By Dave Andrusko

I spend a lot of time skewering the "mainstream media" for its relentlessly one-sided, tunnel-visioned coverage of issues about which we care. So when the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel not only debunks a pro-abortion attack but explains why its characterization of the pro-lifer is wrong, it is worth a tip of the hat.

I'm going to be real brief, for you can read the full analysis at http://politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2010/oct/10/tom-barrett/democratic-governor-candidate-tom-barrett-says-opp.

Tom Barrett is the pro-abortion Democratic candidate for governor of Wisconsin. Recently he unloaded on the pro-life Republican candidate, charging in an ad that "Scott Walker says he would ban stem cell research."

So what says "PolitiFact Wisconsin," a joint effort of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and PolitiFact.com? "We rate Barrett's claim False."

To be clear, the claim IS false, but to come to that conclusion the newspaper had to go beyond the customary and wholly unfair way the issue is usually framed. By that I mean, if a candidate opposes harvesting human embryos for stem cells [ESCR], he or she is said to be "against stem research" or (as Barrett charged Walker) "would ban stem cell research."

PolitiFact Wisconsin made an elementary but pivotal distinction. You can be against ESCR but FOR stem cell research that (a) uses adult stem cells, or (b) employs techniques that "reprogram adult cells back to the embryonic state" (induced pluripotent stem cells). While the analysis misses or omits some key points--that adult stems are already in use around the world to remedy diseases, for example, or that there was just a major breakthrough that deals with safety concerns surrounding iPS cells--on the whole it's pretty good.

Final thought. Just because a newspaper and/or a website claims to be fact-checking the validity of political ads doesn't mean it necessarily gets it right. In this case PolitiFact Wisconsin deserves credit for getting to the truth by going the extra mile beyond the usual pro-abortion clichés.

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