tf? you are the one using this to aire a political grievance.

I am not joking, but I get your joke.

“Broadly” is doing a lot of work here. There is an increasing number of media producers who print whatever they fucking feel like.

The press are broadly beholden to journalistic standards that require multiple sources to corroborate something as fact before publishing it. Us regular jack offs have no such limitations.

As to why people are speculating that he’s dead? For one, the place does appear to be a literal death camp. Also, officials in the Administration have admitted he was deported “in error” (though there have been conflicting statements over this and at least one firing). Since any sane person would want to fix a mistake of this magnitude, you could see why them refusing to might make people wonder.

They could call it “sparkling deportation” /s

This is not about intelligence. People, in general, are really fucking smart. Think of the dumbest person you know, who is not cognitively disabled. I’d bet they are intelligent enough to hold down a job and live a meaningful life. Of all the things I’ve seen that hold people back, lack of intelligence doesn’t even rank.

I think high levels of bias are to blame. Current media and culture encourage the embrace of bias because it makes people easier to sell to; more suggestible to marketing. It doesn’t matter how smart you are, if your navel feels good when someone sings your tune, you’ll believe whatever they tell you. Especially if you aren’t even making an attempt to understand your bias tendencies.