Today on HuffPo

By the his point, I think it's pretty clear that the Huffington Post can get pretty whimsical about what it decides it Big News to put on its home page, ranging from seriously insightful to pandering to snarky and "Say what??".  For instance, today we have a Miley Cyrus photo shoot, and a story about how Miley Cyrus doesn't need your concern, and how to have better sex, and why Brooke Shields got divorced years ago, along with how the cast of Leave It To Beaver" looks today half a century after the show was on TV, along with a couple stories about bug, as well as an impressive collection of banner headline stories about the government shutdown.

But two other stories most particularly caught my eye.  One was this, about two-thirds of the way down the homepage.

I understand having a bit of a swaggering story every now and then.  Personally, I think that jobs reports are actually serious and important, because they don't just tell you what the story is now, but how it's changed over time, which perhaps helps give an understanding of "why" and therefore considerations of how to improve the situation.  Besides which, having facts to point to is always a good thing when it comes to the national discourse.  Not to mention that it was probably a jobs report that did initially tell us how lousy the job market it.  But all that said, a little bit of posturing does allow a point to get made in an offhanded way, and that's sort of the case here.

Except that, the thing is, a little ways up the page, the Huffington Post also has this story on the very same homepage today, as well --

So, as far as I can tell, the Huffington Post is telling us that they don't need a jobs report to tell us about what the jobs market actually is -- but they do need a jobs report (and a chart) to show us what the jobs mark might possibly be in some fantasy alternative universe.

Mind you, I think that this story is valid, too.  It's important to know how our actions impact what we do, so that we can try to figure out what we want and how we can address the situation.  It also allows us to hold people accountable for their actions.

I don't require total consistency in my news coverage.  Hey, life gets convoluted, and sometimes you need a scorecard to keep track amidst all the serious news, pandering, "Say what?" and naked Miley Cyrus stories.  And even snarky is fine, since it can add perspective, though it requires a thinner tightrope to walk on.  But if one is going to be inconsistent, I prefer there to be at least a reasonable lapse of time to justify the inconsistency to make it understandable, rather than layered right on top of one another.  Especially if you're going to throw in snarky at the same time.

On the other hand, at least there wasn't a homepage story today (yet) about some new Apple Rumor, so that's a step in the right direction.

Unless you count this --