If you’ve ever tried to “fact check” a political ad, you know it’s a lot harder than it looks. What do the ads’ sparse words mean? What do the candidate’s vague positions include? At what point is an ad untrue, or three quarters of the way to the right on the pants-on-fire meter?

But to you journalists out there who are trying to fact check ads having anything to do with Mitt Romney and abortion, get ready for your head to explode.

Take for example Newt Gingrich’s ad attacking Romney for allegedly expanding access to abortion.

Respected journalists Lori Robertson and Robert Farley at Factcheck.org concluded that it was “highly misleading” for Gingrich’s ad to state that Romney “expanded access to abortion pills.”

The “abortion pills” in question are what most people would call “contraception.”  Known as “Plan B” or morning-after pills, they are high-dose birth-control pills that can prevent a fertilized egg (or zygote) from thriving in the uterus. In 2005, Romney allowed expanded access to Plan B in Massachusetts.

Factcheck.org reported that because “abortion” was not actually involved, but instead “contraception” pills, then Romney cannot be credibly accused of expanding access to abortion.

I personally would agree with Factcheck.org, and its conclusion is in keeping with current law, but Romney himself would not agree.

Romney, like Gingrich, has stated that life begins at conception, and Romney told Mike Huckabee just this year that he’d “absolutely” favor a personhood amendment in Massachusetts’ constitution defining life as beginning at conception.

So Romney himself would define Plan B as an “abortifacient,” which is the word that anti-abortion activists use to describe “contraception” and other things that cause “abortions.” And he’s written as much.

Therefore, using Romney’s own definition of abortion, he expanded access to abortion by giving the green light to morning-after pills. And to be consistent, Romney would have to call them “abortion pills.”

To be fair to Gingrich, Factcheck.org should have stated this as they panned the Gingrich ad. Gingrich and Romney should define “abortion” and “contraception” the same way, because they both believe life begins at conception.

But Factcheck.org did offer some key context:

To be sure, some abortion opponents have pushed for a so-called “personhood” law declaring that life begins at the moment a human egg is fertilized, which could make the “morning-after” pill illegal, and arguably an “abortion” pill. But an effort to pass such a law by ballot initiative was recently rejected by more than 55 percent of voters in Mississippi. And of course, it wasn’t the law in Massachusetts.

Our view is that the language in the ad misleads voters into thinking Romney expanded access to RU-486, which – there’s no debate about it – induces abortion.

Nationally, journalists have had a hard time sorting out Romney’s position on personhood, with some reporters incorrectly stating that Romney has no position on the issue.

But here in Colorado, possibly because he’s had plenty of time to ponder the issue during past election cycles with personhood amendments, Denver Post Editorial Page Editor Curtis Hubbard has correctly concluded that Romney has come out for personhood. (Romney has flipped his position of federal personhood, but he’s stated that he’s for it at the state level.)

Just this week, Hubbard re-stated his view on Jon Caldara’s Devil’s Advocate television show on Colorado Public Television, KBDI:

“Romney already came out for personhood at the state level,” Hubbard told Caldara. “So if Romney is the nominee, he’s going to be asked that same question [about personhood]. It’s going to be difficult.”

Difficult for Romney would be seeing the doctor in the Bennet TV ad saying Romney wants to outlaw birth control, which, by Romney’s and Gingrich’s definition of “abortion,” and given their support of “personhood,” would be deemed by fact checkers as absolutely true.

One reason we like to have reporters on the job is so they can join those boring conference calls with politicians who don’t say much.

Unless they are asked right questions.

The Denver Post’s Allison Sherry dialed into a call with Rep. Cory Gardner Dec. 14, and asked a really good follow-up question raising doubts about Gardner’s subsequent explanation that he opposed a two-month extension of the payroll tax cut because two months was too short.

The Colorado GOP organized the news conference call last week to tout passage of a House bill that extended the payroll tax cut, but the House bill also included riders, which would, among other things, have paved the way for the Keystone oil pipeline.

