Posted on 05/20/2021 7:53:12 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
It was just last year that PolitiFact labeled Fox News host Tucker Carlson a “pants on fire” kind of liar for his report that the COVID-19 virus wasn’t just a naturally occurring virus, but one that was actually created in a lab in Wuhan. It wasn’t just a wild claim either. Carlson brought on virologist Dr. Li-Meng Yan from the University of Hong Kong who said she could actually produce scientific evidence for the claim.
Yet, the “fact-checkers” at PolitiFact weren’t just dismissive, they seemed to get a bit defensive.
“The claim is inaccurate and ridiculous,” wrote Daniel Funke in September. “We rate it Pants on Fire!”
Now, PolitiFact is walking their ruling back and archiving it away for good measure with an editor’s note:
When this fact-check was first published in September 2020, PolitiFact’s sources included researchers who asserted the SARS-CoV-2 virus could not have been manipulated. That assertion is now more widely disputed. For that reason, we are removing this fact-check from our database pending a more thorough review. Currently, we consider the claim to be unsupported by evidence and in dispute. The original fact-check in its entirety is preserved below for transparency and archival purposes. Read our May 2021 report for more on the origins of the virus that causes COVID-19.
This correction comes on the back of an article penned by Tom Kertscher and Noah Y. Kim which stated very plainly that they don’t know the origin of the COVID-19 virus and listed four points, all of which point to possible manipulation of an existing virus to infect the human population.
- SARS-CoV-2 was first noticed in Wuhan, close to a lab where bat coronaviruses were being studied and far from the location where naturally occurring relatives of the virus were found. However, there are other plausible explanations of how the virus could have made its way to Wuhan besides a lab leak.
- Researchers at the Wuhan lab used reverse genetics on bat coronaviruses to create viruses not found in nature. Some of this research was funded by a grant provided by the National Institutes of Health. However, there’s no evidence that this research led to the creation of SARS-CoV-2.
- Scientists who have studied the coronavirus have generally concluded that it resembles naturally occurring viruses. However, we can’t completely rule out that the virus was somehow manipulated. Some extremely competent forms of gain-of-function research don’t leave signatures or telltale signs of manipulation.
- The early outbreak of the coronavirus was linked to various wildlife markets, which lends support to the claim that the virus jumped from animals to humans. However, scientists haven’t yet identified an intermediate host animal that could have incubated the virus before it jumped to humans.
When the possibility was first brought to the public’s attention, those who label themselves fact-checkers, many of whom declared very confidently that the virus itself showed no possibility of lab manipulation.
Interestingly enough, more information is coming out about the United States’ own National Institute of Health, under the nation’s most famous virologist, Anthony Fauci, approving grants to the Wuhan Lab where the virus possibly originated.
So the angle that Carlson reported on wasn’t so crazy after all. What’s more, it exposes the fact that “fact-checking” sites such as PolitiFact will move against an idea without all the data themselves, and even spew false information in ignorance in order to protect a political narrative.
It’s not just happening on PolitiFact either. The Facebook “fact-checkers” have also been censoring debate about climate science as Townhall reported on Thursday.
President Ulysses S. Grant Gave money to the Wuhan lab? He died a 135 years ago. Any wasn’t president for 8 years before that period
That is exactly why NOBODY should trust any “fact checker.” They all have political axes to grind and they are always pro-progressive or pro-commie.
“Fact checkers” are straight from Orwell’s ministry of truth
They still can’t explain why the SARS-COV-2 virus genome and the RaTG13 bat virus that was purported to be the original source that jumped to humans are too similar in the spike protein gene sequence to have occurred by natural selection. The RaTg13 bat virus appears to have been manipulated by gain-of-function techniques to bind to the human ACE receptor using the “furin cleavage” site as previously published by other PLA researchers in the past. Why haven’t the “fact checkers” actually done the same sequence analysis as Dr. Yan to confirm or refute her findings? The fingerprints are on the gun if someone will just look at them.
Don’t trust “POLITIFARCE”. It is not only leftist but “Stupid Leftist” a that.
I would rate them as a “disseminator of Red Chinese disinformation”, whether they know it or not. Either way, they are “used, confused and need to be defused”.
THAT BIDEN WIN IS AN AWARD TO CHINA FOR INVADING US USING COVID 19
Effort praised by CCP scientist doing so
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3960570/posts
Here’s that compliment paid to the CCP by the Biden campaign for bringing in the virus which they admitted really helped fix it to get Biden elected http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3940857/posts
Every time an American looked at an item for where it was made in it came from China. Now China’s reliance making everything was being threatened by a change in leadership in America which was a major consumer of those products. When Americans hailed their leaders decision to make many of them in their country US. Their politburo worried.
Worse yet opponents to the Chinese regime in power had its citizens protesting its policies , as in Hong Kong, since that change in American leadership, wave the American flag and present Trump’s name when doing so.
All of which presented those in power the need to destroy that leader Donald Trump. In totalitarian political circles this strategy has been reported to be frequently considered Would a runaway plague created by a nation which could threaten populations of an enemy cause them to react by demanding extreme restriction of movement by its population to prevent its spread ? Thus wind up fragmenting its economy and create defeat for that leader’s upcoming election.When they released it that was the CCP intention but it got away from them and went world wide and they should be made to pay
Here’s that compliment paid to the CCP by the Biden campaign for bringing in the virus which they admitted really helped fix it to get Biden elected http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3940857/posts
I agree entirely. This was very fishy from the beginning, and is entirely consistent with the kind of unimpressive non-hypothesis-driven technique heavy ‘look what we can do’ research that is too often done in China.
Every fact they quote is slanted in a specific {left} direction.
Whether it is employment, covid deaths, inflation, weather/climate stats, or student proficiency at math, reading etc. nothing is straight forward and factual.
They giggle the sample set of 'workers' or the definition of 'covid related deaths' or the sample of years for heat/cooling periods.
Want a fact checker, try kojak, now that his family portrait of ten members of ass eaters has been put aside.
kojak and a few other FReepers are still buying the bullshit as facts.
Fixed that.
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