[Richard Poe]

<< ...your argument didn't address his arguments, at least in the initial post, but was an ad hominem attack on his motives. >>

I'm afraid I don't know what you mean.

I thought my entire exchange with Raimondo dealt with substantive arguments, and that a man's beliefs, motivation or ideology are fair game in a political discussion.

I have been posting and lurking on FR, under various handles, for nearly four years, but perhaps there are still some unspoken rules around here that I have failed to grasp. I will try to be more attentive in future to these subtleties.

[deport]

I have been posting and lurking on FR, under various handles, for nearly four years,

Why is that? Have you been banned or your account deleted before? Why do you need various handles? Won't one do?

[jammer]

Motivations of the person who makes an argument or states a hypothesis/theory do not make that argument or hypothesis/theory any more or less correct. That's an elementary logical proposition.

Please forgive me for not attempting to post a link, but you can cut and paste to go to this:

http://www.intrepidsoftware.com/fallacy/attack.htm

[jammer]

One other caveat--lol--I have used the same fallacy myself, sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. For example, I have derided arguments because someone is a "newbie"!

But you don't have to apologize for being new or lurking. Neither affects the quality of your argument.

The only unwritten "rules" I can think of are that ad hominem arguments used by people who agree with the moderator are overlooked, while ad hominem arguments used by people who do not agree with the moderator are usually dealt with promptly and, sometimes, severely.