They love this site, bc they get a rise out of passionate peoiple working for the GOOD of America.  George Allen would love to think that he is helping Virginians, but we all know the truth:  he is a racist, he is STUPID, he is unfit, and he is abusive.

So right on, and let's bring.  It.  ON.

is that we allow trolls to have their say, as long as they're not *just* foul-mouthed, talking-point-spewing machines. We respond to them -- though not always politely -- we argue with them, we never give up the idea that they might start making sense one day.

The "true red" blogs on the other hand, do not allow dissent, however polite. If your comment is not in line with the accepted "truth", it'll get censored out, without ever having any chance at swaying anyone's point of view.

I don't recommend we do the same thing; I think we need to know how the other side thinks and operates (and I don't want to have to take more than two showers a day, ie read their blogs and feel dirty afterwards).

But, remembering how info-propaganda was handled back in Poland when I was growing up there,  I do think Jim Webb was dead on target, when he said that the dark side (I agree with VA for Ike; the Repub party is now a party of mutants) "is so far to the left, it *looks* like they're coming from the right"

even though we never delete comments or diaries. In addition, we arguably allow more free discussion than any other political blog in Virginia (who else allows anyone to post a diary on their site?).  We also have only banned one or two people in almost two years, and they have been unbanned within days or weeks.  Imagine that on a right-wing blog?  What a laugh.  Hell, they don't even allow comments on right-wing blogs like Michelle Malkin or George Allen's blog.  How can it be a blog without comments?  Only in right-wing world.

PS  For those intellectually challenged souls who STILL don't understand what a community blog is, I recommend reading the FAQs at another community blog, Daily Kos. It's really not that compliated, but apparently some people - overwhelmingly right wingnuts - just can't figure it out.  Duhhhhhh....

grab them by the balls, you know what.. if they dont have anything postive to contribute to the debate.

can em. we get canned on right wing blogs. why do we allow bullshit?

Watch out trolls, your on thin ice.

::rolls eyes::

I couldn't resist.  Doc Montana was talking about grabbing people by the "----s" and it was an easy chip shot.  Accept my humble apology.

There are plenty of other sites on the net to pursue that line.

That's why nuts like i.pocket puts stuff here. It's what I said about Roger today (I like his civility btw) and why some "new" folks have shown up and seem to have a mantra of talking points I've seen elsewhere.

Now, personally, I love to make fun of i.pork because he is just ridiculous. I can only imagine a very angry 30 something in mom's basement railing against the man (us?) who has kept him down. Maybe I should just not respond, read the post, mark it troll rating and move on? What do you all think? My thoughts about folks who post here are:

1) i.porkulous is just angry and needs a good cuddle from someone, but please God not any of us, should be ignored, trolled and left at that
2) roger j. - decent poster who is honest in his views, regurgitates talking points but is very bearable
3) blackamerican (I think that's right)- some RNC staffer tasked to hit more popular blogs and throw in talking point stands

I haven't followed others. I don't mind if you say its innapropriate to even post this stuff, since I'm fairly new the blogs.

...well put.

I don't regurgitate talking points. I don't need to because I can independently engage in debate with my own knowledge.

I'm not a paid Allen hack but am a corporate litigator.  Do the google search and you'll find me. 

Not many folks have the balls to post their own real name here.  You know that.

Know this.  On certain subjects, I will fully engage you and any other blogger when you and others distort the truth on certain subjects I hold dear.

I think my positings here on the VMI subject bear out that I know my 'taters.'  My VMI comments weren't even close to any talking points. Neither are my other comments.

when you say Webb only server 10 months in the Reagan administration. That is not true, but is trotted out like mad. He server 4 years, and left after 10 months as SECNAV because CONGRESS cut the budget for the Navy. That's very talking point of you, but please feel free to counter me and reference your reasons for saying it.

There are lots of papers, and I actually remember the debate, that had Webb solidly behind the vision of the return to the 600 ship Navy. This was important in the mid 1980s because of our nature of conflict with the Soviets at the time- we were working to be sure their sea power was contained to cold water port choke points. Reagan was behind this, as were many solid conservative thinkers and many solid liberal thinkers (see Gary Hart and Joe Biden on these, along with John McCain, et. al.) And Webb was 100% behind this. When congress, God knows why, cut the Navy budget and scuttled the 600 ship Navy Webb quit. Your characterization that this was a disagreement between Webb and Reagan is just plain wrong.

