Is This a Photo of the Nashville RV Explosion Suspect?
On Christmas morning of 2020, a recreational vehicle   exploded on the streets of Nashville near a building owned by AT&T. exploded A few days later, the FBI identified a person of interest in connection with the explosion, Anthony Quinn Warner, who was believed to have been "paranoid about 5G technology"  Anthony Quinn Warner 5G technology While the FBI was pursuing its investigation, social media users circulated a photograph said to depict Warner, a picture purportedly showing him wearing a "Trump 2020" cap:  However, this photograph was a hoax, one which bore no resemblance to a picture of Warner published by CBS News that was reported as confirmed by "law enforcement sources": CBS News
It's been more than three decades since the original "Home Alone" film was released. However, fans of the 1990 movie were still noticing details they may have missed in past viewings, like the fate of Kevin's airline ticket. details We previously reported that the black-and-white gangster films depicted in "Home Alone" and "Home Alone 2: Lost in New York" were not real classics. We also published a story about the fact that Catherine O'Hara was the same actress who played both Kate McCallister (Kevin's mother in "Home Alone") as well as Moira Rose on the TV series "Schitt's Creek." The news may not have shocked some of O'Hara's fans, but the number of likes, comments, and shares on various TikTok videos showed that not everyone realized she played both characters. were not real classics story Speaking of the McCallisters, we decided to take another closer look at "Home Alone" after a TikTok video purported to shine a light on an obscure detail: the fate of Kevin's airline ticket. TikTok video In the plot for "Home Alone," the young Kevin McCallister is accidentally left at home while the rest of his family flies to Paris for a Christmas vacation. A series of events allows the mishap to occur, and one of those was the loss of his airplane ticket:   The TikTok video was posted by @scouseblu on Dec. 17, 2020. The Twitter account @FilmEasterEggs considered the moment to be an Easter egg: posted @FilmEasterEggs  Some responded saying they already knew about the ticket being thrown into the garbage, while others expressed surprise:     One Twitter user claimed that the airplane ticket going into the trash was an "integral plot point," which was potentially questionable:  In "Home Alone," the McCallister family runs through the airport and hands their stack of tickets to a gate agent. However, the gate agent did not appear to look at the tickets, but she did conduct a headcount as they walked to the airplane. While the videos from TikTok and Twitter showed the ticket going in the trash, preceding shots showed a row of cups in front of the tickets and passports:  Courtesy: 20th Century Fox  After Kevin attacks his older brother Buzz for eating all of the cheese pizza, the stack of tickets and passports are briefly visible for a split second before several cups of milk all come crashing down:  Courtesy: 20th Century Fox  Milk was mentioned in the scene by Kate and was likely chosen by writers because of its ability for the white color to obscure the ticket during cleanup. The stack of tickets and passports all got soaked, but only Kevin's ticket made it in the trash. Freeform aired double features of "Home Alone" and "Home Alone 2: Lost in New York" multiple times in December 2020. Some of the showings included interesting tidbits about the films, in what the Disney-owned channel called its "Pop'n Knowledge Edition." One of those tidbits popped onscreen the moment that Kevin's ticket was thrown in the trash. Freeform also partially edited a sceneout of the sequel "Home Alone 2: Lost in New York." partially edited a scene Way back in the olden days of 2007, readers were asking us about this much-circulated bit of helpful advice concerning automobile fuel level displays: I have been driving for many years. One would think I would have noticed the little secret on my dash that was staring me right in the face the whole time. I didn't and I bet you probably haven't either. Quick question, what side of your car is your gas tank? You probably can't remember right away especially if you drive more than one car or if you do a rental while on vacation. My solution was to uncomfortably stick my head out the window, strain my neck and look. If you don't do this in your own car you definitely have done it in a borrowed or rental car. If you look at your gas gauge, you will see a small icon of a gas pump. The handle of the gas pump will extend out on either the left or right side of the pump. If your tank is on the left, the handle will be on the left. If your tank is on the right, the handle will be on the right (see attached images). It is that simple! Why don't the dealers share such important information with car buyers? I have on purpose asked many car salesmen since I found this out and 'THEY DON'T EVEN KNOW THIS - NOT ONE DID'. As anyone who has driven a rental car well knows, it is indeed useful to have some sort of indicator on the instrument panel that reveals which side to refuel on. Sadly, "The World's Best Kept Auto Secret" (as the e-mail was often titled) was a bit of misinformation or a misunderstanding: while the indicator it described was real, the "The World's Best Kept Auto Secret" message misidentified its nature. The nozzle-and-hose side of the fuel level (or "low fuel") indicator, which is usually presented as an icon depicting a gas pump, doesn't consistently correspond with the side of the car where the fuel door is to be found, nor does its placement on the instrument array (left side versus right side) tell whether you should bring the passenger's or driver's side up next to the pumps at your local gas station.  