Did you know Obama killed the pledge?!

Before you forward that alarming email — you know, the one that reports what the evil mainstream media won’t touch — verify its veracity.

Every day, lies, half-truths and even occasional true stories clog the Internet highway. Seeing that in the dead of night President Obama issued an executive order abolishing the pledge of allegiance, skeptical readers will question how something like that could possibly happen. And they’ll invest a minute or two to investigate, quickly learning that it’s a hoax that keeps making its rounds and landing in an inbox near you.

We’re grateful that a number of Press readers routinely forward questionable emails our way. We’ve learned most of these readers really want to discover the truth but aren’t certain how to do that. Some reject perhaps the most popular myth-debunking website, snopes.com. That’s OK, because there are plenty more.

If you receive forwarded email that seems too outrageous to be true, especially along political lines, below are several other websites that can help you separate fact from fiction.

Our favorite for all things political is politifact.com. This winner of the Pulitzer Prize is a straight shooter. It even tracks how many of President Obama’s promises he’s kept, broken and compromised.

Other useful sites — again, check them out for yourselves; don’t take our word for it — include:

• FactCheck.org (another reliable place to, well, check facts, particularly of a political nature)

• Truthorfiction.com (opens with the latest erumors)

• Hoax-slayer.com (we like the updated Top 10 articles)

• Hoaxbusters.org (thousands of entries, including nearly 300 nasty — and mostly fictitious — rumors about Obama)

• OpenSecrets.org (not a myth debunker but a great way to follow political money)

• About.com (go to urbanlegends.about.com for a fun foray through the latest urban legends)

That list is just a starting point. And for our two bits, we find snopes.com generally effective and accurate. We simply don’t rely on that site alone.

The fact that there are now so many websites dedicated to shining light on misleading or outright fictitious email forwards is proof that the average American is on the receiving end of an unprecedented stream of b.s. Use this list, please, to arm yourself with accurate information before passing the shocking “news” along.