News media factchecking

Okay, I was always under the impression that news media would do a little bit of fact checking on their stories. Sure, they may say 'Man claims Teen Celeb crashed into his parked car' where in the very title they are stating that it is just a claim, not solid evidence. Still, I expect news media, even Internet news media, to do a little bit of background checking. If the guy who makes that claim doesn't even own a car, or the Teen Celeb is doing a concert 3 states away, or what have you.

YahooNews has since taken down the direct link to the story, but you can still find bits and pieces of it.

"An elderly Iraqi woman shows two bullets which she says hit her house following an early coalition forces raid in the predominantly Shiite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City. At least 175 people were slaughtered on Tuesday and more than 200 wounded when four suicide truck bombs targeted people from an ancient religious sect in northern Iraq, officials said.(AFP/Wissam al-Okaili) "

Look, we all know that often times people both here and over there lie to news media to strengthen their case or whatever. Sometimes they are really fooling themselves (It is much easier to live with yourself as a mine owner if you can hold onto the believe the collapse was caused by an earthquake, not your decisions) Still, news media should stay away from blatant liars. Like this woman. What she is holding is the entire cartridge, the bullet still seated on top of the gunpowder, all held within the brass casing. Obviously, she did not dig those out of her wall. Someone told her 'here go take these and lie to the media about what happened!' And the media was more than happy to oblige and run the story without even thinking or looking twice, even with all their technical experts and 'ex-military advisers' and all the rest