Palin's death panels named the biggest Lie of the Year: PolitiFact

The non-partisan Pulitzer Prize-winning site run by the St. Petersburg Times recently called Sarah Palin’s description of health-care the biggest Lie of the Year.

Former Alaska Gov. Palin's use of the term “death panels” to describe the Democrats' health-care overhaul was rated as the biggest lie from Politifact.com.

PolitiFact readers overwhelmingly supported the decision. Nearly 5,000 voted in a national poll to name the biggest lie, and 61 percent chose death panels from a field of eight finalists.

It is the first year Polifact.com has held such a contest.Politifact.com credits Palin for coining the phrase.

The former Alaska governor has expressed no regrets, saying “The term I used to describe the panel making these decisions should not be taken literally.”

The runners-up in the “Lie of the Year” contest include: a claim by Glenn Beck that John Holdren, a science adviser to President Barack Obama, proposed forcing abortions and sterilants on the U.S. population, a claim by conspiracy theorist Orly Taitz that Obama was born in Kenya, and a claim by Vice President Joe Biden during the height of H1N1 flu hysteria that “when one person sneezes, it goes all the way through the aircraft.