The propagation of malware is associated with the 'Be Like Bill' phenomena.
In January 2016, a Facebook trend most commonly referenced as "Be Like Bill" swept the social network. During that time, users initially posted comics wherein a character named "Bill" served as a reinforcer of social media etiquette, before "Be Like Bill" generators enabled users to create personalized versions of the meme:  As is often the case with items like "Be Like Bill" that appear seemingly from the ether and go Facebook-wide, it wasn't long before folks became suspicious of this Bill character and his purpose on their News Feeds. Soonafter Bill became the meme of the day, a backlash against the meme was started: one that first simply decried the "scolding" nature of the trend, then followed up with rumors that the ubiquitous comic was a vector for malware, information theft, or other undesirable outcomes: scolding   Bill proved so popular and omnipresent that multiple local news outlets carried reports about the potential dangers of creating a "Be Like Bill" meme. Missouri TV station KFVS, Kansas City station KCTV (clip below), and Washington, D.C., station WTTGran some concern-generatingcoverage about the specific comic, typically lumping it into the general category of "clickbait" and associating it with the risk of all unvetted apps: KFVS KCTV WTTG It's known as 'clickbait', and if you haven't read the terms and conditions on the creator's website, the details may shock you. The company originally said in its terms of privacy, "You will allow us to use, edit your content with our service permanently, no limit and no recover." KFVS-TV also says, in some cases, content can contain viruses that can damage your computer, use your Facebook profile in ways you might not know, or even attempt to steal your credit card or bank account numbers. KCTV5 KCTV5 As the above-quoted material stated, Facebook has indeed presented a handy way for bad actors to engage in all sorts of unpleasant activities using compelling content. However, the "in some cases" outcomes described apply to malicious apps in general and not specifically to any known vulnerabilities linked to the "Be Like Bill" meme. Many articles cited extantBetter Business Bureau warnings about rogue apps that antedated "Be Like Bill" and referenced "clickbait," but the term was applied exceptionally broadly and not specifically to malware. In short, whether an item is clickbait itself has no bearing on its potential to cause harm to computers or accounts, and plenty of clickbait exists just to drive traffic to various web sites. clickbait Of additional interest (in bold) was a widely-reproduced excerpt from the Terms of Service of publisher Blobla's (who offered a mechanism for customizing "Be Like Bob" memes) that purportedly stated end users agreed to "allow [Blobla] to use, edit your content with our service permanently, no limit and no recover." We were unable to verify such language ever appeared in the agreement in question, and no such wording was in the their agreement as of 27 January 2016. Blobla's On 27 January 2016, Chicago station WMAQ published an article which reported that the Better Business Bureau (BBB) didn't suggest "Be Like Bill" posed any specific threat at all to social media users and added that the President and CEO of the Better Business Bureau of Chicago and Northern Illinois Steve Bernas had confirmed only that the BBB was looking into the meme (and keeping an eye out for impostors). article According to the outlet, Blobla clarified that the generator didn't require Facebook authorizations of the sort generally associated with malware or rogue apps: However, the Better Business Bureau has not yet definitely ruled whether the generated memes pose a risk to you or your computer. The sensation's creator, Bloba, on the other hand says they don't collect any data from users and their terms are the same as any others you see on Facebook. "First, our game Be Like Bill doesn't require users to authorize a Facebook app," a spokesperson for Bloba wrote in response. "Of course if users want to share the results to Facebook, they must be logged in Facebook. However we use Facebook share dialog for users to share their results. It's a very common ... This doesn't allow us to collect any data from user's Facebook account." Blobla's creators also explained that the now-elided, widely-cited verbiage ("permanently, no limit and no recover") was poorly composed and pertained to unrelated functions which might have ended up on their web site: "Second, we do not store any information of users on our servers, as stated in our ToS," Bloba continued. "Third, the Terms about our right to users' content is about posts on our website (a post may be a game like Be Like Bill, or a quiz, a video...). Because our website has a function for normal users to create a post in other languages. We have removed that term to avoid misunderstanding." On 29 January 2016, BBB communications director Katherine Hutt clarified the bureau's stance on "Be Like Bill," due to themultiple news reports conflating their earlier "clickbait" warnings withthat particularmeme and generator: We don't issue warnings about a specific company without investigating first. Finally, outlets devoted to more detailed reporting on online security (such as Sophos' Naked Security blog) haven't issued any warnings about "Be Like Bill" or the popular comic generator. No widespread reports of adverse outcomes have substantiated news affiliate speculation, and the bulk of "Be Like Bill"-themed reports focused on the general ability for malware to spread through apps, not any reports definitively (or anecdotally) related to that meme specifically. While users might tire of seeing Bill across their feeds, he doesn't pose a threat to anything more than annoyance-free browsing. blog
In February 2021, several readers asked Snopes to examine the authenticity and accuracy of online posts which claimed that Coca-Cola had given its employees diversity training that included slides encouraging them to "try to be less white." On Feb. 19, the Twitter account @LeftyMoment posted a widely shared tweet which contained the caption "This was in Coca-Cola's diversity training" along with an image that appeared to be composed of two screenshots: one showing a presentation slide with the words "Try to be less white"; and the other with a list of "white" traits, explaining that "to be less white" means being "less oppressive," "less arrogant," "less certain" and so on:   Those and other similar images appeared to have been leaked by a Coca-Cola employee to Karlyn Borysenko, a prominent online opponent of critical race theory and many aspects of corporate diversity training, who describes herself on LinkedIn as an organizational pyschologist and "executive/performance coach." LinkedIn Borysenko shared the screenshots on Feb. 19, consistently characterizing them as having been part of required training for Coca-Cola employees. As proof of this, she cited the Coca-Cola logo visible in the top right-hand corner of the screen. shared The screenshots were also shared on the controversial 4Chan thread /pol/, a frequent online source of political disinformation in recent years. Nigel Farage, former leader of the far-right UK Independence Party, mentioned the story in a YouTube video, saying Coca-Cola had "lost their marbles" by "putting their staff through compulsory training on 'How to be less white.'" shared on controversial mentioned The presentation in question is real, and the "try to be less white" slides were authentic. However, the evidence presented by Borysenko and others does not prove that Coca-Cola included the presentation in its required diversity training for employees, and the company has explicitly denied that claim. The slides contained in the widely-shared online posts in February 2021 came from a presentation entitled "Confronting Racism," which featured Robin DiAngelo, a writer and consultant whose work on racism has proven controversial and who has been hired to conduct diversity and anti-racism training for many American companies.  work controversial The course was created by Big Think, an educational video platform, using footage taken from an earlier interview they conducted with DiAngelo. "Confronting Racism" had been available on LinkedIn Learning, but was removed on Feb. 23, on foot of a request by the producers of the course Big Think, and representatives for DiAngelo. Before it was taken down, it carried the following description: available In this course, Robin DiAngelo, the best-selling author of White Fragility, gives you the vocabulary and practices you need to start confronting racism and unconscious bias at the individual level and throughout your organization. Theres no magic recipe for building an inclusive workplace. Its a process that needs to involve people of color, and that needs to go on for as long as your companys in business. But with these tools at your disposal, youll be well on your way. The slides in question appeared during the "What you can do" section of the course:     Those slides appeared as part of a video, which the screenshots shared widely in February 2021 did not fully reflect. In that section of the video, DiAngelo provides the following narration: I try to be a little less white. I'm really clear that I'm not going to be free of my conditioning and racism is not going to end in my lifetime. The question I ask myself is "How do I do a little less harm?" and "How do I know?" right? Am I, in any given moment, behaving in anti-racist ways? Not "I'm already done, I'm never racist." Not "I'm a terrible person, I'm always racist." In any given moment, how am I doing? And how do I know? And that keeps me humble, and it keeps me accountable. So for me, to do less harm is no small thing. Because it could literally be one more hour on a person of color's life, who didn't have to take home my nonsense and agonize all night long whether it was worth it to talk to me, or they should just suck it up yet again, lest they risk my lashing out in defensiveness. So for me to be "less white" is to be less oppressive, racially. To be less arrogant, to be less certain, to be less defensive, to be less ignorant, quite frankly. To be more humble, to listen, to believe, to break with apathy, to break with white solidarity. It's not easy, it's a lifelong process. But nothing is more rewarding.  