Posted on 04/01/2005 2:39:59 PM PST by hchutch
Six months ago, Free Republic was riding high, and I was proud to be a part of it. It was coming off having blown the cover off of Dan Rather’s use of forged memos against the President. The President was well on his way to winning re-election. It was a great time to be a Freeper.
However, things have changed. It started with the justifiable removal of ALIPAC. I supported that move by Jim Robinson, but the ugliness directed towards Alberto Gonzales. He was accused of everything under the sun, and Senator Mel Martinez was viciously attacked for speaking Spanish on the Senate floor. The tone and outright viciousness (terms like FROBL and traitor were fired off at anyone who did not toe the line established by Michelle Malkin and Tom Tancredo) on immigration threads had concerned me, but I had concluded it was an isolated incident. After ALIPAC was removed from FR, I had hoped the tone there would improve. But it only got worse. I was point-blank called a traitor because my views on immigration differ from those of Michelle Malkin’s groupies. On immigration threads, questioning the questionable is not allowed. One must accept the unacceptable and allow folks to defend the indefensible. Never mind that VDARE, American Renaissance, and other sites are racist or have no problem hanging out with those that are racists (I’m just going to call a spade a spade here).
There were folks who had the long knives out for Senator Rick Santorum, one of the strongest pro-life members of the United States Senate. Why? Because he endorsed Arlen Specter over Pat Toomey. It was stunning to see these long knives out for a conservative. And all it would accomplish would be his replacement by a Democrat. How in the world replacing Rick Santorum with a Democrat would aid conservatism is beyond me, but it was demanded because Santorum endorsed Specter. The long knives were out, and I suppose it was a sign of what was to come.
The whole Terri Schiavo case has changed everything for me. A mob mentality took over the first few days after the order to pull the tube was given. Anyone who did not toe the line was attacked. I saw a dedicated active-duty member of our armed forces called a “Maine liberal” for simply asking why troops in harm’s way did not get the same sort of “all-nighter” attention that Terri Schiavo got. It was a reasonable question – we have 40-year-old P-3s still out there. We have a war on terrorism still going on, in case folks have not noticed. We have to get Social Security fixed. I say this as a person who believes that at best, Michael Schiavo’s relationship with a woman (and having two kids with her) meant he had a conflict of interest – and that he had decided that Terri was inconvenient. I cannot take his word alone that Terri would have wanted this. I also believe that George Felos is a supporter of euthanasia, and that he is using this case for his own ends. Those folks give me the creeps, and I think that Jim Robinson was on the right side of this issue. However, I also got a very bad feeling when the Schindlers embraced the likes of Randall Terry and Bo Gritz. I had to wonder what has happened to the conservative movement when the threads were allowed to spiral so out of control. The concept of euthanasia is repulsive and disgusting, but it does not excuse allowing the threads to spin out of control.
I have seen the President of the United States, George W. Bush, and the Governor of Florida, John Ellis Bush, take huge political risks in an effort to save Terri’s life. I believe they were doing their best to do the right thing, and that the original law passed in 2003 was a reasonable one that was wrongly stuck down by Judge Greer and the Florida Supreme Court. I think that the Republican Party has taken a huge risk to give Terri a chance at life, and I am disgusted with those who seek a pretext that will justify leaving the GOP in the lurch. I’m sick of the way the Terri threads spun out of control, and the vicious attacks launched at reasonable people who came to a different conclusions about the situation or who pointed out facts that certain people found inconvenient. This is not what I signed on here for.
I believe in a strong national defense, cutting taxes, and in general trying to keep government involvement as minimal as possible (there are times when the best one can do is to limit government involvement in a situation). I am pro-life (with exceptions for rape, incest, and to protect the life of the mother) and pro-Second Amendment. However, I do NOT want the federal government to be involved in any culture war. “Culture” was never mentioned in the constitution, thus I believe it is left to the States or TO THE PEOPLE (see the Tenth Amendment). I do NOT think immigration is a problem, but I believe some mistakes were made along the way (like eliminating the bracero program). I also think that the President of the United States has proposed a sensible plan that will go a long way towards solving the problems on our border with Mexico and do much to alleviate the problems surrounding illegal immigration. Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that it is time for me and Free Republic to part company, because Free Republic has left this limited-government neoconservative. In the process of Free Republic leaving me, I now find that I fear the social conservatives as much as I fear the loony left. As a result of coming to this conclusion, I ask that my account be deleted and all posts I have made, save for this opus and the ping to my friends be removed.
