DoD Suspension of Brass Cartridge Casing Sales
Claim:  The Department of Defense has cut off sales of spent cartridge cases to U.S. ammunition manufacturers.  OF AND  OUTDATED INFORMATION Example:  [Collected via e-mail, March 2009] Georgia Arms is the 5th largest retailer of .223 Ammo in America.  (they sell 9 mm, .45, etc ammo) They normally buy spent brass from the US Dept of Defense - 'one time used' shell casings by our Military - from training on Military bases, etc.  They buy the brass and then re-load for resale to Law Enforcement, Gun Shops, Gun Clubs, Wal-Mart, and etc. They normally buy 30,000 lbs of spent brass at a time. This week the DoD wrote a letter to the owner of Georgia Arms and said that from now on the DoD will be destroying the brass - shredding it. It is no longer available to the Ammo makers - unless they just buy it in a scrap shredded condition (which they have No use for).  The shredded brass is NOW going to be sold by the DoD to China as scrap metal.... after the DoD pays for it to be shredded. The DoD is selling the brass to China for less money than Ammo manufacturers have been paying... plus the DoD has to pay to have the brass shredded and do all the accounting paperwork.  That sure helps the US economy now, doesn't it?  Sell cheaper to China - and do not sell shells at all to a proven US business.  Any agenda working here???? Obama going after our ammunition!!!!! The Georgia Arms owner even related a story that one of his competitors had already purchased a load of brass last week - and the DoD contacted him this week and said they were sending someone over to make sure it was destroyed.  Shell Casings he had already bought!  THE BRASS HAS NO VALUE TO THE AMMO MAKER IF IT IS DESTROYED/SHREDDED/MELTED.  THE AMMO MANUFACTURER ONLY USES THE EMPTY BRASS SHELLS TO RELOAD DIFFERENT CALIBERS - MAINLY .223 BULLETS. Georgia Arms owner says that he will have to lay off at least Half of his 60 workers, within 2 - 3 months if the DoD no longer sells their spent brass to him. He has 2 - 3 months inventory of shells to use.  By summer - he's out. If he has to buy new manufactured brass shells, then the cost of ammunitioin to the buyer will double and triple. Origins:  The Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service (DRMS), which is part of the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), which in turn is part of the Department of Defense (DoD), is the service "responsible for the disposition of excess and surplus DoD property" and is tasked with "protecting national security by ensuring property is properly identified for reutilization and disposition and not released for public sale when to do so would jeopardize national security." DRMS In March 2009, while reviewing a policy change issued by the DoD the previous year, the DLA halted or reclassified the sale of a broad category of items, a  category which included spent cartridge cases. This event caused consternation among manufacturers and purchasers of ammunition because it cut off some ammunition manufacturers from their largest supply of brass casings, as U.S. senators Max Baucas and Jon Tester noted in a letter on the  subject to the DLA: "This reclassification has an impact on small businesses who sell reloaded ammunition utilizing these fired casings, and upon individual gun owners who purchase spent military brass at considerable cost savings for their personal use." letter The issue was quickly resolved, however: a week later the DLA issued a press release announcing that upon completion of their review, they had determined that cartridge cases "could be appropriately placed in a category of government property allowing for their release for sale": press release Small arms cartridge cases are identified as a sensitive Munitions List item and were held pending review of the policy relating to the category of items in which cartridge cases were included. Upon review, the Defense Logistics Agency has determined the cartridge cases could be appropriately placed in a category of government property allowing for their release for sale. The DRMS sales contractor has been notified of this decision and has begun the process of reoffering the cases that have been held pending completion of the policy review. The National Rifle Association Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) also issued a statement on 18 March 2009  which noted (in part): statement [T]he Department of Defense informed NRA-ILA that fired military small arms cartridge cases are once again eligible for sale, following a temporary suspension in such sales instituted last week. NRA-ILA began discussions with DoD shortly after the suspension took effect, and we were assured from the beginning that efforts were underway to resolve the issue favorably.  In announcing that the suspension has been lifted, DoD also made clear that no cartridge cases that, in the absence of the suspension, would have been sold for reloading purposes were destroyed while the suspension was in effect. Such cases were instead protected by DoD during the suspension, and are again eligible for sale. With ammunition currently in short supply, that was welcome news, to be sure.  