At the start of the week, The New York Times was caught in an embarrassing error as it tried to throw a new sexual-harassment allegation at Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh. PolitiFact did not assign any "Truth-o-Meter" punishments to the Times. Instead, since they are sympathetic liberal journalists, the site's John Kruzel critiqued the conservatives at PJ Media instead.
The headline was "No, the New York Times has not admitted to peddling ‘fake news’ about most recent Kavanaugh claim."
It was not an admission of guilt when the Times had to add something crucial they omitted: that the so-called Kavanaugh "victim" that caused hours of breathless reporting about a "new allegation" actually "declined to be interviewed and friends say she does not recall the episode."
This left the Times team and their unctuous backers twisting into logical pretzels, claiming that just because she doesn't remember it doesn't mean it didn't happen.
The original headline on the PJ Media blog by Matt Margolis was "New York Times Now Admits New Kavanaugh Accusation Is Fake News." PJ Media editor Paula Bolyard told the "fact checker" that Margolis wrote an opinion piece and the "fake news" dunking was "rhetorical."
PolitiFact won't get that technical with its fellow liberals when the Times makes a mess. Take this additional example. Kruzel quotes from an explanatory article by opinion editor James Dao:
During the authors’ investigation, they learned that a classmate, Max Stier, witnessed the event and later reported it to senators and to the F.B.I. The authors corroborated his story with two government officials, who said they found it credible.
As the Times did in the original Sunday Review mess, they fail to say "Max Stier says he witnessed an event." They (over)state "Stier witnessed the event," when the alleged victim doesn't recall the event ever happened.
Kruzel lectured: "There are elements of opinion in PJ Media's post, but it’s important for online readers to know that the Times did not retract or reverse its reporting, as PJ Media's headline suggests." Kruzel reported that New York Times spokesperson Danielle Rhoades Ha told PolitiFact the PJ Media headline is "inaccurate," and added that "the editors' note is not a retraction in any way."'
So, PolitiFact is shaming PJ Media for dunking too hard when the Times arrogantly refused to concede there was any admission of fake news, or any "retraction." Liberals shame President Trump for refused to concede or retract, so what's going on at Times Square?
The PJ Media headline is now "New York Times Botches Kavanaugh Story, Issues Embarrassing 'Editor's Note'." This underlines that the Times are still the ones that embarrassed themselves on this Kavanaugh mess.
