RedState vs. OrangeState

Submitted by gjohnsit on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 3:42pm

It looks like both sides are playing the exact same game.

Salem Media, owner of the influential conservative outlet RedState, froze the site on Friday and dismissed many of its writers.
Erick Erickson, the site's longtime editor who left in 2015, tweeted about what he called the "mass firing" on Friday morning.
"Very sad to see, but not really surprising given Salem's direction," he wrote. "And, finally, after all these years, they've turned off my account."
Multiple sources told CNNMoney that they believed conservative critics of President Trump were the writers targeted for removal.
"Insufficiently partisan" was the phrase one writer used in a RedState group chat.

"They fired everybody who was insufficiently supportive of Trump," one of the sources who spoke with CNNMoney said, adding, "how do you define being 'sufficiently supportive' of Trump?"

The rumors are true. There has been a mass firing at RedState, and those let go (including me) are all Trump critics. His supporters remain.

— Patterico (@Patterico) April 27, 2018

Hmmm. Banning dissenting and independent opinions.
That sounds vaguely familiar to me. Does it sound familiar to you?

After the primaries on March 15, “I will no longer tolerate malicious attacks on our presumptive presidential nominee or our presidential efforts,” Kos writes, speaking on behalf of everyone who uses the high-traffic site.
Ironically, almost exactly eight years before, during the presidential campaign in mid-March 2008, Kos banned criticism of Obama and insisted Clinton “doesn’t deserve fairness on this site” — but more on that in a moment.
...
Then the clincher: “Saying you won’t vote, or will vote for Trump, or will vote for Jill Stein (or another Third Party) is not allowed,” Kos declares.”If that’s how you feel, but have other places in which you can be constructive on the site, then keep your presidential feelings to yourself,” the Daily Kos despot states.
Kos also goes out of his way to ban “pessimism” and being a “Debbie-Downer,” substantive political concerns.
“Battle ‘the establishment’ where it makes sense,” the glorious leader declares. “So you are angry at the establishment? Go stick it to the man in downballot races where there good anti-establishment candidates on the ballot [sic].”
“We pick our battles, and in many places, the establishment will be our allies,” Kos openly admits.

After March 15, @DailyKos bans 3rd parties & harsh criticism of Clinton https://t.co/BjcAk82mma
ht @freedomrideblog pic.twitter.com/Quocgdk3Dw

— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) March 8, 2016

In early 2016, the GOS was ranked by Alexa as the 272nd biggest website in the United States.
Gee. I wonder how purges of blasphemers works out?

I'm sure that things will turn around at RedState just like they did at OrangeState.

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redstate

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Comments

Submitted by detroitmechworks on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 4:33pm

Scratch a Censor, find a Fascist.

The MSM will continue to claim that these two sites are the main sources of political discourse, naturally.

It is after all, about controlling the narrative. As long as they can make it the Reds Versus the Blues, the Emperor will continue to enjoy his sweetmeats and orgies.

—

I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 8:16pm

Blues versus Greens

@detroitmechworks

Scratch a Censor, find a Fascist. The MSM will continue to claim that these two sites are the main sources of political discourse, naturally.

It is after all, about controlling the narrative. As long as they can make it the Reds Versus the Blues,

Or the Blues Versus the Greens.....

Nika! Nika! Nika!

the Emperor will continue to enjoy his sweetmeats and orgies.

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by Azazello on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 9:25am

Drop your reds,

@thanatokephaloides
drop your greens and blues.
Nice to see somebody else remembers their Gibbon.

—

We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 5:27pm

Batting 1000 the past few days!

@Azazello

Drop your reds, drop your greens and blues.
Nice to see somebody else remembers their Gibbon.

And Dante, too! I've been batting 1000 the past few days!

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by jim p on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 11:39pm

Yep. The wish to control

@detroitmechworks the non-criminal manifestations of other people is at the root of censorship and fascism, both. And it really doesn't matter what the ideological patter justifying it is.

—

Orwell: Where's the omelette?

Submitted by snoopydawg on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 4:41pm

Hahahaha!

From 272 - 4000 in two years is some feat. Nothing like shooting your own blog for betting the house on the worst candidate evah!

After the ides of March any criticism of the Clinton Creature was considered right wing talking points even when I got the link from the same ones that are used there now.

I'm seeing comments there that say that those of us who were banned were probably just Russian bots and we were there to spread Russian talking points. Going all the way back to 2003. Yep. That has been Russia's long term plan for 15 years. Getting Americans to divide the country so that they could eventually get their puppet into the White House. Patient little buggers, ehh?

