Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper (1807)

I was in the vicinity of a news story once and I interacted with the press. A reporter from a local news station. She asked me what I saw and took notes. There were two follow up questions: "did you notice anything else?", and that's it. The report didn't really include any of the extra details that I provided, just what you could see from the street. It included a clip from a different witness who was much more chatty and added their own... flair.

I say all this because in my limited experience, the embellishments come from average Joes who are eager to say such things to reporters.

Reminds me of the opening text of Fargo.

> The events depicted in this film took place in Minnesota in 1987. At the request of the survivors, the names have been changed. Out of respect for the dead, the rest has been told exactly as it occurred.

So solemn, so respectful and complete bs :D

Above the fold on my 2016 MacBook running uBlock Origin (so I may be dropping some ads if they have advertorial stuff, not sure), here's what I get:

Trump suggests voters should commit fraud; an uncharitable read, but basically true -- Trump suggested voters in NC vote by mail and in person as part of his contention that vote by mail is easily exploitable by fraudsters. I suspect when this blows up he'll say he was joking, but the words were literally true and nothing about the context of him saying it (let alone the broader context of his attacks on vote by mail and election integrity generally) suggests it's especially a joke. I agree that this is an uncharitable framing.

BREAKING Facebook will limit some ads in the week before the election, but it will let politicians run ads with lies. Clicked on the article and this seems like an accurate summary of events; Facebook will not get into the business of policing lies in political ads generally, but will limit them in the last week of the campaign

Analysis: Donald Trump is already working the debate refs; Analysis implies it's an opinion piece. My biggest objection here is the style of putting asterisks around the word already instead of using tags. It looks like the biggest objection to the headline is that it's the Trump campaign who are working the refs, not Trump himself. I think that kind of "royal we" thing is pretty common, though.

Analysis: Bill Barr's indefensible defense of 2020 voter fraud. This title is all sorts of mangled, the actual thesis is that Barr is alleging systematic mail vote fraud including by foreign actors with no evidence to support it. That seems in keeping with past statements he's made.

Barr interview gets tense when pressed on mail-in voting; this appears to just be a link to the video discussed in the piece immediately above.

AG William Barr: "I don't think there are two justice systems"; this is Barr discussing racial inequality in justice. The headline is a direct quote and surely Barr knew to the extent that this is an inflammatory argument, he was making it.

Opinion: What Barr could have up his sleeve for Trump; dumb title, the op-ed piece's thesis is that the Justice Department customarily avoids announcing any major activity within 60 days of the election to avoid the appearance of impropriety, and that Barr might not respect this precedent. I don't see strong evidence here and as an editor I think I'd have pressed the writer to revise the argument a bit, but it doesn't seem false per se?

Police officer poisoned by Novichok in UK issues cryptic tweet on Navalny; the tweet is clearly deliberately cryptic, and the headline seems true. I would argue this is a bit of a nothingburger as a story.

Pelosi says she was set up by salon owner; Pelosi's defence here seems quite thin. She responds very poorly to criticism and this specific story I think is the kind of personal gotcha that tends to get a bunch of traction. But she did literally say this, so...

Officers covered a Black man's head before he stopped breathing, video shows; there's clearly an implied frame here that the officers action was police abuse, so you could maybe argue that a fairer frame would contextualize the actions better, but again seems literally true

Laid off and now evicted amid Covid-19, a Houston father contemplates homelessness; story seems true, although you can argue whether this is adequately framed in terms of how common or uncommon it is

The US jobs market is gradually recovering from the pandemic lockdown; this seems basically true. We're still down a bunch from highs, but recovery is happening. The headline attributes the job losses to the lockdown in a way that is causally clearer than I think the evidence suggests, but it exists in the realm of truth certainly.

CNN political director: This is a problem for Trump; truly awful headline, and it links to a video whose thesis is basically that Trump is behind in polling in "swing states" and in "key demographics". This is factually true [I have not worked for CNN but have polled this election for the last 15 months for a day job]. You could argue some of the conclusions require an exploration of the limits of polling, or the uses of "basically tied" -- and the reported MOEs are classical sample MOEs, not TSEs -- but this is consistent with what most pollsters would tell you.

These children are being held in hotels, then kicked out of the US; again, terrible headline, but it seems to be true and is a story about migrant ("illegal immigrant" if you prefer) children detention.

MacKenzie Scott has become the world's richest woman; I think it's difficult to assess the wealth of autocrats or whatever, but given the restriction that wealth lists relate to public, documented wealth this seems likely, especially given Bezos' wealth growth over the last few years.

Overall, I would say that this is certainly a news source whose editorial voice is focusing on stories closer to the interest of Democratic voters, but covering generally true things without a particularly strong editorial slant. I don't habitually read CNN or watch any TV news an I'm not about to start because a lot of these pieces are pretty shallow and I didn't learn anything. But if the question is "Do you still believe all of it?", subject to the general limitations I would apply to skepticism of any source, I think the stories presented are broadly true.

Since I took time out of my day to do your exercise, do you think you could flesh out your own position a little bit more about what exactly it is you think I missed? In asking me to do this, surely you did it yourself, and I have to believe you wouldn't have posted if you didn't have specific objections.