SF CHRON ON FR: FReep This -- How The Right Wing Is Making Itself Heard

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | January 30, 2003 | Joyce Slaton

[L.N. Smithee]

Something strange happened during the 2000 Gore-Bush election fiasco you may have missed.

CNN, which was running 24-hour special election coverage, hosted a program with conservative columnist Bob Novak shortly after the disputed election results were returned. Novak was adamant that Al Gore should quit trying to steal the election and concede. To bolster his point, he brought up the results of CNN.com's public-opinion poll "Should Al Gore concede?" Poll results showed that a full 89 percent of the thousands of people who had visited CNN.com and voted had agreed -- Gore should give up the ghost.

[weegee]

Easy now, there were a dozen libertarians who marched on DC with the members of ANSWER yet they claim that they weren't pawns in a commie propaganda protest. Not everyone here on FR believes that ANSWER is a leftist organization.

I myself understand otherwise though...

[weegee]

Looks like she cribbed her hit piece.

[reagandemocrat]

This is such an obvious hit piece, JimRob should be proud. I'm thinking of changing my moniker to "Hardcore Whackjob".

(BTW--is it really true that JimRob was a Democrat when he created FR?)

RD

[ElkGroveDan]

Well, I mean, let's just say the obvious: THERE ARE ALSO LIBERALS SPAMMING THE POLLS....

No bout a doubt it. As one of the most effective poll spammers on the net, I've seen it live and in-person.

There have been many times when I've paused to catch my breath only to watch the poll take a wild swing in the other direction.

I have learned though that we are much more dedicated than they are. Even when you're going head-to-head with a lefty poll-pinger simply keeping at it causes them to give up in disgust.

[Fraulein]

the purpose of freeping the polls is to render the on-line polls useless

Bingo. My sentiments exactly. However, if we do not Freep -- and the liberals dominate the online polls -- then the liberal results will be picked up and reported as accurate news.

[Bernard Marx]

I think your memory is selective. Remember Mike Barnicle of the Globe -- a liberal if ever there was one -- was nailed before Jacoby was by the same newspaper on the same charge. And both of these situations were management decisions, not lawsuits.

There's no doubt in my mind that Jacoby was punished because he's a conservative. But no one sued him for plagiarism -- some candy a$$ liberal on staff (and that includes everyone but Jacoby) probably decided that if Barnicle was punished then Jacoby should be too even if the charges were trumped up. I agree with you: he wasn't guilty of anything. In the Chron's case you can bet the candy a$$ liberals running it won't discipline this author.

[Kip Lange]

It's also a form of non-violent protest, at base level. The point in spamming a poll is, as the previous poster said, to make the poll irrelevant. What the real figures are, nobody knows, since if a poll can be swayed in the first place (if it isn't checking and logging your IP), it's just nothing but rank BS, and is, as people have said, a loaded question that's dangled out there by news agencies in order to pad left-wing...excuse me, "left-leaning"...puff pieces (or hit pieces, as the case may be...)

In other words, the goal is not to skew the poll in our direction so *that* gets reported inaccurately; the goal is to skew the poll so the poll becomes pointless and they CAN'T report it as news, either way...

--CWL

[Kip Lange]

Remember Mike Barnicle of the Globe

Absolutely, but the thing is, Mike and the...oh lord I forget her name, the female columnist who was suspended for just BLATANT plagiarism...both got what the Globe called "warnings" and "second chances". They wanted to make an example out of somebody after all the bad PR, and that was Jeff. On the contrary, my memory is NOT selective at all. :-) (altho if anyone can remember the name of that woman who got suspended...bah I'll just go look her up)

--CWL

[Kip Lange]

As I recall, btw, she was fabricating sources out of whole cloth -- for a WHILE, before anyone "noticed". Jeff's "offense" was to mix in some (factual) stuff that was on a mass e-mail about the trials the founders had to face on the 4th of July (or so it was claimed) without "making a note of it in the editorial" or some blather like that...Kangaroo Court, please convene, etc.

--CWL

[CharacterCounts]

Steele's webmaster later told the LA Weekly that hundreds of "donations" listing fake credit-card numbers ended up costing Steele around $4,000, since she had to pay her e-commerce service company 25 to 35 cents to process each one.

At 25 cents each it would take 16,000 to cost her $4,000 but she says it was hundreds.

[Political Junkie Too]

Gee, think they're trying to make us all out to sound like Tim McVeigh?

More like the Freemen of Montana.

-PJ

[L.N. Smithee]

What liberals classify as hate speech somehow is NOT hate speech when it comes from a liberal.

You got it. The same blacktivists who would vote against a white politician for having a black lawn jockey on his front porch will put Clarence Thomas on the cover of their magazine dressed as a lawn jockey. They will also stand in silent approval as Condoleezza Rice is spoken of as scrubbing the floors of the White House for her white masters.

[Political Junkie Too]

I think far too many see FR as some sort of monolithic entity.

When I first signed up after the 2000 election, it appeared to me that this site was the home of many people involved in journalism, from camera people to writers to archivists to talk-show hosts (all anonymously). This was the life-blood of conservative punditry. If you tracked what was discussed here during the Condit affair with what was reported in the news, you'd see what I mean. Also, the breaking news breaks here very quickly.

As its popularity grew, the average joe signed up, too, but I still believe that most of the punditry still discuss their views here. It's that context that worries the Left -- that opinion-shapers get their influences here, sort of like one giant focus-group session for the Right.

-PJ

[Bernard Marx]

I think you'd best do some research. Your "facts" are simply wrong. Barnicle received a 2-month suspension for his first offense. Jacoby got 4 months' suspension without pay. Barnicle came up on a second charge from an earlier column and was forced to resign from the Globe.

The female columnist you're trying to remember is Patricia Smith. She was also forced to resign.

Jacoby still writes for the Globe. So the score is two liberals gone, one conservative punished but working. I don't think Jeff should have been disciplined at all, but he still has a job.

[Political Junkie Too]

Jeff's "offense" was to mix in some (factual) stuff that was on a mass e-mail about the trials the founders had to face on the 4th of July (or so it was claimed) without "making a note of it in the editorial".

Jacoby's offense was to be a conservative political commentator at the Boston Globe. Barnicle was a human-interest columnists, like Dave Barry and Erma Bombeck. Barnicle was removed for repeated plagiarism; Jacoby was suspended in order to get an effective conservative voice "off the air" during the 2000 election.

-PJ

[Dr. Zoo]

Correction:

a heavily trafficked right-wing Web site founded by a Fresno Republican Democrat in 1996.

__________________________________________

It's just the lunatic fringe I worry about.

I knew one of those...

[Mat_Helm]

Well....all I can say is...

BWAAAAAA HAAA HAAA HAAAA.... .........BWAAAAAAA

[Fraulein]

I agree. That's my point. However, you made it much better than I did. :)

[Drango]

If she put her by-line on someone else's writing with that person's permission, no big deal.

I would *LOVE* to see the SF Chron try and defend such a postion...