There's this fine line between true debate between people of opposing viewpoints and absolute anarchy. That line is often crossed here when one side's arguments stray so far from truth and logic and no authority steps in and takes charge and put up the BS flag. While I commend Robert for wanting as little interaction as possible for free and open speech, we have become deluged by what other sites would consider nothing more than spammers and trolls.

When I interact in real life (when a person must actually look you in the eye and keep a straight face) with folks of opposite ideology, there's a degree of self-restraint in them where they know they can't take that extra step and lie to your face or completely distort the facts of the case. Were they to engage in the type of rhetoric we get here, the name calling and labeling, the implications of some communist conspiracy, the flat out racism of guys like Lee, they would know there could be some serious price to pay. Some of that stuff, if said to some guy sitting at a bar stool next to you, might end up with your ass on the floor and a busted jaw.

Yet, without the rules and restraints you see on major blogging sites for this type of behavior, the anonymity of the internet lets these jokers get away with murder and hijack threads away from the purpose of the original author. I can't tell you how many times I've clearly addressed some issue or responded to someone's post only to have one of our right wing propagandists jump into the middle and send the conversation off into some unrelated and contentious side trip.

Now if the thread was on Flame, I'm ok with that being the place for this "grand social experiment" I keep hearing about. The rules there clearly state that for all intents and purposes there are no rules. If I jump into a debate there I know that kidney punches are clearly in bounds. I can spar with the best of them.

Obviously though that's not where the damage is being done. The manipulations often begin on CE, community, or Off-topic where there's a built in assumption of truth and legitimacy of message. Somehow a few purveyors of propaganda, which anyone willing to spend a minute of so looking at sources and asking the basic question "WTF? That doesn't sound right." can clearly rebut, gain respect and admiration because of either their writing volume or the few cutesy and homey posts they make in between. All I imagine when I see folks falling for that is why I'm not in the snake oil business.

ER and I have similar backgrounds. We both have military backgrounds where we encountered extremes of character under bizarre authoritarian rule where propaganda was rife in our daily lives. We've dealt with characters like these all our lives so it's tough to sit back and watch them spout out some obvious crap and have people we respect responding back to them as if there's any validity in their overall argument just because they put a tiny spattering of actual fact in amongst the steaming pile. It's what con artists have always done and anyone with a rich life experience and a few burned fingers along the way should have learned how to spot them quickly. Obviously that talent is not well developed or people like Limbaugh and Beck wouldn't command the audiences they do.

Jumping into a section of America where one gets to watch the dynamics of this dance is extremely frustrating to those of us that get it. It makes you lose faith in the country as a whole and worry about the future of your children and others you leave behind.

If this place is some "grand experiment", the results we're seeing are depressing and I understand completely why ER and others have to walk away from it. I may join him.

Art