This House passed this bill before the Senate passed its bill this week extending the payroll tax cut for two months.

On the call, Sherry, along with 9News’ Brandon Rittiman, wondered about the inclusion of the Keystone rider in the House bill. And the de-funding of some of Obamacare. Why was that stuff on the bill?

Sherry put the question to Gardner like this. (at the 10-minute 40-second mark in the recording here).

Sherry: I think what one of the other Democratic members of the Colorado delegation said last night was, look, we do all agree on one thing, which is that we want the payroll tax cut to extend, and so why can’t we focus on that, and why are these other policy riders lumped into the House bill. And I’m not even talking about the Keystone pipeline. I think they were talking about the EPA regulations, the defending of some of the Obamacare stuff. Why would the House go and pass something that probably won’t pass the Senate and the President would veto, if we all do agree on wanting to pass the payroll tax cut.

Gardner didn’t answer the question.

So Sherry calmly put it another way, that got to the heart of the matter.

Sherry: And you said to me yesterday, and I want to make sure you still agree with this, that you don’t believe that this is a make-or-break deal for you. If there is something that you had to vote on that didn’t have the Keystone pipeline on it, that didn’t have some of the EPA provisions, you would still likely vote yes, because you believe in extending the payroll tax cut.

Gardner responded:

Gardner: I believe in extending the payroll tax cut. But again I don’t understand why there’s opposition to putting job-creation measures along with the payroll tax cut, because the payroll tax holiday is about job creation as well. So, they go along well. So, yeah,  I’m still in the same boat, but again, I simply don’t understand the opposition, unless it’s political opposition, and that’s a shame.

And strangely enough, the Senate passed a bipartisan stop-gap measure that gave Gardner the chance  to support a bill that would have done exactly what Gardner said he’d likely do. That is, vote for an extension of the payroll tax cut.

But Gardner opposed the Senate bill. 

He justified this by saying he won’t, no-how no-way, pass a mere two-month extension. He wants a year. The two-month part of the Senate legislation became a deal breaker for him and other Republicans.

But, if a year-long payroll tax cut was so important to Gardner, if he felt so passionately about it that he would risk passage of any bill, even one supported by Senate Republicans, why didn’t we hear about it the week before the vote? He didn’t say a word about it to reporters, when The Post gave him a clear shot to put it on the record.

But he did say it would be a “shame” if political opposition torpedoed the payroll tax cut that he and Democrats all support.

If you’ve been reading The Denver Post over the past year, you know Secretary of State Scott Gessler likes to talk about possible fraud in Denver elections, as he did when he filed a lawsuit trying to stop counties from mailing ballots to inactive voters, and as he did when he was waving lists of possible illegal voters.

(My mistake, he didn’t wave these lists; he just talked about them and refused to make them public.)

But, if you’ve been reading The Post, you may not know that Gessler has alleged real-life, actual, happening-now fraud. That’s of course a far more serious allegation, but not a word of it has graced the pages of The Post.

That is, until Saturday, in an opinion column by Fred Brown, who scooped the entire news department.

Brown’s column was the first piece of any kind, news or opinion in The Post, stating Scott Gessler’s view that there is actual election fraud in Colorado.

Brown wrote:

“He [Gessler] rode into office in 2010 on a wave of Tea Party insurgence and immediately began warning everyone, from Coloradans to congressional committees, about election fraud, which he says is widespread but most others, including Meyer, say is a minor problem.”

In an email exchange with me, Brown wrote that he didn’t talk to Gessler directly about this. 

Brown wrote that he relied on other sources, including Gessler’s congressional testimony, which was quoted in The Post but does not quite allege fraud. Gessler testified,  “We know we have a problem with possible noncitizens on the voter rolls.”

But Gessler said on the radio: “So we know fraud exists. The question is, what’s the extent and what’s the proper balance.”

And to the Pueblo Chieftain: “Signatures vary a lot, and sometimes people’s signatures don’t match what’s on file. Some are fraud, some are innocent mistakes.”

