TASK DEFINITION: Given a paragraph and a claim, classify it this way: If the claim contradicts the evidence present in the paragraph, classify the claim as '0'. If the claim has multiple supporting *AND* contradicting evidences, classify the claim as '1'. If the claim has supporting evidence and the paragraph is in overall favor of the claim, then classify the claim as '2'.
PROBLEM: Paragraph: On 10 June 2016, theDaily Beastreported that Sen. David Perdue urged attendees of the Faith & Freedom Coalition's Road to Majority conferenceto pray for misfortune and death to befall President Barack Obama: At a major event for conservative Christians this morning, a Republican senator joked about praying for President Obama's "days to be short." Sen. David Perdue, a freshman senator from Georgia, opened his remarks at the Faith & Freedom Coalition's Road to Majority conference by encouraging attendees to pray for President Obama. But, he added in a joking tone, they need to pray for him in a very specific way: "We should pray for him like Psalms 109:8 says: Let his days be few, and let another have his office," the senator said, smiling wryly. The crowd chuckled and he moved on with his address. The rest of that passage, which Perdue did not recite, reads, "May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow. May his children be wandering beggars; may they be driven from their ruined homes." The psalm is a pointed, lengthy death wish for one of David's enemies. Video depicted Purdue's 10 June 2016 remarks: Psalms 109:8 (alternately named "Song of the Slandered") was rendered in the manner below in the King James Bible: Hold not thy peace, O God of my praise; For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful are opened against me: they have spoken against me with a lying tongue. They compassed me about also with words of hatred; and fought against me without a cause. For my love they are my adversaries: but I give myself unto prayer. And they have rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my love. Set thou a wicked man over him: and let Satan stand at his right hand. When he shall be judged, let him be condemned: and let his prayer become sin. Let his days be few; and let another take his office. Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labour. Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children. Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out. Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the LORD; and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out. Let them be before the LORD continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth. As many pointed out, the Senator's Biblical reference wasn'ta newor even uncommon scripture-based jab at President Obama. A 2009 articlereported that the verse was traction across the internet as a veiled threat cloaked in the guise of prayerful intent: There's a new slogan making its way onto car bumpers and across the Internet. It reads simply: "Pray for Obama: Psalm 109:8" A nice sentiment? Maybe not. The psalm reads, "Let his days be few; and let another take his office." Presidential criticism through witty slogans is nothing new. Bumper stickers, t-shirts, and hats with "1/20/09" commemorated President Bush's last day in office. But the verse immediately following the psalm referenced is a bit more ominous: "Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow." The slogan comes at a time of heightened concern about antigovernment anger. Earlier this year, the president's senior adviser, David Axelrod, said that Tea Parties could lead to something unhealthy. In September, authorities shut down a poll on Facebook asking if President Obama should be killed. Still, that doesn't push the Psalms citation into the realm of hate speech, says Chris Hansen, a staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). That particular piece was published during President Obama's first term in office. Some argued at the time that the reference to the versesimply expressed a hope that he not be re-elected to a second term: Deborah Lauter, director of civil rights at the Anti-Defamation League agrees that the bumper sticker falls within acceptable political discourse. "The problem is you don't know if people who are donning that message in a shirt or on a bumper sticker are fully aware of the quote or what follows. Obviously that message makes the ambiguity disappear. If they're just referring to him being out of office, that's one thing. If they're referring to him being dead, that's so offensive. It's protected speech, but it's clearly offensive." However, that motive ceased to be relevant after Obama's 2012 re-election. A representative for the Senator provided a terse statement to a Bloomberg reporter about the controversy: David Perdue spokeswoman Caroline Vanvick responds in an email: "He in no way wishes harm towards our president" pic.twitter.com/PPj5jtZv0n Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) June 10, 2016 The statementread: Senator Perdue said we are called to pray for our country, for our leaders, and for our president. He in no way wishes harm towards our president and everyone in the room understood that. However, we should add the media to our prayer list because they are pushing a narrative to create controversy and this is exactly what the American people are tired of. It istrue Sen. David Perdue laughed and referenced Psalms 109:8 during a 10 June 2016 conservative Christian event. A representative for the Senator addressed the ensuing controversy, blaming the media for "pushing a narrative" forthe outcry. Claim: Sen. David Perdue advised attendees to offer up an ominous prayer aimed at President Obama during the 2016 Faith & Freedom Coalition's Road to Majority conference.

