USA Today has been both praised and criticized for running the fact-deprived op ed by the president last week, where he talked about Medicare.
Some criticized the paper running it, since, as The Washington Post's fact-checkers said, virtually every sentence contained inaccuracies, exaggerations or straight-out fallacies. Others criticized the paper for including links to fact-checking sites.
I understand that reputable papers usually fact-check op ed submissions when statements are presented as facts rather than opinion and if they are off base, the piece would be rejected or returned to the writer for corrections.
The editors at USA Today faced a tricky choice. They had in their hands a piece by the president of the United States. But they knew it was full of lies or errors.
Do they refuse to run it? Do they give it back and insist the White House correct it? Or run it, with lies exposed and corrected?
I think the paper did the right thing by running it, with links to other reports that showed the real facts. It let readers see the president's words while exposing them for the lies that they are. False statements side-by-side with clear facts. Let readers make their own judgement as to what's fake news.
Leslie Stahl also came under criticism from the right for her interview with the president, which aired on "60 Minutes" last night.
From what I saw, she was doing her job as an objective journalist, trying to get at the truth. She asked the president some tough and direct questions and didn't let him squirm out of them by changing the subject or throwing more falsehoods into the mix. But now there's meme going around on Facebook saying how slanted the interview was. "FOX & Friends" whined that the president was "peppered endlessly with questions" during the interview, as if Stahl was doing something bad by asking questions and repeating or following up on them when they weren't directly answered.
When the fake news comes from the president, whether as an op ed or in answer to interview questions on TV, it should be called out for what it is -- lies.
Finally, the media is doing that. Good for them and good for us.