DLA also put to rest various theories and rumors that were circulated on the internet concerning the reason for the suspension. As DLA explained to Senators Baucus and Tester, and to NRA-ILA, DoD officials responsible for the demilitarization of military property temporarily halted the release of the cartridge cases last week pending review of a policy change issued last year by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, which, in the interest of national security, halted the sale of items within a broad category of government property including, but not limited to, surplus small arms cartridge cases.  To make cartridge cases eligible for sale once again, DoD demilitarization officials verified that the cases could be appropriately placed in a category of government property allowing for their release for use within the United States, and then executed the recategorization. Whereas during the brief suspension, fired cartridge cases would have been releaseable only if the purchaser crushed or smelted them, now the cases may be sold as before, intact and reloadable. Last updated:  19 April 2009    Gonsalves, Chris.  "Feds Lift Rule That Threatened Ammo Shortages."   Newsmax.  19 March 2009.     Johnson, Tonya.  "Small Arms Cartridge Case Policy Revised."   Defense Logistics Agency   20 March 2009.
Claim:  The sister ship to the Olympic and Titanic was originally intended to be named the Gigantic.   . Origins:   The   Titanic was originally conceived by the White Star Company as one of a triumvirate of ships intended to vie with Cunard for the trans-Atlantic passenger service business.  White Star couldn't hope to offer ships as fast as Cunard's liners, so they planned to compete by building liners that were both bigger (and hence able to carry more paying passengers and cargo) and more luxurious than Cunard's.  Moreover, since an Atlantic crossing typically took five days in the new class of steamships operated by Cunard and White Star in the first decade of the 20th century, creating a trio of similar ships would allow White Star to offer trans-Atlantic service in both directions on a regular weekly schedule. The planned ships were so large that the shipbuilders, Harland and Wolff, had to allocate space normally used for building three hulls to handle just two of the new behemoths.  Harland and Wolff planned to construct the liners on a staggered schedule so that White Star would have one ready to go into service each spring between 1911 and 1913, and initially everything went according to plan. The keel of the first ship, the Olympic, was laid in December 1908, and the Titanic followed suit three months later.  The Olympic was launched in October 1910, and the Titanic in May 1911.  The  Olympic's maiden voyage took place in June 1911, and the Titanic's in April 1912.  And then ... After the Titanic disaster, the feverish public interest in these massive ocean liners abated, and the third ship of the planned triumvirate, the Britannic, was finally launched (after extensive modifications and with considerably less fanfare than her sisters) in April 1914.  Like her sister ship Titanic, she wasn't around long, though: World War I broke out before the Britannic ever went into passenger service; she was requisitioned by the Royal Navy and pressed into service as a hospital ship; and she struck a mine and sank off the coast of Greece in November  1916.   The magnitude of the Titanic disaster and World War I both overshadowed the short life of the Britannic, and she was gone before many people were even aware she had been built.  Over the years a rumor began to circulate that the Britannic's original name had been the Gigantic, but White Star had thought better of it and quietly changed their minds after the Titanic sank.  White Star maintained that this was not true; they had planned to name the ship Britannic all along and had never considered the name Gigantic. From a purely logical point of view, Gigantic seems the more likely choice.  The names Olympic, Titanic, and Gigantic all evoke a sense of size and strength that Britannic simply does not.  And White Star had considered naming a ship Gigantic on at least one other occasion, as demonstrated by this brief article that appeared 17 September 1892 New York Times: London, Sept. 16  The White Star Company has commissioned the great Belfast shipbuilders Harland and Wolff to build an Atlantic steamer that will beat the record in size and speed. She has already been named the  Gigantic, and will be 700 feet long, 65 feet 7-1/2 inches beam and 4,500 horsepower. It is calculated that she will steam 22 knots an hour, with a maximum speed of 27 knots. She will have three screws, two fitted like Majestic's, and the third in the centre. She is to be ready for sea in March, 1894. We have more than logic and supposition to go by here, however.  Contemporary references publications such as The New York Times, Scientific American, and Lloyd's List and Shipping Gazette as well as a promotional flyer from White Star itself all indicate that White Star did indeed originally have the name  Gigantic in mind, but one could hardly blame them for altering their plans.  