“Was I supposed to have used them in the search line?”
yes. and you need to cut and paste my search string verbetum, including (and especially)the site: part ... the space - after 2015 in double quotes is important tooo
verbatim search string:
site:www.freerepublic.com “be-baw” trump “2015 -”
also, this link should do the same thing:
https://www.google.com/search?q=+site%3Awww.freerepublic.com+”be-baw”+trump+”2015+-"
Thank you. That worked great. Still haven’t found what I’m looking for, but I have a much better understanding how to search FR. I owe you one.