Because Brown didn’t talk with Gessler directly, a door is wide open for a Post reporter to get out in front of the commentary section, track down Scott Gessler, and ask him, “Where’s his evidence for fraud in Colorado elections?”

And if he has none, why does a laywer like him, much less a man who’s got the title of Secretary of State, play fast and loose with the F word?

I discussed media bias today on a panel with Jason Bane, Dan Caplis, Stephen Keating, and Dave Kopel at a forum organized bvy the Centennial Institute as part of its “News in the 21st Century” project.

Last time I went to a Centennial Institute event, the views were narrow, with speakers Walker Stapleton and Scott Gessler on a predictable war path against progressives and Democrats like John Hickenlooper, with lots of heads nodding.

Today’s event, in contrast, had views from people like Mike Littwin, who was on a panel addressing whether the “media is simply giving the public what they want,” to Brent Bozell, who gave they keynote talk.

Some students thanked me for coming out and said they don’t hear different opinions all that often. (Maybe they need more liberal professors out there?)

I hear opinions different from my own most often on talk radio, and in print. But I had a good time talking to conservatives in the flesh today.

And I even got my picture taken with Brent Bozell, with John Andrews in the background. What more could you want from a visit to Colorado Christian University?

Jason Salzman and Brent Bozell at Colorado Christian University Dec. 2

Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler said last month that he thinks  “a lot of the mainstream media” get upset when Republicans “make waves,” but these hostile feelings toward the media didn’t stop him Monday from suggesting people can influence newspaper editors by writing letters to the editor and online comments.

“When they write a story, and they see a large number of comments one way or the other, that means something,” said Gessler. “We do a terrible job on our ideological side of the fence. We do a terrible job of this.”

Gessler’s comments came in response to a question from the audience at his lecture Monday evening at Colorado Christian University’s Centennial Institute.

The unidentified questioner asked speakers Gessler and Colorado State Treasurer Walker Stapleton what ordinary citizens can do.

In addition to influencing journalists, by writing letters-to-the-editor and blogging, Gessler suggested people volunteer as election judges, sign up to receive e-mails from his office, and attend rulemaking hearings or submit comments on proposed rules.

“So, sign up for our e-newsletters, sign up for our notifications, write an email, write an email to us so you know what’s going on,” Gessler said. “Come to our rulemaking hearings. Once every two months, write a letter-to-the-editor. Twenty minutes a week, do a blog. I won’t ask anyone to contribute money to a campaign. And serve as an election judge. Those are the things you can do.”

Gessler said testifying during the rulemaking process is important but did not have an impact in the recent challenge of his rule to increase the amount of money a group of people can raise for an political issue before their group is subject to campaign finance laws.

“Now, this particular court [in the issue-committee-threshold case] didn’t read any of that [citizen testimony], so he [the judge] wasn’t quite prepared, which he admitted, which is unfortunate, but I’m sure the Court of Appeals will be far more prepared than he was, and those comments are just critical for helping me out,” said Gessler.

Here’s an excerpt of Gessler’s comments on this topic:

Look, if you can spend time, two or three hours, once every two months, to write a letter-to-the editor, that makes a difference. Writing a letter-to-the-editor once every two months really makes a difference.  It only takes three or four hours, about as much time as you’ll spend driving here, listening, and driving home. That makes a difference.

It doesn’t just have to be The Denver Post.; particularly local papers as well helps. When you see something in a local paper online, I’m assuming most people go online., instead of merely raging at the machine, I love raging at the machine, don’t get me wrong, instead of merely raging at the machine, write a post to that story. Because let me tell you something, newspaper editors pay attention to that stuff. And actually a lot of readers pay attention to that stuff too. When they write a story and they see a large number of comments one way or the other, that means something. We do a terrible job on our ideological side of the fence. We do a terrible job of this. I’ll go online, and my wife is watching, and she’ll say, ‘Don’t read those. Don’t read ‘em.’ And I’ll read them nonetheless. And look, people on our side don’t take the time to do that. You don’t have to put your name. You can be anonymous. You have sign up and register with your real name, but it can be absolutely anonymous.  I would challenge everyone to do this, 20 minutes, once a week. That’s what I would challenge you to do for 20 minutes, maybe 30 minutes once a week.

