“All the FReepers who are ex-left would disagree.”
+1.
As to how we can better use FR, I’d say less preaching to the choir. We need to double down on harassing the MSM for their bias. Call them up, ask why aren’t they covering major stories that appear on FR.
A substantial portion of the population won’t read Drudge or FR. We need to re-assert our voice in the MSM, where the other half of the population will hear us.
We should make more attempts to persuade those on the other side to re-examine their own positions and consider ours, using irrefutable, calm logic.
We should be more willing to unite on single issues whenever possible, and build toward a conservative consensus, with the understanding that not everybody’s journey starts at the same place or moves at the same speed.
When I read here about some middle-of-the-roader speaking out, taking an agreeable stance on a particular issue, and then FReepers proceed to drag out whatever that person said or did 20 years ago to remind us that we should continue hating that person’s guts, as if that’s the only principled thing to do-—that just frustrates me so much. How is that helping -—them, us, our country?
WWJD? I think He meets people where they are, and walks forward with them.
I think you pegged it, mumbly.
I expect it very possible that the MSM, squirming in the light of Donald’s “wicked” tweets, will eventually back off its pride enough to start telling first half truths, then 3/4 truths, then 7/8 truths, etc.
It was a heady venture for the MSM itself when it began to realize that it, alone, could push the progress of world events. It doubtless hastened the ignominious end of the Vietnam War. What was sacrificed needlessly in doing such a thing did not weigh upon their minds at that moment.
And, as a side observation, not every war deserves an equal amount of rah-rahs. Some began with bumbles, though defusing them through diplomacy would have been preferable to defusing them through an ignominious political strangling. Political correctness can come at us from the hawk side as well as the dove side.
If perfection were the only good thing, we’d be railing right on at these media no matter what. But perfection does not exist on earth.
My personal suggestion on how to “use” FR is to literally “use” it as a resource, and not try to change it.
I am personally doing that by daily posting (at least 3 times a day) links to FR posts that I think are particularly good or particularly well written or particularly to-the-point on a specific issue. (Never my own posts, only posts of others.)
And where do I post links to these “great” (in my opinion) FR posts?
I tweet them to one of these twitter accounts:
@seanspicer
@Trump
@KellyannePolls
@mike_pence
@TeamTrump
@realDonaldTrump
I am trying to encourage Trump and his team to read FR.
As to the idea of “preaching to the choir”... well, I consider this place a meeting of like minds. I wouldn’t want that to change. And my reading of how Jim R is running this site is that he doesn’t want that to change either.
Read the front page of the site before thinking of ways to change the site.
This IS a conservative forum. Period. End of story. It is not a Safe Place for Snowflakes. Never has been. Never will be.
If someone really wants to go out into the world and try to convert leftists, I’m all for that. But FR is not the place for that. FR is the place for conservatives to hone ideas. That is not preaching to the choir. That is creating a hot-house of ideas.
Ideas that can be shared out to any other alternative forum you choose. In my case, I am sharing FR on twitter to Trump accounts.