Replies

It should have it's own thread but I think it is pretty informative how two sets of groups that differ in political persuasion are responding to this tragedy. On the FR thread the majority of the people are distraught by this horrible accident. If one reads the FreeRepublic thread and then removes the Howling\TSPR flame war and a few other replies the thread mainly consists of people reporting the latest information, people that are grief stricken, people that are encouraging others, people requesting prayer for the families of the astronauts and the nation as a whole, and people trying to sort out what happen and how.

On the DU thread it is viewed as a political event with the majority of the replies bashing Bush and wondering how much mileage he will get out of it politically. You have people blaming Bush for the accident, people bemoaning the fact that Clinton never got the break Bush got by having a tragedy on his watch(That there are people who would want this or 911 to happen for a better Clinton approval rating is beyond sickening and disgusting), people using the event to protest the coming war with Iraq, people espousing wild conspiracy theories involving Bush, people that are just mainly mean spirited, and a couple of people distraught by the tragedy.

I wish there was someway to spit the screen and run the FR and DU threads side by side and do a comparison as the event unfolded. It would be clearly evident that the liberals are insane. Jim Rob should print out both and send them a media outlets so the world could see the difference. I would love to see the mainstream liberal media trying to defend what is being said on DU. On one hand the conservative forum is mourning and reporting on the event while on the other the liberal forum it is being politicized to advance their cause while demeaning the death of fellow citizens.

The same thought has struck me every time I've sampled the buzz at DU. Here, I read many posts exhibiting beautiful patriotism, hope, faith... over there I read many posts dripping with paranoia, vitriol, hatred and fear. There's a thread at DU right now where they're challinging people to present proof that the shuttle disaster really was an accident (and not some diabolical plot cooked up by Andrew Card and Bush).

Free Republic thrives on love and hope, DU feeds on hate and loathing. Modern "liberalism" is a species of mental illness.

It is an interesting idea but unfortunately would never see the light of day in any of the mainstream press. The liberals have become so whacked out as to believe they're actually mainstream. Sad. But I do agree that an event like this really separates the sheep from the goats in a manner of speaking. I didn't look at much over there. I couldn't bear it today, but I did see that there were a couple of voices of reason and compassion in an otherwise toxic cesspool. I also saw here a few that I wished would have spent their day doing something else. I think what it comes down to really is a relationship with the truth. I think that here, for the most part, we seek truth and authenticity in all things and while we get very caught up at times in our opinions and emotions, most of us are open to the possibility of being wrong about some issues. With few exceptions we freely admit that we don't have all the answers, but most of us have faith in the One who does, and even those who do not profess a religious faith, show respect to those who do; at least that has been my experience.

Over there it is very different. Challenge is not tolerated and I see little evidence that there is any room for differing opinions even within their own ranks. It seems they exist not to furthur their own understanding and knowledge, but to spit and fume and wax hysterical in their own hate to the point that they feed on it and it poisons everything and everyone within range that interacts with them. I am not suggesting that there are no reasonable and truth-seeking people over there, but I don't believe they last very long because they would never find what they were looking for in such a restrictive and controlled environment. Neither am I suggesting that FR is for everyone, although I think that people of widely varying opinions can feel welcome here as long as they behave reasonably and treat others with respect.

I would like to think that that other site is just a niche element of radical fringe, but I fear that more and more it is becoming the face of the enemy within (within the country I mean; not FR). A lot of them lurk here, and we have many posters who either post on both forums or who have been banned there and found that they were welcomed here and that maybe their core beliefs were not so far from us after all.