Is the Santa Claus-dying kid story made-up b.s.?

He's the Alex Jones of media hate.

 

It would take 10 minutes to make a couple of phone calls. After a couple of hospital checks turn up dry, the questions start hanging in the air. And any decent reporter knows the fact-checking begins with him.

 

If you ain't got a name a nurse supervisor isn't giving you shit.

 

It's almost impossible to believe that someone wouldn't have leaked this to somebody at this point, at least the name of the hospital. If national news happened at any office in America, it would be the talk of the water cooler for weeks.

 

He has the "proof" of sent text messages. What more do you need besides "evidence" that can be fabricated in seconds?

 

All starts with the News-Sentinel not doing basic checks. I think everyone else who picked up the story trusted that was done.

 

In an alternate universe:

"Wow, that's an incredible story. I'd like to talk to the parents ..."
"I didn't catch their names and they've been through enough already."
"That's understandable. Who was your nurse friend ..."
"Don't drag her into this!"
"Ok. Umm, what hospital was this again?"
"None of your business! That's against the law."
"Thank you for your time. With all the privacy concerns, let's just leave this alone."

 

At least then you're just one of the news outlets that shares the story and can say you were trusting the originating outlet did all the fact-checking. Win (clicks)-Win (not culpable).

 

I at least hope there was a debate between reporter and editor that involved at Least one of them saying, "but it's just one person's word!"

 

Probably more like: "Great read. We're gonna look good with this one."

 

More time passes and no one (parents, nurse, hospital) comes forward. It ain't looking good...

... and Mediaite has a good point: A Trump fan can't immediately (correctly) recall if this happened before or after the election? Bullshitometer is smoking.

 

Yeah, I imagine it was mostly high-fives.