Those are fair questions, but they’re difficult to answer. Conceivably, I could explain the situation better by posting embarassing old quotes from numerous prominent FReepers who were demanding DuMond’s release at the time - but I’m NOT going to do that!!!!!
If this were my forum, I’d be going back and deleting all of those old DuMond threads for the sake of my friends and long-time members who were misinformed on this issue at the time. If Huckabee wins the nomination, the Dems could have a field day with those old comments - to Hillary’s benefit and our regret.
I realize that the supporters of Huckabee’s opponents are concerned and a little panicky about at his rise in the polls. Their natural instinct is to throw anything and everything they can find at Huckabee, without a though of how it could backfire. But the newcomers don’t realize the role that Free Republic and Steve Dunleavy played in winning Wayne DuMond’s release, so they post this stuff without understanding the consequences. (The same article posted above was also posted yesterday by another recently-joined member - and pulled voluntarily after the history of the situation was explained. It’s interesting how this exact same old article seems to be popping up so frequently now.)
In my opinion, the best course of action is to keep this stuff off of the forum for now. We don’t need to be posting two-year-old propaganda from Murray Waas and the left-wing Arkansas Times. If Huckabee wins the nomination, a strategy will be available for dealing with the inevitable attacks from Hillary’s camp.
If Huckabee’s opponents on this forum believe that they absolutely must post this garbage, they could at least see to it that those old threads are deleted first so that they won’t be used against Free Republic in the future.
I really don’t like talking about damage control on the public forum. It’s like an open line to Hell, and our enemies could easily pick up on it. But at the same time, I don’t know how to explain this stuff to the noobs. They weren’t here when it was going on, so they don’t fully appreciate the situation. I’ve been doing opposition research on the Clintons for 27 years, so I can see the trainwreck we’re heading into if the present course of action continues.
Thanks for the response I don’t want you to expend much energy on my questions, save that for the bigger discussion some of you guys are going to have.
My curiosity right now is light and shallow, but I do hope to read some more in depth discussions on this tomorrow or the next day.
Personally I don’t see the big deal yet, I thought that the very nature of this passionate, activist, insider forum, meant that we would sometimes be on the wrong side of history, or would have reached a bloody hard fought consensus, that a few years down the road would prove to be wrong and sometimes humiliatingly wrong.
My take on this forum is that we live in real time, and we have to let it all hang out and go balls to the wall on our ideas and causes, that means that looking back to old threads, even dominant ideas may look pretty bad at a future time.
Trying to conceal something so public, available and permanent seems a destructive effort in possibly a fatal cover up for a reason that I still don’t understand.
Google this on google news and you will see that everybody out there is covering this, including Rush.
I may be embarrassed by my lack of insight tomorrow, but I don’t see the big deal.
Like I said don’t put a lot of effort into my curiosity tonight but if you can freepmail me a few short hints of what disturbs you about this I would appreciate it, I’ll let the details play out as I read you and the other old timers discuss it.
The DNA in the Missouri woman was pretty convincing.
It is also interesting that it was the Dem governor that started the parole process, and then went to jail himself.
With that statement, I hope Jim is busy this morning; the 'Hills' have eyes...