There's no magic to it. Although "The World's Best Kept Auto Secret" will prove true for some vehicles, it won't for others, it's akin to the many folkloric "tests" for determining an unborn child's sex, it has only two outcomes (the icon's nozzle-and-hose side and the side the vehicle's fuel door is on match or they don't), so this "secret" will work  sometimes but not always. (Yes, we know that some vehicles have their fuel doors in the back, but there are so few of them that for the purpose of this discussion we might as well ignore that possibility.)  sex The fuel icons in modern cars do inform drivers which side to refuel on, but it's not the placement or shape of the fuel icon that carries that information: Nearly all newer models of automobiles include a small arrow or triangle next to the fuel icon that indicates which side of the vehicle bears the fuel door.  As seen in the graphic example displayed below, sometimes the arrow and fuel handle are on opposite sides of the icon; it's the former, not the latter, that signifies where the gas cap is:  There's no agreement among auto manufacturers as to which side the gas cap should be on (which, if they would just choose one side or the other, would solve the whole problem right there: you'd then always know which side of your vehicle to park closest to the pump). It would make more sense to consistently position the aperture on the passenger's side, both because it's easier to get out of your vehicle when you don't have to weasel your bulk past the gas pump you've just parked next to, and because should you run out of gas on the highway, it's a lot safer to pour more in when you're not standing next to the traffic whizzing by you. An argument can also be made for placing the gas cap on the rear of vehicles. Were it there, you would no longer need be concerned about getting any particular side of your car sidled up to the pump:  provided the rear of the vehicle were somewhat close to the refueling array, it wouldn't matter if the gas pump island were to the left or the right.  Yet another solution would be to have two fuel entry doors, one on each side. That notion, however, fails on cost. According to Rick Asher, a spokesman for General Motors, the cost of putting a gas cap on both sides of a vehicle would far exceed the value of the added convenience for the vast majority of people. Which leaves us right back where we started, which is having to make mental note of which side a vehicle's fuel door is on when driving rentals or other cars unfamiliar to us (or try checking the side-view mirrors to see where it is before pulling up to the pumps). Cichowski, John.  "An Idea on Gas-Cap Issue We Can All Get Behind."
  The [Bergen County] Record.  20 January 2006  (p. A3).

 Huntsville Times.  "Gas Cap Adaption Not Worth the Cost."
  4 December 2005  (p. A2). When Florida Gov. Rick Scott announced he approved a$74.1 billion budget, he portrayed it as having plenty of goodies for everyone, from school teacher raises to hot meals for the elderly. But he also claimed that the budget was lean. This budget also reflects the smallest state government workforce per 1,000 residents in Florida in this century, Scott wrote in his May 20thveto and budget message. The Florida Families First budget is one of our state's smallest budgets this century, when adjusted for population growth and inflation. PolitiFact Florida has separately tracked Scott's 2010 campaign progress to reduce the state workforce by 5 percent -- we rated thatPromise Keptearlier this year. Here, we wanted to fact-check Scott's claim that the recently approved budget reflects the smallest state workforce in relation to population since 2000. Scott's data There are a few valid ways to measure the number of state workers. TheU.S. Bureau of Labor Statisticscompiles data on actual state workers while the state Department of Management Servicesannual workforce reportsshow both established positions (including vacant ones) and actual employees (some folks refer to that as heartbeats'.) But here, Scott's office of policy and budget created their ownchartby pulling together budget data. We did not review the full backup that shows all the details that went into the chart but we interviewed spokespersons in Scott's office who explained their methodology to PolitiFact. Here is how they arrived at their figures: They started with the state's general appropriations budget each year, which does not include the state university workers. Then they made some adjustments to provide apples to apples comparisons: Scott subtracted for vetoes -- his own and by recent past governors -- and by subtracting county health workers, who were not included in state budgets before 2009-10. Scott's office also added in positions that were included in separate bills not reflected in the general budget bill. That's how Scott's office arrived at a figure of adjusted positions. Then Scott's office examined population data from the state's Office of Economic and Democratic Research. That data includes some projections so it sometimes has slightly different figures from the Census