After the sinking of the Titanic, passengers were suddenly less concerned with size and luxury than they were with getting to their destinations alive, and the dignified name Britannic conveyed a sense of safety and reliability in a way the attention-grabbing Gigantic could not. Last updated:  18 December 2005    Sources:   Eaton, John P. and Charles A. Haas.  Titanic: Destination Disaster.   Wellingborough, England: Patrick Stephens, 1987.  ISBN 0-85059-868-0  (pp. 54-56). Titanic: Destination Disaster    Heyer, Paul.  Titanic Legacy: Disaster As Media Event and Myth.   Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1995.  ISBN 0-275-95352-1  (pp. 20-22). President Barack Obama touted the success of Obamacare during his final State of the Union address. He said the Affordable Care Act has led to nearly 18 million more people gaining health insurance and has helped to slow health care cost inflation. He added that the law didnt destroy the job market,despite pessimistic predictionsfrom critics. Our businesses have created jobs every single month since it became law, Obama said on Capitol Hill on Jan. 12, 2016. We hadnt heard that particular Obamacare talking point before, so we decided to take a look. Because Obama referred specifically to our businesses, we looked atprivate-sector employment datafrom the Bureau of Labor Statistics starting in March 2010, when Obama signed theAffordable Care Act. Of the 70 months since, Obama is correct that every single one has seen positive job growth. Thats a record for uninterrupted job growth, according to our friends at theWashington PostFact Checker. This graph from BLS shows monthly change in private-sector job growth (in thousands) since the start of 2010:  From early 2010 on, the data is above the zero line, showing positive job growth. The fact that the country has gained jobs despite the health care law also might not assuage critics argument that job growth, and other aspects of the economy, would have been stronger absent the law. For example, in aJanuary 2015 fact-check, we found that the law might have caused many thousands of employees to have their hours cut from full-time to part-time. But independent studies havent backed up claims that the law would end up reducing employment. In 2011, we rated a claim from former Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., that Obamacare is job killingFalse. Former Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, said in 2014 that Obamacare is expected to destroy 2.3 million jobs. We rated that claimMostly False. Our ruling Obama said, Our businesses have created jobs every single month since (Obamacare) became law. The private sector has seen job growth every single month since Obama signed the Affordable Care Act in March 2010. Theres room for argument over what the growth would have looked like absent the health care law, but Obamas statistic is on target. We rate this claim True. Democrats criticized Rick Perry for college costs the day the Republican governor gave his valedictory speech to Texas lawmakers. Among the beefs in a Jan. 15, 2015, email blast from the Democratic National Committee: College tuition rates in Texas jumped by 55% since 2003, putting the dream of earning a college degree further out of reach for many Texans. That year should ring a bell; its when Perry and the Republican-controlled Legislatureagreed to deregulate public college tuition, handing control to appointed college and university governing boards. Committee's source We wondered how much tuition ultimately escalated. By email, Miryam Lipper, a committee spokeswoman, pointed out a September 2012news storyin theDallas Morning Newsthat said by the papers analysis, Texas students are paying 55 percent more for tuition and fees at state universities a decade after lawmakers lifted restrictions on costs. The story also said: State officials used to brag about the affordability of college, but the costs have ballooned since 2003, even when inflation is factored in. Updated data Seeking up-to-date information, we reached out to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, where a staff spokeswoman, Kelly Carper Polden, pointed out aFebruary 2014 board documentshe described as the most recent publicly available report on Texas tuition and fees. The document said, in part: From fall 2003 through fall 2013, the statewide average total academic charges for a student taking 15 SCHs at a public university has increased by 104 percent. An SCH is a semester credit-hour. According to the document, the boards calculations were rooted in tuition and fees charged students. Then again, the board said, a student's actual charges may vary based on the student's classification and level of enrollment, the college the student attends within the university, the student's specific personal circumstances, or for other reasons deemed appropriate by the institution. Charts in the board analysis indicate the tuition and fees each year from fall 2003 through fall 2013 for nearly 40 institutions, most of them