Snopes: Reliably Liberal and Liberally Unreliable

I'm not sure if I ever posted the German brothel story -- a story about women being told they might have to take jobs as sex-workers (i.e., whores) or lose welfare benefits -- but if I did, I guess I have to note that Snopes "debunks" the story.

But a sharp-eyed reader of NRO's The Corner debunks that debunking, and notes that Snopes is hopelessly left-leaning.

I think the same. I remember reading one "debunking." It concerned Hillary Clinton's volunteering to work for the criminal defense of a Black Panther accused, I think, of murder.

Snopes claimed, basically, that the story wasn't true. Except, when you read the "debunking," all the facts of the story were stipulated as being true. Snopes basically added "context," arguing how important it is to give murderers the best defense and all that jazz, and, on the basis of this "context," "determined" the story to be "false."

Except, you know, the story wasn't false. What Snopes was really claiming was that while the facts were true, it would be "false" to draw any negative inferences about Hillary Clinton from those facts.

Ummm, Snopes? Go F--- yourself. "True" means true and "False" means false. You're supposed to be fact-checking, not interpretation-checking.

Snopes does that with an awful lot of political stories. Time and time again, it brands stories "false" not because the facts alleged are proven to be untrue but because Snopes just sort of doesn't like the cause the facts have been enlisted in serving.

So, read Snopes at your own risk. For urban legends and email scams, it's a great site.

For anything having to do with politics, it's a lefty spin-site.

Thanks for both tips to NickS.

The Missing Link Update: Here's the Snopes non-debunking of the Hillary Clinton/Black Panther story. Decide for yourself if this is fact-checking or just liberal spin about uncontested facts.

posted by Ace at 12:08 PM

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