LinkedIn Learning is a service provided to LinkedIn members with a paid "Premium" subscription. Users do not purchase individual videos, but rather their premium membership gives them access to all the additional content contained in the LinkedIn Learning platform: videos; courses; and "learning paths." This is an important feature of LinkedIn Learning, in the context of the controversy prompted by Borysenko's tweets and YouTube videos about Coca-Cola. In a news release published on Feb. 20, Coca-Cola stated that "Confronting Racism" "was not part of the company's curriculum," meaning it was not something Coca-Cola obliged its employees to view. Rather, the company said, its training involved use of LinkedIn Learning, and the course was accessible there. news release So a company employee could log into a Coca-Cola LinkedIn account in order to watch videos that are part of their mandatory diversity training, but then navigate, within LinkedIn Learning, to "Confronting Racism," which need not be required viewing in order for them to access it. This would allow them to create screenshots that feature slides from the course, alongside a Coca-Cola logo in the top right-hand corner. So, contrary to Borysenko's claim, the presence of the logo was not proof that "Confronting Racism" was required viewing for company employees, merely that someone at Coca-Cola had viewed it. We asked Coca-Cola to provide details of the company's "diversity, equity and inclusion training." A company spokesperson did not provide a comprehensive curriculum, but did provide Snopes several examples of topics included as required viewing. Each of the following items appears to match individual videos available through the LinkedIn Learning platform:  Fundamentals Six steps unconscious bias impact brave allyship The spokesperson also provided further clarification about Coca-Cola's use of LinkedIn Learning in company trainings: "On learning channels not owned by The Coca-Cola Company, users had the ability to navigate outside of the intended curriculum which may have given the false impression that certain videos were part of the training." The controversy appears to have been caused by a fundamental misunderstanding, on the part of Borysenko and others, as to how LinkedIn Learning works, and the fact that Coca-Cola employees could, while taking part in their mandatory training, access hundreds of videos and courses that bore no relation to that training, and were not required. However, we cannot rule out the possibility that, despite Coca-Cola's clear denials, the existence of a coherent alternative explanation, and despite the complete absence of evidence so far, "Confronting Racism" was in fact listed on the curriculum.  [Correction]: Feb. 23, 2021. This fact check previously inaccurately described Robin DiAngelo as the producer of the video course "Confronting Racism." In fact, the course was produced by Big Think, using video footage taken from an earlier interview with DiAngelo. As U.S. President Donald Trump accelerated unsubstantiated attacks on the legitimacy of mail-in voting during the summer of 2020, numerous Snopes readers asked us to investigate whether the leader of the U.S. Postal Service was carrying out a nefarious scheme to help Trump win another presidential term. mail-in voting In late July and early August, various rumors surfaced regarding Louis DeJoy, a North Carolina businessman whom the Postal Service's governing board selected to run the agency in May 2020. For example, a viral tweet thread alleged: viral tweet My mailman just confirmed they have all officially been told to "SLOW THE MAIL DOWN," per trump's Postmaster General. ...He says that there is backed up mail ALL OVER THE FLOOR. He's never seen anything like it. It has ALREADY begun. But as long as we keep each other informed, we can beat their dirty tricks with INFORMATION.   The claim's underlying notions were these: DeJoy was a political ally to the Republican president, and the new postmaster general had used his new authority to order Postal Service carriers and clerks to slow deliveries to help Trump win the 2020 November election. A backlog of ballots in the weeks or days before Election Day, critics of the president worried, could lead to votes going uncounted or deemed invalid due to state laws governing mail-in election deadlines. state laws What follows is an examination of federal documents obtained by Snopes  including letters by members of Congress, campaign finance reports, and internal memos to Postal Service employees  as well as interviews with postal union representatives and a Postal Service spokesperson, to determine the legitimacy of those questions. DeJoy could not be reached for an interview for this report.  Note: Snopes not only investigated DeJoy's relationship to Trump, but his financial stake in companies that compete with the Postal Service to evaluate if, or to what extent, his past investments provided any evidence of a plan to undermine the Postal Service's longstanding mission: to provide mail service to every American, no matter their address or income. Yes. DeJoy, who lives in Greensboro, donated more than $1.2 million to the Trump campaign between August 2016 and February 2020, according to campaign finance reports compiled by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC). Federal Elections Commission It's unclear when or how DeJoy developed a relationship with Trump, and why he decided to support the billionaire's political pursuits. In a 2005 interview with Greensboro's local newspaper, DeJoy  then-CEO of New Breed Logistics, a distribution and warehousing company  appeared less supportive of Trump, saying his self-important attitude on the reality-TV show "The Apprentice" was destructive. 2005 interview The Apprentice "I'd be fired," DeJoy said, if he was a contestant. Nonetheless, by early 2017, DeJoy was among his state's top donors to Trump (see below for The Charlotte Observer's list that ranks DeJoy at No. 3 with a total contribution of $111,000). And by October of that year, DeJoy had become close enough to the president to host him and other donors for fundraiser at his Greensboro house. top donors Greensboro house.     Also, by that time, DeJoy's wife, Aldona Wos, had been appointed by the president to serve as vice chair of a White House commission that oversees paid fellowships in federal offices, according to the couple's foundation website. foundation website In addition to his contributions to Trump's political campaigns specifically, DeJoy has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to Republican causes or campaigns over decades, the FEC records show. The Postal Service's governing board, a group appointed by the president with confirmation from the Senate, selected DeJoy as Postmaster General on May 6, 2020, after what it described as an extensive nationwide search for qualified candidates. At the time of that decision, Trump had appointed all six board members  Chairman Robert Duncan, John Barger, Ron Bloom, Roman Martinez IV, Donald Moak, and William Zollars  since the early days of his presidency. what it described Robert Duncan John Barger Ron Bloom Roman Martinez IV Donald Moak William Zollars  DeJoy, who was in charge of fundraising for the Republican National Convention (RNC) in Charlotte when the board made its announcement, made the following donations since the start of 2020, according to filings from the FEC: National Republican Congressional Committee. National Republican Congressional Committee Facebook In sum, considering DeJoy's record of donations, as well as evidence of him hosting a Trump fundraiser at his Greensboro home in fall 2017, it is accurate to claim that the new postmaster general is a political ally to the Republican president.  