SOLUTION: 2

PROBLEM: Paragraph: Through ups and downs in popularity, health troubles and weight fluctuations and the sorts of seismic shifts that take place over decades in the entertainment industry, Lewis always figured out a way to battle back, to reinvent himself, to stay relevant. It's what enduring stars know how to do instinctively; perhaps it's that very drive that makes them stars in the first place. Through it all, Lewis remained the consummate showman, and his distinctive comic legacy surely will continue to survive for decades to come. The manic, rubber-faced performer who jumped and hollered to fame in a stage, radio, TV and film partnership with Dean Martin, settled to become a self-conscious auteur in movies he wrote, produced and directed, and found new fame as the tireless, teary host of the annual muscular dystrophy telethons, died Sunday at home in Las Vegas surrounded by family. He was 91. Lewis, who had battled the lung disease pulmonary fibrosis, heart issues, a debilitating back problem and addiction to pain killers, died of natural causes, according to his publicist. His career spanned the history of show business in the 20th century, beginning in his parents' vaudeville act at the age of 5. He was just 20 when his pairing with Martin made them international stars. After their cold parting in 1956, Lewis made such favorites as "The Bellboy" and "The Nutty Professor," was featured in Martin Scorsese's "The King of Comedy" and appeared as himself in Billy Crystal's "Mr. Saturday Night." In the 1990s, he scored a stage comeback as the devil in the Broadway revival of "Damn Yankees." In his 80s, he was still traveling the world, planning to remake some of his earlier movies and working on a stage version of "The Nutty Professor." He was so active he would sometimes forget the basics, like eating, his associates would recall. In 2012, Lewis missed an awards ceremony thrown by his beloved Friars Club because his blood sugar dropped from lack of food and he had to spend the night in the hospital. In an interview with The Associated Press from 2016, Lewis, at 90 and promoting the film "Max Rose," said he still woke up every day at 4:30 or 5 in the morning to write, and he had a handful of standup shows on the schedule. Although a clear influence on Jim Carrey and other slapstick performers, later generations knew Lewis primarily as the ringmaster of the Labor Day Muscular Dystrophy Association, joking and reminiscing and introducing guests, sharing stories about ailing kids and concluding with his personal anthem, the ballad "You'll Never Walk Alone." From the 1960s onward, the telethons raised about $1.5 billion. He announced in 2011 that he would step down as host, but he would remain chairman of the association he joined some 60 years ago. His fundraising efforts won him the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award at the 2009 Oscar telecast, an honor he said "touches my heart and the very depth of my soul." But the telethon was also criticized for being mawkish and exploitative of children, known as "Jerry's Kids." A 1960s muscular dystrophy poster boy, Mike Ervin, later made a documentary called "The Kids Are All Alright," in which he alleged that Lewis and the Muscular Dystrophy Association had treated him and others as objects of pity rather than real people. Responded Lewis: "You don't want to be pitied because you're a cripple in a wheelchair, stay in your house!" He was the classic funnyman who longed to play "Hamlet." He cried as hard as he laughed. He sassed and snarled at critics and interviewers who displeased him. He pontificated on talk shows, lectured to college students and compiled his thoughts in the 1971 book "The Total Film-Maker." "I believe, in my own way, that I say something on film. I'm getting to those who probably don't have the mentality to understand what ... 'A Man for All Seasons' is all about, plus many who did understand it," he wrote. "I am not ashamed or embarrassed at how seemingly trite or saccharine something in my films will sound. I really do make films for my great-great-grandchildren and not for my fellows at the Screen Directors Guild or for the critics." In his early movies, he played the kind of fellows who would have had no idea what the elder Lewis was talking about: loose-limbed, buck-toothed, overgrown adolescents, trouble-prone and inclined to wail when beset by enemies. American critics recognized the comedian's popular appeal but not his pretensions of higher art. Not the French. Writing in Paris' Le Monde newspaper, Jacques Siclier praised Lewis' "apish allure, his conduct of a child, his grimaces, his contortions, his maladjustment to the world, his morbid fear of women, his way of disturbing order everywhere he appeared." The French government awarded Lewis the Chevalier of the Legion of Honor in 1983 and Commander of Arts and Letters the following