And why was the 600 ship Navy a big deal? Take a 1991 war as example- 98% of logistical material for the Gulf War was transported by sea. 1950 to present, sea power is the ability to move MASSIVE amounts of material. The Soviets had one gigantic strategic disadvantage to the USA- no warm water ports free of chokepoints. This is why The Hunt for Red October was such a huge seller. This is why the USSR invaded Aghanistan- one country away from a warm water port free of choke points- Pakistan or Iran.

So, back to my point- I like your posts, I've seen your law practice page, I do think you post pre-written talking points from the Allen campaign here, because you have to read about Webb and the 1980s to understand why he quit, what brought him to be the nation's first Under sec def for reserve affairs, why and how he defended a black soldier after a massacare in Vietnam, why he wrote about the Naval Academy in loving terms, in very harsh terms (enough to be banned for 4 years- there's a great story to run with!!) and to write about why women should not be in combat and be straight up enough to admit that was a wrong position to take and to apologize about it (he did that today).

So, whew, that's a lot of writing and all off the cuff from my knowledge. As I believe most of yours is. But some of yours... not so much.

I don't need Allen talking points to talk about the 1980s because I lived them...just as I am sure you did.

Secondly, I have read some of Webb's works.  On the whole, he is not bad as a writer.  The General's Spy is one of my favorite -- the portion where the protagonist got sliced across the face by a banana knife was a little over the top, however.

My primary point in all of this discussion was that he not only resigned in a huff but that he was not a "team player."

I've heard from some of these officials first hand about his combativeness, his inability to get along with others, and his testiness.

Based on that and his many writings debated within this page, I do not believe he is fit for office.  Platoon leader, yes.  Academic, maybe.  Senator, no.

Finally, my motivation against him is that I am a tried and true Reaganite.  I got involved in politics because of Ronald Reagan.

On that subject, why is it that some within your party continues to underestimate the deep love and allegiance that Reaganites have for him? Knowing full well that he trounced both Carter and Mondale, reshaped domestic policy, winning the Cold War, and restoring pride that Americans had in themselves, I would think that you and others would tread softly on Reagan's memory.

As I said earlier, he has only been dead for a little more than two years.  Did you not see the outpouring of affection that we and others had for this man.

Why screw with that?  You've only awakened the passions of Reagan's supporters.  This will not help you.

I read a great analogy on another webpage.  Imagine if someone in my party tried to wrap himself with Jack Kennedy only to disavow the wishes of Jackie. 

Could you imagine the outcry?  I sure can.

I have always been an Allen supporter.  Hell, I was a charter member of his advisory committee in 1992 when he was regarded as a longshot for the Governor's Mansion.

I would have walked to the ends of the earth for him anyway.  Now, however, you'all have gone and messed with this Reagan thing.

And, I'll work my ass off to defeat you for it.  Trust me, there are many others who feel the way I do too.

I know that Bush wrapped himself in JFK and Truman, while not using their pictures or words, implied that they were the true heirs to their legacies of spreading freedom etc. I know Truman's daughter came out and blasted Bush for it and I think Kennedy's daughter did as well.

As for your points on Reagan; as enormously popular as he was and still is among many Americans, it's almost a Wizard of Oz syndrome. They love the man, but they're not wild about what's behind the curtain. Only Reagan had the charm and presence to carry a conservative agenda; 41 felt the moderate backlash coming and advocated a 'softer, gentler America'. Bush ran the same way in 92 and Bob "I don't read the party platform" Dole wasn't a die in the wool conservative either. Even 43 ran in the election as a moderate 'uniter'; some of you may remember the clip of Howard Dean at some joing Vermont/New Hampshire/ Canadian talk show where he said something like "I am deeply dissapointed Al Gore did not win election, but I'm not devastated because I beleive at heart President-Elect Bush is a moderate. Only when he got in office did W make a v-line to the right.

They are surely plenty of you Reaganites that are going to work their asses off for Allen, but I don't think Virginians as a whole view Allen in the same universe as Reagan (hard as he may try).

But you are describing your feelings. I grew up in a Nixon/Reagan household. I even have my invitation to the 1972 innagural- since we are playing the "who knows this subject best" game. My parents really could have written what you did about Reagan. I have dear friends my age that feel the same way.

