Facts have been having a tough year, which makes it all the more significant that PolitiFact has managed to pick a standout winner for its inaugural “Lie Of The Year” competition: Death Panels.
The site announced today that “of all the falsehoods and distortions in the political discourse this year, one stood out from the rest. ‘Death panels.'” The site provided an explanation for its selection, which started to gain traction when Sarah Palin wrote about it on her Facebook page.
Her assertion — that the government would set up boards to determine whether seniors and the disabled were worthy of care — spread through newscasts, talk shows, blogs and town hall meetings. Opponents of health care legislation said it revealed the real goals of the Democratic proposals. Advocates for health reform said it showed the depths to which their opponents would sink. Still others scratched their heads and said, “Death panels? Really?”
TPM’s Eric Kleefeld was one of the first to catch Palin’s Facebook post, which envisioned a future in which “my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s ‘death panel’ so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their ‘level of productivity in society,’ whether they are worthy of health care.”
In other words, you’re welcome!
THE EVOLUTION OF THE DEATH PANEL MEME: For those who still haven’t had enough of the death panels in 2009, check out TPM’s comprehensive history of America’s favorite lie.
