News vs propaganda

On the day of the crash of the Polish presidential plane on April 10, 2010 the international news channels began covering the catastrophe. Interestingly, the late president Lech Kaczyński was labeled by some of them, e.g. the BBC or France24, as a "controversial" or "divisive" figure. On France24 someone from the portal Russia24 proclaimed in a live interview that Lech Kaczyński was a Polish Nixon. One of the most stupid things I heard in a long time. Clearly the Russian propaganda was at work. BBC was not far behind, using the terms "controversial" and "divisive". The trick was to replace the word "a man representing traditional values" with "controversial" or "divisive figure".

Most media outlets repeated the Russian claim of the pilot error. How did they know without an investigation?

This rush to slander the just-deceased president was amazing. No time for reflection and pondering the depth of the tragedy of the 10 April. How should an average viewer or reader distinguish the news from the propaganda?