in the University of Texas or Texas A&M University systems. On average in fall 2003, tuition and fees were $1,934 for 15 semester credit-hours, according to the report. The average in fall 2013 was $3,951, the board said. By phone, Polden confirmed the boards results didnt take inflation into account. So we employed a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statisticsinflation calculatorto estimate that tuition and fees at the states public colleges and universities escalated 61 percent, in real terms, from fall 2003 through fall 2013. But that didnt bring us to the 2014-15 school year. So we asked for comparable charges on average for a student as of fall 2014. By email, Polden said the fall 2014 statewide average for someone taking 15 SCHs was $4,091, lifting the raw average tuition increase since fall 2003 to 112 percent. Adjusted for inflation, we calculated, the increase was 64 percent. UT Austin Separately, we asked the University of Texas at Austin for its fall 2014 charge for that many credit hours. Spokesman Gary Susswein emailed the amount, $4,905, which we compared with the fall 2003 charge for that university of $2,721. Adjusted for inflation, the hike over the years came out to 40 percent. Out of governor's control? Worth mention: After signing tuition deregulation into law, Perry subsequently had no sway over tuition hikes except to appoint higher education governing boards. In recent years too, Perrycalled for $10,000, four-year degree programs and for institutions to freeze tuitionso an entering student would pay the same tab each year while earning a degree. Our ruling The Democratic group, zeroing in on Perry, said Texas college tuition rates increased 55 percent since 2003. That figure is outdated--the increase through fall 2014 was 64 percent--and it's also worth clarifying the governor didn't directly control tuition, though he approved of the 2003 law deregulating rates and appointed ruling public college and university governing boards. We rate the statement Mostly True. MOSTLY TRUE The statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information. Click here formoreon the six PolitiFact ratings and how we select facts to check. An Internet meme circulating during the final weeks of the 2016 presidential campaign purported to reveal financial trickery on the part of Democratic contender Hillary Clinton, who allegedly deducted $1 million from her 2015 income tax return after donating it "to herself" via contributions to the Clinton Foundation. On the assumption that this information came from the candidate's 2015 tax filing (released to the public earlier this year), that's where we went to verify the accuracy of the claims. Our findings were these: filing 1. The return was a joint filing for both Hillary and William J. Clinton. 2. Their shared charitable donations totaled $1,042,000: $42,000 to Desert Classic Charities and $1 million to the Clinton Family Foundation. Desert Classic Charities Clinton Family Foundation   3. Declaring an amount  say $1 million  as a charitable donation only reduces your taxable income; it doesn't mean your "tax bill" is reduced by that amount. 4. The Clinton Family Foundation is a separate entity from the Clinton Foundation. Inside Philanthropy describes the Clinton Family Foundation as "a traditional private foundation that serves as the vehicle for the couple's personal charitable giving." It has neither staff nor offices.  Clinton Foundation describes 5. According to Inside Philanthropy, the Clinton Family Foundation regularly disburses contributions to scores of different charities (one of which is, in fact, the Clinton Foundation): Digging into the Clinton Family Foundation's 2014 tax return reveals that they did around $3.8 million in grantmaking and held some $5.3 million in assets. Of total grantmaking in 2014, $1.8 million went to the Clinton Foundation, just under half of total giving.  2014 tax return However, in 2013, the Clintons gave $1.8 million through their personal foundation, with only around a fifth of that money going to the Clinton Foundation, around the same share as in 2012.  So where have all the other gifts gone? To lots of different places, is the short answer. In 2014, the Clintons gave money to 70 nonprofits through their foundation. The picture looked similar the year before, with many grants falling in the range of $5,000 to $25,000.  Recipients of the Clintons' largesse via the Clinton Family Foundation in 2014 ranged from the School of American Ballet to the Arkansas Childrens Hospital Foundation to Wellesley College to the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity. 2014 The foundation's 2015 tax filing has not yet been made public, so we don't have an accounting of the organizations to whom the $1 million contributed by the Clintons that year was disbursed. Regarding the apparent assumption that any monies donated to the Clinton Foundation simply end up in the Clintons' own pockets, we refer readers, once again, to Inside Philanthropy, which describes the actual work the foundation does, and to the charity rating service Charity Navigator, which gives the Clinton Foundation an overall score of 94.74 points out of 100 in terms of its financials, accountability, and transparency. Inside Philanthropy Charity Navigator  Callahan, David."What the Heck Does the Clinton Foundation Actually DO?"
