Monday, November 13, 2006

Getting Wired



How'm I supposed to get any ridin' done? - Bob Dylan

Lately I've been feeling more like an administrator and web designer than a blogger, and the damn thing is I'm not very good at either of them. Maybe I'm overstretched. No - I am overstretched, and not doing as much of what I really care to do here. But this will pass - I'm heading towards the light, not the light - and the effort, I believe, will be worth it.

Here's the gateway page to RI's new domain. Be unsparing in your comments: it's subject to redesign by people who know what they're doing, but at least it's finally live. The forum is much improved, and has grown a lot in the last week by an influx of new members. And I'm genuinely excited about some new RI features I hope to roll out in coming weeks that should prove great enhancements to your experience of the site.

A new post is in the works. While I wrap my head around that, please consider this an open thread.

70 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chin up, Jeff! I always appreciate your hard work. Hey, at least you're not sick and trying to sort through all this techno mumbo-jumbo.

Did you hear that there has been an investigation of Rummy, Gonzalez, and Tenet (among others) opened in Germany?

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1557842,00.html

11/13/2006 12:52:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Maybe jumping the gun a bit, but I'm still getting the "Coming Soon" page at your new site.

11/13/2006 12:53:00 PM  
Blogger Jeff Wells said...

Maybe jumping the gun a bit, but I'm still getting the "Coming Soon" page at your new site.

I think it's a cookies issue. I was finding the same thing in Firefox for a while last night, though it appeared immediately in Explorer.

11/13/2006 01:00:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

If you're blocking me, at least be man enough to annouce it as such.

11/13/2006 01:00:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Congratulations Jeff,

The new pages look great.

I've been reading the great "Towers of Deception, the media cover-up of 9/11" by Barrie Zwicker who is also Canadian. I've laughed at silly jokes about Canadians in the past and thought of Canada as cold, uptight and boring but my view has shifted lately because of you, Barrie and other Canadian writers and thinkers who I've come to love and appreciate for your life giving infusions of words. Thanks for everything!

I want to thank you also as a mind control survivor for helping to bring awareness to this issue. This was the first forum outside of survivor environments where people discussed mind control in an intelligent and compassionate way. Thanks, Thanks and Thanks!

11/13/2006 01:01:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The psychic landscape is now divided into two parts: those who felt a heavy load lifted from their hearts by last week's election result, and those who didn't.

With James Wolcott, I felt as though the sun felt sunnier, and the rain rainier. And I am no Democrat, but a registered Republican! But after 5 years of outrage piled upon outrage, what better news could we wish for? I know, I know...there's not a dime's worth of difference between the two parties, the financial elites still control everything...but still, would you really prefer the Republicans to have kept control of the House and Senate? Wouldn't even the gloomiest and doomiest of you admit that you felt a bit less paranoid cruising the net over the weekend, or discussing politics with friends?

Don't you see that the dawn has come, and the Night of the Living Dead has ended?

It surprises me to find so many naysayers on this board, who don't understand what a profound sea change occurred last week. Today Pelosi is putting up Murtha as majority leader, and there is talk of Cheney being next in the tumbril: am I foolish to think that this might signal the end of the Bush crime family? All James Baker can do now is run damage control, see how badly Junior has wrecked the family wagon, and make out the insurance report: can you really imagine another Bush being elected to office?

The world is changing, and the old imperial politics, dependent as it was for so long (at least 100 years) on carefully propagandized masses, is evaporating. The internet allows too many of the unwashed to see behind the curtain. Humpty-Dumpty fell off the wall, and Katie Couric ain't going to put him back up again.

More and more, through the power of reading and learning, and through the brilliant use of irony, the people's voice will be determinative. When the fearmongers say boo, too many of us will simply laugh in their faces. An exciting moment to witness!

To Jeff: Thanks for your hard work, but (ahem)... do we have to stare at that stupid "all-seeing eye" everytime we visit? It signals ... I don't know ... "lose all hope, ye who enter." It coopts a symbol THEY feel is very important, but rather than media-jamming it, or satirizing it, you simply transmit the fearfulness inherent in the icon.