year. Film critic Andrew Sarris observed: "The fact that Lewis lacks verbal wit on the screen doesn't particularly bother the French." Lewis had teamed up with Martin after World War II, and their radio and stage antics delighted audiences, although not immediately. Their debut, in 1946 at Atlantic City's 500 Club, was a bust. Warned by owner "Skinny" D'Amato that they might be fired, Martin and Lewis tossed the script and improvised their way into history. New York columnists Walter Winchell and Ed Sullivan raved over the sexy singer and the berserk clown. Hollywood producer Hal Wallis saw them at New York's Copacabana and signed them to a film contract. Martin and Lewis first appeared in supporting roles in, then they began a hit series of starring vehicles: "At War With the Army," That's My Boy," Sailor Beware," Jumping Jacks," The Stooge," The Caddy," Money From Home," Living It Up," Three Ring Circus," You're Never Too Young," Artists and Models," Pardners," Hollywood or Bust." But in the mid-1950s, their partnership began to wear. Lewis longed for more than laughs. Martin had tired of playing straight man and of Lewis' attempts to inject Chaplinesque pathos into their movies. He also wearied of the pace of films, television, nightclub and theater appearances, benefits and publicity junkets on which Lewis thrived. The rift became increasingly public as the two camps sparred verbally. "I knew we were in trouble the day someone gave Jerry a book about Charlie Chaplin," Martin cracked. On July 24, 1956, Martin and Lewis closed shop, at the Copa, and remained estranged for years. Martin, who died in 1995, did make a dramatic, surprise appearance on Lewis' telethon in 1976 (a reunion brokered by mutual pal Frank Sinatra). After Martin's death, Lewis said the two had again become friendly during his former partner's final years and he would repeatedly express his admiration for Martin above all others. Lewis distinguished himself after the break, revealing a serious side as unexpected as Martin's gift for comedy. He brought in comedy director Frank Tashlin for "Rock-a-bye Baby," Cinderfella," The Disorderly Orderly," The Geisha Boy" and "Who's Minding the Store?" With "The Bellboy," though, Lewis assumed the posts of producer, director, writer and star, like his idol Chaplin. Among his hits under his own direction was the 1963 "The Nutty Professor," playing a dual Jekyll and Hyde role, transforming himself from a nerdy college teacher to a sexy (and conceited) lounge singer, Buddy Love, regarded as a spoof of his old partner Martin. Lewis' more recent film credits included such low-budget releases as "Arizona Dream," co-starring Johnny Depp, "Funny Bones," and "Max Rose," from 2016. He was seen briefly in Eddie Murphy's remake of "The Nutty Professor." He was born Joseph Levitch in Newark, New Jersey, on March 16, 1926. His father, billed as Danny Lewis, was a singer on the borscht and burlesque circuits. His mother played piano for Danny's act. Their only child was often left alone in hotel rooms, or lived in Brooklyn with his paternal grandparents, Russian Jewish immigrants, or his aunts in New Jersey. "All my life I've been afraid of being alone," Lewis once said. In his later years the solitude haunted him, and he surrounded himself with an entourage at work and at home. Joey Levitch made his professional debut at age 5, singing the Depression tearjerker "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" to great applause. By 16, Jerry Lewis had dropped out of school and was earning as much as $150 a week as a solo performer. Rejected by the Army because of a heart murmur and punctured eardrum, Lewis entertained troops in World War II and toured with his lip-sync act. In 1944 he married Patti Palmer, a band vocalist. The following year he met Martin, on a March day in 1945 in Manhattan. Fame brought him women and Lewis wrote openly of his many partners. After 36 years of marriage and six sons, Patti Lewis sued her husband for divorce in 1982. She later wrote a book claiming that he was an adulterer and drug addict who abused their children. In his late 50s, Lewis married Sandra Pitnick, 32, a former airline stewardess. They had a daughter, Dani, named for Jerry's father. "When the truth comes down to the truth, I am so grateful that I'm on that stage or in front of that camera," Lewis told The Associated Press in 2016. "To have a career that I had in film, I'm the luckiest Jew that ever lived. I'm so grateful for it. I don't take advantage of it. I don't use it improperly. And I love the fact that there's nowhere I can go where people don't know me." ___ Lemire is a former Associated Press writer. Associated Press writer Bob Thomas and AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr in Los Angeles and AP National Writer Hillel Italie in New York contributed to this report. Claim: Jerry Lewis, Hollywood survivor, showman, dies at 91.

