this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2024
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Consensus? So when Newsmax fact checking says something isn't true, you can't achieve consensus?
Look, the problem is that there's no way to do this where you don't run into problems.
If you say it's a government agency that does the fact checking, then you run the risk that one of the parties messes with that government agency so that the facts always favor its side. If you leave it to private companies, then there's nothing to stop highly partisan companies from claiming to be fact checkers. If you say the courts can decide, you have a problem when the courts are biased. If you have an elected council of fact checkers chosen by popular vote, you're relying on voters having enough knowledge and integrity to select unbiased fact checkers.
Does newsmax have a fact checker? There's only so much you can bend when it comes to matters of fact. If one checker is routinely inaccurate it should be removed from the set.
I think you're in for a big surprise.
Routinely inaccurate based on what? Fact checking? Newsmax fact checking says it is 100% accurate in all the facts it has checked, but that Snopes and Politifact only hit 60% accuracy, therefore Snopes and Politifact should be removed from the set.
Newsmax doesn't have a fact checker, but in a hypothetical situation where they did: most facts that get checked come to the same conclusions.
Trump did not have the largest inauguration crowd in history, it's easily observed by looking at photos of the event compared to other inaugurations. Every fact checker agrees on that fact. If there were a rogue fact checker that regularly went against clearly evident fact in favor of a political narrative, it would lose credibility and be removed from the set of rigorous fact checkers.
A "fact checking service" that had a deliberate bias could easily work around that. They could claim that the pictures chosen are not representative. They could talk about how crowded people were in one picture vs. another. They could claim that certain people seen in the crowd were not actually there for the inauguration, but were protesters or something.
That's because there hasn't been any reason to set up a Russian Fact Checker service. Instead they just question the credibility of the existing fact checkers. But, if there were a reason for a Russian Fact Checker service, there would definitely be one.
How could you tell? Look at all the people living in the MAGA bubble. They don't understand that everything in that bubble goes against clearly evident facts. But, what could happen to them could happen to anyone if the disinformation was strong enough.