I do this with regret, since I will miss some of those who I have met here, but I feel no other choice. So long.
Well, I been around since 97. Seen plenty of Opuses, when ya reconsider, you probalby welcome back.
please reconsider....stay and fight for FR....
PukinDog put some kind of motion activated sprinkler near his to get rid of a heron... it worked! I may have to FReepmail him and ask how to get one.
"Newbies."
You bet mon. I learn something new all the time on this site.
One of these days Ill even learn how to post nice pics too.
Some people like to learn new stuff...others get a thrill pointing out other peoples posting dates. Thats the point I tried to make.
Would they be madder than those who've had loved ones raped, robbed and murdered by cretins who were born here of parents who were born here?
Wrong.
I guarantee that you can't guarantee a thing beyond the fact that every one of us will die one day.
Just wondering, how long do you have to be a member of FR before you get past the "newbie" status?
The short answer...for some...never.
"Are you kidding? You post an Opus like that and nobody's supposed to say anything? Is that your MO? Here's a thought: Screw You. We're from Texas: Screw You
How dare you come swooping in on a day like this when everyone is focused on their grief, on a day when we feel like we're on a deathwatch that's gone on for a month, during an Easter that hasn't been much of a celebration at all, and sh!t all over everything with a stupid demand for attention. GROW UP! Don't come back till you do.
Get out of here! Who needs you? This forum is not for the faint hearted.
In the immortal words of the demon general arafat: bye-bye."
I would like to enter into evidence the above comment as an example of the level of discourse that appears more often than not on too many threads here at FR. This one is all too typical. Having just gone through multiple attempts by Schiavo supporters to hector me off of the Schiavo threads by those who wanted no debate, just a monologue, I am still patching up my battle scars. I simply refused to leave those threads to those who wanted only one point of view. I felt it important to not let that happen, just for the principle of the matter. If this is a debate forum, on too many a thread lately, there are serious efforts to make sure there is no debate at all.
I totally sympathize w/Hutch. I too thought of buzzing off FR entirely, and maybe one day it will come to that. However, my hackles are up now at this site's takeover by the hardcore religious zealots (whom by the way, are now infiltrating many other threads on FR). You can spot them in two seconds, as a Schiavo comment will show up out of left field in a totally unrelated thread. When the balance swings to where this site bears no resemblence to what it was when I first started freeping in 1998, that's when I will take a powder. It's starting to get closer to that I sadly say. What I don't understand is why some of the most egregious comments aren't zapped. On the Schiavo threads, there were constant death threats being made, name-calling, insults, downright hatred, intolerance, etc. etc. etc. and it totally amazed me. I understand the concept of freedom of speech, but some of those posters went so over the top with threats of violence, that I couldn't understand why they weren't zapped. Amazing.
What I fear is that the casual reader from the outside, checking out the Freeper website, will read some of the comments and forever take a powder, or in the alternative, they are a kook and will be attracted to the site so that they too can spit out their venom. This, to my mind, is not good. I don't think FR wants to be put in the same category as DU, but lately, it's not been that different on some of the threads. Well, I'm in watch and wait mode now. Time will tell which way the wind blows on FR and whether it's a site one wants to be associated with. I might add, over at another website, comments were not allowed after a Schiavo article was posted, because they figured out that nothing good would come of it and all too many of the irrational and delusional would post nasty comments if it was allowed. Maybe FR would have been a lot better off doing the same. But again, I don't understand why some of the more hateful and threat-ridden comments weren't zapped by the moderators. I'm off of those threads now, because I don't want it to rub off on me and I become just like them. Ghastly thought.
Mr. Holland, we are your Opus, we are your symphony..."
Well, I for one am sorry to see you go, you've been a voice of reason in what occasionally seems to be a world gone upside down.
I love this forum, I love the fact that as a result of actively participating in the discussions (and the wars) that have blown through it over the years, I've grown so much.
But there comes a time for all to leave, and then perhaps the forum becomes more a source of information and a place to easily find our favorite pundit's latest article, than a constructive idea exchange.