—

Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.

Submitted by gjohnsit on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 4:50pm

Yes and no

@snoopydawg

The decline wasn't quite that bad.

However, DKos is still declining during the current 2018 Democratic primaries!
What happens after November?

Which brings us back to this laugher of a 2017 headline.

Submitted by snoopydawg on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 5:14pm

Awe. I see what I got wrong

@gjohnsit

Thanks for pointing that out. Heh, I remember when I read that headline I did the same thing when I read the rankings today.

—

Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.

Submitted by gjohnsit on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 5:18pm

A little reminder from 2008

@snoopydawg
same link as above

Hillary Clinton “doesn’t deserve fairness on this site,” Kos proclaimed on 17 March 2008.
Why? Because she “fails the test of the guiding principles of this site” and has “no reasonable chance of victory.”

How the times have changed. Almost exactly eight years ago, in a piece titled “The Clinton civil war,” Kos effectively banned criticism of Obama and support for Clinton, arguing she and her supporters were “fomenting civil war in order to overturn the will of the Democratic electorate,” with the support of anti-democratic superdelegates (which he still opposes today; I’ll give him a point for consistency).

In response, pro-Clinton users declared that they were going on “strike” (cute, considering at their first date, longtime scabs Hillary and Bill crossed a picket line).

Kos countered the “strike” with similar language: “It’s a big Internet, so I hope they find what they’re looking for.”

Submitted by snoopydawg on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 7:28pm

Here's another blast from the past

@gjohnsit

A few snips

Hillary Clinton: Too Much of a Clinton Democrat?

Hillary Clinton has a few problems if she wants to secure the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. She is a leader who fails to lead. She does not appear "electable." But most of all, Hillary has a Bill Clinton problem. (And no, it's not about that. )

No better argument for why Trump is president

Hillary Clinton leads her Democratic rivals in the polls and in fundraising. Unfortunately, however, the New York senator is part of a failed Democratic Party establishment -- led by her husband -- that enabled the George W. Bush presidency and the Republican majorities, and all the havoc they have wreaked at home and abroad.

She certainly didn't change anything about her views since kos wrote that so it must have been something in him that changed for him to choose her over Bernie who was running on what the democrats used to stand for.

And therein lie Hillary Clinton's biggest problems. She epitomizes the "insider" label of the early crowd of 2008 Democratic contenders. She's part of the Clinton machine that decimated the national Democratic Party.

Kos is a weathervane and he flips as much as Romney does. Flip/flop ... anyone remember that video? I can't remember the name of it, but I can hum a few bars ...

—

Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.

Submitted by dkmich on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 7:07am

Kos follows the money.

@snoopydawg

He says what he is told to say when he is told to say. Has been this way since the bloggers took out Lieberman and Bubba took them to lunch at his digs in Harlem. The whole bunch of them rolled right over and shut up. They’ve all been good little soldiers ever since.

—

"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Submitted by snoopydawg on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 9:29pm

From your link to kos' Clinton diary

@gjohnsit

My how things have changed in just a few 8 years.

Given that candidate Clinton is a member of the DLC, voted to authorize the war, accepts federal lobbyist and PAC money, clearly thinks that a lot (if not most) states “don’t matter,” and epitomizes a 1990s style top-down form of doing politics, it’s no surprise that for all of 2007 Clinton never exceeded 11 percent support in the monthly Daily Kos users straw poll.

Voted for the war. This is why more people voted for Obama over her then. But this time her war vote was still in play for many of us as well as her Honduras and Libyan coup. But many of those same people were able to now overlook not only her Iraq war vote, but the two others, her use of her private email server, her tons of speeches in support of fracking and the TPP and of course her "pay to play" scheme.

If it had been a republican candidate who had been the SOS who used their private email server and their position to gobble up hundreds of millions of dollars, would her supporters think that was acceptable or would they feel like many of us did? I'm betting that they would have had a problem with it. Very sure in fact.

Now I'm willing to stipulate that on the consultant front, there's likely not much difference between the Obama and Clinton campaigns (I don't know if it's true, but I assume it is). But on everything else, Clinton fails the test of the guiding principles of this site, and of my first book, Crashing the Gate,

I wonder when he decided to build those Gates back up and then bar them from the inside?

—

Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.

Submitted by MrWebster on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 6:24pm

The censorship is not "official" but still at TOP

@snoopydawg Just scanning the headlines over time there seems to be very few "pro-progressive" diaries and attack Hillary and you get a time out. Not go along with the Russia hysteria and get insults or time outs. Basically a site dominated by very much entrenched by DNC Hillary supporters.