Inside Philanthropy.23 June 2016. Callahan, David and Adeniji, Ade."The Other Clinton Foundation: A Look at Bill and Hillary's Personal Philanthropy."
Inside Philanthropy.29 July 2016. When the governmentsjobs reportfor May offered a bleak picture of the economy, with employers adding just 69,000 jobs in May, U.S. Rep. Diane Black, R-Gallatin, and other lawmakers expressed their frustrations, often in very partisan terms.The report said the unemployment rate edged up slightly to 8.2 percent, from 8.1 percent in April, and Black issued a press release that among other things said the prospects for unemployed or underemployed Americans finding full-time work are not very good after 40 straight months of unemployment at 8 percent or higher.We know the unemployment has remained stubbornly high, but has it really been at 8 percent or higher for 40 straight months?For the purposes of this ruling, we're only going to look closely at the statistics Black cited and stay out of the political blame game. Suffice to say, its not hard to find Republicans blaming Democratic policies and Democrats blaming Republican obstruction for the inability to move the economy closer to full employment.We called Blacks office and asked them to back up the claim. Her spokeswoman, Allison Huff, pointed us to achartcompiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which is the gold standard for unemployment statistics.According to the bureau, the last time unemployment was below 8 percent was in January 2009, when it was 7.8 percent -- it then spiked quickly to 8.3 percent in February of 2009 and to 9.4 percent by May before topping out at 10.0 percent in October of 2009. It dropped gradually from there, and the May report listing unemployment at 8.2 percent marked the 40th consecutive month it has been at 8 percent or higher.As dismal as that may be, its not the record.The rate of unemployment in the United States has exceeded 8 percent since February 2009, making the past three years the longest stretch of high unemployment in this country since the Great Depression, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported in astudyin February 2012.In the Great Depression era, unemployment topped 15 percent annually for six straight years, from 1931 to 1936, and never fell below 8.7 percent over 12 years, according toestimatesadopted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In four consecutive years, unemployment exceeded 20 percent a year.Our colleagues at PolitiFact National cited those figures when they rated asFalsea claim by Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus, who said, We have unemployment that rivals the Great Depression.There is a qualifier, though. The Depression-era unemployment data counted those age 14 and up, not 16 and up (the standard that began in 1948). In addition, monthly unemployment statistics were not kept until 1948 as well. Thus, all statistics during the Great Depression were on an annual basis.Our rulingRep. Black did not go as far as some other Republicans and claim that unemployment is as bad as during the Great Depression. She merely said it has been at 8 percent or higher for 40 straight months. Based upon the governments own data, we rate her statement as True. Claim:  Zuccotti Park is owned by Brookfield Properties, which has other political connections.  OF AND  INFORMATION Examples:  [Collected via e-mail, October 2011] Whaaaaaaaaaaaat a coincidence! Hey, this is great! Imagine the odds of this happening. Do you know the park in NYC that the Wall Street protesters are occupying? Zucotti Park. DId you know this park is not owned by the city? It is owned by Brookfield Properties. Who was just hired by Brookfield Properties as an attorney? Vice President Joe Biden's son. Who sits on the board of Brookfield Properties? Mayor Bloomberg's live-in girlfriend. Now, guess what company just recieved some of the last of the Obama Stimulus $$$$$$$. Thaaaaaaaaaaaaat's right, Brookfield Properties. Isn't life great! Hey, on a completely unrelated note, Wisconsin is shaping up to be the swing state in the 2012 presidential elections. Not Florida. Not Ohio. But Wisconsin. Now, guess who owns the company that will be tabulating the electronic votes in Wisconsin. Thaaaaaaaaaaaat's right, the biggest contributor to Obama, George Soros. Whaaaaaaaat a coincidence! Remember what Stalin said. "He who votes does not have power. He who counts the votes has power".  Origins: Between Broadway, Trinity Place, Liberty Street and Cedar Street in Lower Manhattan, New York City, sits 33,000 sq. ft. Zuccotti Park.  Created by U.S. Steel, it was originally named Liberty Plaza Park.  