Who stole my news!

   A growing number of people receive their news via electronic feeds. It's a testament to the expanding digital age. Some feeds come directly through news agencies from major networks such as ABC or WGN, while others are more generic feeds that will include news from various sources including Reuters, CNN, and NBC as well as editorial comments.

   For many, this is a more economical use of time. For me it's simply a self defense tactic. There is only so much sensationalism I can take. When I reach my limit (which is admittedly very low) I fail to absorb more information. I seldom survive broadcast news past the second story. Rather than be in the dark to the changing events of the world around me, I opt to pull my news out of a feed.

    The danger in using these tools to collect current events is customization. Typical feeds can be personalized to incorporate only the news and articles you want to collect from agencies you want to read or view, thus supporting your bias. To avoid this, I make an effort to select a variety of reputable sources to enrich my knowledge of current events. There is still a great deal of sensationalism, but it is tempered to a degree that allows me to gather news and still function.

   Typically the results are good, I generally receive news that both support and counter my own personal beliefs. But recently I noticed something was wrong with my open approach to gathering information. Some of the articles were disappearing from the news feed.

   This week I saw a headline for a news story about the GOP that alarmed me. Okay, I see lots of things in the news that alarm me. This article, however, was quietly tucked between big headlines about the national prayer meeting in which our president evidently prayed for a TV show (there was a great deal more to what he said, you can view the transcript through this link here) and what drug he takes to fend off hair loss (ummm, not sure how this is major headline news).

   Since I was pressed for time, I thought I would come back to read the story later. I suppose I should have bookmarked it, but I didn't. I didn't think I needed to, since it seemed of some importance on a national level. I was wrong. Returning to my feed a short while later , I found the article was gone, along with one other that I had chosen to bookmark. There were still "headline" stories about presidential hair loss drugs and what the POTUS signature says about him (hate to think about what my signature says about me), but the headline that had caught my attention had vanished.

It wasn't the first time I had seen this happen.

   Pushing my brain past projected conspiracy theories that now cropped up, I managed to recall that the headline mentioned GOP changing senate rules in regard to presidential picks. In light of other waivers being issued recently, this topic piqued my interest. I scrolled the entire feed, but to no avail. Had I imagined the story, or was the GOP so unimportant that it could not maintain national headlines?

   Not daunted, I did a few searches using Google and found the original New York Post article GOP changes Senate rules , approves cabinet pick. I also found the NPR article I had bookmarked, Senate Republicans defy Democrats' Boycott to Advance Trump Nominees. My desire to know more about the topic let to further investigation into articles that helped familiarize myself with the workings of our Senate and the rules passed by both parties in the past four years. It wasn't a flattering picture for any of the groups involved.

If I hadn't believed any of the conspiracy rumors before, I was now inclined to keep an open mind.

   Why had these and other articles "disappeared" while stories about hair care products and backlash stories about celebrity opinions had continued to abound? Now I can't help but wonder....

Who stole my news? And why?