They are die hard Webb fans too and will vote for him.

I am just going to dismiss your characterization of Webb because there is really no way for me to disprove your view or for you to disprove mine, my parents' or my friends'. I file it myself under "you really wish he would say something that sounds like he's not a team player before the election." He won't, because he does work well with others...

As to your last sentence- ditto and ditto. As someone else said here- the point to politics is not to win the election, but to govern.

"President" Reagan also quintupled the national debt in 5 years; oversaw the illegal Iran-Contra affair, and sat there with a stupified look on his face while the sheeple felt good about his policies screwing them.

And your point is???

"The name calling and such" about Jim Webb and pretty much anything Democratic is way beyond "silly."  On your question as to why we support Jim Webb, I would note we have been laying out the case FOR Webb, in tremendous detail, for almost 10 months now.  You are a newcomer, however, so maybe you missed all that, including why we so strongly support Webb.  In short, he's an amazing man of tremendous integrity and courage who will make Virginia proud in the US Senate.  In many ways, I see him as a younger, more centrist version of John Warner - another former Navy Secretary.  In contrast, if I were a conservative, I'd be utterly embarrassed by George "Macaca" Allen.  As a Progressive, I simply find him appalling in every way.

I can actually tick them off and why they are important to me:

1) a woman's right to choose - this is important to me because it is basically right and I have a daughter. I would NEVER want her to have an abortion, but that is ultimately her decision not mine. Jim Webb agrees.
2) The government's authority stops at my front door, unless it has a compelling reason to come in. Jim Webb is against the NSA's illegal wiretapping of my phone. I have understood this from the inside, what the congress allows bush to get away with now is criminal.
3) Liberty from corporate oppression- a new type of libertarian, who is someone with Jim Webb's sensibilities- protects individuals from large corporations by sensibly regulating them. Regulation is NOT a bad word, it is necessary and right.
4) Stem cell research. It is not abortion. It is right. Jim Webb supports it. George Allen does not.
5) Raising the minimum wage. It is right and moral for society to require a living wage for all citizens. It creates more jobs- this is absolutely proven, not the opposite. It frees capital and puts money into the system, vs. locking it away in intangible investments. Jim Webb supports this, George Allen does not.

I can and will go on, but I have given you enough time. You post platitudes here, I do not. Those are real issues. Those are Jim Webb's real stances on those issues.

I am a volunteer for Webb's campaign because I love where he stands on the issues and I love his life story, his writing and his courage.

You say that you don't like name calling, yet you support a Felix Allen, a man who singled out another person in public, called an ethnic slur, and then insulted by welcoming him to American.

I just find that "conservatives" like yourself like to coddle racists way too much.

And conservatism has nothing to do with racism, if you look at the core.

Yet for some reason, you guys in the Republican Party love forgiving racist speech.

You say that you are a "blackamerican". Yet racism is not an important issue for you?

So, why do you coddle racists?

I do not know if Macaca is even a word or an insult, but I will take others word for it. What got me was the s--- eating grin as Allen said Welcome to America to an all white crowd. It is not if that was racist, IT WAS DEGRADING another person of a different race. That arragant superiority Allen protrays. Like riding a horse in a parade so no one can get close to him. No matter what he says he stands for, he could never convince me he is serious and sincere.
It reminds me of the 2004 Republican convention, where Bush laid out his program for improving education and when he presented his budget after the elction education was the first place he cut funds. Allen 97% equals another Bush.

You dodged the question. I will put it in bold for you so that you can answer it:

Why do Republicans coddle racists?

Allen insulted this man and made it clear that it was because he wasn't white. He called a dark skinned man a monkey.

This is not racist to you?

Why do Republicans coddle racists?

Allen used race to win the laughs of the white audience. It was Allen who used the race card. So,

Why do Republicans coddle racists?

How do you feel about the noose that Allen had hanging from a tree in front of his office. You know, Virginia, a tree, noose; it sort of remind people of lynching, doesn't it?
This doesn't bother you as a "black" man? How about it bothering you as an ethical man? So,

Why do Republicans coddle racists?

Now after you answer that question, please answer this:

You say that you agree with Felix "Bush 2.0" Allen. Please tell me what exactly you like about him.