Snopes published piece on 'four years of George W. Bush double standards.'

[RobertSeattle]

(apparently they are still working on this one)

Claim: E-mail lists 'four years of George W. Bush double standards.'"

Status: Incomplete.

Example:

Make sure this list gets to as many people as possible before November!!! Bush is the biggest lying hypocrite ever to sit in the White House and this proves it better than anything I've ever seen . . . !!


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1 Number of Bush administration public statements on National security issued between 20 January 2001 and 10 September 2001 that mentioned al-Qa'ida.

104 Number of Bush administration public statements on National security and defence in the same period that mentioned Iraq or Saddam Hussein.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/numbers.asp

[The Magistrate]

1. An Interesting List, Sir

It certainly seems credible enough, despite the dilly-dalying of the Snopes organization....

"LET'S GO GET THOSE BUSH BASTARDS!"

[Tim_in_HK]

2. Aren't those numbers

from the recent Vanity Fair?

[LuminousX]

3. Yes

and the sheer volume of the list would make it hard to fact check in a short period of time.

[Czolgosz]

4. Don't hold your breath

Snopes holds itself out as a nonpartisan website, but there is a definite right-wing spin reflected in the topics chosen for "debunking" (here are three telling examples):

1. During a hospital visit, President George W. Bush saluted an Army officer who had been badly injured during the September 11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon.*

2. President George W. Bush has been nominated to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.*

3. The domain GeorgeWBush.com hosts the legitimate web site of President Bush's 2004 re-election campaign.

None of these issues was ever in any dispute that needed any kind of "debunking." This is just partisan information posted to reach a wider audience.

Compare these topics to three for Kerry-Edwards:

1. Soldier's letter to John Kerry.

2. Swift boat veterans offer opinions about John Kerry.

3. E-mail from neighbor describes Democratic vice-presidential candidate John Edwards.

If snopes assessed these stories according to the same type of analysis it used to address the Bush stories, snopes would call each out as false. Why, for example, does it not address the Shifty Boat Liars and call out the obvious falsity of their campaign but, instead, it chooses to address the non-issue that different veterans have varying opinions about Kerry (no shit, different veterans have varying opinions about everything from Bush to toothpaste -- there is no "debunking" that whereas the Shifty Boat Liars warrant outright debunking for their blatantly disprovable lies)?

I doubt you'll see much confirmation of anti-Bush facts or much "debunking" of anti-Kerry nonsense between now and November 2 on snopes.