Why not a picture of yourself, shoveling snow?
(just kidding)

11/13/2006 01:08:00 PM  
Blogger Jeff Wells said...

If you're blocking me, at least be man enough to annouce it as such.

Not blocking you, but your first comment - the first comment - was that you find women's fencing erotic. Your second was, too. Perhaps I should have been clearer: an open thread isn't an open invitation to troll. Remarks such as yours, especially early in a thread, tend to hijack conversation and discourage serious comment.

11/13/2006 01:13:00 PM  
Blogger Jeff Wells said...

do we have to stare at that stupid "all-seeing eye" everytime we visit?

You make a good point. The design's very provisional; I'd like to consider revisions that illustrate our power at least as much as theirs.

11/13/2006 01:17:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Recommended front page image to support the motto "What you don't know..." might be something as mundane as a map of Iran surrounded by US forces and the gateway to the Caspian Sea oil and gas prize.

After all, this is what almost all other issues we discuss is really about.

This site can alternate between detail-obsessive and disconnectedly vague and an Anchor like this would help both site vets and newcomers.

Thanks for being here.
It's the Thought that counts.

11/13/2006 01:32:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

So, let me get this straight. I've been physically threatened on a past thread, and I never heard a peep from you admonishing the individual who perpetrated it, and I've been insulted by sniping Anony's, relentlessly, yet no block of posts there, either, but you block the aforementioned, which is meant to be light-hearted and fun? Or is that too dirty for your pure mind, Jeff, but Dick Cheney's large cock is fair game?

Does it say somewhere that the comments section should remain serious at all times? Is there no room for humor at your site? Are you going upscale, as I surmized you might?

Do you have proof that such a comment will discourage serious conversation? Can you really call what is posited in the Comments section a conversation?

My opinion of you just dropped, precipitously. You claim to adhere to a philosophy of Intellectual Honesty, and you pull a contradictory stunt like that, meaning you allow the aforementioned to transpire in the Comments Section, unabated, yet you block me on something as superfluous as that.

It was nice while it lasted....but keep in mind, folks, ultimately these places out in Cyberspace become what they despise in society at large. You'll find yourself creating a closed offed, walled little community walking around in straight jackets you fail to see.

See you, Richard, for good this time. You were one of the few honest ones here.

For those of you who have questioned why I don't get a blog of my own.....well, I'd rather spend my time with my wife and two children.

I understand you have a wife and a very young child, Jeff. How do you justify finding the time to block my superfluous comment, considering? Also, how do you justify upholding all this considering that sacrifice of time to your family....and without recompense? A number of folks have made inquiries about donating through paypal, and it always seems to be later is the answer. I know I couldn't justify the added time and expense of all this and consider myself a good Father. I post between duties and obligations at work and at limited intervals in the evenings and on weekends. Anymore than that would be unjustified...so it's a mystery to me how you do it, or why you do it.

Is it really altruistic, as some claim, and you seem to imply, or is it selfish and self-promoting, and you use the former as a guise? Or, is it something more nefarious, and you don't need funding cuz you have a source, already? I mean, we are here to try to connect dots, aren't we? I just mentioned a few dots I have seen and I am attempting to connect them.....always a persistant danger when you engage in Rigorous Witchhunts.

Adios Friends.

Enjoy the reaminder of the ride.

11/13/2006 01:44:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Jeff, you're the imagiste, not me, but what about the guy blocking the tank column at Tianemen? Photoshopped in nice pastels? Too trite? Yeah, I guess so.

A WTC burning shot is probably not comprehensive enough.

Rodin's 'The Thinker?' Too etiolated. What about the all-seeing eye superimposed on Alfred E. Neumann's face? Copyright restrictions? Maybe a picture of Albert Hoffman, or Huxley, or...well, I won't say it.

Are there any shots of a young Dylan meeting Richard Nixon?

It's a good question: what symbol best conveys a sense of human liberty and fraternity (without getting sectarian)?

Ah, I've got it ... a guillotine! With Cheney's trademark snarl.