The Schiavo threads troubled me to the point where I've all but ceased to post myself. I believe that the damage suffered by the pro-life movement, the GOP, and the religious right has been immense.
See you around.
Amen.
I hope you read Dog Gone's response, because he speaks for me as well.
Still, from my viewpoint, Free Republic is an indispensible collection of articles. When the commentary becomes too offensive or unpleasant to read, the articles still lead me here.
I discovered Mark Steyn here and will probably read him for the rest of my life(*), no matter what happens to FR itself. And there's no easier way for me to read him than the Steyn ping list and others.
Discussion threads on issues such as immigration and our pal Terri have indeed become tedious to the extreme, primarily because people with otherwise similar political views are inclined to rip each other to shreds. I don't think this is a brainy scheme, for the conservative movement or people in general.
That being said, HCHutch has mentioned issues on which most conservatives agree, such as the war on terrorism, Social InSecurity and so on. These are issues where I think most of us can find a stable common ground, and FR is still a very useful way to rally opinion on these issues.
This is especially true if more of us can avoid the temptation to read and respond on the hot-button threads, which so rapidly degrade into meanness.
So in sum, I hope you will reconsider your decision and remain around, even if you decide against combat on those threads, which I agree have become tiresome to the extreme.
Best wishes.
David H Dennis
(*) Or his.
I believe that the damage done to FR in the eyes of the GOP is even greater than that.
It's a tough world. It takes tough people to stand in the gap and fight for what's right...even when it gets uncomfortable.
If a few poorly chosen words are all it takes, the statement is more about you than those you target in your opus.
Some have the stones, and some don't.
Enough said.
Time to change your intellectual Operating System - that one crashes too often due to too many inherent logic loops.
Thanks for immediately pinging who you consider fellow neocons and thus erasing my suspicions. You're either a conservative or not (see Barry Goldwater). Only Ronald Reagan managed to pull off a hybrid style, yet every time he diverged from the true faith bad things happened (see Amnesty, Deficit Spending). I'm speaking of the strong Goldwater circa 1962; not the near-senile man who caved to his wife's pro-abortion stances in the late 1980's.
Which brings up the value of human life and how it has been vehemently debated here lately (Mrs. Chiavo). I view the end of our lives as part of the pursuit of happiness and consider artificial extension against our personal wishes to be in defiance of that (it's ultimately between us and our God). Government intrudes into too much of our personal lives as it is - allowing it to intrude into the most personal issue of all is tantamount to opening a Frankensteinian raft of possible abuses (see Stem Cells, Profitable Organ Recycling).
Bottom Line: Terri Schiavo, never having gotten the chance to state otherwise, deserved life support until natural death. Despite the atrocious expense I believe we all deserve that consideration while none of our peers hold Godhood. The costs of any American caught in such circumstances would be defrayed through the savings made from DENYING ILLEGAL ALIENS UNDESERVED SERVICES.
We'd be living in a near paradise right now if we had proper enforcement of existing law.
Neoconservatism means playing footsie with liberal scum. Before one knows it their Ex-Prez old man is honoring Ted Kennedy for his "human achievements". That was a unplanned diet day for me.
One of our wisest members has devoted great effort to outline basic conservatism. Ohioan's "Return of the Gods" site covers most major issues and cuts to the chase.
Good luck to you in your endeavors and may God keep our volunteers safe.
The Schindlers, uninvolved in the pro-life movement, probably had no idea about Randall Terry, his reputation or his role in it. While it is no secret that a I am no big fan of Terry's (and quite the opposite) it was their decision.
However, I chose to give them the little bit of assistance I could, doing what I thought was best. The cause was too important to allow anything, including some of the people involved and tactics I disagreed with, to stop me from making my own contributions.
You left out disabled people. If there is one group feeling vulnerable right now, it's them.
I understand what you are saying I was on a religion thread a few days ago and in the 24th post the name calling started. And these people were calling themselves Christians, go figure!
On another thread people are just plain snotty. I use my scroll button a lot.
Don't leave just wait FR goes through this every so often. It will change again.
Hang in there!
If disabled people are doing something other than setting up a living will, they have more problems than just being disabled.
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