So this was by far the most successful week yet in the campaign. We have received more traffic to our website this week than in any other week since we started. (5,767 visitors) Even more importantly we had a tremendous amount of crowd-sourced help, resulting in 12 fact-check conclusions, which is extraordinary. There was also research done for another four, but we have been unable to reach conclusions on those – at least yet. (Our apologies to those who researched for checks we have not yet published, sometimes this is bound to happen.)

As promised we kept track of the time spent: This week it took a combined 29 hours, 15 minutes to complete the work done by us and our contributors fact-checking Meet the Press. (8 hours and 20 minutes of which was towards checks we have not yet been able to conclude on.) So according to David Gregory, the average viewer of Meet the Press has at least 29 hours of time in the week to fact-check the show on their own terms.

It has also been a great week for fact-checking overall, as a report came out indicating the Associated Press has learned that their articles that focus on fact-checking are among the most popular they publish, and there was also news that a new fact-checking operation in Minnesota (for Minnesota) called PoliGraph will be starting up soon as well. The fact-checking renaissance is obviously still going strong.

We hope our many crowd-sourcers from last week will return to help fact-check the statements made on tomorrow’s show, and be joined by some new contributors. We hope our many, many new followers will tune in again as well. We will of course post the statements we think are fact-checkable as quickly as possible following the show. Here is a preview of what’s in store:

Meet the Press: May 23, 2010
UPDATE: Here are the 5/23 checkable statements

Interview:

Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA)
Pennsylvania’s Democratic Nominee for U.S. Senate

This Sunday, a live interview with Rep. Joe Sestak who won the Democratic nomination in Pennsylvania, pushing long-time Senator Arlen Specter from office. Will he be able to keep that Senate seat in the Democratic column?

Please note: Rand Paul was going to be on the show but “canceled due to exhaustion.”

Debate:

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX)
Chair, National Republican Senatorial Committee

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ)
Chair, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee

The anti-incumbent wave: Anger against Washington was on display as voters took a stand in Tuesday’s primary elections. What will it mean for November’s mid-term elections? We’ll have an exclusive debate between the two men responsible for leading their parties to victory this fall: the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) vs. his Democratic counterpart, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ).

Roundtable:

Tom Friedman
Columnist, New York Times

Paul Gigot
Editorial Page Editor, Wall Street Journal

Andrea Mitchell
Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, NBC News
Host, msnbc’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports”

Bob Woodward
Associate Editor, The Washington Post

A big week in politics and a full agenda for the Obama administration. What does the resignation of National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair mean for the nation’s security and for the state of this country’s intelligence gathering community? How do Tuesday’s election results reflect on the President? And what does it all mean for the November elections?  And as the uncontained oil spill in the Gulf continues to threaten the coastline and the region’s health and welfare, how has Washington managed the response and cleanup effort and what will be the long-term ramification of this disaster? Our roundtable weighs in: The New York Times’ Tom Friedman; The Wall Street Journal’s Paul Gigot; NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell; and The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward.