Do facts matter any more ???

This hatchet job attacks someone who thinks Michael Hastings was murdered:

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/michael-hastings-conspiracy-theories-kim-dvorak

Whether or not you believe her, this whole issue brings up some important questions:

• Do facts matter any more? and
• If they do, how do we know what is fact and what is not?

I previously discussed that which Cass Sunstein called a "crippled epistemology":

http://sainthoward.blogspot.com/2013/06/born-in-kenya.html

When evidence is destroyed or withheld, when records are classified or otherwise unavailable, when the chief suspect gets to decide what is or is not fact, how is it even possible to determine what the hell happened?