Wednesday – February 1, 2023
After you read the post below, please check out the comments made by Lead Safe Mama readers (scroll down to the comments section below the article) and feel free to add your own comments too!
Today’s theme here at Lead Safe Mama, LLC appears to be “journalism” and “journalistic integrity” (or the lack thereof!) Today (while fully in the space of being excited over the inclusion of the work of Lead Safe Mama, LLC in the Consumer Reports article) I also heard from the Editor of the Fact-Check team at USA Today.
I want to take this moment to give a big “shout out” to Lead Safe Mama readers for generating this outcome (that this guy [Eric] even e-mailed me!) — because it was YOUR social media tags, and YOUR follow-up e-mails to the journalist (see earlier related post here) that precipitated this response.
There are screenshots (and text) from two e-mails below. The first is the e-mail from Eric (Editor of the USA Today Fact-Check team) to me. The second is my response to him (fairly immediately after seeing his e-mail.) As noted in my e-mail below (and as with many things I write), I will be writing a more-detailed response to Eric “asap”, and will publish that here as soon as I have sent it. There’s just not enough time in the day…
#1) Eric Litke’s email to me (sent at 10:43 a.m. PST, 2/1/2023)
Here’s the text from the above e-mail:
“Tamara,
I run the fact-check team at USA TODAY. BrieAnna has flagged me on your email and the multiple social posts you’ve tagged her in.
A few points:
Fact checks are a specific undertaking and about a point in time. This format is about examining a particular claim and whether the evidence present at the time of that claim supports it or conflicts with it. Our story isn’t an exhaustive investigation into KitchenAid and lead, it’s a fact-check of the claim that there is a recall currently on the stand mixer accessories. That’s wrong, so we accurately rated that claim as false. I know you mentioned filing a CPSC report, but we wouldn’t include a citizen report to the CPSC until that was confirmed in some fashion.
So if you’re looking for media coverage of your findings, we wouldn’t be the people to talk to. I don’t anticipate doing additional reporting unless new viral claims emerge about the mixers that aren’t addressed by our current file.
If there are specific posts that you feel have been unfairly flagged with our fact-check, you can feel free to appeal them by writing to factcheck@usatoday.com. We’ll review those.
Eric Litke
Fact-Check Editor
Twitter: @ericlitke ”
#2) Buy response to Eric Litke’s email (sent at 10:58 a.m. PST, 2/1/2023)
Here’s the text from the above e-mail:
“Hi Eric,
Again… I will respond in more detail asap.
I really wish they could understand how their fact checking some tangential, process-y ‘fact’ can lead people to throw out the entire issue (ie they’re fact-checking that somebody somewhere mistakenly said there’s a recall on Kitchenaid paddles because they contain lead, when they’re obscuring the fact that Kitchenaid paddles have, uhm, LEAD.) I really hope they can start to see how their relentless fact checking of rather unimportant details can distract from the actual issue. Sorry you have to go through this.
Point! Exactly! This is what I intend to write to him (but very carefully – lol – so he cannot misunderstand it and *mansplain” back to me with other garbage!)
Thanks for commenting, Desi!
T
They understand this PERFECTLY, and that is the entire point of their disengenuous “fact checking.” They know the truth, and in order to discredit the truth they “fact check” an irrelevant side note in order to confuse people and make them toss out the whole issue. It is calculated. It is deliberate. “Fact checkers” are NOT on the side of truth. They are narrative shapers for the status quo.
This.
Bingo.
Fact checkers are not on the side of truth, they are narrative shapers for the status quo.
This is bang on!
Bangity bang bang bang misinformation/ distraction/ lead herring…to keep the cash register chingity chingity ching chinging.
Watch for lead herrings.
Yes. Absolutely. You nailed it, Skye!
The energy you expend on correcting BS regarding your anti-lead advocacy is beyond belief. Smart people are in your corner and I’m still waiting for the movie.
Leave it to the fact checkers to derail the most important and impactful part of the entire situation: a product that all of us use contains lead! Why not choose to fact check if the product contains lead? Why focus on the fact that there isn’t a current nationwide recall?
Congratulations on all of your successes
and in tilting at the WIND mills of bloviatingly distracting, propaganda BS of corporate controlled $ewer Main $tream Media.
Thank you, thank you, … , continuing . . .
near endlessly, for all the half lives of uranium that end in LEAD.
You are such a force. Formidable. Integrity across every data point and an inexhaustible Heart. I have such gratitude & respect for you & your work.
You are Fierce! Waiting on the day all the Kitchenaide parts are recalled. It’s just a matter of time. tick tick, and the movie will be great!