Bureau. Let's look at Scott's figures:  Year Population (in 1000s) Adjusted positions Positions per 1,000 residents 1999-2000 15,881.7 126,557 8 2000-01 16,228 124,843 7.7 2001-02 16,551.2 120,091 7.3 2002-03 16,892 117,869 7.0 2003-04 17,273.8 116,797 6.8 2004-05 17,677.3 116,317 6.6 2005-06 18,062.2 116,463 6.4 2006-07 18,378.2 113,634 6.2 2007-08 18,578.9 114,270 6.2 2008-09 18,671.4 112,867 6.0 2009-10 18,770.5 114,852 6.1 2010-11 18,879.1 113,202 6.0 2011-12 19,028.6 108,844 5.7 2012-13 19,218 105,023 5.5 2013-14 19,432 101,784 5.2 We spot-checked some of the math and the calculations were correct. The ratio declined before Scott, too Our task here is to fact-check whether Scott's claim about the declining state workers per capita was correct -- not whether or not that is the best policy or why the numbers declined. But we will briefly provide some background about the state workforce. First, we'll note that the ratio of Scott's adjusted positions compared to population has declined under not only Scott, but also his predecessors Charlie Crist (Republican turned independent while in office, and now a Democrat) and Jeb Bush (Republican). PolitiFact Florida fact-checked a claim by Alex Sink, Scott's Democratic opponent in 2010, who said at the time that Compared to other states, Florida ranks last in the ratio of employees to residents: 118 per 10,000 compared to the national average of 216 employees per 10,000 residents. And Florida is dead last in the nation in state employee payroll expenditures per resident: $38 compared to the national average of $69 per resident. We rated Sink's claimTrue. (The National Conference of State Legislatures did not have an updated ranking to reflect Scott's tenure.) Since Scott took office, there have been about 60,000 staffers to leave because they quit, retired or for other reasons, and the state laid off 2,197 workers. (Those figures don't include state universities but do include temporary state workers who briefly work for the state.) One area Scott has targeted in the budget to save money is the state prisons. In January, his administration announced that it would outsource health care for more than 15,000 inmates including at prisons in Miami-Dade County. That has affected about 400 workers but about 97 percent were hired by the company, according to the state Department of Corrections. We sent Scott's claim to Chris Lafakis, a senior economist at Moody's who studies Florida. (He used BLS data to examine Scott's claim.) He's right if you look at it in terms of state government workers per capita, but this is partially because of all the retirees that have flooded into the state. If you look at the state government share of total employment, it is low, but not at an all time low. .... This number has been steadily declining since the mid 1990s, and Scott has continued it on the downward trend, Lafakis told PolitiFact Florida in an email. We also interviewed two professors of public administration at Florida International University -- chair Howard A. Frank and assistant professor Hai (David) Guo. Both said that Scott's claim may not tell the full story about the state's workforce. Frank raised a question about how to factor in privatization efforts. Ideology aside, those employees are less burdensome in terms of direct outlays, but I suspect at least some are quasi-governmental if they are employed by entities that derive a significant part of their revenue from the state-local sector, he wrote. Guo said that additional indicators of government size include the budget per capita and its growth and whether the state has shifted any responsibilities to local governments. The employee number of state government alone may not tell the whole story, Guo wrote in an email. Our ruling Scott said that the 2013-14 budget reflects the smallest state government workforce per 1,000 residents in Florida in this century. To get there, Scott's office examined budgeted positions and made certain adjustments including subtracting for vetoes. They also projected the state's population for 2013-14. We think their assessment is largely fair, with some small caveats. First, there are other ways to measure both the state workforce -- either by using federal labor statistics, or other state data. And second, the size of the state workforce per capita has been declining for years. Minor points, though. We rate this claim Mostly True. On March 3, 2021, conservative media outlet The Washington Times reported that U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said new metal detectors designed to keep lawmakers safe following the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection were a form of voter suppression.  