Quick Fact: Fox & Friends advanced debunked claim that ACORN's Lewis visited White House
On Fox & Friends, co-host Gretchen Carlson falsely claimed that ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis "got an inside look at the White House just days before those explosive undercover tapes about ACORN were released," presumably referring to right-wing claims that recently released White House visitor logs included Lewis' name. In fact, the "Bertha Lewis" who visited the White House was reportedly not the Bertha Lewis who is the CEO of ACORN.
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Fox & Friends trumpets ACORN story days after it is debunked
From the January 4 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends:
CARLSON: And ACORN's chief Bertha Lewis got an inside look at the White House just days before those explosive undercover tapes about ACORN were released. Could her relationship with the First Family affect the way the administration ended up viewing those tapes?
FACT: The "Bertha Lewis" who visited the White House is reportedly not ACORN's Lewis
Ben Smith: "Wrong Bertha Lewis." After Andrew Breitbart's BigGovernment.com alleged that Lewis had gone to the White House, Politico's Ben Smith reported in a blog post that according to an "administration official," the "Bertha E. Lewis" who visited the White House was not the Bertha Lewis who is the CEO of ACORN. Moreover, Smith noted that the ACORN CEO's middle initial is "M," not "E."
Why it's in a Dictionary looking up the Definition of Dread.
Because Dreadful is when you know better but Report Bad Information.
Poor Gretchen, All in an attempt to hurt Obama & make herself a Sensation.
Speak truth to power.
Mr. News
In that posting, they tried to tamp down the stories that similarly-named people are always the ones that critics might assume they are!
"Also, as we have previously noted, sometimes rather than providing clear information, transparency can have confusing or amusing results. Given the significant number of visitors to the White House, many visitors share the same name. Today's release includes the names of some notable figures (for example, yet another William Ayers record appears in this disclosure). The well-known individual with that name has not visited the White House, but we have included the record of the individual that did."
Some of the "visitors" to the White House are staff members. Others are from Congress. And some are just average citizens who are there to get a tour. And it was debunked by Ben Smith from Politico within a day after the accusation was made. He made two calls, to the White House and to ACORN, and it was easy to find out that it wasn't the CEO of ACORN that visited the White House. This is the kind of thing one should verify before running with the story - it's not like it's urgent to get the news out, not like there's some deadline after which the info that the CEO of ACORN visited the White House would no longer be newsworthy. Since there was no deadline, there's absolutely no excuse for running this story without vetting the details.
Completely off topic, that hate filled religious group that pickets the funerals of soldiers and other natural disasters and tragedies is here in Houston today, protesting the inauguration of our first openly Lesbian Mayor. They are also protesting Joel Osteen who is delivering the prayer at the ceremony.
Seriously considering going down there and doing a little protesting myself. I have been wanting a piece of their ignorance for quite some time.
There's no excuse for Faux News to run a lie-filled program such as "Faux & Friends".
Here you are trying to go back over a week. Come on you're just trying to stir up trouble!
Puh-LEEZ!
"An administration official."
"No, not THAT Bertha Lewis!"
Puh-LEEZ! Will you believe anything? So which Bertha Lewis was it?
You know, there's blind loyalty and then there's just retarded.
She looks almost possessed. What a dingbat.
But on topic, Fox knows there's no risk in repeating these debunked items. Even if the typical Fox viewer sees it debunked elsewhere, they've also seen it reported as factual on a Fair & Balanced news channel. They've got "both sides of the story" - fact, and fiction- and can decide for themselves to believe Fox if it makes them feel good.
I'm sure Gretchen will make Countdowns' Worst and deservedly so.And if Beck and O'Rielly run with the story Worst may have the Fox News Trifecta tonight.
If Ms. Carlson is as intelligent as Jon Stewart says she is; it appears that she just realized that she has entered "The Twilight Zone".
I would like to know who this other Bertha Lewis is though.