home The answer to this question is less clear. In summer 2020, the viral claim about DeJoy  that he had directed carriers to delay mail to benefit Trump's reelection campaign (which we unpack below)  took on another layer: that DeJoy had also allegedly invested $70 million of his own money in delivery companies that compete with the Postal Service. another layer allegedly     That allegation, which we deemed true (see the explanation below), was particularly worrisome for critics of Trump and DeJoy, who believed the alleged holdings were more proof of the two leaders conspiring together  this time in an attempt to privatize the Postal Service. critics Here's some context before we dive into DeJoy's personal assets: Conservative Republicans have long pushed to remove government from mail services that they believe should be left to the private commercial market. Since Trump took office, he has called the Postal Service "a joke" or Amazon's "delivery boy," considering its package rates, and has floated the idea of eventually privatizing the agency. a joke delivery boy eventually privatizing the agency Meanwhile, others fear dismantling the federally-mandated mail service would disproportionately affect people who live in rural areas, where private companies such as FedEx and UPS either charge higher rates or do no shipments at all. At the same time, the Postal Service  which does not receive tax dollars for its operating expenses  faces a worsening financial situation due to a 2006 congressional mandate that required the agency to prepay health care benefits of retirees, as well as a decline in first-class mail customers. The coronavirus pandemic exacerbated those long-standing problems, forcing several post offices nationwide to completely close or scale back hours. congressional mandate coronavirus pandemic scale back hours For instance, on April 9, 2020, roughly one month before DeJoy was selected to lead the Postal Service, then-Postmaster General Megan Brennan said the agency was preparing for a $13 billion revenue shortfall due directly to COVID-19 and an additional $54.3 billion in losses over 10 years. Considering those projections, she said the agency could run out of cash this fiscal year  or the end of September  without federal intervention. (Brennan announced her retirement in October 2019, after more than 30 years with the agency.) April 9, 2020 announced her retirement The former Postal Service leader made those comments shortly after federal leaders negotiated a $2.2 trillion COVID-19 economic relief package, called the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, which, initially, included a $13 billion one-time boost for the mail service. But, purportedly at the urging of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and aides to Trump, congressional leaders removed that provision from the stimulus package, and instead included a $10 billion loan that the Trump administration could leverage in its favor. Then, on July 29, 2020, The Washington Post reported that under DeJoy's leadership, the postal agency gave Mnuchin's office's proprietary information about the Postal Service's most lucrative private-sector contracts, such as Amazon, FedEx and UPS, in exchange for the loan money. economic relief package Steven Mnuchin The Washington Post By that time, Congressional leaders and Trump were battling yet again over another emergency relief package; Democrats proposed a $25 billion boost for the Postal Service but then lowered that amount to $10 billion during talks with Republicans. On Aug. 13, 2020, during an interview on Fox Business Network, the president said frankly the tug-and-pull over Postal Service funding was part of his administration's plan to try to make it harder for the agency to handle the expected surge in mail-in ballots in the November election. If we dont make a deal, that means they dont get the money, Trump told host Maria Bartiromo, referring to the false claim that Democrats are are proposing a universal mail-in voting system. That means they cant have universal mail-in voting; they just cant have it. told Which brings us to DeJoy's assets, and the above-mentioned claim that he had "$70 million invested in companies that compete with USPS." For the basis of this analysis, we considered private companies that provide shipping or distribution services, such as DHL, the FedEx Corporation, and United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS), business competitors with the post office. For more than 30 years, DeJoy was the CEO of New Breed Logistics, a supply chain business that contracted with a variety of public and private companies, including the Postal Service. In 2014, XPO Logistics acquired DeJoy's company, and he served on the company's executive team or board of directors until May 2018. According to internal documents, which we obtained using the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) database of company filings, XPO Logistics considered its competitors to include DHL, FedEx, UPS, and J.B. Hunt Transport Services.  XPO Logistics DHL FedEx UPS J.B. Hunt Transport Services Aside from that evidence, which proved DeJoy's former company competed for business with organizations that also competed with the Postal Service, Snopes uncovered a letter from his wife, Wos, to a White House legal advisor on January 3, 2020, that listed her family's financial assets, known as "Attachment A." According to that list, the family had stock in companies including UPS, J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc., and XPO Logistics, Inc. letter She wrote the letter in response to a nomination by the Trump administration to serve as U.S. ambassador to Canada, and she said she would divest from all holdings in the document within 90 days of her confirmation. However, as of this writing, Wos had not been sworn into the position. The letter, which was available via the Office of Government Ethics, read: nomination Office of Government Ethics   As of June 15, 2020, the day DeJoy assumed his role as postmaster general, The Washington Post reported the couple had between $30.1 million and $75.3 million in assets in Postal Service competitors or contractors. XPO Logistics represented the vast majority of those investments, and the couple's combined stake in UPS and trucking company J.B. Hunt, for examples, was roughly $265,000. The Washington Post reported On DeJoy's first day, the Senate's top Democrat, Charles Schumer of New York, said in letter to the Postal Service's board of governors' chairman: "[DeJoy's] financial interests in companies that have business ties with the Postal Services, as well as his extensive campaign fundraising efforts, raise questions" over his ethical conflicts of interest and partisan interests. letter By that point, a spokeswoman for DeJoy told journalists he had resigned as finance chair for the Republican National Convention, and would "comply with any financial divestitures that are required" for the new leadership position. told journalists In sum, reports proved the DeJoy family at one point had millions of dollars in assets in companies that compete or contract with the Postal Service, which lend credibility to the viral assertion. But the exact amount of such investments was unclear, and as of this writing, it was unknown if or to what extent the couple had divested any of the financial holdings. Not exactly  but there is some truth to the claim. Upon our analysis, the rumor seems to have stemmed from a series of directives DeJoy gave Postal Service employees since he took over the agency. On his first day, for example, he addressed the agency in a video that alluded to impending changes under his leadership that aimed to create a "viable operating model," though he did not go into specifics. video Then, in mid-July, he issued several memos to employees, including a "New [Postmaster General's] expectations and plan." Those messages to all managers, clerks, and carriers nationwide appeared to be the source of the claim, and detailed changes to how and when the Postal Agency would deliver mail. A July 10, 2020, internal document to managers, which Snopes received from the American Postal Workers Union and refers to an "operational pivot" for the agency, said the following, for example: American Postal Workers Union The initial step in our pivot is targeted on transportation and the soaring costs we incur due to late trips and extra trips, which costs the organization somewhere around $200 million in added expenses. $200 million in added expenses The shifts are simple, but they will be challenging, as we seek to change our culture and move away from past practices previously used. But perhaps most relevant to the claim, the DeJoy-sponsored directives included instructions for employees to leave letters or packages at distribution centers if they delayed carriers from their routes  contradicting previous rules for deliveries  and said the Postal Service would no longer pay employees overtime to complete all mail deliveries. The July 10, 2020 memo said:  contradicting One aspect of these changes that may be difficult for employees is that  temporarily  we may see mail left behind or mail on the workroom floor or docks [in Processing and Distribution Centers], which is not typical. We will address root causes of these delays and adjust the very next day. Any mail left behind must be properly reported, and employees should ensure this action is taken with integrity and accuracy. As we adjust to the ongoing pivot, which will have a number of phases, we know that operations will begin to run more efficiently and that delayed mail volumes will soon shrink significantly. We also considered a separate message to employees in July 2020 that said, under a new initiative, carriers in certain regions would not sort any mail during the morning and instead clock in, retrieve sorted mail from the previous day and limit time in the office as much as possible. Then, when they returned from the streets, they would sort all available mail for the next day. July 2020 The agency said the extra spending on employees' overtime or delivery trips had not improved "our performance scores," without going into detail on what that meant, and framed the changes as necessary steps to improve its financial position. A July 27, 2020, public statement from DeJoy said: said public statement Given our current situation, it is critical that the Postal Service take a fresh look at our operations and make necessary adjustments. We are highly focused on our public service mission to provide prompt, reliable, and efficient service to every person and business in this country, and to remain a part of the nations critical infrastructure. David Partenheimer, manager of media relations for the Postal Service, told Snopes that the postmaster general was not doing any media interviews regarding the initiatives, nor about the underlying claims of this report. In a roughly 760-word email to us, however, Partenheimer reemphasized what the agency viewed as the need for the adjustments, and said: "We acknowledge that temporary service