"Special Forces Soldier killed in Syria" likely not dead, may have faked death (Occupy San Diego)

[MineralMan]

59. This is why small regional publications should stick to local stories

and not try to do big articles on political issues. They simply do not have the resources to properly check the stories. When I first read this story, alarm bells went off in this old journalist's brain. When you report on the death of a soldier killed in combat somewhere, you really need to be absolutely sure that the information you have is correct.

If a publication and author cannot confirm the information through official sources, they should hold off on publishing the story until they can confirm it. Sadly, small publications like this one in San Diego are usually operating on a shoestring, like most such publications are, so they depend on amateur writers who will write for little or not payment, along with editorial staff without the long experience needed to deal with major stories that involve major issues. That means that stories aren't fully vetted before publication and end up having to be withdrawn or apologized for.

Along the same lines, we see a lot of preliminary things written for some blog or some small publication like this one posted here on DU. Often, we find out later that the stories are not accurate or are just plain wrong from the start. In the meantime, some of these stories stir up all kinds of outrage and get spread all over the internet. Later retractions or evidence that the story was incorrect just don't get the same distribution, so such stories get copied and pasted long after they've been debunked.

It's too bad, really. So much that is incorrect and potentially harmful floats around the Internet. That's why I'm skeptical of such stories and try to dig down and find out the actual facts.