That Time Fake Aliens Invaded Mexico and Real Rats Invaded D.C.

Journos

It's mankind versus nonhuman invaders in this episode of Journos! Stephen's big talk about pant legs gets Brandon thinking about a Washington Post story on rat-hunting that reads like a newspaper version of a snuff film ... only with rats.

What's with WaPo's obsession with the city's rats? Our sleuths dig into the last few years of coverage to sort out whether the city's paper of record really really loves rats, or really really hates them. (Seems like a cross-species frenemy situation.)

All this talk of invasion inspires Stephen to ruminate on Mexico's space alien problem. The problem turns out not to be the aliens, though, because the aliens are fake. The problem is the fabulist who somehow got into Mexico's Congress to talk about fake aliens.

And the bigger problem, as we unpack here, is that the news media is only too happy to push the "alien" part of the story without spending too much time on the "fake" part.

So, prepare your terrier for battle. This episode goes for blood.

NOTES

Washingtonian Magazine gets to the dog story first! // WaPo's rat obsession includes playing rats, video game rats, ratcatcher tips, rat czars, rat panic, heroic rats, and car-eating rats // Orkin reveals the rattiest cities in America // Reuters and NPR report on aliens in Mexico (but wait: here's the original Reuters and original NPR versions!) // WIRED, not having it // El Pais gives us Avi Loeb's support // Loeb is no joke, astronomically speaking // Harvard goes all in on Loeb's alien hunt