impacts can occur as we redouble our efforts to conform to the current operating plans, but any such impacts will be monitored and temporary ... and corrected as appropriate." Soon after the directives, American Postal Workers Union President Mark Dimondstein told us in a phone interview that employees and customers across the country were noticing mail delays. In the Philadelphia region, for instance, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported situations where residents were going upwards of three weeks without receiving packages and letters, and postal union leaders and carriers said mail was piling up at offices, unscanned and unsorted. Mark Dimondstein employees Philadelphia Inquirer "When you ... say this is what you have to do as workers, then that's what we have to do  [the change] runs counter to everything that the Postal Service is about, which is we treat the mail as our own; we get it to the customer as quickly as we can," Dimondstein said. "They've never seen mail backed up like this  it's not being moved." That meant, while DeJoy had not told carriers to "slow the mail down" verbatim, he initiated changes to how and when carriers go about doing their job that the Postal Agency said would cause temporary mail delays. However, it would be inaccurate to assume all slow deliveries under DeJoy's leadership were a result of the July 2020 directives specifically, when they could also be linked to reduced hours for some post offices or other circumstances. Roughly three months before the 2020 presidential election, voting rights groups and outspoken critics to the president believed the new directives by DeJoy occurred at a convenient time for Trump: when a record number of Americans were preparing to vote by mail and avoid potential exposure to the COVID-19 coronavirus by casting ballots at in-person polling places. Specifically, they worried the new requirements for post office carriers and clerks would lead to backlogs of mail-in ballots and thus create challenges for elections officials who, in the majority of states, must invalidate ballots that reach them after Election Day  even if they were postmarked before that date. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, a Democrat from New York, for example, led colleagues in writing a letter to DeJoy on July 20, 2020, that said: Rep. Carolyn Maloney "While these changes [to mail service] in a normal year would be drastic, in a presidential election year when many states are relying heavily on absentee mail-in ballots, increases in mail delivery timing would impair the ability of ballots to be received and counted in a timely manner  an unacceptable outcome for a free and fair election." We asked Dimondstein, APWU president, whether he believed the July directives by Postal Service leadership were somehow linked to a plan to cause mail service chaos before the November election and help Trump win reelection. He said: What we do know for truth is this administration is, in written record, proposing and planning to sell the post office to private corporations, i.e. privatizing. ...That was June 2018. We also know as a fact that ...that [there are] calls for reduced service, increased prices, and less workers' rights and benefits. So if you take those two things together, certainly if they're implemented, then they're going to cause delays in mail; they're going to cause service being undermined. ... written record This is a fact: [DeJoy is] what's considered a mega-donor of the Trump administration and the Republican party. ... Anything that undermines the Postal Service' [service to customers] ... has us concerned that it could be linked back to those who have an agenda to eliminate [the Postal Service]. But I can't sit here and tell you that that's a fact. Partenheimer said any notion that DeJoy made decisions for the Postal Service under directions from Trump (which include claims that he issued the July 2020 changes that resulted in delays to help Trump's re-election campaign) were "wholly misplaced and off-base." He said the Postal Service, typically an apolitical agency, remains committed to "fulfilling our role in the electoral process" in places where politicians allow voters to cast ballots by mail and "to delivering Election Mail in a timely manner consistent with our operational standards." He elaborated: "[Despite] any assertions to the contrary, we are not slowing down Election Mail or any other mail. Instead, we continue to employ a robust and proven process to ensure proper handling of all Election Mail consistent with our standards." Days later, he said in a statement to news media that certain deadlines concerning mail-in ballots, may be incompatible with the Postal Services delivery standards, especially if election officials dont pay more for first-class postage. To the extent that states choose to use the mail as part of their elections, they should do so in a manner that realistically reflects how the mail works, he said. news media Then, on Aug. 18, 2020, DeJoy issued a statement in which he said he would temporarily suspend initiatives "that have been raised as areas of concern as the nation prepares to hold an election in the midst of a devastating pandemic," including the controversial July 2020 directives that eliminated overtime and some delivery trips. The statement read: statement To avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail, I am suspending these initiatives until after the election is concluded. I want to assure all Americans of the following: In addition, effective Oct. 1, we will engage standby resources in all areas of our operations, including transportation, to satisfy any unforeseen demand. In sum, it was accurate to state that DeJoy, a political ally to Trump, ordered Postal Service workers to leave late-arriving mail at distribution centers for delivery the following day and eliminate extra trips in July 2020  a change the Postal Service was expecting to cause temporary mail delays  although no verifiable evidence proved those directives were part of a deliberate scheme to disenfranchise voters in the November 2020 election. Additionally, there was no proof to show the changes aimed to help Trump win reelection. For those reasons, we rate this claim "Unproven." Ye Hee Lee, Michelle and Bogage, Jacob. "Postal Service Backlog Sparks Worries That Ballot Delivery Could Be Delayed In November".
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 News & Record. 7 January 2005. Heckman, Jory. "USPS Board Names Logistics Executive As New Postmaster General".
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 The Intercept. 29 July 2020. Derysh, Igor. "With Trump Donor In Charge, Postal Service May Shut Locations And Cut Service Before Election Day".
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 20 July 2020. Bogage, Jacob. "Trump Ally Takes Over Crisis-Ridden Postal Service As Top Senate Democrat Demands Inquiry On Hiring".
 The Washington Post. 15 June 2020. Murphy, Brian. "NC Businessman, A Big-Time GOP Donor, Is Tapped To Lead US Postal Service".
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 The Washington Post. 31 July 2020. Reichmann, Deb, and Izaguirre, Anthony. "Trump Admits He's Blocking Postal Cash To Stop Mail-In Votes."
 Associated Press. 14 August 2020. USPS. "Postmaster General Louis DeJoy Statement."
 18 August 2020. This report was updated to include an interview by Trump with Fox Business Network on Aug. 13, 2020, where he acknowledged that he was intentionally blocking Postal Service funding in an attempt to make it harder for the agency to process mail-in ballots in the November presidential election. This report was updated to include a statement by DeJoy on Aug. 18, 2020, in which he announced the suspension of certain initiatives "to avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail." Voting in the 2020 U.S. Election may be over, but the misinformation keeps on ticking. Never stop fact-checking. Follow our post-election coverage here. here During the first 2020 U.S. presidential debate held in Cleveland on Sept. 29, Democratic nominee Joe Biden said he does not support the Green New Deal, a resolution introduced in Congress by members of his own party proposing strategies for dealing with climate change, but instead backs the Biden Plan for doing so, which is laid out on his campaign website. Biden's disavowal came on the heels of an attempt by his opponent, U.S. President Donald Trump, to tie him to the Green New Deal, claiming it would cost $100 trillion if implemented. Biden's responses (which begin one hour and 20 minutes into the below video clip) were as follows: That is not my plan. The Green New Deal is not my plan. [] The Green New Deal will pay for itself as we move forward. Were not going to build plants that in fact are great polluting plants. [] No, I dont support the Green New Deal. I support the Biden Plan that I put forward. The Biden Plan, which is different than what [Trump] calls the radical Green New Deal.  https://www.c-span.org/video/?475793-1/trump-biden-debate These statements sparked criticism from Republicans like Omar Navarro, who ran three unsuccessful bids for Californias 43d Congressional District in 2016, 2018, and again in 2020. On Sept. 30, Navarro shared a screenshot from Bidens website that described the Green New Deal as a crucial framework for meeting the climate challenges Omar Navarro  three unsuccessful bids   The language in the tweeted screenshot above was indeed found on Bidens website as of Sept. 30, but was taken out of context and doesn't reflect the differences between the Biden Plan and the Green New Deal, which we will discuss below. The Green New Deal resolution was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives on Feb. 