In an article discussing Republican opposition to Democrats' health care reform, The Washington Post portrayed Sen. Chuck Grassley as one of the "few GOP senators who sought consensus on health care," conjuring up images of Grassley walking hand-in-hand with the Democrats to pass health care reform (unlike, say, Sen. Jon Kyl, who in September 2009 reportedly called reform a "stunning assault on liberty").

To buttress this image, the Post ignored the not-so-small fact that Grassley helped forward the 2009 "Lie of the Year," the widely debunked falsehood that health reform legislation would establish "death panels." At a town hall meeting in August 2009, Grassley said that Americans "have every right to fear" the end-of-life counseling provision in the House bill. He went on to say, "You shouldn't have counseling at the end of life, you should have done that 20 years before. We should not have a government-run plan to decide when to pull the plug on grandma."

In addition to sidestepping Grassley's embrace of the death panel falsehood, the Post also reported that Grassley "worked for months on a bipartisan bill," but that he sees President Obama as "not committed to meaningful compromise." To make this narrative of Grassley the cooperator work, the Post failed to note that during an August 2009 interview on MSNBC's Morning Meeting, Grassley admitted he wouldn't vote for a bill if the GOP remained opposed -- even if Grassley got what he wanted during negotiations.