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Dick Cheney's dot-com bust

It seems Dick Cheney could use a fact-checker himself. During Tuesday night's vice presidential...

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Jon Skillings is an editorial director at CNET, where he's worked since 2000. A born browser of dictionaries, he honed his language skills as a US Army linguist (Polish and German) before diving into editing for tech publications -- including at PC Week and the IDG News Service -- back when the web was just getting under way, and even a little before. For CNET, he's written on topics from GPS, AI and 5G to James Bond, aircraft, astronauts, brass instruments and music streaming services.
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Jon Skillings

It seems Dick Cheney could use a fact-checker himself.

During Tuesday night's vice presidential debate, the incumbent veep took issue with a number of charges by rival John Edwards, and repeatedly accused the Kerry-Edwards camp of getting its facts wrong. When the topic turned to Halliburton, the company that he once ran, Cheney said the truth could be found "if you go, for example, to factcheck.com, an independent Web site sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania."

The problem for the Republican side is that typing "factcheck.com" takes you to a site run by financier George Soros, an avowed foe of the current administration. Visitors to that site are greeted by a bold, oversize, all-caps title declaring "Why we must not re-elect President Bush."

The site Cheney apparently intended to direct voters to is FactCheck.org, which is administered by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at Penn. That site aims to debunk outrageous political claims by both sides. On Wednesday, Slate was quick to point out that even there, the vice president wouldn't find satisfaction, at least on the point about Halliburton.