SOLUTION: 2

PROBLEM: Paragraph: "The story provides the cost of the machine but does not mention how this would influence the treatment costs for the patient. We are not told if this method of cancer treatment would be covered by health insurance, or how the cost would compare to current radiation treatments. The story does not provide any quantification of benefit. The story is a promotional vehicle for a new, potentially cost-prohibitive machine manufactured by TomoTherapy. We are told that proton therapy will work better for patients than radiation, but no data are given to show that this is the case. The story notes potential harms of radiation, but mentions no harms of proton therapy. Proton therapy is not without side effects; this story inappropriately minimizes potential harm of proton beam. Clearly, future clinical studies will help define better the harms, but the story should have noted potential for harms. Common harms include hair loss, skin rash, fatigue story says ""patient won't have undue side effects"" whatever 'undue side effects' may mean the harms are not inconsequential for sure. Here's what another proton center lists: What are some of the side effects from proton therapy?Side effects will depend on the patient's age, medical history, diagnosis, disease size and location. Some patients may receive chemotherapy in conjunction with proton therapy; some will receive much lower radiation doses than others and therefore symptoms will vary significantly. Common symptoms include temporary hair loss and skin reactions in the direct path of the radiation. Fatigue is also associated treatment to large areas. The story provides no quantitative evidence that the proton therapy is better than current radiation. Despite company reassurances, we do not know if this form of therapy is as efficacious as current radiation or if it is safe. We are also not told if this therapy is only for a particular type of cancer or if it could be used on tumors anywhere in the body. The story does not engage in disease mongering, but promotes a new technology and potential future option for cancer treatment. The story cites Dr. DeVere White and Dr. Matthew of UC Davis Cancer. Researchers at this center helped finance research and development of the proton therapy machines with TomoTherapy, Inc., so they have an interest in positively promoting their work. The story also cites a senior project manager at TomoTherapy, Inc., who also cannot provide unbiased information about this new device. The story needs balance from cancer researchers (esp. radiation oncologists) and clinicians to provide perspective on this emerging technology as cancer treatment. The story presents proton therapy as a newer, alternative option for shrinking tumors; however, this technology as cancer therapy is still in early development, thought it has received FDA approval for cancer treatment. The story gives us no data to support this newer option as better than existing methods of X-ray radiation treatment for cancer. There have been advances in standard radiation therapy with the goal of minimizing harm to healthy tissue, and the story does not mention that current forms of X-ray radiation can be targeted to a tumor via computer imaging and the use of devices (i.e. balloon, seeds, etc.) Mary, unsure here if we need to mention the latter, but thought it was important as they position this as proton therapy v. harmful radiation. Radiation, at least as much as I know for breast cancer, is now safer. The story mentions that the proton therapy machines are only in five cancer centers in the U.S.. Space and cost are provided as the reason this therapy is not widely available, but cancer centers may be waiting for evidence that this therapy is safe and works as well (or better) than current forms of targeted radiation delivery. The story presents a new technologyproton therapyas an option for shrinking tumors; however, the story gives us no data to support this newer option as better than existing methods of X-ray radiation treatment for cancer. We can't be sure if the story relied soley or largely on a press release, but there is very little new information in the story that is NOT in a news release posted by TomoTherapy, Inc., makers of the proton therapy machine promoted in the news story." Claim: Partnership plans to build cancer treatment machine

SOLUTION:
1