Posted on 12/02/2009 9:21:09 AM PST by pissant
I have been a minor participant at Free Republic, the Internet’s leading conservative forum, since September 2004. An online friend referred me to a discussion where members of Free Republic were talking about the 1952 and 1956 presidential elections, and using my maps from this page to make a point. I had to join FR to introduce myself to that group, and thank them for visiting. Because that was right after the “Rathergate” scandal, I thus became one of the “Pajamahadeen” that had just brought down the Sauronic eye of CBS.
Being a “Freeper” has been an interesting and fun experience, but I am disturbed by a current trend on those boards. For the past few weeks, at least since the latest fundraising drive ended, I have noticed that every new thread begins with a picture or video reminding us that Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor and presidential candidate, supports abortion. It doesn’t matter what the topic is, the anti-Mitt material pops up.
Personally, I think our current priorities ought to be making sure President Obama and his leftist pals don’t force their health care plan down our throats, and defeating as many moonbats as possible in next year’s congressional and gubernatorial elections, especially Harry Reid, Barbara Boxer, Chris Dodd and Slobbering Barney Frank. Then in 2011 or 2012 we can fight over who we want for the presidency. Consequently, yesterday I posted the following on the Kentucky board:
Is anyone else getting sick and tired of the Mitt Romney bashing that goes on at the beginning of each new thread? Granted, he may not be conservative enough for most of us (my first choice for 2012 would probably be Sarah Palin or Duncan Hunter), but he just HAS to be better than the Chicago mob that rules Washington now. Somebody ought to tell Jim Robinson that BHO and his cabal are the real enemy, not Mitt. Sheesh, an outside observer looking at us now is probably getting the impression that Republicans eat their own. And as for Mitt Romney being a Mormon, well, I’m more concerned about Harry Reid’s Mormon faith. Does he HAVE any?
Four replies have appeared since then, and only one agrees with me. The others just said we ought to do whatever we can to make Mitt Romney unelectable. I guess I’m going to take a timeout from Free Republic. Hopefully the Freepers will be acting more sensibly when I return. ’Bye, see you guys next year.
Lucianne.com seems to attract a more thoughtful group of people. It is less complete than FR, because it doesn’t include blogs. But she has just opened a new site for blogs.
... by whom?
A. You, AuntB?
B. All FReepers?
C. All non-Mormon FReepers?
D. Me?
E. JimRob?
F. None of the above?
PLEASE BE SPECIFIC and tell us again who you are and are not speaking for. If you're speaking for yourself, the ONLY ending to that first sentence would be option A.
THINK with the noggin God gave you, for Pete's sake!!!!!
Sorry, Mitt is NOT one of our own. If he is, then I’m not.
I don’t think his 2002 position was based on a political calculation. I believe he actually supported abortion in 2002. He might have been “personally opposed” to the choice, but it is clear to me that he felt women had a RIGHT to abort, and therefore must have believed that abortion wasn’t really murder.
Romney didn’t come around to rejection of abortion as choice until at least 2005, which menas he is a very recent convert. As such, his conversion is suspect, and even as a Mitt supporter I would have preferred a candidate with a long history of being pro-life.
I understood why some people simply decided not to trust Romney — and I never argued that point, only that if you did trust that Romney had changed, his current positions were quite good from a conservative perspective.
Today of course we have Romneycare, and there’s no dismissing that as some old discarded position since Romney makes the mistake of defending it.
But it is telling that most of the attacks on Romney are for things he did years ago and that he has publicly repudiated. I understand not believing his repudiation, but I argue with those who IGNORE the repudiation and assert as FACT that Romney today is identical to the Romney of 2002, or 1994.
HOM...should take it to heart.
I'd bet that even if you'd read an 18,000 post thread, you STILL couldn't find a single name to back up your claim about all those Rudy supporters that supposedly "got the heave-ho for disagreeing".
Sorry
AMEN.
While many of them were goaded, even baited into it, virtually all the purged freepers said something that led to their ban. They would get tired of being attacked all the time, and lash out personally at someone, and then they’d get zapped.
But it was still within their power to control their own fate. It was like one of those bad movies where all the prisoners are standing, and the guards are trying to bait them into throwing a punch so the guards can kill them, and one guy keeps saying “don’t take the bait”, but one by one the others can’t take it anymore, launch a punch, and end up dead.
It was all very “Lord of the Flies” though, how other freepers danced on their graves.
Calling out the Rombots for a public flogging!
Keep up the good work soldier!
This is not the time to trash a guy who *MIGHT* run for office in a few years.
It’s the time to destroy Obamacare, get Congress back, and defeat liberalism however we can.
Acting like a bunch of idiots will simply marginalize us.
I’m just saying what I’ve seen. Even in the short time I’ve been here I have seen other people get the zot for reasons unknown to me. Figured it was either for something personal I wasn’t privy to, or for the reason you claim isn’t so.
Whatever, I don’t care. I thought I was making a harmless observation, but I sure as heck must have hit a nerve. Wonder why. Are observations off limits? Cool, I won’t make them. Like I said...this is a great news site. I just won’t comment unless we agree, fair enough?
I’m not here to argue with people. If you check my posts, you’ll see as much. Incidentally, I only fire when I’ve been fired upon, and that has happened but once. Hardly a petulant leftie outburst.
Still...Interesting how quickly you jumped on me for presenting a different view. Hmm.
Think about it.
It was all very “Lord of the Flies” though, how other freepers danced on their graves.
____________________________________________
It was totally pathetic.
“The real problem was the California liberal medical community abusing the law and basically encouraging women to have an abortion.”
Isn’t that what I said?
Again, I’m not advocating Romney I’m arguing whether pols can have epiphanies on controversial issues.
FR used to be a site where ALL conservatives of various types could meet and talk.
Now, if you’re not a Creationist, Mitt-Hating, Rudy-Hating, Bible-Thumping, Science-Hating, JimRob worshipping, TV-hating turd, you’re not welcome.
I was in that thread, and even sent private and public messages to some of the zotted BEFORE they were zotted, telling them not to take the bait.
You could tell when they were going to get zotted, because they were goaded into saying things for which they DESERVED to be zotted.
Sure, it wasn’t sporting, and in fact was very sad (I remember the “list of the dead”), but they weren’t zotted simply for disagreeing, they were zotted for HOW they expressed their disagreement.
I’m sure there was room for argument over whether what was said was enough to ban people, and there were plenty of posts saying offensive and vile things that were NOT zotted in that thread because they were supporting the thread’s purpose. But as I tell my kids, you never get away with doing the WRONG thing simply because others get away with it.
Man. You are the definition of a coward. Your screen name is an insult.
>>> “FR isn’t a conservative site. Hasn’t been for a long time. It’s a JimRob fan site. “
Heh.. Thats the problem with the word “Conservative”. And thats the problem with using it to define who we are. It can mean anything and nothing. People can use it to “group” folks together that shouldn’t be grouped together or mislead and obfuscate.
This site has always been a site dedicated to the principles of limited government. The actions of “freepers” today and the “bashing” of Romney and other RINOs is consistent with the principles of fighting for limited government.
You can choose to define “conservative” however the friggen hell you want to, but that doesn’t mean we have to adjust our principles to align with your definition.
Sorry man, RINOs are an endangered species and we intend to wipe them out completely.
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