The Washington Times U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene voter suppression   First, some context: Capitol maintenance crews installed the machines to screen people entering House chambers after the deadly insurrection. Since then, most House members used the metal detectors regularly without questions, The Associated Press reported. But some Republicans initially sidestepped the devices or refused to be checked with wands after they set them off.  deadly insurrection The Associated Press "Capitol Police have now placed desks and velvet ropes near the metal detectors to block anyone from walking around the machines," the AP reported on Jan. 22. Now, let us address the claim that Greene, a far-right conspiratorialist, compared the safety measure to nefarious schemes by partisan groups to prevent people from voting in U.S. elections. According to CSPAN's video recording of congressional proceedings on March 2, the representative indeed said the practice of standing in "long lines to enter the chamber" to use the metal detectors was "real voter suppression" in her opinion. She made the statement during a debate over legislation to change campaign-finance and voting laws on (read bill H.R. 1 here). CSPAN's video recording here Here's Greene's full quote, according to the video footage: I rise in opposition to H.R. 1. While we are talking about voter suppression and long lines, there is real voter suppression that happens right here in Congress. Many members of Congress have to stand in long lines to enter the chamber going through metal detectors, emptying our pockets, and being treated very disrespectfully. So that is real suppression, and it's a shame it happens right here on the House floor. Standing in line to vote is not voter suppression  it's just part of the voting process, just like people stand in line to buy groceries at the grocery store.  Voters in a northwestern region of Georgia in November 2020 elected Greene to represent them, and she began her term in Washington, D.C., in January 2021. During her campaign and afterwards, she embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory and advocated on the frontlines of former President Donald Trump's misinformation campaign to try to convince voters that Joe Biden won the presidency using illegal methods. See our fact checks regarding that false claim here. QAnon conspiracy theory President Donald Trump here In March 2021, a photograph supposedly showing an antelope with a large spiderweb between its horns started to circulate on social media:   These are genuine photographs of a gemsbok, a large antelope that lives in South Africa, with spiderwebs between its horns. photographs These photographs were taken by Dr. Jess Isden, a research associate with the animal conservation group WildCRU, during a safari at the Central Kalahari Game Reserve in Botswana. Isden originally shared these pictures to "The Spider Club of Southern Africa" Facebook page in an attempt to find more information about what sort of spider would make this web. While we still don't know the type of spider  some users suggested it could be a golden orb spider  Isden's post did provide some additional information about these photographs.  Isden wrote: At first I thought the gemsbok must have walked through the web, but on closer inspection it was clear that it was much more intricate than that, and there were living spiders in the webs too. Seen on several animals. They could have easily wiped the webs off their face and horns, yet seem to tolerate it. We also saw the same animal multiple times over 4 days with the web still intact! Seen in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana.   This is not the first time a spider has chosen an animal's horns or antlers for placement of a web. Photographer Frank Solomon has also captured pictures showing spiderwebs between an animals antlers. You can see those images here. Below is a a photograph from wildlife photographer Hector Astorga: here   Correction [30 March 2021]: Previous version of this article mistakenly said "antlers" instead of horns. Claim:   A mysterious "large weird truck convoy" in Virginia remains unexplained. : : Video shows a large convoy of tractor trailers in Virginia.     : No one knows why the convoy occurred.  Examples:  [Collected via e-mail, October 2014] I saw the following post on Facebook today with the caption 'ALERT: Virginia Highway Completely Closed for Mysterious Convoy. I'm wondering if there's any truth to it.  Origins:  On 25 October 2014, a Facebook  user posted video of a large truck convoy spotted in Virginia involving dozens of tractor trailer trucks. The clip depicted several semis traveling on Virginia's Interstate 64 under what appeared to be State Trooper escort. video The unusual sighting and temporary interstate shutdown caused widespread speculation on social media sites as to what could possibly have been afoot. The most widely circulated clip of the large truck "parade" captured several branded trailers as they passed, including Coca-Cola and Walmart vehicles, further confusing the convoy's witnesses as to why the trucks might require a police escort. One user's comments echoed concerns repeatedly expressed as the truck convoy video circulated on sites like Facebook: I can tell you one thing. These trucks are transporting more than you think ? It's all starting. Some will know what I'm talking about and other's will just keep believing what FOX news tells them and vote for the candidate who lies the best ! We are SOOO screwed !  Well, we who are paying attention, know something big is going to happen for sure and really soon ! So many things and all of them are so close together........ I see a dictatorship being announced, military hitting the streets, jets overhead, forced Ebola/flu immunizations (rather true or not) Martial Law, food/water shortages, etc....... We'll see ? Many people worried the event was a covert maneuver to transport supplies, hide medical equipment, or engage in otherwise suspicious activity  fears that particularly loomed large due to the then-current concern over Ebola.  