Update: HuffPo issued the following correction Saturday:
Correction: This article originally stated that Fox News led the charge against Bill Clinton in the 1994 midterm elections, when Fox News did not start broadcasting until 1996. The story has been corrected.
We thank them for their diligence.
Earlier this week, my colleague Frank Ross highlighted an error in a post by Robert Reich cross-posted at Salon.com, RobertReich.org, and the Huffington Post. Here is the essential segment from Ross’ post:
Former Obama economic advisor, Clinton Secretary of Labor, and Berkely Prof. Robert Reich claimed yesterday in his column at Salon.com that Fox News played a role in the conservative resurgence of 1994:
In December 1994, Bill Clinton proposed a so-called middle-class bill of rights including more tax credits for families with children, expanded retirement accounts, and tax-deductible college tuition. Clinton had lost his battle for healthcare reform. Even worse, by that time the Dems had lost the House and Senate. Washington was riding a huge anti-incumbent wave. Right-wing populists were the ascendancy, with Newt Gingrich and Fox News leading the charge. Bill Clinton thought it desperately important to assure Americans he was on their side.
But Prof. Reich overlooked one minor detail: Fox News Channel’s first broadcast wasn’t until October 7, 1996.
Salon.com did their due diligence and formally corrected the error, as you may have noticed here, here, or here. Prof. Reich even edited out the mistake on his own site (though he replaced the case study in Fox Derangement Syndrome with another out-of-context jab at Fox). Still, three days later, Huffington Post has yet to correct the bogus claim.
At this time, we kindly ask the Huffington Post to issue a correction/retraction to the story.
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