Conspiracy theories, like the world being flat or the Moon landings faked, have proven notoriously difficult to stomp out. Add a partisan twist to the issue, and the challenge becomes even harder. Even near the end of his second term, barely a quarter of Republicans were willing to state that President Obama was born in the US.

If we’re seeking to have an informed electorate, then this poses a bit of a problem. But a recent study suggests a very simple solution helps limit the appeal of conspiracy theories: news media literacy. This isn’t knowledge of the news, per se, but knowledge of the companies and processes that help create the news. While the study doesn’t identify how the two are connected, its authors suggest that an understanding of the media landscape helps foster a healthy skepticism.

FK – Well gee I have a ‘journalism degree’ and I’ve worked as a mainstream newswhore so I guess I can tell what ‘news literacy’ is or not huh?

I can tell you this column is blatant propaganda lumping in various ‘conspiracies’ in order to ‘disprove’ them all in the minds of the simple-minded.

Only a political child believes the msm is ‘trustworthy’ or there’s ever been such a thing as an ‘unbiased’ reporter. I’ve known this for decades way before ‘fake news’ became a thing.

But our domestic blood enemies just keep lying about it because of the healthy population of morons we have in this country and the annual fresh crop of indoctrinates from the govt. schools and universities.

If someone tells me they blindly trust any source I know I’m dealing with a child. Now I’m gonna go re-enforce my ignorance on Bigfoot and beef. Not. (And why does this spellchecker claim ‘Bigfoot’ has to be capitalized. That’s rather strange for a non-existent beast.)

And I know exactly how ‘news’ is made: Go along with editorial policy or get fired.

Don’t understand my bad attitude? Start here.

And who wants to bet that commie site blocks me/deletes my comments?