covert maneuver However, the convoy's purpose wasn't hard to discover with a small amount of digging: The truck convoy is a unique one-day celebration where police escort a convoy of trucks through cities and towns in 38 states and Canada. The event helps raise funds and awareness for Special Olympics athletes. About 110 vehicles participated in the ride. In 2013, over $20,000 was raised with 49 trucks participating in Virginia's nearly 50-mile round-trip convoy along Interstate 95 from Caroline County to Henrico County, according to a press release sent by Virginia State police. The footage from Virginia was taken during a leg of the Special Olympics' World's Largest Truck Convoy, described thusly on the organization's website: website Inspired by the powerful impact Special Olympics had on his life through his participation in the Law Enforcement Torch Run, combined with his family's involvement with the trucking industry, Norm Schneiderhan, a Corporal with the Orange County Sheriff's Department, created the Truck Convoy, a one-daycelebration of the trucking industry to help raise awareness and funds for Special Olympics.  Post by ABC 8 News - WRIC.   Post ABC 8 News - WRIC  Although some drivers in Virginia were confused and alarmed by the truck convoy on 25 October 2014, local news stations covered and explained the event on their pages. The purpose of the convoy was not immediately obvious to bystanders, but an explanation was not difficult to find after the fact.  Last updated:  16 July 2015 Claim:  Campbell's Soup will donate a can of soup to the hungry for every click received on a special web page.   . Example:  [Collected on the Internet, 2000] Here is an easy way to make a difference this holiday season.  Campbell's is donating a can of soup to the needy for every person that goes to their site and votes for their favorite NFL team. Go to the site and it is right there, very easy to do. It will only take a few seconds of your time to fill some empty tummies with warm soup this winter. Please forward this message to everyone in your address book too. Thanks.  https://chunky.nfl.com/click_for_cans.html https://chunky.nfl.com/click_for_cans.html  Origins:  The above program to attract visitors to the Campbell's Soup web site through the promise of donating cans of soup to the hungry began in 2000. Akin to the Hunger Site's "click to donate" program, Campbell's Soup ties its beneficence to clicks made on a special page on chunky.com, its Campbell's Chunky web site (which is separate from its main site at campbellsoup.com).  Hunger Site chunky.com campbellsoup.com The   2000 promotion  target of 5 million cans was reached in mid-December 2000.  This on-again, off-again program was restarted in the fall of 2001 with a target of another 5 million cans of soup; it was wrapped up after Campbell's announced that the goal of 5 million cans had been met, then was relaunched with the goal of donating an additional 500,000 cans.  During the 2002 campaign Campbell's was just shy of the halfway mark on 23 October 2002 and had reached their target of 5 million cans by 7 November 2002.  Fall 2003 saw yet another interation of the program with the usual 5 million-can goal. As to what the promotion is about, chunky.com's page provides this information regarding the charity: Our Tackling Hunger campaign will result in donations of up to a total of 5 million cans of a variety of Campbell's soups on behalf of all 32 NFL teams. Click for Cans donations are made over the course of the year to a variety of hunger relief charities across the country, in NFL cities and in many other communities. However, Campbell's has been oddly reluctant to release information about the mechanics of their "Tackling Hunger" program. When we asked them back in 2000 for some details  such as whom the food went to  they refused to answer, claiming such information was "proprietary." Even when we reframed our question to remove any suggestion that we were seeking actual names of organizations or individuals (e.g., "Does it go to group homes, or hospitals, or directly to the homes of needy people?"), they stonewalled us again with a claim that such information was "proprietary."  We made additional inquiries to Campbell's Soups concerning these matters because we believe those who participate in donation programs should know whom they're donating to. Campbell's never answered them, not during the 2000 promotion nor during the year to follow.  The promotion ended with our having no better idea whose hunger was being relieved by this program than what we started out with. And that's disturbing. Perhaps what Campbell's is reluctant to disclose is that the promotion doesn't involve their shipping hundreds of thousands of cans of soup directly from their plant(s) to food pantries and homeless shelters in the represented NFL cities, nor does it allow those cities to determine who gets the soup: Campbell's handles the 'Tackling Hunger' payoff by collecting store returns of dented and otherwise unsaleable cans of soup and sending them to redistribution centers of their choosing.  The (store-returned) cans of soup do eventually reach the needy, but any food pantry or other charity group that doesn't work directly with a redistribution outlet can't claim them, and the NFL teams and cities have no say in where the cans end up.  