In unSpun: Finding Facts in a world of disinformation, Jackson and Jamieson are providing their readers with a tool to recognize spin and thus the ability to dodge the spinners’ misleading agendas and false illustrations of reality. Reading the opening chapter, From Snake Oil to Emu Oil, with continuously furrowed eyebrows, I began wishing I had fallen into this book earlier. Who didn’t know that Listerine couldn’t really cure bad breath?

I will be the first to admit that I am gullible to the furthest extent and would definitely fall under those American who believed the “Dubious Campaign Claims” that George W. Bush and John Kerry had stated back a few years ago. I respected the way in which Jackson and Jamieson presented both the Democratic and Republican’s way of bending facts and created subtle ways to deceive viewers.

For myself, the most eye opening section of the chapter was the uncovering the deceit interwoven in Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11. The buzz around this film left only “misimpression”, questions, and anger in its viewers. Fifty-two percent of American believed that the Bush administration allowed the bin Laden family to fly out of the U.S. while airspace was still closed. Unspun presents falsehoods such as the “Bin Laden Baloney” and begins to unravel the spinners’ web of bended facts and outright lies and I am extremely appreciative of the truth that the book is uncovering. Naturally oblivious and naïve, I am learning to ask questions and not take everything I read or see as factual evidence. I am learning to get down and dirty to find reliable sources from everything to a dependable literature review to a healthy hair shampoo.