Well, I have a different perspective. I was a 2008 Romney supporter of course, although I favored Fred Thompson until he dropped out. I no longer support him, and I support Sarah Palin, I like what she says, and I rarely disagree with her or attack what she is doing.
But I regularly get attacked with terms like PDS, and RomneyBot, and I was called me a deranged idiot. So I see name-calling allowed in some cases, while in others it is not.
I think that most recent post with the fake “Q&A” was way over the line, but unless that was the 3rd time I’d expect the post to be deleted and the freeper warned. I was sorry to see Pissant go, but his comment was crude.
I’ll say that in the past few days, these threads have gotten pretty heated, and while people have asked JR to take action, I haven’t seen people getting zotted except the retread, so maybe there is more freedom to attack people then I thought. Of course, I tend not to pay attention to who posts what, so often what appears to be a zot out of the blue is simply because I had no idea all of what someone was saying.
I can’t think of anyone who hasn’t been called names, or called others names in return or called the names first. Maybe there is such a sainted one or three here, but I don’t know.
Jim gives all of us a lot of freedom, but I think we all know when we’ve gone too far, or at least we ought to know.
I’ve mostly been told about the heated wars that have taken place over the past few days, because I’ve spent the vast majority of my time on the FReepathon thread, where I will devote my time today.
We are already into Day 46 or 47, and that’s a real shame, given that every poster enjoys FR and yet, not every regular poster who can afford to, contributes.
Jim does his level best to be fair and he does an excellent job. His moderators are also excellent. I wouldn’t want their jobs.
In my view, there are very few truly nasty posters and in time, I think they’ll eventually get banned, but again, that’s out of my realm. I will either ping Jim or hit abuse whenever I spot one of their nasty, vile posts if I think those posts are disruptive to FR and to our fund raising goals. Running wild and trying to drive off good, loyal FReepers just can’t be permitted, IMO.