An article in the newsletter for the Catholic Diocese of Green Bay, Wisconsin, chronicled the disappointment one team's fans experienced with the program's administration in 2001. Green Bay Barbara "this tomato is not too chicken to use her noodle" Mikkelson Last updated:  1 October 2007 Republican senate candidate George Allen says he has the will and experience to bring tax relief to Virginia families.When I was elected Governor, we had an audacious agenda that naysayers said couldnt be enacted with a Democrat majority in the state legislature, Allen said in a Feb. 23 guest column forInsideNova.com. However, we worked across party lines and enacted historic reforms. Working together, we cut taxes by more than $600 million...Well stipulate that Allen, who was governor from 1994 to 1998, did convince a Democrat-controlled legislature to pass major reforms to welfare, criminal sentencing and juvenile justice. But his claim of cutting taxes by $600 million, which Allen first made in his farewell address to the General Assembly at the end of his term, has gone largely unexamined.Until now.We asked Dan Allen, a spokesman for the Allen campaign, for proof. He sent us a list of more than a dozen bills and budget changes that occurred on George Allens watch as governor. We scoured economic impact statements for those pieces of legislation and searched newspaper archives to find monetary values for each item.Three of the biggest tax cuts were approved in 1994. *A Social Security income tax deduction for self-employed Virginians valued at $162.1 million over six years, according to a 1997 estimate of the Finance Department. The measure was introduced by previous Gov. L. Douglas Wilder, a Democrat, in his farewell budget. *A tax cut for senior citizens that the Finance Department valued at $215.7 million over six years. The action was tied to a settlement after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a Virginia policy of taxing the pensions of federal retirees but not of state government retirees. The high court ruled the groups had to be treated equally. *A tax cut on the tangible assets of corporations worth $104.3 million over four years. The program was originally passed under Gov. Gerald L. Baliles in 1988 and slated to last for eight years. It was suspended for two years in 1992 under Wilder, who was battling a poor economy. Wilder, in his 1994 farewell budget, urged resuming the tax cut for the final four years and Allen, who came to office that January, agreed.Those three cuts add up to $482.1 million.In 1997, Allen signed a bill giving self-employed Virginians a break on unemployment insurance taxes that was worth $137 million over four years, according to the Finance Department document.The campaign also sent us a list of smaller tax cuts that passed when Allen was governor. We found their value by researching impact statements that were prepared at the time by the Department of Planning and Budget. Heres the list:*Major Business Facility Jobs Tax Credit, 1994, worth $2.1 million over two years. *Coal Employment Enhancement Credits, 1995, totaling $33.2 million over two years. *Enterprise Zones, 1995, worth $2.8 million over two years. *Film Production Tax Exemption, 1995, worth $571,000 in two years. *Military Tax Relief, 1996, worth $600,000 in two years. *Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credit, 1996, totaling $1.25 million in two years. *Space Flight and Space Launch Activities, 1997, worth $1.35 million annually. *Worker Retraining Tax Credit, 1997, worth $2.1 million in one year. *Virginia Coal Employment and Production Incentive Tax Credit, 1997, worth $13 million over two year.The list from Allen also included the BPOL tax cut on the earnings of businesses. The local tax was estimated to generate $300 million annually. The legislation allowed varying tax reductions depending on the size cities and counties.We were unable to find a value for the BPOL cut and the Allen campaign didnt have one. Dan Allen did not include this reduction in his $600 million calculation. Localities had their own flexibility on this, so it would be hard to quantify, he said.They also didnt include tax cut proposals from George Allens farewell budget in 1998, which news reports valued at $350 million. The major one, approved by the General Assembly, was setting aside $260 million to phase in the first two years of a car tax cut promised by incoming Gov. Jim Gilmore, a Republican.We should note that Allen also proposed a massive $2.1 billion package of tax cuts in 1995 that was opposed by the business community and defeated by Democrats in the General Assembly. And despite Allens tax cutting efforts,state spending roseat an average level for Virginia governors during Allens term.Our ruling:George Allen said more than $600 million in taxes were cut during his governorship.We came up with $676.1 million in cuts, although we should point out that some of these reductions took place over six years. Allen, however, never qualified the time period for the tax cuts. And he arguably could have added other reductions to his list.We rate his statement True. After a flurry of attack ads in the past two weeks, President Barack Obama this week released aTV adin which he spoke directly into the camera and discussed how his policy approaches differed from Mitt Romneys. He cited taxes as one area where they had different philosophies. Obama said, Gov. Romney's plan would cut taxes for the folks at the very top.Well check whether this is an accurate characterization of Romneys plan.Romney has posted somekey elements of his tax planon his campaign website. Heres a summary of the provisions for individual taxpayers: Cut marginal rates by one-fifth