The other thing is, come to my website…and sign up for our e-newsletters….

So my office engages in rulemaking a lot. I just said, I’m re-doing all the campaign finance rules to make them clear. Okay. What helps me a lot, is when you come in to my office during rulemaking. You can come in person, is the best and testify. You can write us an email and that becomes part of our record. You can write us a regular letter and that becomes part of our record. The reason this is so important is, if I say, for example, I want to raise the threshold, and I did this. I held a rulemaking hearing, saying I want to raise the threshold to $5,000.  Well, what happened is people came in, and I see Matt Arnold with his hand up the entire time, and he’s one of the people who came in. I’m teasing Matt. And he said look, and other people did, this is why it’s so hard, this is the burden we face. And when I get that evidence and testimony, and I can take that evidence and testimony and use it in court to defend myself. So if you can bring your personal experiences in, that’s just so critical. Now, this particular court didn’t read any of that, so he wasn’t quite prepared, which he admitted, which is unfortunate, but I’m sure the Court of Appeals will be far more prepared than he was, and those comments are just critical for helping me out.

So, sign up for our e-newsletters, sign up for our notifications, write an email, write an email to us so you know what’s going on. Come to our rulemaking hearings. Once every two months, write a letter-to-the-editor. Twenty minutes a week, do a blog. I won’t ask anyone to contribute money to a campaign. And serve as an election judge. Those are the things you can do.

And let me tell you. If everyone in this room did those things on a consistent basis, it would make a huge impact here in the state of Colorado. It would have an impact people rarely ever see. Just the people in this room, if everyone did that on a consistent basis.

You may have noticed that The Denver Post’s op-ed columnists Mike Littwin and Vincent Carroll have written a flurry of blog posts recently.

Well, that is, if you call Littwin’s four posts since Oct. 28 a flurry, which I would, given that Littwin wrote six blog posts this year prior to Oct. 28. Littwin jump started his blogging with string of two blog posts on the same day, Oct. 28.

Carroll has written ten blog posts since Oct. 5, when he apparently first started blogging.

I asked Littwin via email if he was joining the ranks of the blogging class, in addition to writing his normal column.

His response:

Yeah, I’m trying to join the digital-first, or at least digital-second, world. Obviously, you can’t be a full-time columnist and full-time blogger – or an old guy like me can’t, anyway – but I’m trying to do some blogging, and even tweeting, on days when I’m not columnizing. We’ll see how it works. When I’m blogging, I am, by necessity, sacrificing some of the time I would normally spend doing old-fashioned reporting for my column. But I’m not blind to the new realities, so I’m giving it a whirl.

You can find his “Fair and Unbalanced” blog here. Carroll’s blog is here.

They’re both off to a good start. It’s an honor to have them join us here in the blogosphere.

When a public figure attacks journalism, reporters should see it as an opportunity to help people understand what reporters do and why they should continue to exist.

I mean, if journalists don’t defend themselves, who will? Academics? Maybe, but who cares?

And if only the marginalized and irrelevant characters are defending journalism, you have to think the profession will sink even faster than it is now.

In July, for example, Rep. Cory Gardner said on Grassroots Radio Colorado that “the media” is biased against people like him who believe in smaller government, but as far as I know, no journalist has reported why Gardner believes this, much less responded to it.

Last week, Secretary of State Scott Gessler said “a lot of the mainstream media” are “fine” with Republicans as long as they “don’t make waves.” But if Republicans, presumably like Gessler himself,  “challenge the status quo,” then then the media get upset.

