A pro-government television station in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia broadcast a fake, half-hour news report depicting a Russian military invasion of the country, sending fear and panic throughout Georgian citizens. The station called the broadcast a "simulation" of what a new invasion might look like. In August, 2008 Russian tanks, troops and armored vehicles invaded Georgia after Georgian troops attacked pro-Russian separatists in the breakaway republic of South Ossetia. The fake news show used footage of Georgians fleeing that 2008 conflict, and sound bites from Russian presidents Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Throughout the broadcast, a news anchor provided "updates" saying Russian forces had bombed a military base and an airport in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, and reported on the number of deaths. The broadcast ended with a note that the events were not real, but the station did not run any on-screen notes during the rest of the show to make viewers aware that what they were watching wasn't real. Two hours after the show, the TV station ran an apology.

The U.S. media told the public for weeks that a big, offensive battle was taking place in Marja, in Afghanistan, a "city of 80,000 people" in Helmand province which was also the logistical hub of the Taliban. The description gave the impression that the U.S. presence in Marja was a major strategic objective, and that the city was more important than other district centers in the province. But the picture the military painted of Marja and duly reported by a biddable news media was one of the most dramatic pieces of misinformation so far in the entire war, aimed at hyping the offensive as a big turning point in the conflict. In truth, Marja is not a city or even a town, but either a few groups of farmers' homes or a large farming area encompassing much of the southern Helmand River Valley. The sparsley populated area is completely rural, with no incorporated city or town. The fiction that Marja was a city of 80,000 got started at a briefing given by officials on February 2 at the U.S. Marine base called Camp Leatherneck. Officials referred to Marja as a populous city. The Associated Press put out an article that same day saying they expected up to 1,000 insurgents were "holed up" in the "southern Afghan town of 80,000 people," a statement that evoked a picture of house-to-house, urban street fighting. ABC News perpetuated the myth the next day, in a story that referred to the "city of Marja" and claiming that the city and its surrounding area were "more heavily populated, urban and dense than other places the Marines so far have been able to clear and hold." The rest of the news media fell in line, giving fake descriptions of a densely populated, urban Marja, often using the terms "city" and "town" interchangeably, without fact-checking the descriptions. On February 22, the Washington Post reported that the decision to launch the big offensive against Marja was intended largely to impress U.S. public opinion with the military's effectiveness in Afghanistan by showing that it could achieve a "large and loud victory." The false idea that Marja was a significantly large city center was an essential part of that message.

Depiction of Obama in RNC presentationA confidential Republican National Committee (RNC)
PowerPoint presentation about fundraising strategies discusses raising money for the 2010 election cycle by capitalizing on donors' fear of President Obama and promising to "save the country from trending toward socialism." One page of the presentation titled "The Evil Empire" depicts Obama as the Joker from Batman, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as Cruella DeVille, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid as Scooby Doo. Another page explains that major donors who engage in "calculated giving" are "ego-driven," react to "peer to peer pressure" and are motivated by "access," while smaller donors -- called "visceral donors" -- are "reactionary," motivated by "fear" and "extreme negative feelings toward existing Administration." The presentation, titled "Tools for Success," was prepared by Party finance staff and delivered by RNC Finance Director Rob Bickhart at a $2,500-a-head party retreat held in Boca Grande, Florida on February 18. The full 72-page document was provided to Politico.com by a Democrat who found a hard copy that was left behind in the hotel where the RNC hosted the event.

The pro-health care reform group Health Care for America Now has released a study (pdf) that contradicts insurance companies' claims that their recent, exorbitant rate hikes were driven by increases in the cost of medical care. The study shows that over the last eight years premiums have almost doubled, while medical inflation only increased by 40 percent. HCAN found that insurance companies are raising their rates more than 20 percent faster than the amount they are paying out to doctors, and twice as fast as their underlying costs of medical care are rising. In short, insurance companies are hiking premium prices much more quickly than their costs are increasing. HCAN also found that insurance companies are spending the extra money on perks. For example, Anthem spent $27 million on 103 executive retreats to locations like Hawaii in 2007 and 2008 alone. From 2000 to 2008, insurance companies spent $716.4 billion of their premium dollars on administrative costs, salaries for their CEOs, and investor profit -- practically enough to fund the entire health reform bill.

The conservative blogosphere is busy charging that the United States Missile Defense Agency's (MDA) new logo looks suspicious ... like a combination of the Muslim crescent moon and Barack Obama's campaign logo. Some even say they detect a similarity to the logo of Iran's Space Agency. Right wing blogger Frank Gaffney, a former senior official at the Pentagon during the Reagan administration, says something "nefarious is afoot" about the new logo. These latest Obama conspiracy-theorists may be disappointed, though, because it turns out that the agency's "new" logo isn't all that new. MDA spokesman Rick Lehner says it was developed three years ago, during the George W. Bush administration, and a full year before the 2008 presidential campaign. Lehner said the logo was chosen because it is cheaper, since it consists of three colors, as opposed to the five colors contained in the agency's former official logo.

By writing the health care reform bill as a budget bill, Senate Democrats could advance the measure using a procedure called "reconciliation," which would avoid a Republican attempt to stall the measure by filibustering it. But Republicans are portraying use of reconciliation -- "Washington-speak" for seeking a simple majority vote -- as scandalously improper for a health reform bill. Senator Bill Frist (R- Tenessee) claimed use of reconciliation would be "unprecedented" and "historic." Scott Brown (R-Massachusetts) erroneously called reconciliation "the nuclear option." John Kyl (R-Arizona) complains that reconciliation "was never designed for a large, comprehensive piece of legislation such as health care," and Orrin Hatch (R- Utah) said "The use of expedited reconciliation process to push through more dramatic changes to a health care bill of such size, scope and magnitude is unprecedented." In reality, use of reconciliation to pass major health reform measures is the norm. Most health care reform measures passed over the last 30 years were passed using reconciliation. The bill that created COBRA, for example -- the law that allows people to keep their health insurance after they leave their jobs -- was passed through reconciliation. ("COBRA" stands for "Consolidated Omnibus Reconciliation Act of 1985," the name of the bill in which it was passed.) Expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) was also achieved through reconciliation. The process was also used to add protections for nursing home patients, preventive care like cancer screenings, and a hospice benefit to Medicare. In fact, over the last 30 years, far more major health care financing measures have been passed using reconciliation than not.

The Pentagon is formally rebranding the Iraq war by changing its name from "Operation Iraqi Freedom" to the sunnier "Operation New Dawn," to reflect the reduced role the American military is supposed to have in that country over the next year. The new name is scheduled to go into effect in September, 2010.The more optimistic moniker comes after months of deadly bombings in Iraq, and after an aide to the governor of Iraq's Anbar province, Khari Abdul Hadi, expressed "resignation bordering on despair" about the latest bombings in the province, according to the New York Times. The re-naming of the war to "Operation New Dawn" happens during the same week that the U.S. military launched a major new assault in Afghanistan, and after the Obama administration unveiled a military budget of unprecedented proportions.