Friday,June,04,2004

Cowardice at ConservativeGroundswell.com

The folks (including Ann Coulter) at ConservativeGroundswell (or is it Conservative Groundswell?) are dishonest ethically challenged cowards!

The folks at ConservativeGroundswell have a blog that attacks liberals in the typical fashion of Ann Coulter and Fox News, calling them names and hurling screeching tirades, composed of paralogistic reasoning and outright lies, at a frequency that only a dog can really hear.  In the usual “extreme right” way, they aren’t interested in irritations like facts or reality. Using a plank from what seems to be the Conservative Platform, they exercise a strategy of stifling dissenting opinion. The operators of ConservativeGroundswell don’t like to hear from people that might disagree with them, and certainly don’t want their “Groundswell” of support to be confused by hearing an opposing viewpoint…

They include a “comments” link for each story that they post. But WAIT just a minute here… If you want to have any hope of them including your comments on THEIR website, you better say something like, “mega dittos” or you don’t stand a chance of anyone but the “moderator” seeing your post.

Ann Coulter posted an article Tit for Tet on the ConservativeGoundswell website in which she tried (and failed) to make a case that we are winning the war in Iraq, but the “liberal media” is distorting the truth, and will ultimately cause us to lose (Just like Viet Nam according to Coulter). I know typical right-wing fantastical distortions—But, I, in an unusual episode of free time decided to click on the “comments” link and post a reponse pointing out what I thought were a couple of major flaws in her argument. I was respectful and polite.  After I was done typing, I clicked on the little “submit” button. A screen indicating that a moderator would have to approve my post appeared, and I went back to my random surfing.

A few days later I decided to check and see if there had been any reponses to my posting. When I got to the ConservativeGroundswell site, I was heartened to see that there was ONE comment listed for Ms. Coulter’s article. I clicked on the link and saw:

“Thank you for this story! I really enjoy your writing style; It’s exactly the way I’d write if I could write

Larry Pope”

I was SHOCKED! My nice, polite reponse to Ms. Coulter had disappeared! Instead, a comment posted a couple of days after mine had made it past the moderator!

Now I understand that the operator of a website decides what content to post and what to send to the bit bucket. However, when you call yourself “ConservativeGroundswell” (implying a grass roots movement of the people), and have a link that encourages readers of the site to comment, you have a reponsibility to be clear as to what your comments policy is. I think it’s downright deceptive and a LIE to have a comments link when the only comments you post are the ones that are in agreement with the authors. It’s as if the “Letters to the Editor” page of your daily newspaper only printed letters from readers that agreed with the editorials! This would be unacceptable, yet that is exactly what these folks at ConservativeGroundswell have done.

I think the presence of a “comments” link that is available to all, but only functional for those readers that agree with the viewpoints of the site is dishonest because it gives the impression that while comments are possible, the only comments received are positive, and that there are no arguments against the positions taken by the authors.

If you agree with me on this issue, please take a moment and link to this page (use the permalink listed below) so that we can get the word out about the people at ConservativeGroundswell.com. I’d love it if we can get this post to show up on the first page of google results if you search for ConservativeGroundswell! Help me get my reponse to Ann Coulter out to the impressionable masses!

Of course all my readers are welcome to respond to this post. That includes you, Ann Coulter, and the other CHICKENS at ConservativeGroundswell.com.

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