Here’s a chance for journalists to explain 1) whether they’ve been “upset” at Gessler, and 2) why their coverage of him has been in the public interest.

But no such stories have been written, even though Gessler’s attack on the media appeared in The Denver Post’s Spot blog.

Then over the weekend, The Post served up a story about Gerry Whitman lashing out at the media during a farewell news conference, saying the news media’s portrayal of his department was “just ridiculous” and stories about excessive force have been overblown.

Another opportunity for journalists to stand up for themselves! But I noticed little or no such self defense in the article.

So I emailed Post reporter Kirk Mitchell, who wrote the Whitman article, and told him that when a public official attacks the media, I think reporters should treat the accusation as they would in any other news story, and present readers with a response from the entity that’s attacked.

Why didn’t he offer a quotation from a Post editor or another journalist about whether the media’s police coverage was fair.

He wrote back, “The story did mention that there were 10 police firings since March.”

True, that’s indeed a response, but let’s face it. It’s weak (and it was left out of the online edition). Here’s the graf Mitchell refers to:

[Whitman’s] comments came during a year in which 10 of his officers have been fired since March, six after lying about excessive-force complaints.

The Post could have fired back at Whitman with more force, if not excessive force. An editor might have blasted him with something like:

It’s a newspaper’s job to inform the public about lying and violent-happy cops, especially when they get fired. That’s why we’re here. That’s how journalism holds public officials accountable. Rather than attacking us, Whitman might advise his own police force to behave better under the next chief, so that the Police Department’s problems won’t be in the newspaper. Until then, we’ll continue to give our readers the truth, to the best of our ability.

You probably won’t see anything like this in The Denver Post anytime soon, though I’m glad to see Post Editor Greg Moore defending the newspaper’s coverage more often on high-profile stories, including his newspaper’s handling of Mayor Michael Hancock’s alleged use of prostitutes and Scott McInnis’ non-use of a plagiarism checker.

You’re more likely to find outfits like “Fair and Balanced” Fox News get self rightious about what it does, even though it’s far less likely to be fair and accurate than the mainstream media in Denver.

Unfortunately, it seems that the more serious the news outlet, the less likely it is to get mad and defend itself, as if this is beneath it or something.

My advice is, fight back, while you still can.

In its coverage of the release of  Hickenlooper’s proposed state budget, The Denver Post predicted a partisan battle in the state legislature next year over Hick’s proposal to suspend Senior Homestead Exemption, which gives some seniors a property-tax break and costs the state around $100 million in tax revenue.

As it pointed to signs that the GOP will fight Hick on the Homestead Exemption, The Post noted, as it has in the past, that Republicans themselves previously voted to suspend the same Homestead tax break to seniors.

That kind of context is always a must for journalists, but even more so today with partisanship gone wild and voters baffled by it all.

And in the case of the Homestead Exemption, you can argue that another contextual tidbit is useful to pass on to readers:  Hickenlooper’s current Budget Director, Henry Sobanet, quoted extensively in The Post piece, first proposed this same thing in 2003 when he was Bill Owens’ deputy budget director.

 As The Post had the good sense to report when this issue arose in July, Republicans voted for the suspension in 2003, and then they reversed themselves in 2009 and 2010. This is important background whenever Sobanet gets mentioned. He was proposing the same thing, for the same reasons, when he was working for a Republican governor.

And it’s likely we’ll be hearing a lot for Sobanet, as he’s the wonk assigned to deliver the Hick Administration’s view that suspending the Homestead Examption is the only option left, if you don’t want to raise taxes or make further cuts. As he told The Post:

“There are only a few places to find money to balance the budget,” Sobanet said, “and half the budget goes to K-12 education and higher education. And so, $98.6 million to senior homestead means you have to find budget reductions most likely in K-12 or higher education.”

The Post’s prediction of partisan fight over the Homestead Exemption looks right, given that Evergreen Republican Rep. Cheri Gerou, Vice Chair of the Joint Budget Committee, told The Post that she was “concerned” about suspending the tax break for seniors for another year.