7, 2019, in response to Trumps 2017 announcement that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement on climate change. The 14-page proposal sets forth a number of policies aimed at lowering greenhouse gas emissions produced by American companies, creating high-wage jobs for Americans, and to set an overall framework for environmental justice and resiliency against climate change-related disasters. It is important to note that the Green New Deal is nonbinding, and if it were to pass, nothing outlined within its pages would become law. 14-page proposal nonbinding Biden made climate change a cornerstone of his 2020 bid for the presidency, in turn criticizing Trump's handling of environmental affairs. It is true that the Biden Plan (archived here for reference) includes elements of the Green New Deal and is similar to it in that both plans agree that the U.S. needs to act urgently and epically to meet the scope of the climate change challenge, and that the environment and the economy are completely and totally connected. The Biden Plan addresses many of the issues outlined in the Green New Deal, with the addition of specific actions that a Biden administration would take should he be elected in November 2020. cornerstone Biden Plan here We dug through both proposals to understand the nuances between the two, where they differ, and where they are the same. Generally speaking, both policies establish a similar framework but differ in the specifics of how policymakers should go about enforcing and reaching defined goals. For example, both plans highlight the importance of clean, safe drinking water and community-driven projects that promote social and environmental justice in areas disproportionately impacted by the effects of climate change.  The greatest difference between the Biden Plan and the Green New Deal lies in their stances on the Paris Agreement, an international agreement established in 2015 with the central aim of coordinating and strengthening the global response to climate change and keeping the global temperature rise in this century below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Whereas the Biden Plan promises a recommitment to the Paris Agreement, the Green New Deal does not mention it at all.  Paris Agreement When it comes to clean energy, the Green New Deal and the Biden Plan are similar in that they aim to achieve 100% clean energy and net-zero emissions, but the former sets forth a 10-year mobilization deadline, whereas the Biden Plan sets a goal of no later than 2050. Both plans establish priorities for investment in clean energy innovation and research; however, the Biden Plan is far vaguer. The Green New Deal goes into greater detail, specifying that those investments should include infrastructure and industry, sustainable farming and land-use practices, zero-emission vehicle infrastructure, manufacturing public transit, removing greenhouse gas emissions from manufacturing and industry, and the research and development of new clean and renewable energy technologies. Other key areas of overlap between the two plans include creating resiliency across the nation and committing to international policy and trade that employ strong labor and environmental protections. According to his website, the Biden plan will be paid for by rolling back Trump tax incentives and will require a federal investment of $1.7 trillion over the next decade, leveraging the additional private sector and state and local investments to total more than $5 trillion. This estimated cost is significantly lower than the $100 trillion bill that Trump claimed the U.S. would foot during the debate. However, serious disagreement exists over how much implementation of the Green New Deal might actually cost.  website After its 2019 introduction by U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Republican leaders and some media publications cited research by the right-wing think tank American Action Forum that speculated the Green New Deal could cost up to $93 trillion, or an estimated $600,000 per household, in its first 10 years. (A supplementary brief from the organization outlining the projected costs can be found here.) But a number of financial experts have countered that research, suggesting that it is more likely that the Green New Deal would cost significantly less, and in some estimates half as much. In fact, a September 2020 study published in the journal Energy Research & Social Science suggested a total overall cost of just over $16 trillion over 15 years. media publications American Action Forum here financial experts estimates Energy Research & Social Science Though both the Biden Plan and the Green New Deal provide similar general frameworks for moving towards a cleaner economy and combating the effects of climate change at a national level, subtle differences exist between the two. Although Biden stated outright that he does not support the Green New Deal, it is apparent from his own policy statements that he supports elements of it that have been incorporated into his own plan. As such, we rate this claim as a "Mixture." Green New Deal Friedman, Lisa.  "What Is the Green New Deal? A Climate Proposal, Explained."
  The New York Times.  21 Feb. 2019.  116th Congress 1st Session  "Recognizing the Duty of the Federal Government to Create a Green New Deal."
  7 Feb. 2019.  Muyskens, John, Uhrmacher, Kevin.  "Where 2020 Democrats Stand on Climate Change."
  The Washington Post.  8 April 2019.  Relman, Eliza.  "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Says Her Green New deal Climate Plan Would Cost At Least $10 Trillion."
  Business Insider.  5 June 2019.  Re, Gregg.  "Green New Deal Would Cost Up To $93 Trillion, Or $600G Per Household, Study Says."
  Business Insider.  5 June 2019.  Holtz-Eakin, Douglas, et al.  "The Green New Deal: Scope, Scale, and Implications."
  American Action Forum.  25 Feb. 2019.  Holtz-Eakin, Douglas.  "An Initial Analysis of the Green New Deal."
  American Action Forum.  25 Feb. 2019.  Sherman, Amy.  "The Green New Deal Would Put a $600,000 Tax Burden on Every Household."
  PolitiFact.  27 Sept.. 2019.  McDonald, Jessica.  "How Much Will the Green New Deal Cost?"
  FactCheck.org.  14 March 2019.  Galvin, Ray and Noel Healy.  "The Green New Deal in the United States: What It Is and How to Pay For It."
  Energy Research & Social Science .  September 2020. Claim:  Actor Michael J. Fox chose the middle name 'Jello' for himself when he was a child.  Example: [Collected via e-mail, May 2015] I have read several times since the 90s that Michael J. Fox's middle name was left up to him to choose, and that when he was six years old, he chose "Jello."   Origins:  What is actor Michael J. Fox's middle name? Is it Justin? Jackson? How about Jazzhands? The answer to the question of exactly what that initial stands for has proved elusive to many of his fans, allowing for the rise of a strange rumor: Michael Fox's parents  allowed him to choose his own middle name, so when he was six years old he opted honor his favorite dessert and become Michael Jello Fox. The exact origins of this rumor are unclear (it's probably an escapee from one of the plethora of fake "Did you know?" factoid lists that have long circulated online), but the unusual claim has been posted to multiple Internet forums over the years.  Although the details of the story change depending upon the source, the basic premise of the rumor was provided during a 2008 "off-topic" discussion on the Rotten Tomatoes film site about middle names: change discussion But here's the absolute best nickname in the world: Jello! When Michael J. Fox was a kid, he was given the chance to pick his own middle name, so he picked the name of his favorite dessert at the time! Michael JELLO Fox. I kid you not! Curiously, expressions of this rumor have also made their way into some online sales listings for the Back to the Future DVD: listings Notes:Theatrical release: May 25, 1990. Estimated budget: $22 million. BACK TO THE FUTURE grossed more than $80 million at the domestic box office and more than $240 million worldwide. Michael J. Fox's middle name is Jello. His parents let him pick his own middle name at the age of two. (This note is also wrong in stating that Back to the Future had its theatrical release in 1990. The second sequel, Back to the Future III, Okay, so what is Michael J. Fox's real middle name?  The correct answer is ... wait for it ... "Andrew." Huh?  How is that possible? According to a brief biography from the Michael J. Fox Foundation, the actor was born Michael Andrew Fox in 1961 to parents William and Phyllis Fox in Edmonton, Alberta. The actor explained in his autobiography Lucky Man: A Memoir that it wasn't until he had to register for the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) that he decided to use a different middle initial for his professional name, due to industry requirements for unique stage identifiers: biography The Screen Actors Guild prohibits any two members from working under the same stage name, and they already had a "Michael Fox" on the books. My middle name is Andrew, but "Andrew Fox" or "Andy Fox" didn't cut it for me.  "Michael A. Fox" was even worse, the word fox having recently come into use as a synonym for attractive. (Presumptuous?) It also sounded uncomfortably Canadian  Michael Eh? Fox  but maybe I was just being oversensitive. And then I remembered one of my favorite character actors, Michael J. Pollard, the guileless accomplice in Bonnie and Clyde. I stuck in the J, which sometimes I tell people stands for either Jenuine or Jenuis, and resubmitted my forms.  So it was Michael J. Fox on the call sheet I picked up at wrap each night that summer. In terms of birth names, Michael J. Fox's middle name is therefore Andrew.  