Photoshoped?

Part one.
I've been reading a kind of a lot about news photography/photo journalism/faked photos lately, mostly in regards to good/cool/editorial Photoshop chops, and then today I came across this photo and I thought, "No way is this real..." But I haven't read anything that purports it as a fake. It which case, it's quite the picture. Or wait, does that matter?Part two.
Does it matter if a photo is "real" or not? Do we still believe by seeing? And isn't the term "Photoshop Fake" redundant? :)

In terms of judging imagery for its visual appeal, I don't think that these things matter all that much really. I like to look at pretty things, and most of the time I just don't care how the image came to be. Other times I'm excited by images that show the mastery that a person can have over their images, equipment and software. It's when these images are purported as News that things can get confusing.

How about this: What's the difference between a photographer dodging and burning his photograph and increasing the contrast to bring out the smoke of a burning building (all very old-school) and a (new school) photographer using Photoshop tools and brushes to make that same smoke look more menacing?

Or what if the above photo is chopped/faked, but based on factual information? (The gator was seen holding the zookeeper's arm in its jaws, knuckles curled and severed 3/4ths of the way between the wrist and the elbow - with 3" of tattered bloody flesh trailing out the severed end...) Gruesome, right? But why not make that picture to get people's attention? I think some gory headline would be just as sensational as a "fake" photo.

Thoughts?

(...all of that just so I can show a crazy picture that I saw today...)