Okay, okay, just kidding. Sauron is still active in Mordor.

What about a shot of a tanned, handsome John Kennedy, an Atlantic breeze ruffling his hair?
Reverse, at least symbolically, the evil they accomplished (heck, almost the 43rd anniversary) by projecting him as the icon of a "new Camelot."

You'd get the Catholic vote!

Or, there's always Borat.

11/13/2006 01:54:00 PM  
Blogger Jeff Wells said...

You heard from me because I just happened to be here, and because two hours' sleep lowers my threshold for nonsense.

I've been occupied the past few days and haven't read the comment to which you refer. As I wrote, I'm stretched thin, so right now my attention is intermittent. My advice to anyone who sees objectionable comments is that they email me.

11/13/2006 01:58:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Cheers! This past week I've been discovering the exact same thing, running a website at even a medium level of quality is a full-time job, in fact several full-time jobs. You're doing great, though.

One thing I remind myself when I feel like I'm slacking is "the RI factor" --- Jeff, you have so much quality material in the archives on here that's plenty to keep anyone busy. Just because there's not a new headline on the main site every day, you're still providing a huge and valuable service, thanks for that.

11/13/2006 02:00:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The site looks good Jeff. Keep it up.

If you have the stomach for this discussion, which I barely do right now, China has made serious diplomatic and economic moves in its want for natural resources. According to the findings of a U.S. congressional commitee chaired by Representative Christopher Cox (R-CA), Israel has "offered significant technology cooperation to the People's Republic of China, especially in aircraft and missle development", including helping China build its current F-10 fighter jet. According to Asia Times Online, Israel also provided China its Star-1 cruise missle technology, which incorporates U.S. stealth technology.

China and Russia did launch their first ever joint military exercises on a China penninsula. An eight day event called Peace Mission 2005. This reported in the China Daily on 8-18-2005. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said in Washington," We expect that whatever activities take place would be ones that would further what we believe is everybody's shared goal of stability and peace in that region. We would hope that anything that they do is not something that would be disruptive to the current atmosphere in the region."

Charles Smith reported on Worldnetdaily.com in October 2000:

Defense analysts agree that the U.S. is fully a decade behind Russia in high-speed cruise missle designs. Russia currently deploys and exports the supersonic SS-N-22 Moskit cruise missle, NATO codenamed "Sunburn." The SS-N-22 is considered the most lethal anti-ship missle in the world, and flies at over 2.5 times the speed of sound only a few feet from the surface of the water. These missles were obtained by China, and America seems to be defenseless agaisnt them.

The U.S. military is far ahead of China in military experience, tactics, training, and overall level of defense spending. America is superior in command control, communications, computers, and intelligence. America is far ahead in terms of its ability to project military strength far from the homeland. But China's inevitable re-emergence as a great power is a serious problem. If America does not acquiesce there may be a war. I realize that this is the issue at hand. If America does not then war is the alternative.

11/13/2006 02:09:00 PM  
Blogger iridescent cuttlefish said...

Following Oarwell, how's about using the image, photo-shopped eerily, of that Ashcroft-cloistered lady of justice closing her eyes while taking off the offensively puritannical garb in which she has been encased? As metaphor, it would work on several levels, some immediately assimible, some only arriving after some thought...

Truth, nakedness, and change are all compelling subjects our slowly growing knowledge and our vast, occasionally rigourous intuition.

11/13/2006 02:17:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Jeff you could post Chinese Navy sailors on their ship waving to the camera on an U.S. Seaport. Or maybe kangaroos with jet propulsion devices strapped on their backs flying through space with boxing gloves on. Symbolic of the space wars. Like zany, wild stuff man.

11/13/2006 02:40:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A new blog and this one without Shrub! Yippeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

11/13/2006 02:57:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ding Dong the Witch is Dead??

