{"id":3713,"date":"2023-07-12T19:03:22","date_gmt":"2023-07-12T19:03:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/?p=3713"},"modified":"2023-07-12T19:03:23","modified_gmt":"2023-07-12T19:03:23","slug":"just-the-facts-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/?p=3713","title":{"rendered":"Just the Facts"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Maybe I\u2019m just getting old, but the Internet (and even the local and national news) seems to be full of \u201cfactual\u201d accounts and stories that are in fact, <em>not<\/em> true. This morning, I did something that I <em>almost<\/em> <em>never<\/em> do \u2014 I looked at Facebook. Actually, it was a mistake \u2014 I intended to open something else, but my finger must have activated Facebook on my iPad. I started to immediately close it, but something caught my eye \u2014 one of my \u201cfriends,\u201d who I have no idea who he\/she is, had posted in big, bold letters \u2014\u201cRobert E. Lee owned no slaves, but Ulysses S. Grant did own slaves during the Civil War.\u201d<br>Well\u2026.. there was no source mentioned as where this information came from, or even why it was posted.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I closed Facebook and went on to what I originally started to do \u2014 but, as the day went on, I got to thinking about that statement \u2014 it just didn\u2019t seem right. Pretty much everyone owned slaves around the time of the civil war, so it didn\u2019t make sense that Lee wouldn\u2019t.\u00a0 So a bit of quick extensive research put this statement in the false, or not true, category. I\u2019d guess if it was in the news, the Washington Post would give it four Pinocchios.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Lee personally owned slaves that he inherited upon the death of his mother, Ann Lee. Following the death of his father-in-law, he assumed command of 189 enslaved people. I didn\u2019t dig much more \u2014 that was enough to convince me that the statement was false.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When fake information is repeated, it becomes difficult for people to discern what\u2019s real. Unfortunately, we seem to have gotten to the point that when we agree, it\u2019s the truth \u2014 when we differ, it\u2019s fake.<br>\u2014 30 \u2014<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Maybe I\u2019m just getting old, but the Internet (and even the local and national news) seems to be full of \u201cfactual\u201d accounts and stories that are in fact, not true. This morning, I did something that I almost never do &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/?p=3713\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3713"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3713"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3714,"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3713\/revisions\/3714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jimmy.ekota.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}