“Woman gives birth to a kangaroo! Television found inside never-before-opened ancient Egyptian pyramid! East German doctor discovers diseases that are caused by microscopic aliens in our bloodstream!”
ROTFLMAO!
ROTFLMAO!
Believe it or not, I saw all 3 of those articles on a checkout-aisle tabloid in the late 80s that I (to my everlasting shame) bought. Though on the one hand I did this only for purposes of shaming the rag by posting choice, highlighted pieces of it on the walls of my work cubie, on the other hand my action contributed to the bottom line of this rag. Talk about mixed emotions.
Before the Iron Curtain fell, these hack writers often attempted to make their articles look believable by citing names, cities and institutions where the research was done. The catch was that it was always a Soviet or Eastern Bloc source. In the pre-internet / Iron Curtain days, there was no way on earth to prove that this named E. German doctor existed or was fictional. So they were able to hide behind this figleaf.
What was particularly fascinating and ROTFL-able about this one article is that the writer actually tried to make it sound like there really was a valid scientific proof that these microscopic disease-causing aliens existed.
The proof went like this:
You know, it's nice to know that some things never change. Such as how much proof and how much logic some people require to believe in the latest Conspiracy Theory du Jour.