In terms of stage names, his middle name is  like that of President Harry S. Truman  simply an initial that stands for nothing in particular. Truman Last updated:  5 May 2015 Claim:  Alabama mom's Obamacare horror story gives America a glimpse of government run healthcare. CORRECTLY ATTRIBUTED Example:  [Collected on the Internet, December 2013] My family's journey with securing our new insurance under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) started on October 1, 2013.   I have decided to write this letter to let the American people know what it has been like for us.   We are a family of four, with two little boys' ages seven years old and three years old.   My husband and I have had full time jobs for 6 years and 13 years respectively.  We have been with the same two companies for those years.  We are a middle class family; we own our three bedroom two bath house, we own two cars, and previously provided our own insurance for the four of us.  We have coverage through Individual Blue from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alabama until 12/31/13. Our premiums have been $380.00 a month, which also included dental coverage for all four of us.  On October, 1, 2013 we received our letters like other Alabamians about our new premiums and plans for 2014 from Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) of Alabama.  When I opened our letter to say I had sticker shock was an understatement.  Our premiums for the Blue Saver Silver would now be $753.26. This included the ACA tax but did not include the additional $75.00 we would need to pay in order to keep dental for me and my husband.  So we would need to pay total $828.26 to keep health and dental insurance for the four of us.  This payment is roughly $64.00 less than what we pay for our mortgage each month.  I was outraged that anyone thought we could afford this.  Sure we have some savings, but with that price tag we would whittle it down to almost nothing very quickly.  I consider savings as a rainy day fund, a start to saving for the kids college, our retirement, etc.  I never dreamed in a million years we would need to use it to pay our insurance premiums each month  how in the world could this help the economy too?  [Rest of article here.] here Origins:  The item referenced above, an open detailing one Alabama woman's extreme difficulty and frustration in obtaining ACA-compliant health insurance coverage for her family (including her 7-year-old son with ADHD) was posted under the name of Karri Kinder on 23 December 2013 as the sole entry in a blog and was republished (without additional comment) by the Independent Journal Review on 31 December 2013. blog republished Certainly her experience is not unique in kind, as many residents of Alabama covered by Blue Cross and Blue Shield (BCBS) of Alabama (an insurer who has an 88% share of the state's health insurance market) found out at the end of 2013 that they would be paying much higher premiums for ACA-compliant coverage through BCBS: Doug Hoffman, who works statewide to help people sign up for benefits through the Affordable Care Act, just received a Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama notice in the mail to find health insurance rates for his family have doubled. And  he's mad  at Blue Cross. "I just got my benefits renewal from Blue Cross for next year and they doubled my rate!" he wrote AL.com in an email. "I was paying $675 for a family premium (2 adults, one 22 yo dependent) with a $1,500 deducible. The new rate for a comparable plan is $1,360 with a $3,000 deductible. Basically they have doubled my costs." "It appears as though Blue Cross is taking advantage of the ACA by hiking rates big time," said Hoffman, who is based in Birmingham with Enroll Alabama. Others, who have received the notices from the state's dominant health insurer are mad as well  at Obamacare. "Obama thinks that he is making insurance affordable," wrote one reader to the Mobile Press Register Sound Off feature. "I just got a letter from my Blue Cross Blue Shield that if I want to keep their insurance it's going to cost me $300 more a month. I already pay $300 a month now and they're wanting right at $600 a month for this Affordable Care Act." Blue Cross posted an explanation for the rate hikes to its Facebook page, maintaining that several reasons are behind the increased premiums: more taxes and fees, a requirement to rate family members individually, and the elimination of health underwriting and waiting periods for preexisting conditions: explanation The new law requires all health insurance companies in the individual and small group markets to use a consistent rating method called "member level rating." For the individual market, this means each person on an insurance policy will now be rated based on age, whether he or she uses tobacco, and the county in which the policy holder lives. In the past Blue Cross was able to offer one family premium, no matter the size.  For family plans, most family members will now be rated individually. Once each person has been rated, the amounts are added together to get a family's premium cost. For children age 20 and younger, the oldest three children will be individually rated and included in the family premium amount.   As a result, larger families may experience higher premiums. As Mike Oliver noted in an article for AL.com, the elimination of health underwriting may have a substantial effect on health insurance premiums in that state: article "Alabama has allowed medical underwriting  you're going to be quoted a high premium if you have something wrong with you," said Michael Morrisey, director of the University of Alabama at Birmingham Lister Hill Center for Health Policy. "The Affordable Care Act abolishes medical underwriting." This means that those with expensive health problems will likely now jump in and buy coverage because it will be less expensive for them  or if they already have coverage  their rates will go down. But that also means rates will go up for everyone else as the insurer spreads that new cost around. "The thing that happens when you eliminate underwriting is that you lump dissimilar people together," Morrisey said. "When you combine groups, one group is better off and the other group is worse off"  in terms of premium prices. As a policy, the elimination of medical underwriting and preexisting condition clauses helps broaden access to health care coverage and that was the aim of its inclusion in the Affordable Care Act. Reformers say it eliminates insurers from "cherry-picking" and reduces uncompensated care. Karri Kinder subsequently posted followups to her original blog entry about her insurance issue, the update of 4 January 2014 stating that: Karri Kinder blog entry I do have some good news.  Because I decided to write my letter and speak out, people stepped up and helped us.  We were contacted on January 1, 2014 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.  I was told by the woman I spoke with that she had read my letter and wanted to get her team involved and see what they could do to help us.  I recounted to her what was happening and that I had been advised to go ahead and sign me and my husband up for a plan on healthcare.gov.  We went with a lower cost plan because it was going to just be the two of us.  We had no idea what it was going to cost for the children once we got some answers.  So we went with BCBS Blue Value Saver plan.  The cost of the plan is $459.19.  We qualified for $255.00 in subsidies so the final cost of the plan to us is $204.19 each month.  I told the lady that I would cancel that plan if I needed to.  What we wanted was to have all of us on one plan like we always have been.  She said, "If the kids qualify for All Kids then I am pretty sure they have to go that route or you will have to buy them a plan at the normal rate."  So again we were told more than likely we will have to go through All Kids.  She took the rest of our information down and said she was getting her team to work on it and would either call us back or All Kids would contact us. Last updated:  4 January 2014    Oliver, Mike.   "Blue Cross in Alabama: We Didn't 'Cancel' Health Policies."   AL.com.  2 December 2013.    Walsh, Alex.   "Obamacare, Big Blue, and You."   AL.com.  31 December 2013. For all the advances since the era of teased-out rocker hair, one thing hasnt changed for Americas average working man: the amount of bacon he brings home. So says Rana Foroohar, a CNN global economic analyst andTimemagazine assistant managing editor (who, by the way,snagged thefirst interviewwith new Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen). Appearing on CNNsThe Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer,Foroohar brought up the point during a general discussion about the countrys economic woes. You know, I have to jump in on this because we are living in a time when the corporate share of the overall economic pie is as high as it has been in decades, Foroohar said. Meanwhile, the median male worker in this country has not seen a raise, inflation-adjusted, for 30 years, basically. Foroohars eye-popping statistic about median male worker income is certainly interesting. We wanted to know if it is correct. Comparing 1982-2012 TheU.S. Census Bureauproved a go-to source. The bureaus Septemberreporton income, poverty and health insurance coverage in 2012 contains text and tables outlining historical changes (or lack thereof) in earnings for both men and women. Foroohar referenced median earnings, which experts say is a better measure than the average because the income difference between the countrys rich and working-class earners is stark. In 2012, the latest year for which data is available, the median full-time, year-round