicans.

The Coakley campaign conspicuously avoided using that method.  They did produce a comparison of Brown's votes compared with "the leadership of his/her party," however, finding that Brown voted with the leadership 90 percent of the time over the course of his career in state government.

These numbers produce many questions about the methods used by the Coakley campaign.  Why use the Tisei comparison if one to Republican leaders as a group was available?  And why not do the comparison as it should have been done?


Do the numbers add up?

Another page at Coakley's Web site offers an entirely different set of figures for the same comparison even though the two sets were published less than week apart.  The numbers quoted above result in a figure of 95.6 percent, which is fairly rounded up to 96 percent.  From the earlier (Jan. 10) page, however, the figure comes to 94.7 percent.  The latter is not fairly represented as 96 percent.  One set of figures is wrong, at minimum.

I have a request for a free trial of Insta-Trac's service pending.

Afters:

Will PolitiFact check President Obama's accuracy?  Don't hold your breath.


Update:

This story apparently has some legs.

I have tentative evidence that PolitiFact is interested in this story, but from the perspective of fact checking Scott Brown's denial that he voted with Republicans 96 percent of the time.

A note for my readers:  I haven't shown my entire hand on this item.  I have avoided mention of the aspect of the story that I would most expect reporters with a liberal bias to flub.  Don't let me down, PolitiFact!

Is the Coakley-Brown race about ObamaCare or not?

The St. Petersburg Times has finally done something substantial to increase its readers' political awareness:  It printed an AP story about the Massachusetts special election that will fill the seat formerly held by the late Sen. Ted Kennedy (aka "Kennedy's seat").

Because of the AP's hypersensitivity about having its stories quoted by bloggers, please read it at the Times' site.

The story never says anything direct about the special election serving as a referendum on ObamaCare.  But if anyone has the least ability to read between the lines, that thread runs implicitly throughout the story, starting with the headline:  "Mass. Senate race may kill health bill."

The story quotes Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) to the effect that a victory by Republican contender Scott Brown win will kill the health care legislation currently on the table.

It quotes the Massachusetts secretary of state, who suggests that if it takes two weeks to certify Brown as the winner then it may provide enough time for Congress to pass the legislation before Brown can affect the outcome.

The story sounded a single note out of tune with that message, reporting Vice President Joe Biden's criticism of Brown for opposing tax hikes on the banking industry.

The content bias is clear, and conveys the editorial message:  The special election is about ObamaCare.

What conclusion do we draw from Brown's "unexpected" strong challenge to Democrat Martha Coakley?  I predict that most left-leaning editorials will make the story about Coakley's failings as a candidate. 

Funny how those aren't on display in the reporting.

Ad: Scott Brown wants to deny rape victims medical care

Greg Sargent's blog at whorunsgov.com has the details:

This is absolutely brutal: Massachusetts Dems have dropped a mail piece accusing GOP Senate candidate Scott Brown of wanting hospitals to turn away “all” rape victims.

It's a short and interesting story, so pay Sargent's blog a visit and get the whole story.

Amazing stuff, especially placed next to Ed Schultz's recent oral effusion (via Hot Air).

The early Martha Coakley campaign video

Browsing YouTube, I ran across an older video extolling Martha Coakley for Massachusetts senator.

It's an interesting piece of work.  It presents Coakley as "A Different Kind of Leader for Massachusetts."  But at same time, Coakley emphasizes that her service will resemble that of Ted Kennedy.  Coakley also claims that she will not serve as a partisan, and follows that with a laundry list of partisan causes that she intends to support.




Sounds like she's from the "say what you think you need to say to get elected" school.  Damn the contradictions and full speed ahead.

That's different.

Here's to a Scott Brown victory on Tuesday.

Afters

"Adding comments has been disabled for this video."

Smart idea.

Who is Martha Coakley to St. Petersburg Times readers?

I was poised to post an item with the "Piquing PolitiFact" tag after suggesting a fact for PolitiFact to check.  So far they have taken none of my suggestions, so far as I am aware.  Here is the latest:

(click to enlarge)


With some time elapsed since I posted, I began to wonder what "In the Know" readers of the Times know about Martha Coakley.

The Times search function produced three results for Coakley.

1.  The first, from 2002, was a brief mention of Coakley respecting her former role as district attorney.

2.  On Sept. 28, 2009, E. J. Dionne mentioned Coakley in an op-ed picked up by the Times:

The woman to beat is Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, who has the most statewide recognition.

Coakley has received an unexpectedly strong challenge from Republican Scott Brown.  Judging from his op-ed, Dionne didn't see it coming.

3.  The third mention comes hot off the virtual presses, dated Jan. 15, 2010.  A brief blurb about a President Obama digital campaign appearance on behalf of Coakley accompanies the story of the unions cutting a deal to delay implementation of the Cadillace insurance plan tax on (who else?) the unions.  Sounds like the unions learned a little something from Ben Nelson (D, Neb.).  The story in the Times omits the apparent terms of the deal.  The story does mention Scott Brown by name and affirms that Obama lent his support in light of the fact that the race in Massachusetts between Brown and Coakley is "competitive."  No word on why that might be.

In the know.