A lighthouse in the storm that is now.
"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly;
what is essential is invisible to the eye." — Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince
"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly;
what is essential is invisible to the eye." — Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince
Click any headline for an in-depth analysis of today's biggest stories
Click any story to discover how it's fueling misinformation and polarization
The crises that define our time — and what you can do about them
Compass calibrated — your perspective is guiding the resources below.
"Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it."
From a kitchen table in Prairie du Sac to a mission to restore trust
VERITAS began the way most impossible things do — with one person staring at a screen, wondering why nobody was doing anything about a problem that was eating the world alive.
In late 2024, Rauel LaBreche — a 65-year-old IT professional with an MFA in theater, a psychology degree, a career that had already included stints as a silk merchant, stage director, and corporate trainer — sat in his home office in Prairie du Sac, Wisconsin, and decided he was done waiting for someone else to fix the information crisis.
The information ecosystem wasn't just broken — it was weaponized. Misinformation, propaganda, and manipulation had become industrialized. People of good faith on all sides were being played against each other by forces that profited from division. And the tools that existed to fight back were either partisan, paternalistic, or both.
They told people what to think instead of showing them how to see.
VERITAS doesn't tell you what to think. It shows you what's real, exposes what's not, and puts the power to act in your hands.
VERITAS — Latin for "truth" — was chosen deliberately. Not because truth is simple, but because it matters. The full name is an acronym: Validated, Ethical, Reliable Information Transmission and Accurate Synthesis.
But the heart of it is older than any acronym. It's the ancient, stubborn belief that when people have access to honest information, they make better decisions. Not because they agree with each other — but because they can finally see what they're actually disagreeing about.
VERITAS was never designed to be neutral in the way that pretends all claims are equal. It was designed to be fair — rigorously, symmetrically, unflinchingly fair. The same standard applies whether the claim comes from the left, the right, the center, or somewhere else entirely.
The 3-Zone scoring system doesn't give you a number and walk away. It shows you three dimensions of every claim: Is it real? What's the evidence? And is the framing honest? That last one might be the most important — because a true fact, framed dishonestly, can do more damage than an outright lie.
VERITAS LLC is headquartered in Prairie du Sac, Wisconsin. It was built by Rauel LaBreche in collaboration with AI, a partnership he describes as "Rauel and Resonance, rocking the road to truth." The advisory circle is growing, the mission is clear, and the road ahead is long.
But then again — Don Quixote never let the length of the road stop him from tilting at the windmill.
Three pillars. One mission. A lighthouse in the storm.
VERITAS is built on a simple architecture: three pillars, each addressing a different dimension of the information crisis. Together, they form a complete system — from awareness to understanding to action.
Live wire-service headlines assessed in real time by the Veracity Engine. Every story gets scored across three zones: Reality Position, Evidence Quality, and Framing Honesty.
Propaganda dissection powered by the VENOM framework. Identifies manipulation tactics, traces narrative structures, and exposes the machinery behind the message.
Civic action from every vantage point. The same issue, seen through progressive, democrat, and republican lenses — because shared understanding begins with honest framing.
At the heart of VERITAS is the Veracity Engine — a 4-stage assessment cascade that processes claims with increasing depth and rigor. It starts fast (a quick assessment in seconds) and goes deep (full verification with source analysis, evidence mapping, and framing detection).
The engine uses a 3-Zone scoring system, each scored from +3 to -3:
Reality Position — Is the claim supported by evidence and expert consensus?
Evidence Quality — How strong, diverse, and verifiable are the sources?
Framing Honesty — Is the presentation fair, or is it designed to manipulate?
The aggregate score maps to a luminosity scale — from Luminous (the claim is well-supported, well-sourced, and honestly framed) to Murky (the claim has serious problems across multiple dimensions).
Named after the University of Wisconsin's famous plaque — "Whatever may be the limitations which trammel inquiry elsewhere, we believe that the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found" — this tool puts the full Veracity Engine in your hands. Paste any claim, headline, or URL. Get the truth.
VERITAS is in active development. The VITAL Chronicles are live with real-time wire feeds. ANTIVENOM is building toward live propaganda detection. VALOR is expanding its issue coverage. And the Veracity Engine gets smarter with every assessment.
The vision isn't to build the world's most sophisticated fact-checker. It's to build something that makes people better at thinking — not by telling them what's true, but by showing them how to see clearly.
Welcome to the signal in the noise — here's how everything works.
VERITAS is three tools built around one engine — available as both a website and a Chrome extension.
veritastruth.net (WEB) — Three pillars — VITAL Chronicles, ANTIVENOM, and VALOR — live side by side on the homepage. Plus Sift & Winnow for on-demand assessment.