11/13/2006 02:58:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think the majority of you are too tough on Shrub. He is very clever, funny, and quite sarcastic, which is my kind of humor. He is not afraid to make waves and to even support arguments he knows are unpopular. That's the makings of a great humorist/philosopher. Jeff, I'm a big fan of yours, but you are only as good as the community that surrounds you. Maybe you should try to get Shrub back, even if he isn't everyone's favorite. At least he was provacative, which is more that I can say for the Anonies above me here in the comments.

11/13/2006 03:52:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

On the all-seeing eye...
How about tossing an eye patch over it, or making the eyelid closed, or even a stick poking into it? A stick in the eye of the elite?

11/13/2006 04:05:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Crikey Shrub - take a look at the new domain and you'll see that Jeff has the cap extended. Your innuendo about funding is tawdry, my friend. You can do better. Your comments on parenting are also out of line, and not just because of the ugly self-righteousness you employ in the course of insulting our host here. Everybody knows that after Jeff, the busiest entity at RI is Mr. Shrubaggedon; family-man extraordinaire, model employee, and thoughtful pundit.

Drop the gloves dummy, get over your little snit-fit and come back. Sometimes you're worth reading.

Jeff - congrats on all the new stuff.

11/13/2006 04:07:00 PM  
Blogger Qlipoth said...

Congratulations on the move, Jeff.

If you're considering new graphics, maybe you should indeed drop the all-seeing eye, which has become a bit of a cliché, and which may be offputting to many. I'd suggest replacing it with a photo of the Pentagon MASCAL exercise, which is still under-publicised:

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/7/72/200px-PentagonMASCAL.jpg

Then you'd have the bombs dropping straight out of the wrecked Pentagon's bottom, so to speak.

And that photo of John Kerry with Bush senior in the Stars-and-Stripes jacket seems to me to encapsulate the nature of "opposition" in US politics.

But what the hell do I know about graphics? Thanks for your unique and inimitable blog, which I link to so often it's embarrassing.

Best,

Bismillah

11/13/2006 05:12:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Many have said...

'do we have to stare at that stupid "all-seeing eye" everytime we visit?'

How about a warding sign instead? The "Eye of Horus" has a cool look. This link has a collection of some nice evil eye symbols, and you can ignore the commerce if you just look at the one page.

http://www.evileyeclothing.com/beliefs.htm

My personal opinion is that you already have some VERY fine images from the last 2+ years. Save yourself time and pain and use some of them on your new home and topic pages.

11/13/2006 05:59:00 PM  
Blogger Sounder said...

It is a very human thing to draw inferences larger than the evidence allows. Operators that control and shape evidence play with this atavistic tendency.

Evidence can be made to look conclusive, and yet in fact it is a set-up. Our whole culture and society is a set-up, necessary in my opinion.

It is in figuring out the nature of the set-up that we will overcome the stupidities of current expressions within our world.

11/13/2006 07:22:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

alreet Jeff

Been around for a while now and this is a positive development so don't sweat it about the teething troubles. Keep on keepin on.

gnosticheresy

11/13/2006 07:34:00 PM  
Blogger Jeff Wells said...

you have exceeded the CPU quota jeff

Retry. I've see that message before and gotten back in with a couple of attempts. I'm not seeing it now.

I do need to speak with my provider, though, to see about clearing that up error message.

11/13/2006 09:13:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is my first comment here. I have been reading posts and comments for a few months. I just read a couple of posts on the discussion board about the possibility of humans being infected with alien entities, with references to Castenada and the early Gnostics. Isn't alien infection the basic premise of Scientology? And one can be cleared of it by giving them vast sums of money? How are the ideas different from each other (other than spending vast sums of money to be cleared). Although this comment may sound somewhat flippant, it is a serious, or at least sincere, question. Thanks.

11/13/2006 09:28:00 PM  
Blogger foist lastus said...

Doesn't scientology infect stupid actors with contiguous Satanism?

Bad joke.

I am glad others have commented on the appreciation for the supporting art. What about a slideshow of all the magical images, with a hpyerlink option back to the associated articles? This might be too much to ask for now, but maybe in the future?

11/13/2006 11:21:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Where do some of these idiots come off questioning Jeff as a father? Jesus Christ people do you have no shame?

