You bring up the question of, how do we know what's true in this day of internet news?

Well, the answer is research and discussion.

Why do people here seem so worried that the government is lying to them about their powers and can't be trusted?

because: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_R._Clapper#False_testimo...

because: Edward Snowden, who revealed illegal government activity. The government reacted by instead of admitting it was wrong, turning him into a criminal. Worse, all kinds of pseudo-news (TV, radio, internet, even NPR!) bought into this dialog that he's "Helping Russia." The fact is that he's in Russia because the US canceled his passport when he was on his way to South America.

Just because people are scared and emotional doesn't mean they're wrong (e.g. Germany in the 1930s). If you think the conclusions people are coming to are invalid, try to question in a respectful way instead of labeling.

As long as there's a financial incentive tied to telling people what they want to hear, companies will bend the truth to the biases of their target audience. I don't think there is a fix for this. Our only hope is to design our institutions to withstand a starkly polarized populace.

Or, stop throwing gas on the fire to entertain the mob mentality and sell more ads. A vote by 4 individuals killed(most) unbiased reporting in the US 30 years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairness_Doctrine

> Where's the startup to fix that?

Right, because companies whose founders' sole goal is to get a big payout and move on is going to fix journalism/news/information distribution.