When Is a Lie “Half True”?
Maybe when reality begins to make a desire for political manipulation into a threat to personal professional credibility.
Such is the case, one may presume, with this year’s PolitiFact Lie of the Year, which went to “If you like your health care plan, you can keep it.” The article acknowledges that PolitiFact twice graded the statement “half true,” but it never suggests an intention to revise those rulings or explains how a statement that “is partially correct and partially wrong” could be considered a lie.
If you like your “half true,” you can keep it?
Indeed, every other Lie of the Year had previously been ruled “Pants on Fire” (sometimes in combination with being “False”):
As painful as the next three years are likely to be, it’s going to be fascinating to watch as the supposed watchdogs in the mainstream media search for the boundaries of their hedges.