Posted on 03/27/2018 1:00:28 PM PDT by The Citizen Soldier
My journey with Free Republic began in late 1998. It was near the end of the Clinton Presidency, and there seemed to be a new wave of hope and a sense of renewed patriotism as we gathered to defeat Al Gore and elect George W. Bush. But, on the whole, we lacked a platform, a vehicle, whereby we could gather together and speak with a common voice.
Jim Robinson provided that platform, utterly unique at the time, a place for conservative voices to sing out, to proclaim their views, to unite, and to encourage one another that we were not battling alone.
I would meet FRiends when I traveled to Washington D.C. in January 2001 to attend the inauguration of George W. Bush, the 43rd President of the United States. I’ll never forget the joy and the celebration of that day; a new day, a new hope, a new opportunity.
Along the way I lost my Free Republic password, and there was no way to recover it. And so I started anew as The Citizen Soldier on November 26, 2002. Over the past twenty years, Free Republic has been my go to site to confirm conservative stories, to read thoughtful and insightful conservative comment, and generally “lurk.” Actually, evidenced by my relatively few posts over the years, I would categorize myself as a life-time lurker at Free Republic.
In 2016, in the run-up to the election of Donald J. Trump as the 45th President of the United States, I began to detect the seeds of dissension and disharmony at Free Republic, ala the “Never Trump” crowd that emerged. Less and less, I frequented the site because it seemed that every thread was a mini-battle, not with liberals and socialists—I would have welcomed that—but with ourselves; conservatives and libertarians taking off the gloves, continually entering the battle royal.
Oh, I participated now and then, but I tired of fighting our own side, and found new online homes where I could find more consistent support for our new President. Through it all, Free Republic has remained bookmarked and like a magnet it has continually drawn me back. I lurk again and again. But lately it has all become too much. Every move our President makes is scrutinized and criticized, often with the reminder, “I’ve always been a never-Trumper,” either voiced or implied. The thought of a Hillary Clinton Presidency, and the CERTAIN destruction of our great nation that would have brought, makes me cringe to this day, now into the second year of the Donald Trump's Presidency. But I feel like a voice in the wilderness, as the criticism of Donald Trump and his administration escalates week by week.
I’m not leaving. I’m 70 years old now, and I’ve moved from California to Arizona to enjoy the “sunshine years” of my life. Recently my 46 year-old son visited and before he left he said, “Dad, please don’t ever stop fighting.” And I won’t. But, my dear FRiends, Free Republic must recapture the spirit of independence and conservatism.
As a Christian, I end my comments with a paraphrase from Bob George’s, “Classic Christianity.”
“The answer is not simply calling someone wrong or proving yourself right. The real issue is what answer can we give to those who desperately need to hear the message of conservatism?”
Primaries are brutal. Thankfully, we won’t have to go through that nonsense the next time around and the Democrats will. Good times are coming.
The first thing you should realize is that not everyone here are what they claim to be. We have Russian, democrat, socialist and Bircher posters that are not Conservative or Libertarian and have never been.
They post to confuse and discourage.
There were some knock down-drag outs in '16. Yes sir. But they paled in comparison the the bugzapper threads of 2008. Thousands of arguments. Hundreds of zots. On a daily basis.
And there are some, who make a habit of correcting grammatical errors, rather than addressing the subject being discussed.
And there are those who “hijack” a thread and then the discussion gets off topic.
And sadly, some get personally insulting, if you are not considered conservative enough by their purity standards.
But I think you run into all of that on other sites, and indeed, in everyday life, if you discuss the issues of the day with people.
For those reasons we established the Trump Train early under Jims blessing. We have become so close it’s often referred to as the Trump Family Train. Yes we keep a low profile most of the time. But you are welcome to lurk there. And post when you are comfortable. From all fifty states and many in your age group. Will ping you to. It and you can introduce yourself when ready
Bircher posters?
As in John Birch Society?
Can you show me a Bircher poster? I’ve been here 15 years and I’ve never seen one.
