…would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”
The problem is that the opposite of the headline would be the surprising one. If it was “Trump refuses to give Elon Musk’s buddy total control over NASA, citing <X/Y/Z valid reasons>”, that would be the current Onion-level headline.
That’s the problem with living in the weirdest timeline: reality is more satirical than fiction.
I basically go by the “this would be an Onion headline in a sane world” criteria.
Because “crazy person acted rationally and within established norms” is frankly not a fascinating read nor THAT surprising when the last person in the room with him is sometimes either a rational person or someone wanting reasonable things for unreasonable reasons.
