You're making a strong statement in favor of fact checking.
People can lie with statistics and people can lie without statistics. The latter is much easier, but the former is possible, as you lay out.
That's why we need to check whether an alleged fact is true, or at least can be confirmed from multiple sources of evidence so it can be accepted as true for the time being. We can also check statistics for anomalies and errors. Statisticians do that all the time.
People can lie with statistics and people can lie without statistics. The latter is much easier, but the former is possible, as you lay out.
That's why we need to check whether an alleged fact is true, or at least can be confirmed from multiple sources of evidence so it can be accepted as true for the time being. We can also check statistics for anomalies and errors. Statisticians do that all the time.
All of that is fact checking.