The Washington Post “Fact Checker” on Monday gave former Obama official Susan Rice an embarrassing “Four Pinocchios” for her claim months ago that the chemical weapons stockpile in Syria had been disposed of; an assertion that has gone up in the smoke of a U.S. missile strike prompted by the use of chemical weapons on civilians last week.
About the same time that was happening, Rasmussen Reports revealed the results of a new survey that found 47 percent of likely voters think it is possible that former President Barack Obama or “his top aides” knew about intelligence agency spying on the Trump campaign and transition team. Whether true or not, with that percentage of the public believing it, the past administration has a credibility problem.
As reported by Fox News:
“Rice’s claim, however, was more recent. In January, she told NPR that the Obama administration was able to “find a solution” on Syria that didn’t require the use of force – and still dealt with the chemical weapons threat, using diplomacy.
“We were able to get the Syrian government to voluntarily and verifiably give up its chemical weapons stockpile,” she claimed.”
Four Pinocchios is the lowest rating on the WaPo’s “Truth Scale,” and that’s worse than what the newspaper gave her former boss regarding his claim in 2013 that 40 percent of gun sales happen without a background check.
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The Washington Post “Fact Checker” is often considered to be the liberal “smell test.”
As for the Rasmussen survey results, 42 percent of likely voters disagreed with the notion of intelligence agency spying on the Trump crowd.
Rasmussen also reported that 33 percent of survey respondents believe senior Obama administration members “spread secretly obtained information about the incoming president and his team to members of the media.” However, the survey also revealed that, “Roughly half (48%) of voters, however, disagree with that assertion. Another 19% are not sure.”
Adding to Monday’s bad news for the past administration, PolitiFact last week rescinded a “mostly true” rating given to a claim by then-Secretary of State John Kerry in 2014 that Syria’s chemical weapons had been removed.
Will the “mainstream” dominant media report any of this fairly or accurately, if at all? A different Rasmussen survey from several days ago suggests not. That survey said 48 percent of the likely voters “think the media is more interested in creating controversies when it comes to covering President Trump and the new Congress, while nearly as many (46%) believe the press is more interested in helping the public understand the issues.”
But that has an interesting breakdown: “While 67% of Republican voters say creating a controversy is the media’s top priority, 66% of Democratic voters think the press is more interested in helping the public understand the issues,” Rasmussen said. “Among voters not affiliated with either major party, 52% say the media wants to create controversies, while 38% think they want to clarify the issues.”
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