11/14/2006 12:08:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

When I read Shrub attacking Jeff Wells, I was thinking someone stole his name and was trying to make him look bad. Hey, if someone like that wants to go, please do not try to talk them out of it.

I, too, think the dollar bill eye is annoying. There's that stupid Fintan Dunne website where there is the eye action also. Stupid people who post there tend to have the eyes in their avatars. Fintan Dunne called Jeff Wells a CIA fake. That website over there has to be the stupidest yawn of them all with plenty of doom and gloom debunking conspiracy yuck. That place is a mess.

Get rid of the eye. There are a lot of hippies out there who agree with an earlier poster here that we are sick of superimposed realities.

Please don't ban me. I didn't know we couldn't call someone disinfo. The other day I posted here about Shgrub maybe being disinfo. To me, anyone who consistently derails or hogs thread is either a paid troll with a psy op agenda or is someone with shall we say.... narcisistic personality disorder?

I'm not trying to slam the guy. But what if he deserves slamming? He just attacked this website's owner. That kid should apologize. Otherwise I wonder if he is someone who just continually manufactures fake internet identities due to craziness or a paycheck. OK, I'll leave Shrub out of this. But these people exist, do they not?

And don't they seem to be everywhere or at least trying to be everywhere, like with HuffPo.

Hey, if I'm banned, I'm banned. This is my second post here. Peace.

11/14/2006 12:55:00 AM  
Blogger Civic Center said...

Dear Jeff: Congratulations on your evolution. One of the anonymous commenters made a great suggestion, which is that since you already have created so many great, iconic title Photoshops over the last year, it may be time to just recycle some of them, since so many of the stories are just variations on certain themes.

Again, good luck taking your next step.

11/14/2006 01:06:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

*in memoriam*

[sotto voce: 'is this thing on? ok..']

[aloud] well, well, well, friends...i never would've thought that ol' shrubby would up and hurl himself overboard just because he couldn't start off a red-letter thread with some queer sexist comment about women fencers...how bizarre! and then to insinuate--nay! accuse!--jeff of being a bad father and getting funding from "them" just takes the cake--my god! i mean, he *asked* to know if he was getting blocked, didn't he? seems ol' shrub couldn't "handle" the "truth" he was always blabbing about! [crowd chuckles.] and didn't *really* believe in the equality of the sexes either, my friends. just goes to show that the preacher is always the exception that proves the rule....

[clears throat. again aloud] shrubby, we hardly knew thee, truly: you were more infantile than i could've imagined if that's all it took for you to quit trolling at RI and to go out grievously insulting your host! atrocious! scandal! [ad-libs] i'd go ahead and block you--and just you--for those last comments, just for good measure. [appeals to audience.] i mean, it shouldn't matter, should it? he won't be back anyway, he said....

[shuffles cards. coughs.] shrub, you were our resident Stewie--articulate, bright and deliciously sarcastic, but in the end just a big baby...oh, wait! that's right--stubby or shrewbie or whatever didn't EVER watch tv, now did he? ok, so that'll fall flat...[searching notes. sotto voce: 'damn! i can't use *any* of these!']

[leans into mic, ad-libs.] jeff: love the eye. keep the eye.

[clears throat.] anyway! s'long, shreb! adieu! ciao! we'll see you again when you start jonesing for some old fashioned RI, i'm sure....

[lifts glass.] grubby is dead! long live shreb..er..stubb..uhh..stewby!

[toasts and taps. all hands bury the dead. silence, then band begins to raucously play "With Plenty of Money and You".]

*finis*

11/14/2006 01:24:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Five'll getcha ten he'll be back, Jeff. Something tells me mr. Shrubageddon has a real need for the kind of interaction he's able to engage in at R.I. Reminds me a little of a woman friend of mine--the only ways she knows to interact with people is to either get pissed off at them or make them pissed off at her. The one thing she can't do is just keep still. So, though the "handle" might change, I'm sure we'll recognize Shrubs sunny disposition and cogent commentary again before long.