male worker earned $49,398. In 1982, exactly 30 years earlier, earnings in 2012 dollars were $48,152. So from 1982 to 2012, there was actually an inflation-adjusted raise of $1,246.But thats more because Foroohar is looking at two years in isolation. Tracking the income of median male workers over time shows that incomes climbed steeply from 1960 to 1970. But the figure has ebbed and flowed and remained mostly stagnant since 1970, dipping as low as $46,841 in 1996 and reaching a high of $51,670 in 1973. (You canview the tableon page 50 of the report.) Point being:You could just as easily widen or shrink Foroohars 30-year window by a few years and find a number that supports her point. Median earnings of the 2012 male worker are down compared to his counterpart 25 years ago (who earned $50,166 in 1987), 35 years ago ($50,480 in 1977) or 40 years ago ($50,074 in 1970). Even though Foroohars window shows a 2.6 percent pay increase between 1982 and 2012, its really pretty close to flat, said Gary Burtless, a senior fellow in economic studies at the Brookings Institution. It means that male median earnings increases just 0.085 percent per year (that is, 85 one-thousandths of a percentage point per year), he said. Some say men are even worse off Foroohars larger point, while technically correct and oft-repeated, misses the larger economic picture and is actually too generous, argues Michael Greenstone, an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Greenstone co-authored a2012New York Timespostwith Brookings fellow Adam Looney that presented another way to examine median male wages. Instead of counting only the earnings of men with jobs, as the Census Bureau does, Greenstone factored in all working-age men. Factoring in men without jobs brings down the median income. The fraction of men in the workforce has declined sharply over the last several decades, he wrote, from 94 percent of prime-age men working in 1970 to 81 percent in 2010. It happened as incarceration rates and enrollment in the Social Security disability insurance program increased and labor force participation waned, as well as the wild success of women entering the labor market, he said. His 2012 study found real earnings of median males actually dropped by 19 percent since 1970, he found. This means that the median man in 2010 earned as much as the median man did in 1964  nearly a half century ago. The reasons for the trend are complex, Greenstone told us. Yes, there have been sweeping changes in technology, machinery and trade over the last 30 or 40 years that have had some effect. More striking, he said, is that educational attainment among men, which used to climb with each generation, has dropped off. The decline in working is concentrated among the men who have lower levels of education, Greenstone said. Its not concentrated among the college-grad guy who is married to a super successful woman. Michael Saltsman of the conservative Employment Policies Institute also argued the idea of stagnant wages is more controversial than it seems -- to a different end. He cited a 2012study in the National Tax Journalthat analyzed middle-class income from the past three cycles. Instead of using pre-tax income data, the researchers expanded the income definition to include taxes, income transfers and fringe benefits. Middle-class Americans are found to have made substantial gains, and these increases are even larger when including non-cash income, such as the ex-ante value of health insurance, the report says. Meanwhile, the earnings of female workers isnt cited as often as a metric of the economy because their participation in the workforce jumped sharply over the last 50 years. In any case, the 2012 full-time, year-round median female worker earned $37,791, according to census figures. In 1982, when about half as many women were working, median earnings were $29,731. Our ruling Foroohar said, the median male worker in this country has not seen a raise, inflation-adjusted, for 30 years, basically. Federal data for 1982-2012 shows a slight increase, though the numbers show the real value of median male earnings have been in the range of $46,840-$51,670 for about 40 years. We found another point of view that says the real median income has declined significantly once men without jobs are factored in. We also found a broader definition of income that changes the dynamic. Still, Foroohar clearly has a point. We rate her claim Mostly True. Claim:  A band musician received a fatal head injury from a trombone slide. Status:  False. Example:  [Weekly World News, 1996] Bocholt, Germany  A band musician died of a brain injury when the trombonist behind him jerked the slide of his trombone forward and struck the trumpeter in the back of the head! Police  say the tragedy occurred as the Gratzfeld College band was rehearsing the spirited American jazz classic, "When the Saints Go Marching In." According to other band members, trombonist Peter Niemeyer, 19, "got carried away" with the music.  He started gyrating and thrashing around as he played.  At one point, he jerked forward and the rounded metal slide on his instrument hit trumpet player Dolph Mohr, 20, dropping him instantly to the floor. "Niemeyer was pumping the slide very hard," said medical examiner Dr. Max Krause.  "But it wasn't just the force of the blow that killed Mohr.  The slide struck him in the worst possible place  the vulnerable spot just behind and below the left ear.  Bone fragments pierced his brain, killing him instantly." The incident has provoked a storm of controversy over whether or not American jazz should be played in German colleges. "I believe the music is to blame," said Gratzfeld band director Heinrich Sommer.  "I was pressured to play that selection by school administrators. But I've always said jazz is dangerous music. Our musicians can't control themselves when they play it. They move and rock back and forth, creating chaos. If I had my way, American Dixieland would be outlawed in Germany. I've been directing bands for 30 years and I've never heard of anyone dying while playing a German march." Origins:  If there were competition for the title of "America's wackiest newspaper," the this link Weekly World News would probably win the award hands-down.  Unlike other supermarket tabloids, which primarily offer a  this link  mixture of celebrity news and gossip, shocking scandals, and health and diet tips, the WWN's stock in trade is the bizarre.  Extraterrestrials, ghosts, cannibals, vampires, and half-human animals populate the pages of the WWN; articles about alien visitations, unusual deaths, Bigfoot, and impending planetary doom can generally be found in every issue.  Facts are infrequent visitors to the WWN, rude party-crashers who occasionally succeed at sneaking in through the back door and are quickly hustled off the premises. Despite the mostly playful, tongue-in-cheek style of WWN articles, occasionally a WWN story will "escape" into the wild and be circulated on the Internet as a genuine news article (because it has been stripped of its attribution, or because a forwarder wasn't familiar with the essence of the Weekly World News); on rare occasions, a WWN piece will even resurface in the "legitimate" news media, reported as a factual account of a real-life event.  In the last several years, all of the following topics which originally appeared in the Weekly World News were widely circulated as true:  A scientist's plot to blow up the sun. A time-traveling trader who made a killing in the stock market. A tree that produces meat rather than fruit. The revelation that Saddam Hussein once starred in gay porn films. A medical study that found ogling women's breasts is good for a man's health. A woman who sued a pharmacy after she became pregnant despite her consumption of contraceptive jelly. A chess player whose head exploded during a match. A worker who died at his desk and went unnoticed by his co-workers for five days. sun trader tree Saddam Hussein breasts jelly exploded desk The story reproduced above, of a trumpeter who died when struck in the head by the slide of an overenthusiastic trombonist, is another entry from the Weekly World News fiction collection, this one originally published in the tabloid on 23 January 1996.  It was quickly posted to a variety of USENET newsgroups, and even though its attribution has largely remained intact as it has been republished on a variety of Internet sites over the years, it regularly surfaces in our inbox as the subject of "Is this true?" queries. Last updated:  10 November 2004    Sources:   Jeffries, Randy.  "Man Slides His Trombone & Kills Musician in Front of Him!"   Weekly World News.  23 January 1996. Claim:  A man in Ireland killed by the bite of a deadly redback spider UNDETERMINED Example:  [Collected on the Internet, August 2014]  I saw an article in a news paper about the deadly redback spider being in the uk. It was headlined with "KILLER TOILET SPIDER WARNING: Dad dies from deadly redback bite" alot of people on Facebook are freaking out so I just wanted to see if it's true or false. Origins:  In August 2014 social media networks were abuzz with reprinted versions of a typically sensationalized Sun article ("Yes, the deadly redback spider is ALREADY in Britain  and could be LURKING under your toilet seat") about a 48-year-old man named John Francis Kennedy in Cork, Ireland, who reportedly was bitten on the neck by a "poisonous red-back" spider while watching a movie at home and died of "massive internal bleeding": Sun John Francis Kennedy, who went by the nickname 'JFK', suffered horrifying injuries as a result of the bite, and died last month from massive internal bleeding. His wife Jeanne insists that his death was the result of a spider bite he got last year  and her description matches that of the deadly redback, which is one of the few spiders that can be seriously harmful to humans. Sometimes known as the 'toilet spider', redbacks can be commonly found living under toilet seats. The redback spider (Latrodectus hasseltii, also known as the red-striped spider, red-spot spider, and jockey spider) is a species of venomous spider indigenous to Australia, that typically lives in warm, sheltered locations, often in or around human dwellings.  