I think this highlights something I've thought about recently.
I've realized reading the "news" is a skill. Particularly, HN. As a reader, you need to be able to quickly differentiate what matters and what doesn't; what's bias and what's not, what has actual substance and what doesn't; and what the stories mean in the grand scheme. Also, and most importantly, you have to be able to move on.
It's so easy to get distracted and sucked into the k-hole of news. News should educate and inform your worldview. But remember there's plenty of unsubstantiated ruminations and pointless, heavily-biased garbage out there.
Modern civilization is extremely complex; so much so that even seemingly cut-and-dry news stories are simply beyond full comprehension and understanding of what actually is going on.
My reading strategy for news is to allow a particular story to be substantiated by more than a few known trusted sources, but, again, to remember that it's just a distant narrative and to move on.
The Ukraine situation is a great example. I'm not from the Ukraine and don't know many Ukrainians so for me it's just another news story. It brings up interesting geopolitical, human rights and economic problems but for me it's still a distant narrative. I have friends who are in the same position as me, but seem to believe it's the beginning of WWIII; again, flying down the news k-hole.
Or the ferry disaster in South Korea. Or the Malaysian flight disaster. All sad but intriguing(they both raise questions such as: how could these happen? why did the leadership respond they way they did?), but one can only speculate on the implications what these stories mean beyond them being tragedies.
People will write speculations about these events; I can't let someone's speculation or assumptions to run wild within my mind because it's just not news. Again, it's important to differentiate real news from everything else.