I did the same thing, sort of. I joined here in 2000 under a different name. Because I had differing opinions with a few, I was harassed and my life made miserable so I finally left after being here for several years. I rejoined under a different screen name sometime around when Obama came on the scene. So far I haven’t been trolled as much but I don’t post much now and I never start topics.
I see all of the never-Trump’ers in here and don’t respond because I don’t plan to leave again. Some days it’s more like DU in here than the Free Republic I love but I’m dealing with it.
I think about half of our members think we’re better as an opposition party when the democrats are in power. The other half thinks we’re better as an opposition party when the republicans are in power. And sometimes our hats get mixed up.
It’s the same at all the other sites as well.
People being people...................
There are so many things that are causing the difference. Conservatism is going through a metamorphosis. We to a degree experience great division during primaries. But the primary season has continued because we elected a candidate that didn’t arrive with traditional conservative bona fides. And that candidate was able to cobble together an electoral victory and become president. Yet he while he has done some great things, he still hasn’t acted Presidential and his past scandals keep playing out. A lot of people here claimed they never could support a person with the character issues lack of family values that this president has exhibited in the past and possibly present. Raw language, multiple marriages, iffy business dealings, a known philanderer to past wives and possibly the existing one had made it difficult to have in the White House a man who brings a democrats baggage.
Aren’t never trumper posts here really rare?
Maybe i haven’t been paying attention or just ignore them.
I think this forum is pretty great these days, I don’t see any problems but maybe I’m following different threads
It’s not supposed to be a Libertarian site. Libertarians and conservatives are dogmatically opposed in many issues.
You have an interesting take on things. I stopped frequenting FreeRepublic during the time leading up to the primary election because the pro-Trump crowd was absolutely brutal to anyone supporting any other candidate. I think what you see today is not so much the views of Never-Trumpers, but people who are disappointed in Trump signing the Omnibus bill and talking about instituting gun control.
I think everyone on FreeRepublic was glad to see Trump beat Hillary. And I think most people here agree that Trump has done a lot of good. If there’s any frustration here, it’s probably because the Republicans hold both houses of Congress and the White House, and yet they can’t get Trump’s appointments approved, they can’t stop the awful Omnibus bill, they can’t build the wall, they can’t repeal Obamacare, and they can’t seem to drain the swamp. It’s not all Trump’s fault. In fact, it’s not even mostly his fault. Our representatives and senators have let us down.
But I surely don’t share your view that the site is dominated by Never-Trumpers.
There are two things I like about this forum. First are the postings, which are usually relevant to the things I care about, and save me the time of having to dig up facts and commentary for myself. The second is the clean, uncluttered format, which is just robust enough for the purpose. Those are the things I like about this forum.
A huge amount of the people active on this forum used to be strongly in favor of open borders.
As a nation we are at the exist or cease to exist point.
It became no longer possible to allow any of them to subvert border security priority to anything else...and they have largely left.
That is the largest group by far which has departed.
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I agree and in the late 50s and early 1960 I was 'dabbling' in the JBS probably as an alternate but I (and a few cohorts) were seemingly convinced it was ex USN Officers involved (maybe just the San Diego chapter??)
I just ran across this though and it is VERY prolific - if nothing else... (Almost on target as Ayn Rand was)
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One of the first public activities of the society was a "Get US Out!" (of membership in the UN) campaign, which claimed in 1959 that the "Real nature of [the] UN is to build a One World Government".[37] In 1960, Welch advised JBS members to: "Join your local P.T.A. at the beginning of the school year, get your conservative friends to do likewise, and go to work to take it over."[38] One Man's Opinion,[39] a magazine launched by Welch in 1956, was renamed American Opinion,[40] and became the society's official publication. The society publishes The New American, a biweekly magazine.[13][41]
We’re in a difficult place. Many of the bricks of our conservative edifice turned out to be false. We’ve all had to rethink our positions once it turned out that the pub-e party really HAD gone over to the dark side.
Yep. Rather similar to both houses of Congress. You've got your Conservatives, and then you've got your RINOs.
I think this forum is pretty great these days, I don’t see any problems but maybe I’m following different threads"
I agree. I can't remember the last never-Trumper post I've seen on Freerepublic.
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