So, you want to talk about catnip? Talk. Do it here. Now.

Who's the latest target of the New But definitely Not Improved Troll Patrol over at dkos?

Me.

Take a look in the comments here.

The genesis of this shitstorm?

I had the audacity to state (back on Feb 24th) that I'd rather see an educated non-voter than an uneducated voter. [I made the same comment back in the 90s to a local, liberal radio talk show host and he used it in his promos for a week after that - not because it contained any shock value but because I was a regular caller he had interviewed in person once about human rights abuses. He respected my opinions and later became (and still is) an elected official*. Are votes important to him? Sure. But he understood exactly what I meant because we live in Conservative Hell.]

* Note to Deoliver47 whose new hobby is doing "research" about me using Google: the story I just shared will not be found online so that one's a dead end.

Anyway, here's how all of this then spiraled out of control. (You will note that I didn't say anything about anybody's race, creed, colour, religion, sexual identity or popcorn-flavour preference in the above comment).

I'd rather see neither. (6+ / 0-)

but at least the voter is standing up and contributing to the process.

this isn't professional sports. most people don't HAVE to be mere spectators.

by mallyroyal on Thu Feb 24, 2011 at 10:27:58 AM MST
____

you're implying... (2+ / 0-)

...that non-voters are merely spectators and that they don't contribute anything to democracy. That is not necessarily true.

by catnip on Thu Feb 24, 2011 at 10:33:52 AM MST
____


I don't know how else to put how I feel (5+ / 0-)

about the American nonvoter withought degenerating into insults. truly.

by mallyroyal on Thu Feb 24, 2011 at 10:35:46 AM MST

___

"feel" is the key word there (2+ / 0-)

Try thinking about why some people don't vote and how they still contribute to democracy.

by catnip on Thu Feb 24, 2011 at 10:43:07 AM MST

___

See anything about race there? Nope? That's because it wasn't the issue - until some people made it THE issue. If you follow the thread, you'll see that it diverged into 2 topics which both had the same result: accusing me of being a racist.

The first divergence was made by those who insisted that people who died in wars died for the right to vote. I disagreed. I said people died for freedom - including the right not to vote.

Let me insert the bleedingly obvious here: did the protesters in Egypt and elsewhere recently die "for the right to vote"? Seems to me those Egyptians already had that right even when Mu was still the dictator. No. They died for freedom. That's a pretty simple point, don't you think? But no, when I said to dkos yanks that people died for freedom, that became an affront to African-American soldiers somehow. I'm "culturally insenstive", apparently. (Just another phrase for "racist").

The second divergence from that conversation? I made the mistake of telling mallyroyal (an AA kossack) to "think" instead of "feel". I was immediately jumped on with this:

well you know.... (6+ / 0-)

I only voted for Obama because he's black.

I didn't think about his policy position just like most AA didn't. That's why he has such a high approval ratings from us unthinking AA.

I must try some of that THINKING catnip suggests, but then again being an unthinking AA is so much easier.

;-)

by sephius1 on Thu Feb 24, 2011 at 03:21:38 PM

Had I said anything about anybody's race? No.

Ironically, mallyroyal (the person I was accused of being racist against - along with all other AAs) posted this yesterday:

finally some common sense in these comments. (3+ / 0-)

any rational person would read this from a POTUS to a former governor whose brother and father were previously POTUS.

too many kossacks allow their emotionalism to reign supreme while calling it rationale.

by mallyroyal on Sat Mar 05, 2011 at 10:50:31 AM MST

Did the same people accuse him of saying that AAs don't think? Of course not.

Let's fast forward through this clusterfuck:

1. Today I was accused 3 times of outing several people over at mcat's and elsewhere. Of course, the accusers didn't provide any links and one of the people I was accused of outing - slinkerwink - actually outed herself on dkos.

2. Consider this for a moment:

When you stated Sephius called you a racist (5+ / 0-)

which you continued to assert, you were calling him a racist.

