"...but it is now costing over $20,000 per month to cover all expenses."
Gee, JR, charge a $2.00 a month user fee...Ought to also keep some of the rif-raff out. Anyone not willing to pay $24.00 a year to participate here doesn't belong here anyway!
I like this idea. 24 dollars a year, 2 dollars a month, is also a reasonable, affordable cost if this user fee is what it has to come to.
Lots of us spend more than 2 bucks on newspapers every week alone.
Jim, and many of us began our opposition to Clinton corruption as early as 1993. Back then, it was on a forum called "Whitewater" and on a now-outdated service called Prodigy. Liberals dominated Prodigy. And as our sharing of information on the Clintons became larger (a newsgroup alt.clinton.whitewater(actually took hold from these discussions) leaders like Jim started their rise fame. It wasn't so much that Jim was the most vocal. Let's just say he was the most activist among us. And as Prodigy began to actually censor some of the conversations surrounding the Clintons, Jim and others started looking for a new home for us. Free Republic in those days was yet a word or words one would put together to identify this calling we now all proudly claim.
. Anyway, and this is only going on recollection, and not on any written history, somehow we all - or most of us landed at another place. It was the newsgroup, clinton.alt.whitewater, I think. Anyway,around 1996 or so - decades now it seems like - Jim founded FR.
Over the years some of us have come and gone. Jim and his family have stayed with it. It has become so large and well known that it is no longer unusual to hear Rush or some other talk radio host mention it on their show. None the less, it is important to remember that Jim started it, and he has tried valiantly to regularly remind us that we are generally all on the same side. Obviously he does a far better job of that that I can do here. The point of all this is such:
1. Mr.Robinson is the man behind the idea and success of FR.
2. Many others devote time and money to the cause, but it is Jim's risks and devotion that have made it what it is.
3. We have collectively made a difference. In the Impeachment of a most unworthy man - X-42 - and have helped elect our current president.
4. We have added and lost many, most of all growijng far beyond waht many evet thought possible. And in the growth has come a great amount of unfamiliarty. That means a lot of people have no idea who they are "talking" to. We have also had a fair share of fifth columnists aka disruptors.
5. With the success of FR has come a good amount of newbies. People with the best of intentions that are unfamiliar with FR ways. Vanities, vanities of vanities, and genral offenses of a decorum that is always in flux. In short, mob rule but with some limits to civility.
That is my take on FR. Sometimes an active role. Sometimes a breather, particularly after the previous crisis of X=42. We can all do better in life. But chances are good we will never reach the level of impact one James Robinson, USN (ret), will ever make on this nation's political framework.
One can certainly hope though.
I'm in.