on a permanent, across-the-board basis Eliminate interest, dividend, and capital gains taxes for taxpayers with an adjusted gross income below $200,000 Eliminate the estate tax Repeal the Alternative Minimum TaxTo analyze the Romney tax cut, we turned to the Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, an independent think tank that evaluates the tax proposals submitted by presidential candidates. The Tax Policy Center looked at two versions of Romneys tax proposal. We will use theanalysisof the more recent of Romneys two plans, which the group published in March 2012.The Tax Policy Center ran two sets of numbers, one that gives Romney credit for extending the tax cuts enacted under President George W. Bush and for an annual adjustment in the Alternative Minimum Tax and one that doesn't. Under the analysis that gives Romney credit for extending the Bush tax cuts and the AMT, people in each of the 11 income ranges in the centers study saw a tax cut, with after-tax income increasing by anywhere from 0.3 percent for people who earn less than $10,000 to 19.8 percent for people earning more than $1 million per year. Under the other measurement, which we find is more appropriate, people in eight of the 11 income ranges got cuts -- all except the income ranges below $30,000. For those earning more than that, after-tax income would increase by anywhere from 0.8 percent for those in the $30,000 to $40,000 range to nearly 12 percent for those earning more than $1 million.So Obama is telling part of the story. Yes, there are substantial benefits for people at the top, but he ignores that most people in the middle and lower reaches of the income ladder would benefit as well. Using the calculation that does not give him credit for the Bush and AMT extensions, people earning from $40,000 to $50,000 would see a cut of $512 on average, while taxpayers in the $50,000-to-$75,000 range would see a cut of $1,122.Still, there is support for Obama's point because the Romney tax cuts are tilted toward the wealthy. The biggest winners under Romneys tax plan are those earning more than $1 million. That group accounts for less than 1 percent of all taxpayers, but would receive 26 to 31 percent of the Romney plans tax benefits, according to the Tax Policy Center's calculations.Our ruling Obama is correct that Romneys plan does indeed cut taxes for high-income Americans -- quite heavily in fact -- but the rich arent the only ones who would see a cut. Taxes would be reduced in lower income ranges, too. Still, the plan gives a large share of the benefits to higher income taxpayers. On balance, we rate the claim Mostly True. Nearly two years into the pandemic, the world saw a resurgence of COVID-19 cases and with them, reiterations of unfounded claims that have pulsated through the global community since early 2020.  In response to a rise of U.S. case counts, parts of the nation saw an increase in the use of the anti-parasitic drug ivermectin, which has been falsely touted as a potential treatment for the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2, and online claims that the anti-parasitic drug could cure the virus since at least April 2020. April 2020 That debate was sparked again in early September 2021 when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a health advisory following a spike in ivermectin dispensing at retail pharmacies, as well as over-the-counter veterinary formulations not intended for human use.  Some social media users seized the health agencys announcement as an opportunity to peddle misinformation surrounding the drug, including a citation in a 2011 study that claimed to find that 85% of men treated for river blindness with ivermectin were found to be sterile. The purported study was shared to Reddit and Twitter where the post received thousands of engagements across both platforms.  Reddit Twitter  Ivermectin tablets are approved by the FDA for human use to treat river blindness and some parasitic worms (intestinal strongyloidiasis). Prescribed topical formulations are also used to treat some external parasites like head lice and rosacea. A different formulation is FDA-approved for animals to prevent heartworm disease and to treat internal and external parasites.  Ivermectin A spokesperson for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said that it continues to monitor reports of all adverse events with ivermectin, and infertility in men is not a known side effect of it and, as such, is not included as a side effect in U.S. labeling. Ivermectin was also shown to have no adverse effects on the fertility in rats in studies at repeated doses of up to three times the maximum recommended human dose, the FDA added.  labeling The claim that Ivermectin caused infertility in rats is based on findings published in a questionable study hosted online by the Archives of Applied Science Research. study Archives of Applied Science Research According to the publication tracking service Publons, Archives of Applied Science Research is a peer reviewed, open access journal published by an institution known as Scholars Research Library  but as of this writing, the organizations social media account had been suspended by Twitter for violating the platforms rules. Additionally, Scholars Research Library is self-described as a self-supporting organization that does not receive funding from any institution or government. And while it does not require submission charges, study authors are required to pay a fair handling fee for processing their articles of up to 1000 euros.  