Submitted by snoopydawg on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 7:40pm

Attack any blue dawg over there

@MrWebster

and you get Tuffied! Big time blue dawg protectionist. "We need the blue dawgs because they will give us the majority when we need them to vote for our legislation." In other words ignore them when they vote with the republicans on bills that no democrat should even think about doing. Besides, how are we going to get a progressive elected in a red state? Hmm?

—

Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 10:35pm

Kos just effing shot himself

@snoopydawg

Hahahaha!

ROFL

From 272 - 4000 in two years is some feat. Nothing like shooting your own blog for betting the house on the worst candidate evah!

[video:https://youtu.be/XTGmTrQXrwg]

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by jim p on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 11:45pm

The Supreme irony being

@snoopydawg
"any criticism of the Clinton Creature was considered right wing talking points"

She had the most fervent right wing neocons supporting her. But you could be banned for calling her foreign policy "neocon, "

—

Orwell: Where's the omelette?

Submitted by snoopydawg on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 1:48am

I know, right?

@jim p

The guys who wrote the PNAC battle plan were afraid that Trump wouldn't be evil enough to continue their plans for the Middle East so they threw their eggs behind Hillary. Kagan and his wife, Vicky Nuland, the person behind the Ukraine coup, Billyboy Krystal and the rest of the gang were backing her. Guess who Hillary's SOS was probably going to be? Good ole Vicky. And why not? She definitely showed that she was bloodthirsty enough to do the job. Letting the new Nazis run wild during the Maiden Square affair proved that. Now what would have her supporters have said if she had done that? Probably still refuse to believe that Herheinous was a warmonger.

—

Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.

Submitted by Snode on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 5:02pm

Well, they're both selling a product

and to deliver a "clean" product they need to get rid of participants that don't conform to what they're selling. Orange pill sends out little "enforcers" to derail or mob threads, and discourage wrong thinking, and a choir to drown out potential troublemakers. I'm having to relearn the meaning of a lot of things because of the disinformation that's cannon there.

Submitted by gulfgal98 on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 5:18pm

Politics is reduced to a team sport

No critical thinking skills allowed. Rah, rah, rah...our team regardless of whether or not they even deserve our support. Markos said that with his Ides of March decree. I had not even looked at the site in some time until recently and OMG, it is so banal. Even worse than I remember it to be.

What I love about C99% is that we allow for all opinions as long as you can defend them and do it civilly. While we are not big, we do have people here who can actually think for themselves outside the black/white or red/blue duopoly. Just because we do not like one of those two sides presented to us, does not mean we like the other side either.

What we are seeing is that the range of acceptable discussion on any topic in this country is becoming narrower and narrower. We can look no further than Facebook deciding what is acceptable politically for its users based upon what Mark Zuckerburg, etal decide is "fake news." After all they are doing this for our own good.

Meanwhile we do have this small independent corner for critical thinking and good discussion on any topic, courtesy of our benevolent owner, JtC.

—

Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

Submitted by gjohnsit on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 5:34pm

Banal

@gulfgal98 @gulfgal98

I had not even looked at the site in some time until recently and OMG, it is so banal.

Good word. Boring is another good word.
It takes all I have just to scan over the titles. None of them sound even a little interesting.

As for team sport, check out this WashPost headline:
We must rally around Joy Reid

And from Just a week earlier: Joy Reid Is Quietly, Steadily, Stealthily Changing the Game for Women on TV

Submitted by MrWebster on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 6:49pm

Good word "banal". I would offer "Synaptic fatigue"

@gulfgal98 ....results in the temporary inability of neurons to fire and therefore transmit an input signal. It is thought to be a form of negative feedback ....

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 8:23pm

our benevolent site owner JtC

@gulfgal98

Meanwhile we do have this small independent corner for critical thinking and good discussion on any topic, courtesy of our benevolent [site] owner, JtC.

You notice that nobody ever refers to JtC as a "despot" like this writer did:

Then the clincher: “Saying you won’t vote, or will vote for Trump, or will vote for Jill Stein (or another Third Party) is not allowed,” Kos declares.”If that’s how you feel, but have other places in which you can be constructive on the site, then keep your presidential feelings to yourself,” the Daily Kos despot states.

"Tin pot" is more like it......