After undergoing renovations in 2006, the park was renamed by its current owners, Brookfield Office Properties, to Zuccotti Park in honor of John Zuccotti, the U.S. chairman of Brookfield Properties, who was also the chairman of the Real Estate Board of New York, former first deputy mayor of the City of New York, and former chairman of the New York City Planning Commission. Brookfield Office Properties Zuccotti Park In mid-September 2011, "Occupy Wall Street" protesters began using Zuccotti Park as a rallying area and campground in part because it held the desirable combination of being a public plaza required to stay open 24 hours a day yet also a privately owned park not subject to the same curfew restrictions as New York's other public parks.  Thus the protesters could occupy the park around the clock and could not be removed by the NYPD except at the behest of the park's owners, Brookfield Office Properties. removed  Robert Hunter Biden, the son of Vice-President Joseph Biden, is an attorney who was a founding partner of Oldaker, Biden & Belair (now known asOldaker Law Group), a law and government relations firm, and who is now a partner at Rosemont Seneca Partners, an alternative investment and market advisory firm, as well as counsel to the Boies, Schiller, Flexner law firm. Oldaker Law Group Back in 2002 and 2003, Oldaker, Biden & Belair was retained to undertake some lobbying efforts on behalf of Brookfield Office Properties.  However, we could not find evidence of any professional or business connection between Hunter Biden and Brookfield Office Properties since 2003.  Biden quit working as a federal lobbyist in 2008, and we found no connection between Brookfield Office Properties and either of the firms with which he is currently associated. 2002 2003 lobbyist  Diana L. Taylor is often described in the press as being the "girlfriend" or "domestic partner" of New Yorks mayor Michael Bloomberg (a former Republican who ran for a third term as mayor in 2009 as an independent candidate).  Ms. Taylor is a managing director at Wolfensohn & Company, an investment and advisory firm, and also sits on the board of directors of Brookfield Office Properties. girlfriend board  In September 2011, the Department of Energy's Loan Programs Office finalized a partial guarantee (80%) of a $168.9 million loan to Granite Reliable Power for the development of a wind turbine farm (windpark) in New Hampshire "consisting of 33 Vestas V90 3.0-MW turbines, said to be enough to power 20,000 homes and offset 124,000 tons of carbon annually." guarantee Granite Reliable Power windpark The Granite Reliable Power  wind farm project is headed by Brookfield Renewable Power and Freshet Wind Energy.  The former outfit is wholly owned by Brookfield Asset Management, which is also the parent company of Brookfield Office Properties. Brookfield Renewable Power Brookfield Asset Management  The state of Wisconsin utilizes a variety of electronic voting systems, including those provided by Election Systems & Software, Dominion Voting Systems, Populex, and Vote-PAD.  Financier George Soros holds no ownership stake in any of these companies Wisconsin Election Systems & Software Dominion Voting Systems Populex Vote-PAD  The quote about voting attributed to Soviet dictator Josef Stalin is most likely an apocryphal one. apocryphal  On 15 November 2011, a New York judge upheld the city's dismantling of the Occupy Wall Street encampment, ruling that the protesters' first amendment rights didn't entitle them to camp out indefinitely in the plaza. Last updated:  15 November 2011    Hoppock, Julia.  "Hunter Biden Quits Lobbyist Work."   ABCNews.com.  13 September 2008.    Taylor, Kate.  "Diana Taylor, Bloomberg's Girlfriend, Criticizes Obama."   The New York Times.  30 September 2011.    [New York] Daily News.  "Occupy Wall Street Protesters Stripped of Their Power."   28 October 2011. Conservative political commentator Wayne Allyn Root opined back in 2010 that President Obama "is purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos."  Claim:   Wayne Allyn Root wrote in an opinion piece that President Obama is "purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy."  Example:  [Root, June 2010]   Rahm Emanuel cynically said, "You never want a crisis to go to waste." It is now becoming clear that the crisis he was referring to is Barack Obama's presidency. Obama is no fool. He is not incompetent. To the contrary, he is brilliant. He knows exactly what he's doing. He is purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos  thereby destroying capitalism and our country from within. Barack Obama is my college classmate (Columbia University, class of '83). As Glenn Beck correctly predicted from day one, Obama is following the plan of Cloward & Piven, two professors at Columbia University. They outlined a plan to socialize America by overwhelming the system with government spending and entitlement demands. Add up the clues below. Taken individually they're alarming. Taken as a whole, it is a brilliant, Machiavellian game plan to turn the United States into a socialist/Marxist state with a permanent majority that desperately needs government for survival ... and can be counted on to always vote for bigger government. Why not? They have no responsibility to pay for it. [Rest of article here.] here Origins:  Wayne Allyn Root, the Libertarian Party's 2008 vice presidential candidate, is a political commentator whose columns appear on various conservative web sites and the author of several books, including The Conscience of a Libertarian: Empowering the Citizen Revolution with God, Guns, Gambling & Tax Cuts.  