[Jim Robinson]

Free Republic is privately owned and funded. We exercise our right to control the use and content of our website. We also exersize our right to freedom of association. Liberal trolls and their posts are usually removed. We do not want to waste our time or resources on their nonsense. Free Republic is not a liberal debating society.

[visagoth]

Jim:

Thanks for your reply. My intention in posting the thread was not to 'promote a left wing website', but to give others a heads up on the discussion regarding trying to 'troll' FR.

Thanks again for FR. I appreciate it.

[ChuckHam]

Thanks for keeping this site clean. If I want to wallow in the sewer I can go to DU.

[nwrep]

Thanks!

[airborne]

Thank you Mr. Robinson! And a happy, prosperous new year to all!

[BobFromNJ]

Jim--Way to go!! Why do these left-leaning self-appointed intellectuals try so hard to be heard in the wrong places??
Anyway, great response!

[Britton J Wingfield]

Not sure if I'd call that a left wing site or not. I've been checking it out for a couple of days.

There is at least one other freeper there, and some pretty good left/right discussions going on.

Apparently they had a mass exodus of lefties to some other site, equaling things out a bit.

Just my observations.

[bolobaby]

OK, I've been around FR for a few years and I'm pretty darn conservative. I agree with yanking speculative and/or inciteful remarks by lefties who are just trying to cause trouble.

BUT...

It seems to me that his second remark was a factual correction of some sort. As a true conservative, I want the facts. I'd look at a correction like that and think "ok, someone here is wrong." Then I'd do some quick research and figure out what the truth really was.

I haven't looked at this matter, so I don't know where the truth lies, but it does disturb me that the reply was yanked. Any attempt to set facts straight should be given consideration unless it is a blatant misinformation. I look at that post and it doesn't seem like blatant misinformation.

Am I wrong to feel this way?

[SunStar]

BUMP!

We get plenty of liberal brainwashing on the news... Thanks for your dedication to maintaining the focus of FR as a conservative meeting place.

[NormsRevenge]

Free Republic is not a libation liberal debating society. (uhh,, oops!)

Amen to that! Now if ya want to debate libations, that's another story. I'm drinking a beer followed by another beer, imported of course, anybody want to debate about that? ;-)

Hey... It's New Year's Eve. :-\

The only problem with being at the head of the pack is everyone gets to take a shot at your rear.

[OldFriend]

And blessings to you and your family in the new year.

Can't imagine a better website anywhere!

[Richard Kimball]

I've posted quite a few things that are not necessarily within the FR scope, and have never even been warned. However, I've also been around here for a while, and it seems to me that long-time posters get more leeway. I can't think of any forum where you can go in and start throwing bombs immediately, and not be banned. Sometimes I disagree with a thread being pulled, but I've noticed that sites that don't have any active moderation degrade into the lamest fringe elements that have little to do but post all day. There are a pretty big contingent of anarchists who believe in no government who would love to take over FR, because of the wide exposure. LibertyForum, it seems to me, is having terrible problems keeping the site sane.

The scope of FR allows a pretty wide range of debate. If I were to characterize it, though, I'd say it's closer to libertarian-anarchist than conservative. I've also noticed that liberals are allowed to post, so long as they maintain a certain level of civility, and don't try to make the entire forum a blog for the communists. I also suspect that many of the people who are banned are people who have been banned multiple times, as determinable from their IP address (although I have no access to this information). Whenever someone comes in and on their first day posting prints a Mother Earth News indictment of capitalism and uses the term "bushbots" and "WOD'ers", I pretty well suspect that this is their third or fourth screen name.

I think the quickest way to destroy freedom is to abuse it. The statement frequently made is that the only way to protect freedom of speech is to defend that speech which is most indefensible. This is garbage. It is similar to saying that defending the "right to drive a car" is only protected when we defend the most irresponsible driving. Also, FR sends no one to jail for printing their beliefs. However, it is not obligated to give anyone a podium. The arguments made in the article are silly. It implies that the keepers of this forum are not moral agents who have any authority to run the forum as they see fit. To the writer of the article: Start your own forum. Run it without any rules. Watch the nutballs show up. Give equal time to people that write "blah, blah, blah" or post gibberish until it becomes impossible to follow a thread because of the incoherence injected by people who want to destroy debate, not create it.

[whizzer]

Exactly right.Take your left wing agenda elsewhere.This is not a debating society.This site is for people who believe in America,not those trying to tear it down.Hope Jim gets rid of you & your other confederates who are trying to disrupt this site.

[Right_in_Virginia]

Thanks for all you do, Jim.

Happy New Year!

[CyberAnt]

Thank you Jim for making FR the only place I spend hours visiting.

[AgThorn]

Free Republic is privately owned and funded. We exercise our right to control the use and content of our website. We also exersize our right to freedom of association. Liberal trolls and their posts are usually removed. We do not want to waste our time or resources on their nonsense. Free Republic is not a liberal debating society

In that I can agree .. but Jim (and I have to read the rest of this thread to see if this hasn't already been done), can you address the 3-4 comments that he references as being pulled ... i.e. were they as neutral as they sound? If so, it bears some discussion I would think, no?

[Tench_Coxe]

"Free Republic is not a liberal debating society."

Apologzing for the crudeness beforehand, I think 'debating' should be struck and replaced with 'mental masturbation' to provide accuracy.

[FirstPrinciple]

I agree with you. However, I have been attacked more than once in this forum for questioning the policies of Bush. I don't mind being attacked, but an equally sharp tone generally draws responses, otherwise known as flame war. While my posts criticizing Bush were never removed, I couldn't reply my opponents with the same veracity as they attacked me. Should there be a level of decorum for everyone?