Publons suspended self-described The webpage is also riddled with typos, for example: riddled   Snopes contacted the Scholars Research Library for further information on the peer review and vetting processes but did not receive a response. In an email to Snopes, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, an international non-profit organization that promotes collaboration amongst scientists, declined to comment on the credibility of the journal but did refer our team to the indexes at Clarivate, which requires a review of a journals peer-review process. A search of Archives of Applied Science Research did not return any results. Clarivate The study was written by four researchers including Blessing Idonije, or Idonije O.B., who is described as a professor of clinical biochemistry at Ambrose Alli University in Nigeria. Snopes contacted the university but did not hear back in time for publication.  described The study authors wrote that they screened a total of 385 patients diagnosed with river blindness, a tropical disease that the CDC noted as being caused by the parasitic worm, Onchocerca volvulus, and transmitted through the bites of river-breeding blackflies. Infection can result in visual impairment or blindness and cause rashes, itching, and nodules under the skin and is most often treated with ivermectin. But because ivermectin only kills the fly larvae, the anti-parasitic is given every six months for the lifespan of the adult worms, which can be between 10 and 15 years, or for as long as the person shows signs of skin or eye infection. noted treated Of those 385 patients, just 37 individuals between the ages of 28 and 57 at the onset of the study were deemed to have normal sperm counts. The sperm counts of those 37 patients were analyzed before and after an 11-month treatment of ivermectin, including data on motility, morphology, volume, viscosity, and liquefaction time.  We observed significant reduction in the sperm counts and sperm motility of the patients tested. On the morphology there was significant increase in the number of abnormal sperm cells. This took the forms of two heads, double tails, white (albino) sperms and extraordinarily large heads, wrote the study authors, adding that such alterations could only have occurred as a result of their treatment with ivermectin.  But the study has several blaring issues. Firstly, it did not include a section dedicated to limitations that could have been relevant to its findings. Limitations are important for other scientists to understand the context of study findings to interpret the validity of the scientific work. Not only do limitations help scientists to replicate future studies, but it also covers questions that may influence the findings, such as whether the reduction in sperm count could have been caused by river blindness infection.  limitations There were also typos present in the study that should have been caught by scientific editors publishing in a credible journal:    Experts warn that serious harm could result from using either the human or animal medications outside of their intended and prescribed use  but that hasnt stopped some from self-treating with the anti-parasitic. As ivermectin usage spiked, so too have adverse effects and overdoses associated with it. Since July 2021, outpatient ivermectin dispensing increased by 24-fold from before the pandemic. That same month, the U.S. also saw a five-fold increase in the number of calls to Poison Control Centers.  warn  Data was collected from the National Prescription Audit Weekly database, which collects data from a sample of approximately 48,900 U.S. retail pharmacies, representing 92% of all retail prescription activity. Ivermectin dispensed by mail order and long-term care pharmacies, prescriptions by veterinarians, and non-oral formulations were not included. CDC  CDC   Ivermectin is not authorized or approved by FDA for prevention or treatment of COVID-19. The National Institutes of Healths (NIH) COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panel has also determined that there are currently insufficient data to recommend ivermectin for treatment of COVID-19, wrote the CDC.  As Snopes previously reported, preliminary results of several studies showed potential for effectiveness as an antiviral in the treatment and prevention of COVID-19, but as of this writing, the FDA had not authorized or approved ivermectin for the use in preventing or treating COVID-19 in humans. Further clinical trials are needed for guidance on ivermectin treatment of COVID-19 and clinical trials assessing such ivermectin uses are ongoing. reported not authorized Snopes is still fighting an infodemic of rumors and misinformation surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, and you can help. Find out what we've learned and how to inoculate yourself against COVID-19 misinformation. Read the latest fact checks about the vaccines. Submit any questionable rumors and advice you encounter. Become a Founding Member to help us hire more fact-checkers. And, please, follow the CDC or WHO for guidance on protecting your community from the disease.  fighting Find out Read Submit Become a Founding Member CDC WHO Sources UPDATE [Sept. 9, 2021]: This article was updated to include reference to Clarivate indexes.  UPDATE [Sept. 10, 2021]: Language was added to clarify a 2002 citation included in the 2011 study.