He penned a biweekly political opinion column published the Las Vegas Review-Journal, and his entry for 6 June 2010 was the article excerpted above, entitled "Obama's agenda: Overwhelm the system," in which he opined that President Obama is "purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos." Wayne Allyn Root column article Some online-circulated versions of this column are entitled "Obama's college roommate speaks out," but that heading reflects a misreading of the word "classmate," as Wayne Allyn Root never was, or claimed to be, Barack Obama's roommate  Root merely attended Columbia University at the same time as Barack Obama did and later claimed (despite substantial evidence to the contrary) that neither he nor anyone else attending Columbia during that time had ever heard of or met Barack Obama. claimed Root's credentials as a political prognosticator are rather suspect, as he predicted in May 2012 that Barack Obama would lose the upcoming presidential election to Republican candidate Mitt Romney "in a landslide."  (Obama handily won with 62% of the electoral vote.) predicted handily Readers responded with bemusement and skepticism in June 2019 after an "Official 2020 Trump vs Democrat Poll" emerged online and on social media, appearing to pose questions framed in a heavily anti-Democrat way. For example, one survey question asked, "Who would you rather see fix our Nation's shattered immigration policies? President Trump // A MS-13 loving Democrat," while another somewhat tautological question asked: "Who would you trust to NOT raise your taxes? President Trump // A High Tax Democrat." Such bias in the questions, as well as some clear nods to Trump's go-to insults against his political opponents (the poll referenced "a Lyin' Democrat" and "a Low IQ Democrat"), prompted inquiries from Snopes readers who were uncertain whether they were reading a parody or hoax or an official Trump 2020 campaign poll. One reader asked, "Oh my gosh, is this really from the Trump campaign? Or some satire site?" while another wrote, "Is this for real? It sounds too crazy ..." The survey was indeed published by Trump's official re-election campaign committee, on that campaign's official website. An archived version can be read here. The site on which it appeared, donaldjtrump.com, is run by two formally registered, pro-Trump committees and the Republican National Committee (RNC). The website contains the following disclaimer, which makes clear the official nature of the June 2019 survey and all other content featured on the site: here "Paid for by the Trump Make America Great Again Committee, a joint fundraising committee authorized by and composed of Donald J. Trump for President, Inc. and the Republican National Committee." Committee Inc Committee The poll's true purpose may not have been to create a set of results that reflected in a misleadingly positive way on the president but rather to harvest contact information  respondents were required to enter their name, zip code and email address in order to submit their answers.  The full list of questions was as follows: The "Trump vs Democrat" poll bore similarities to another survey on the subject of "mainstream media accountability," which Trump's website published in February 2017, and that included heavily slanted questions such as. "Do you feel that the media is too eager to slur conservatives with baseless accusations of racism and sexism?"  accountability DonaldJTrump.com. "Official 2020 Trump vs Democrat Poll."
 June 2019. DonaldJTrump.com. "Mainstream Media Accountability Survey."
 February 2017. Claim:  President Obama has signed a bill forgiving all student loans taken out within the last ten years. Example:  [Collected via e-mail, June 2014] CONFIRM IF PRESIDENT SIGNED BILL  FORGIVING STUDENT LOANS   Origins:  On 5 June 2014,  the Empire News web site published an article positing that President Obama had signed a bill forgiving all student loans taken out within the last ten years (and any such loans to be taken out by current students in the future): article Americans who are under the financial strain of repaying student loan debt may now be off the hook for their education costs. President Obama signed a new federal bill this week releasing any student who has accrued outstanding debt because of the high interest rates and outrageous balances caused by college loans. "Any student, past or present, who has taken loans from the federal government within the last 10 years to pay for higher education, will no longer be required to pay back those loans," said President Obama. "This forgiveness also is to be extended to any student currently enrolled in college, who may need financial assistance for the next several years as they finish their degrees." By the following day links and excerpts referencing this article were being circulated via social media, with many of those who encountered the item mistaking it for a genuine news article.  