Media getting it wrong

Huff Post "exposes" Joe Wilson as a liar. By claiming that what Obama said was

"illegal immigrants would not qualify for credits for the proposed health care exchanges"

The Huff Post nicely presents the text of the speech. Search for "qualify for credits" or "health care exchanges". The text is not there. Obama did not say what Huff Post says he did, so the truth of that imaginary statement is irrelevant.

They cite a Time Article, which also ignores the plain facts:

The President's seemingly simple statement that "the reforms I am proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally" is not hard to check. In the Senate Finance Committee's working framework for a health plan, which Obama's speech seemed most to mimic, there is the line, "No illegal immigrants will benefit from the health care tax credits."

Now, some Time copy editor didn't read those two sentences to see that the second does not support the first. Obama did not say that the reforms he was proposing would not benefit illegals. He said they would not apply. Since the reforms require everyone, including illegals, to purchase insurance, they clearly apply. The difference is that they will not benefit from government credits. Whatever phrase Obama's "seemed to mimic" doesn't matter - it's what he said, which Time knows, since they just quoted it.

Now, I'm admittedly, making a mountain out of a molehill, arguing technicalities of phrasing. As I said in a previous post, Joe Wilson's outburst was wrong. I believe that Obama (or his speechwriter) meant to say something like "benefit". But he didn't. And arguing technicalities of phrasing is what lawyers and judges will do once this reform is passed. If the leader of our country uses sloppy language, and the media uses sloppy language to analyze the "truthometer", and one suspects that the eventual bill will have sloppy language, some of it deliberate, it's hard to analyze anything for "truth".