Please - stop with the game playing.

by Deoliver47 on Sun Mar 06, 2011 at 10:06:10 AM MST

Here is my response:

let's change the wording... (3+ / 0-)

...to take a look at your preposterous leap of logic:

When you stated Sephius called you a cat (0+ / 0-)

which you continued to assert, you were calling him a cat.

Sorry but your Ps & Qs don't add up.

by catnip on Sun Mar 06, 2011 at 10:47:48 AM MST

Get what's going on there now? Yes. It is that obvious.

I'm not the first person they've done this too. Will I be the last? Stay tuned.

SO, if any of your Troll Patrol keyboard warriors want to take me on: do it here. Now. Be warned: anything goes here and nobody's going to cry for you if your feelings get hurt. The only rule here is: there are no rules.

A memorial for an old friend on Twitter

Ductape Fatwa, whose presence once graced numerous blogs until the fall of 2006, was one of the most thought-provoking writers I’ve had the privilege to know. He was arguably a force who brought many of us together, and who would no doubt have nurtured this blog had his life not been cut short just weeks after its inception. His ability to bring together people of diverse and sometimes divergent viewpoints and personalities is one I have often admired, and is one talent I wish I had. I digress however.

As a few of you may have sussed out, I do spend a little time on Twitter. I’ve had my account for ages, but really didn’t much use it. Anyway, I’ve been on a bit more as of late, and just for kicks decided to see if anyone had made mention of our old friend. Much to my surprise, I found Ductape Fatwa’s Twitter profile. Of course it’s not his per se. It is a memorial set up by someone else. Whoever set it up doesn’t seem to update it very often – seems he or she comes by about once a year since setting up the profile a couple years ago. I would love to thank whoever set it up. In the meantime, check it out, add yourself as a follower, and perhaps we can incite the person responsible to update it a little more often.

Quick update: if you don't have a Twitter account, you can access Ductape Fatwa's profile here.

Boo hoo hoo....a BBB closes

Maybe you've already seen the latest bombshell: Open Left, one of the Big Box Blogs, has shut its virtual doors. The reasoning behind the closure seemed a bit suspect, and Donklephant has pointed out just what stinks to high heaven:

The liberal blog Open Left suddenly announced today that they’ll stop posting content because…

we have gradually run out of money to maintain operations. It is a difficult decision, but we kept going for as long as we could.

But…

The site will not disappear, and all published content will remain online {…}

Wait…what?

Open Left is run on Soap Blox, which is a blogging platform and hosting service. The blog platform appears to be free and the most expensive hosting costs $40 a month. Sure, there are add ons, but Open Left doesn’t get a ton of traffic. They say they’re going to keep the website up, so it’ll cost $480 at the most every year. If you add in extra storage and overages every month, maybe it costs $1,000 a year…maybe.

So the idea that it was too costly to maintain the site is hard to swallow. Why didn’t they just throw a fundraiser? Think they could get 100 people to pitch in $10…or more? This is, after all, some of the same readers who rocketed Howard Dean from obscurity to the national stage because he was able to raise a ton of money online.

Bottom line…if they really cared about their readers they’d simply tell them that they can’t pay their writers anymore so content contributions will go down. And that’s assuming they paid their writers in the first place. Many political blogs simply invite people to blog and pay them zip. The platform, readership and communication is enough compensation. Also, I’ve been frank with all of you about content dropping in the down years between elections…and our hosting costs more than what they were paying. Do you see us going away?

Just saying…Chris Bowers and crew could easily keep that site up and post to it when they want to. But they’re not making any money. That’s the reason they’re quitting. Not very “open” if you ask me.

Amen! Strikes me that there would be plenty of regulars there who would gladly pony up some cabbage, if operating costs were an issue. But like other good corporatists, albeit of the "leftist" flavor, it's all about making the almighty profit - readers be damned.