However, this tem was just a spoof from the Empire News,  a satirical web site that publishes fictional articles such as "Surgeons Remove Toy from Man's Rectum for 37th Time," "Teenager Hospitalized with Facebook Withdrawals," and "School Suspends Student for Gun Shaped Birthmark." Empire News' "About/Disclaimer" page notes that the site is a satirical publication: About/Disclaimer Empire News is a satirical and entertainment website. We only use invented names in all our stories, except in cases when public figures are being satirized. Any other use of real names is accidental and coincidental. On 9 June 2014, President Obama did announce changes to the federal student loan program, but those changes stopped short of the blanket loan forgiveness posited in the Empire News article: changes President Obama announced an expansion of a program that helps student loan borrowers manage their debt, a White House official said. The official said Obama will expand the criteria for an alternative repayment program, which caps monthly payments for certain federal student loans at 10% of a borrower's discretionary income. The alternative payment programs are designed to help borrowers struggling under the weight of student loans. They include forgiveness programs for on-time payments and public-sector employees. Teachers can have their balance canceled after ten years, for example. Low-income borrowers can have their balance canceled after 20 or 25 years of on-time payments. Borrowers who don't quality for forgiveness but use a repayment program find their monthly payments reduced but spread out over a longer period of time. That means they will pay more over the lifetime of the loan, as there is additional time for interest to accrue.   Last updated:  9 June 2014 President Donald Trump and his team found several positives to tout from the newest round of employment numbers. On Jan. 5, the day the new numbers were released, presidential daughter and White House official Ivanka Trumptweeted, The unemployment rate for African Americans fell to 6.8 percent, the lowest ever recorded. We are working hard to bring this rate down even further. The unemployment rate for African Americans fell to 6.8 percent, the lowest ever recorded. We are working hard to bring this rate down even further. @WhiteHouseCEAhttps://t.co/LyNYIQ4D8s The president himself echoed the talking point in his owntweetJan. 8: African American unemployment is the lowest ever recorded in our country. The Hispanic unemployment rate dropped a full point in the last year and is close to the lowest in recorded history. Dems did nothing for you but get your vote! #NeverForget  @foxandfriends. African American unemployment is the lowest ever recorded in our country. The Hispanic unemployment rate dropped a full point in the last year and is close to the lowest in recorded history. Dems did nothing for you but get your vote!#NeverForget@foxandfriends How accurate is the presidents tweet? Hes right on the numbers but leaves out economic gains for those groups under Democratic control. Unemployment rates In December 2017, African-American unemployment fell to 6.8 percent. Thats a record low since the statistic was first calculated in 1972. The previous record low was 7 percent in April 2000 and September 2017. The Hispanic unemployment also dropped by a full percentage point, from 5.9 percent in December 2016 to 4.9 percent in December 2017. As the president said, this is close to the data points all-time low, which was 4.8 percent in October and November 2017. Did Democrats do nothing for black and Hispanic unemployment? The tweet would have been accurate if Trump had stopped after the numbers. But his dig on the Democrats marred his talking point. The unemployment rate for both groups declined dramatically on President Barack Obamas watch. Black unemployment peaked at 16.6 percent in April 2010, when Obama was president. It then fell by more than half to 7.8 percent by the time Obama left office in January 2017. Hispanic unemployment, meanwhile, peaked at 13 percent in August 2009, then fell to 5.9 percent at the end of Obamas term in January 2017 -- also a drop of more than half. We should note that presidents dont deserve either full credit or full blame for the unemployment rate on their watch. The president is not all-powerful on economic matters; broader factors, from the business cycle to changes in technology to demographic shifts, play major roles. The White House did not reply to an inquiry for this article. Our ruling Trump tweeted, African American unemployment is the lowest ever recorded in our country. The Hispanic unemployment rate dropped a full point in the last year and is close to the lowest in recorded history. Dems did nothing for you but get your vote! Hes right about the low unemployment rates for both blacks and Hispanics today. But his slam that the Democrats did nothing in this regard is an exaggeration. Under Obama, the unemployment rate for both groups fell by more than half. We rate his statement Mostly True.