“While we appreciate many of the proposals the governor has made, the governor’s budget does raise some points of concern, like increasing taxes on seniors who have been hit so hard by this recession,” said Rep Cheri Gerou, R-Evergreen, vice chairwoman of the Joint Budget Committee. “House Republicans are committed to working with the governor and Senate to pass a responsible and honest budget.”

On Tuesday, The Post quoted from a July statement by House Speaker Frank McNulty, in which, it’s fair to say, he put clamped his teeth down on the Homestead Exemption and promised not to let go:

“The days of balancing Colorado’s budget on the backs of seniors are over,” McNulty declared in a statement in July in the face of improved state revenues. “Tough budget times led to the suspension of the senior homestead exemption. That meant less money for seniors to spend on medicine and food during this economic crisis. This is money we can now get back to them.”

The Post also reported previously, as it did again Tuesday, that House Republicans didn’t specify furtehr budget cuts that they would make if the Homestead Exemption were not suspended, as proposed by Hick. More cuts? Tax increases? The Post has responsibly asked, if you don’t like suspending the Homestead Exemption, what gives?

Part of the reason Denver Post columnist Vincent Carroll is effective at getting under the skin of liberals is that he’s so good at mixing his opinion with interviews and other types of original reporting.

In my lowly way as a progressive blogger, I try to write like Carroll, with his edge and clear reporting, though he’s better at it (though his opinion is usually wrong, even if his facts are right).

So I read his column.

On Saturday morning, Carroll is very effectively ripping apart the county clerks, and at the end, he’s quoting from his personal interview with Secretary of State Scott Gessler.

For weeks, I’d been trying to ask Gessler–or anyone in his press office–a simple question about whether he thinks there’s fraud in Denver elections, and his office will not comment.

But he’s yapping it up with Carroll.

So I emailed Carroll:

I’m wondering, do you think Gessler or his media people should talk to me, even if I’m progressive, as they do you.

…what seems to bother Gessler’s spokesman the most about me is the fact that I crosspost on ColoradoPols, obviously a left-leaning blog.

I mean, it would be one thing if I were a progressive hatchet man, but I really don’t think I’m harder on the conservatives I interview than you are on the liberals who talk to you.

Carroll replied:

You are right that you are not a left-leaning hatchet man, but that doesn’t mean Gessler is under any obligation to talk to you.  Some people won’t take my calls, too.  Such is life in journalism.

Right.

But you’d think a public official would at least listen to the question, and if it’s a basic one, like whether there’s election fraud in Denver, and if the answer would serve the public interest, he’d respond, whether the questioner were progressive or conservative.

On Saturday, The Denver Post’s spot blog posted a story about Secretary of State Scott Gessler’s comments at a GOP lunch last week.

The Spot’s headline was “Republican Scott Gessler talks about the left: venom, hysteria and class warfare.”

The phrase “mainstream media” should have been added to that list.

Gessler took a serious whack at journalists during his speech when he said, according to a Spot transcript:

It’s really not the civil rights issue of the year. But I look at this venom and I think there’s a couple of things going on that we need to pay attention to as Republicans and conservatives.

And one is it seems pretty clear that to the left and particularly a lot of the mainstream media, Republicans are fine as long as they don’t make waves. And one is it seems pretty clear that to the left and particularly a lot of the mainstream media, Republicans are fine as long as they don’t make waves. Pat them on the head. ‘Good boys, good girls, Republicans.’ But when they actually make waves and challenge the status quo and challenge the way things have been done in the past, the left really gets upset. I think that’s in part what’s going on.

Unless he misspoke, Gessler apparently thinks a lot the “mainstream media” should be lumped together with the left.

In fact, judging from his use of the word “particularly,” it looks like he thinks the mainstream media are even more bothered than the left when Republicans get uppity.

You have to wonder if he’s got evidence for this.

Does he keep it in the same secret box with the evidence for fraud in Denver elections?