It's not like The New Republic hasn't run fabricated stories before. They are in a mighty big hole, yes?

I used to read The New Republic way back when for good, intellectually-honest left wing thought. Today, no such thing exists.

After reading about the lengths that the New Republic went through to fact check the stories and corroborate the claims compared with no information from the US military, I would go with the New Republic. Link

However, you are free to believe the military who brought us the heroic death of Pat Tillman.