Where Can I Get Just the Facts? www.usafacts.org

It can be a challenging world in which to seek out facts. People and organizations are using more "smoke and mirrors" along with the Internet to provide alternative facts, which are mostly meant to cause people to question reality — and support their alternative and preferred line of thinking. 

Enter a relatively new website I just read about, USAFacts, which proposes only to provide you with government data, unembellished with opinions and interpretations of the data. All of which reminds me of, "Facts don't lie, but people do."

This is an effort coming from Steve Ballmer and his wife, Connie. The website is a nonprofit (He's the 22nd-richest person in the world) and he has a team of six people doing the research to "find the facts" which governments are not necessarily forthcoming with — despite all the talk of being transparent.

I'm not a big fan of Steve Ballmer, but in this case, I think he is doing a great public service for people seeking data that translates into facts. Researchers should love his site!