Yes, this is a Popeye, and I apologize for not doing it sooner. When this blog began in 2009, I often relied on the Poynter Institute’s erudition on journalism ethics matters for blog ideas, because back then, it actually was a relatively non-ideological, non-partisan source of media ethics commentary. In the intervening years, Poynter, like so many other institutions and ethics authorities, slowly morphed into another organ of leftist, progressive, Democratic Party and, eventually, Trump Deranged propaganda. It is now a purveyor of ethics rot in journalism rather than a nostrum for it, which is supposedly its mission. Today, like Popeye, I decided that it was “all I can stands” when Poynter joined other biased media “factcheck” attacks on Trump’s “Meet the Press” interview with a particularly blatant example of exactly the kind of bias Trump complained about in the interview. So I deleted Poynter from the Ethics Alarms blogroll, which I bet you didn’t even know existed. (It’s about half-way down the home page here, along with other links).

I should have exiled Poynter when it took over PolitiFact, already the worst and most biased of all the factcheck services, and continued its partisan and dishonest ways. Its latest, however, was particularly outrageous: “Trump’s ‘Meet the Press’ falsehoods about abortion, Jan. 6 security and bacon prices.”

Let me start with the most hilarious “falsehood” among the 9 that the Poynter Institute thought was worthy of its condemnation: “Trump also said that Biden ‘said he drove trucks.’ In 2021, Biden said, ‘I used to drive a tractor trailer.’ We found that he had a summer job driving a school bus in the 1960s.” PolitiFact actually used that to argue that Trump was lying in an interview in which he asked why the news media always covering for Biden! After all, driving a bus is the same as driving a tractor trailer…

A couple of the statements flagged by PolitiFact were genuine misstatements. Trump, while searching in his rabbit warren of a mind for a Biden lie, said, “Biden ‘said he flew airplanes, right? He didn’t.'” Of course, there are hundreds of other Biden claims that have been proven false, like his recent claim that he went to the 9-11 bombing site when he hadn’t. I’d say Trump’s use of “right?” excuses him partially, because that communicates “Am I right?” which implies “I may be wrong.” Trump said that he”didn’t say” that he would order the Defense Department to use special forces against drug cartels when he had said that: it’s on video. (If anyone was ever inclined to give Trump the benefit of the doubt, this would be one example of where it would be reasonable: Trump says and promises so many things spontaneously that its not surprising that he forgets a lot of it.) “You have some states that are allowed to kill the child after birth” is almost too inarticulate to call a lie. Some “states” are allowed to kill babies? I think what Trump meant to say was that doctors are allowed to let babies die after they are born in some states; in fact, I have had doctors tell me that letting badly deformed and sick babies die after being born has been routine in all states for decades, despite no law permitting the practice.

Virginia Democratic Governor Ralph Northam told an interviewer when asked about “third-trimester abortions” that “If a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen. The infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.” Northam was and is a physician, and seemed to be claiming that what he described was standard practice. Trump’s sloppy generalization seems plausible enough since the governor of a state was confidently stating “what would happen.”

The rest of the alleged falsehoods that Poynter is attacking are the typical contrived and biased “factcheck” smears we have seen from the news media for years regarding Trump-speak.

Trump exaggerated the degree that “Bidenflation” had raised the price of bacon: he said it was “five times higher,” and in fact the price of bacon is only 30% higher. Trump’s point, however, was that the inflation is significant and unacceptible, which it is. (I don’t buy bacon any more: the current prices are too high, and might as well be 5X what they were.) PolitiFact calls Trump’s bacon statement a “key claim.” Seriously?

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger “last week said, I didn’t do anything wrong,” said Trump. Read this one yourself: because the media narrative is that Trump shouldn’t have asked Georgia officials to find evidence of flawed vote counts that he was sure existed, Trump’ statement is “wrong,” and thus a mistatement. That’s an opinion, not a “fact” check.

Trump said that before Jan. 6, 2021, “I offered two days before — two or three days before — 10,000 soldiers.” PolitiFact says that there’s no record of such an offer. That proves nothing. Trump may have made the offer orally.

This one is classic: PolitiFact says Trump was lying when he said that Nancy Pelosi as House Speaker was “responsible for the security” at the Capitol on January 6, because she wasn’t the only official with such responsibility. But she was one of the officials responsible, and Trump’s point was that Pelosi shares in the blame for the riot that she has condemned in extreme terms.

Trump said, “We have thousands of essentially motion pictures of people stuffing the ballot boxes. Tens of thousands.” PolitiFact says this is a lie because it doesn’t trust Trump’s sources, then it appeals to authority by saying that Bill Barr, Attorney General under Trump, publicly rejects the evidence and arguments presented by “2000 Mules,” a documentary that purports to show evidence of widespread ballot harvesting. This is a controversial issue that still isn’t settled: just today, a conservative source claimed “smoking gun” evidence of “stuffing the ballot boxes.” Not reaching the same conclusions as biased media partisans doesn’t prove falsehood.

The article is signature significance: if Poynter could be trusted, it wouldn’t have published it. Poynter has descended into bias-driven hackery, just like the profession it supposedly sets standards for. What a shame.