I don't see that at all. Making new members post 20 replies before they could post articles would stop a huge amount of space wasting garbage.
On a related topic, but who is humblegunner?
Humblegunner? He's the self styled Blogger Overlord, leader of the Pimp Busters. They attempt to regulate the dozens of bloggers who fantasize about being the next Allahpundit or Michelle Malkin or Andrew Breitbart and look to generate hits for their websites by spamming Free Republic.
Looks like he/she is banned now.
And I don’t agree with your litmus test of “20 replies before posting”.
My “Marine” will be home soon after having served active duty tours in two combat zones.
His “sign up date” would be later this year, if he cares to participate on this forum.
He might be willing to share experience based information or just his personal opinions that all of us could benefit from reading.
Frankly, I hesitate to direct his attention here.
Jim does a really good job of laying out the “rules” on the homepage of this website.