Real controversy vs. manufactured outrage: a field guide

Outrage is the cheapest product on the internet, and both political teams manufacture it by the truckload. But buried in the noise are real controversies — documented, consequential, and worth your anger. Telling them apart is a skill, and it runs on four questions.

One: is there a primary document? Real controversies leave paper — filings, recordings, data, court records. Manufactured ones leave only other people's reactions. Two: did the story exist before it was useful? A real controversy has a timeline that predates the campaign that adopted it. Three: are the people amplifying it quoting the source or quoting each other? Circular outrage is a tell. Four: what happens if you ignore it for a week? Real controversies develop — hearings, resignations, corrections. Manufactured ones evaporate and get replaced by next week's model.

SmokeScreen's Controversies section runs the ones that pass the test — with the documents attached — and names the ones that don't as what they are: smoke.