Talk about False News

My friend related to me a conversation he had this week with a woman who lives in an affluent part of northern New Jersey.

She apparently said that 10,000 students came to Fairleigh Dickinson University to sign up to be Marines, stoked up with the prospect of going to North Korea to fight on behalf of our country and Trump.

Now, to my cynical and skeptical mind, several things stood out with this declaration. First, 10,000. I doubt there has even been 10,000 students coming to the campus to register for classes, let alone being on the real estate at any given time. Next, who would reasonably opt for going into the military at this time where you could likely be placed in a dangerous foreign war theater, not necessarily NK but say, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, etc. You'd welcome bullets (or worse) being lobbed at you rather than be bored to tears in a classroom? (It's safe to presume these students' families could pay for college.) Even if you joined the military for education and health benefits, would you risk your life unnecessarily? Next, so many students didn't even vote last year. Are you telling me that they're that engaged at this time, that they'd get up from their X-Boxes and enroll in the military? Next, why wouldn't this event be covered by the media? Because it didn't happen. Nothing in local/regional papers, nothing online (UPI, AP, etc.). It didn't happen.

Yet my friend was reluctant to doubt the veracity of this woman's statement because of the conviction when she said it.

Here's the problem: some of us can have our BS radar up, but the false news will filter through even to people who would waver in believing the false news because they trusted the person who delivered the lies.