The redback is one of the few spider species whose bite does pose a significant risk to humans, as its venom can produce pain, muscle rigidity, vomiting, and sweating, and in some cases death: redback spider Perched in its tangled web, the redback spider lies in wait. She is a relative of the black widow; only the red dorsal stripe distinguishes them. Redbacks are found everywhere throughout the Australian continent, especially alongside human habitation. Only females build webs.  Their smaller, less brilliantly colored male counterparts often lurk to the side. Humans must be careful.  The spider won't seek out people to sting, but should a hand stray into her web by accident, a trip to the emergency room may be in order as the venom acts directly on the nerves. Only the female bite is dangerous, and their bites have caused some human deaths. The redback possesses a potent neurotoxic venom.  It does not hunt its prey, but instead waits for a tasty morsel to wander by and become entangled in its web. Once the prey-usually a walking insect-becomes enmeshed in the redback's web, it's wrapped in silk.  When it's time to eat, the spider bites down on its intended victim, injecting its neurotoxic venom.  The venom paralyzes the insect, and digestive enzymes begin to dissolve the prey's insides.  Antivenom for redback spider bites has been available since 1956, and no known deaths directly attributable to redback bites have been documented in more than fifty years since then, which makes this latest case in Ireland quite a subject of interest.  However, note that the victim's wife, Jeanne, stated her husband didn't die soon after being bitten by a spider; he had actually been bitten a year earlier, and then he experienced a long period of declining health with various symptoms before finally passing away in July 2014: Antivenom She said: "He got bitten. We found a spider with a weird red back. "But the bite he got had bled very badly. We went through a roll and a half of toilet roll to try and stop it. "Ever since his health went down. "His stomach started swelling, they said it was his liver and his pancreas. "His testicles also swelled up very bad." Jeanne, 46, went on to describe how John's eyesight deteriorated and he started vomiting BLOOD. He eventually died in hospital last month and an inquest into his death has begun  but Jeanne is already convinced it was the spider. "It had to be down to that sting. "He was in perfect health before the bite happened."   So there's as yet no certainty that John Francis Kennedy was actually bitten by a redback spider, which had not previously been sighted in Ireland, other than someone's year-old recollection of what the spider in question looked like.  And even if that species of spider did deliver a bite to the victim, it's unproven at this point that his death was directly attributable to that bite.  He may have died from something else completely coincidental to that bite, he may have been suffering from an undiagnosed medical condition that had already compromised his health and was exacerbated or compounded by the bite's effects, or he may have suffered an allergic reaction to the bite (rather than being killed by the venom itself)  a host of alternative explanations are possible. Until additional (and less tabloid-sensational) details are provided about this case, it's far too early to claim this as a verified example of a redback spider bite death in Ireland.  And for those locals who fear that such critters are taking up residence in the area: Adam Faulkner, reptile keeper at Drayton Manor Zoo, said: "Redbacks would probably not be able to survive the British climate  but they could survive if they found a warm house to live in." Currently there are no national records of redback spider sightings.     Last updated:  25 August 2014 In November and December 2019, a meme circulated on Facebook warning that human traffickers were leaving zip ties on women's windshield wipers as they shopped to mark them as potential victims/targets for abduction:This was a variation of a familiar meme that we identified as false in July 2019. At that time we reported:  July 2019 Human trafficking affects millions of people worldwide, but its also the frequent subject of viral scarelore  fictional tales intended to frighten audiences, often prompting them to share without questioning the story. millions One such story went viral in October 2018 and again in late July 2019 when social media users shared a meme stating that human traffickers were leaving zip ties (in some posts, black in color) on homes, mailboxes, and cars, of potential female victims to either mark them as targets or distract and abduct them for sex-trafficking purposes when the women try to remove the ties. some The hoax initially centered on San Angelo, Texas, in October 2018 but police there quickly debunked it. We rate the newer variation as "False" as well, because although police in College Station, Texas, addressed the meme and reminded citizens to always be aware of their surroundings, officers were unaware of zip ties being used by human traffickers to mark potential victims. addressed   Have you seen other variations of this claim? Let us know. Let us know. The governors mansion -- a kingly abode for the governor and his family, right?Dont think like a peasant. It isso much more.Executive residences, as the National Governors Associationcalls them, are regarded as an important symbol of the states culture and heritage. As state treasures, executive residences provide an appropriate setting for official state entertaining and are often highly valued as a venue for community functions.Oh.The NGA goes on:Given the critical role executive residences play in official state and cultural activities, considerable care is required in managing, staffing and maintaining the executive residence.Gee, sounds like that could get kinda expensive. Just how much does it cost taxpayers to run the Wisconsin governors mansion -- ahem,executive residence?Too much, says state Sen.Bob Wirch, a Democrat from Pleasant Prairie in Kenosha County. Echoingacallhe made in 2002, when Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle was elected, Wirch wants Republican Governor-elect Scott Walker to sell or lease the 34-room manor.Over the course of one four-year term, Wirch claimed in anewsreleaseNov. 15, 2010, it costs taxpayers more than $1 million simply to operate.Wirch also noted Walkers owncall tocitizensfor ideas on how to make state government run more efficiently. After all, with astructural deficit, lost revenue because of a state Supreme Courtdecisionand other issues, the new governor faces a projected shortfall of$3billionfor the 2011-13 budget.It is hard to set a good example, Wirch said in his statement, if you are living in a mansion.Walker, who will beinauguratedJan. 3, 2011, plans to move with his family from Wauwatosa into the residence, said his spokesman, Cullen Werwie.He said Walker has no comment on Wirchs recommendation to sell or lease the mansion, which is perched on the shores of Lake Mendota.The homes replacement value is $1.63 million, according to the state Department of Administration. But Wirch believes that with its 3.7 acres of land, the estate is worth more than $2.5 million.Perhaps, like us, youve never been to the mansion (although you can see it inpictures).Well, according to the Department of Administration, the state Historical Society and the office of first lady Jessica Doyle, it: Nice. So, who takes care of it?Seven employees, according to Vicki Heymann, the mansions residence director. Full-timers include Heymann, a chef, a gardener and a facilities maintenance specialist. The part-timers are a housekeeper, a laundress and flower arranger, and the head of the waitstaff, who has worked at the mansion for more than 32 years.OK, now lets get to Wirchs claim that operating the mansion costs more than $1 million during a four-year term.Wirchs office said the state Legislative Fiscal Bureau put the operating costs at $265,000 per year. That would come to $1.06 million over four years.The senators per-year number is a touch high, but his four-year figure of more than $1 million is on target.The fiscal bureau told PolitiFact Wisconsin that the mansions operating expenses are budgeted at $262,500 in 2009-10 and the same amount for 2010-11, nearly all of which is salaries. Thats a total of $1.05 million over four years.In fact, actual expenditures are running higher, according to the state Department of Administration. They were $290,462 in 2008-09 and $273,340 in 2009-10. If that were carried out over four years, the total would be $1.13 million.Wisconsin is one of 44 states that provided a governors residence as of 2004, according to the most recentsurveydone by the National Governors Association.Heres how three of the other six treat their governors: OK, lets bring all this mansion talk home.In calling on Governor-elect Scott Walker to save taxpayer dollars, state Sen. Bob Wirch said selling or leasing the governors mansion would enable the state to cut more than $1 million over four years on the cost of operating the mansion. Based on the latest budget and expenditure figures, the operating costs do exceed $1 million over four years.We rate Wirchs statement True.