VERITAS Now! (EXTENSION) — The Chrome extension. Opens as a side panel next to whatever you're reading. Same engine, same three apps, optimized for in-browser use.
The Veracity Engine (BOTH) — The AI core underneath everything. Powers every assessment — quick claims, deep analysis, amplification, and verification.
VINCULUM (BOTH) — The universal language layer. Every assessment, every result — available in 35+ languages. Truth doesn't have a citizenship requirement.
Every assessment runs through a 4-stage pipeline. It starts fast and gets deep — act on the quick result while the deeper layers arrive behind it.
L1 Quick (Haiku · ~5s) — First impression. Fast 3-Zone read. Enough to act on.
L2 Deep (Sonnet · ~15s) — Full analysis — evidence, distortion patterns, framing, sources.
L3 Amplify (Sonnet · ~20s) — Stress-tests L2. Challenges assumptions, surfaces blind spots.
L4 Verify (Sonnet · ~20s) — Independent second opinion. No anchoring to prior stages.
✓ Reality Position — Is the claim supported by evidence and expert consensus? (Grounded +3 → Contested 0 → Conflicts with evidence -3)
◆ Evidence Quality — How strong, diverse, and verifiable are the sources? (High +3 → Moderate 0 → Low -3)
▣ Framing Honesty — Is the presentation fair, or designed to manipulate? (Straightforward +3 → Assumptions present 0 → Misleading -3)
Luminous (+7 to +9) · Clear (+5 to +6) · Emerging (+2 to +4) · Hazy (-1 to +1) · Dim (-2 to -4) · Obscured (-5 to -6) · Murky (-7 to -9)
VITAL monitors NPR, AP, BBC, and PBS — pulling the most significant headlines every 15 minutes, assessed by the Veracity Engine before they reach you.
1. The left column on veritastruth.net is VITAL Chronicles. It loads automatically.
2. Clicking a headline launches a full 4-stage assessment. The article opens alongside the assessment panel.
3. Click 🔔 Watch to add a story to your watchlist. VITAL checks every 5 minutes and alerts you when the story updates.
4. The feed refreshes every 15 minutes automatically. Hit ↻ Refresh for fresh headlines now.
ANTIVENOM doesn't just flag misleading content — it shows you the machinery. How the manipulation is built. What to look for next time.
1. The center column on the website. In the extension, switch to the VENOM app from the side panel.
2. Click any story in the feed, or paste your own text directly into the input field.
3. VENOM produces: RNA strand classification, identified Core States, structural analysis, and the Vaccine — what to recognize next time.
4. VENOM never says "this is manipulative." It describes structural function. The goal is your pattern recognition, not confirmation of your priors.
VALOR is the bridge between understanding and action. For every major issue — grounded information, honest framing of competing perspectives, and concrete ways to get involved.
1. Click 🧭 VALOR Compass to calibrate the content to your vantage point.
2. Pick from the 10 issue tiles, or search for an issue that matters to you.
3. Each issue offers three lenses — Progressive, Democrat, Republican. Shared understanding begins with honest framing.
4. Each view contains: Reality, Obstacles, Common Ground, and This Week (concrete actions).
The universal translation layer woven through everything VERITAS does. Every assessment, every result, every interface element — available in 35+ languages.
Submit claims in any supported language. VINCULUM supports assessment of content from any supported language's media ecosystem.
The full VERITAS toolkit in a side panel that lives alongside whatever you're reading.
1. Search for VERITAS Now! in the Chrome Web Store and install. Pin it to your toolbar.
2. Click the VERITAS icon → Settings → paste your Anthropic API key.
3. Click the VERITAS icon to open the side panel. Switch between VITAL, Assess, and VENOM.
4. Select any text on any web page, right-click, and choose Assess with VERITAS.
What you notice, what breaks, what confuses you — that shapes what VERITAS becomes.
The most useful feedback includes: what you were doing, what you expected, what actually happened, and assessments that feel politically one-sided.
Send feedback to [email protected] — we read every report.
To run live truth assessments on headlines, enter your Anthropic API key. This key is stored locally in your browser and never sent anywhere except Anthropic's API.
Get a key at console.anthropic.com
Position yourself on each scale to help VERITAS find the resources and framing that best serve your perspective. There are no wrong answers — only your answers. You are not being assigned to a team.
VERITAS will use these to guide its resources and framing — not to tell you what to think, but to understand where you’re coming from. You can reposition at any time.
No position is judged. Every point on every scale reflects legitimate values that reasonable people hold across every political tradition.