This is Not Fact-Checking. This is Truth-Fucking.

Somebody tells you she is going to drive the 500 miles from Washington, D.C. to Lexington, Ky in five hours. OK, you say, it's interstate all the way, so if you've got a really fast car and you're a trained driver, and you do it in the middle of the night, you mighrt be able to average 100 miles an hour. But you'd be breaking the speed limit the whole way.

 

No, no, she says; I'll drive the 500 miles in five hours without breaking the speed limit.

 

Impossible! you say. You have to speed. If you're going to drive 500 miles in five hours, you are going to speed.

 

The person turns to FactCheck.org, which calls you out for lying because the person promises not to break the speed limit and therefore is telling the truth.

 

Think Progress:

San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro cited a well-known study from the Tax Policy Center when he stated that Republican candidate Mitt Romney’s tax plan would “raise taxes on the middle class.” FactCheck.org, however, found that claim to be misleading because Romney “has promised he won’t” raise middle-class taxes:

The keynote speaker and others claimed the Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, would raise taxes on the “middle class.” He has promised he won’t. Democrats base their claim on a study that doesn’t necessarily lead to that conclusion.

FactCheck.org is right that Romney’s plan “doesn’t necessarily” raise taxes on the middle class, but it is absurd to base that conclusion on the candidate’s promises. Romney has, indeed, promised not to raise taxes on the middle class. But he has also promised that his tax plan will maintain current revenue levels.

Those promises, by any measure, are totally incompatible, something the Tax Policy Center study made abundantly clear when it found that Romney couldn’t possibly raise enough revenue to maintain current revenue levels by closing tax loopholes that benefit the wealthy. Thus, Romney’s plan will either add to the deficit or raise middle-class taxes, unless he forgoes his 20 percent rate reduction altogether.

Arithmetic is hard. Lying is easy. Stupid is contagious.