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by WIProgressive on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 9:14pm

I am so well recovered from that site

the title of this piece puzzled me. Orangestate? What's Orangestate I wondered? Happy I censored out that droning dribble. Too bad so many I know read it religiously.

—

O.k. When is the next meeting for the revolution?
-FuturePassed on Sunday, November 25, 2018 10:22 p.m.

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Thu, 05/03/2018 - 10:39pm

vigilance

@WIProgressive

I am so well recovered from that site the title of this piece puzzled me. Orangestate? What's Orangestate I wondered? Happy I censored out that droning dribble. Too bad so many I know read it religiously.

Most of us who still read it do so to keep an eye on the more nefarious members, like the founder/proprietor.

(How they stand it, I know not!)

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by WIProgressive on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 6:11am

Yes and good on you and those that do . I meant no disrespect

@thanatokephaloides to those that do. I just don't want to give him any clicks so me and others here rely on you folks for the updates. It saddens me how that place could have been such a force for the betterment of this country and people's lives but went to shit and shattered and scattered so many prolific thinkers and writers. And for what? Ego and money.

Anyway thanks for all you do for the cause!

—

O.k. When is the next meeting for the revolution?
-FuturePassed on Sunday, November 25, 2018 10:22 p.m.

Submitted by dkmich on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 7:19am

I never go there unless a link to something

@WIProgressive @WIProgressive

specific is included in a post somewhere. Years with no comments, tips, or clicks, and last I looked, I still had full bars. Don’t miss that place one bit. Next to be purged is Facebook. Hate that place.

—

"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Submitted by WIProgressive on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 8:23am

I started a Facebook page under the

@dkmich name of my now deceased (and dearly missed) dog. True confession mainly to creep on my kids! Stated to collect the friends but once the election cycle heated up I ended up unfollowing all but about 6 entities: my sister, 2 kids, the Humane Society, our local Alderman and a Local pub to see their weekly specials. The youngins don't use that platform anyway they like Instagram and Snapchat. Husband used it to look for stuff to buy! Again like so much other technology could have really had a positive impact on society. It's nothing more then a Capitalistic spy tool. Sadly I am still addicted to Twitter!

—

O.k. When is the next meeting for the revolution?
-FuturePassed on Sunday, November 25, 2018 10:22 p.m.

Submitted by Jen on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 12:00pm

One good thing

One good thing that came from that orange site - this site.
I lurked for many years over there. I can remember when Bernie himself posted during Bush Jr's term. I made an account there but never posted anything because some of the people there were scary. I didn't want to get ganged up on because of a grammar error or a different opinion.
I was also there when the Purge happened. I had correctly predicted (to my daughter) who the next president would be on the day Her Heinous won the primary. So when the purge happened, I left also because all the writers I loved were gone.
I went back there on election night because I wanted to watch what happened when the orange turd won. It was...amusing.
But I missed the writers that were gone and didn't know what happened to any of them. So for a while I didn't have any site that I found worth my time to read.
Then in November or December of last year, I found the Kossacks for Sanders Reddit. I don't really like Reddit that much so I mainly just checked once every few days to see if anything interested me. That's where I saw an essay linked to here. The essay was by OPOL and once I realized who that was and once I started recognizing a few more names, I knew I had found a new favorite place.
There's just one thing I haven't figured out yet. What do GOS and TOP stand for? I keep saying gross orange site and the orange page. I don't think I have either one right.

Submitted by eyo on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 12:11pm

What do GOS and TOP stand for?

@Jen Great Orange Satan and The/That Other Place... for those who won't speak "his" name, kos.

gross orange site and the orange page

LOL yes! Those are good too.

peace

Submitted by FuturePassed on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 11:30pm

If you speak

@eyo
or write the name of TOP's owner 3 times in 24 hours he appears in front of you from a puff of smoke with great wailing and gnashing of teeth. Careful, the wailing and gnashing might be you.

Submitted by dkmich on Sat, 05/05/2018 - 7:13am

Now this would have been worth the trip.

@Jen

I went back there on election night because I wanted to watch what happened when the orange turd won. It was...amusing.

Sorry I missed it. We could have created an open thread here to follow the meltdown over there. It would have been fun.

—

"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Submitted by edg on Fri, 05/04/2018 - 12:49pm

RedState

RedState experienced a huge fall in readership about 5 weeks after the 2016 election as the #NeverTrumpers took over the site. Moderators started banning anyone that criticized a #NeverTrump essay and readership continues falling. From a purely business perspective, Salem had to do something to rescue the property, and getting rid of the most rabid #NeverTrumpers is probably a good start.