Rachel debunks FoxNews

Absurdities abound at FoxNews.  That's not news.  But this one sort of stands out.

Last week, Bill O'Reilly broke the "smoking gun" story that the former IRS Commissioner had visited the White House 157 times since 2009.  O'Reilly put on this mock innocent pose of "just reporting the facts;  we don't know what it means, but it looks awfully suspiciously like a smoking gun."  Implication:  Obama directed the IRS to go after the Tea Party.

Well, it turns out to be another big fat fake story.   Here are the facts, as best MSNBC has been able to discover.   It's true that Douglas Shulman, IRS Commissioner from March 1998 to November 2012, was put on the clearance list at the White House gate 157 times -- so that, if he wanted to attend any of the meetings concerning health care reform, he was cleared to do so.   Being on the clearance list did not mean he attended -- or had secret meetings with President Obama, or anything like that.   He was just one of many many people cleared to attend meetings, if he so chose.

The only evidence that MSNBC has been able to find of Shulman's actually visiting the White House during that time shows him going there 11 times -- in all of the four years of President Obama's first term.   That's an average of less than three times a year.   And that doesn't mean he visited the president on any of those visits.   He could have visited any of a hundred different people.

For a commissioner of a major arm of our government to visit the White House complex -- which includes all of the Executive Office Building offices -- this is a smoking gun of something nefarious?

And, by the way, Shulman was appointed by President George H. Bush and took office in 2008, while Barack Obama was still a candidate for the office.

Well, never let it be said that FoxNews gave up on a good story -- good, here, meaning attracts viewers.   Even after this was debunked by an article in Atlantic Magazine last week, they're still going with the fake story this week, doubling down on this fake pose of "we're not accusing, or hinting anything;  just stating the facts."  And then they repeat the "visited 157 times" story which has been proved false.   So much for facts.

So, the folks that bring us "fair and balanced" news can't even quit lying when they've been proved wrong.   Because their gullible viewers don't care about facts.   If it's anti-Obama, it's go-oo-od.   Remember the study a couple of years ago that showed the people who watch FoxNews are LESS WELL-INFORMED than people who watch no news programs at all?     Of course they are;   just as in this, they are mis-informed.

Ralph