Burkie

11/14/2006 01:44:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Jeff -
Congrats on the new site.
I will now be unstinting. I have enjoyed, immensely, unsettelingly (sp?), your blog for a couple years now.

Specifically, the very bland "Blogger" interface, so nice, and gentle. And out of the text comes some really trenchant and always interesting, and frequently disturbing ideas. Connections that border on the revolutionary: Connections that, when I read them, I am always glad someone has made.

The photo illustrations are somehow always spot on as well.

The new site does not need to identify the heft of your ideas in it's design or graphics, those are in the writing/blog.

Keep it clean and simple, as 'transparent' as possible. Text/blog most prominent, easy-to-read font.

Best of luck and I look forward to reading your insights for a long while to come.

11/14/2006 05:16:00 AM  
Blogger ericswan said...

JJ..I'm sure the graphics will move with the message. I would appreciate a couple of changes to the blog before you pull your tent pegs here. Double post your critique to both sites..ie your website and the blog. Pull anonymous posting and fix the "time" so that it indicates a date.

You are in the real world now. Congratulations.

11/14/2006 05:36:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well, I for one will shed no tears for the exit of Shrub. I'll never forget how he twisted what I wrote, got mad at me and went off like a little kid in a tantrum. It was really bizarre. Whenever Jeff kept a post up too long it always degenerated into personal attacks and off-subject rantings and ravings about whose dick was bigger. Hopefully, that will come to an end with all the changes around here.

I say hopefully because a junkie like Shrub just can't quit cold turkey. I'll light a candle for him...

11/14/2006 10:16:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Jeff, please don't use the eye. You're an artist with photoshop. Let your imagination design something unique or use one of your other creative designs.

Also, I have been skipping over everything "Shrub" writes simply because his ego is boring.

11/14/2006 11:56:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A tip of the hat to you Shrub. Anyone one who can raise such bile from the "counter aggression with love" crowd deserves some kind of an award.
Here's my favorite so far:
"I'll never forget how he twisted what I wrote, got mad at me and went off like a little kid in a tantrum."

Never forget it, huh?
& they tell you to get a life.

What an effing hoot.

I'm forced to dip back into Ambrose Bierce to find my definition of the typical RI windbag.

HYPOCRITE, n.
One who, professing virtues that he does not respect, secures the advantage of seeming to be what he depises.

Toodles Shrub, it was fun while it lasted.

11/14/2006 01:29:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Richard,

Since you did quote me...

Point of clarification: I'm not part of that crowd you mentioned ("counter aggression with love") and I remember a lot of the details of my life, thank you, not just what some guy on a blog said to me in an imaginary tiff. What he said was memorable only because it was so freaking strange. You'd remember it if it happened to you, too (well, I'd hope so).

Will you be joining your friend?

11/14/2006 01:44:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Just for the record...

There is nothing more tawdry and trite or unbecoming in any forum than some people's inclination to simply talk "about" others rather than directly to them.

To post their worthless gossip and petty insinuations in plain sight and seemingly see nothing wrong or amiss about doing it.

Were they to be caught doing such a thing in our more mundane reality they would no doubt be instantly ashamed of displaying that kind of unnecessary and unwarranted disrespect for everyone else by making them all party to their own small mindedness and lack of common courtesy.

I would like remind those individuals that the circumstances here are no different in any way shape or form.

Now thoughts, ideas and beliefs are all changeable. We may possess them but we certainly do not own them, nor do they ever own or in any way define either what we are or can be.

Some seem to miss that most elelmentary point, which is also the very reason why any forum should exist. To share divergent viewpoints and gain from the honest and thoughtfull opinions of others regarding them.

That's a two way street in case no one has noticed.

Now I realize what an enormous effort it is to scroll past something you'd prefer not to bother yourself with reading but it "comes with the territory" as they say.

Bitching about it, however, doesn't, and it doesn't constitute a legitimate contribution to the dialogue here either.

So if you have something you think is pertinent or interesting to say about what is being discussed by all means add it to the mix and each shall give it whatever consideration they think it's worth.

If they don't find it of any particular value that doesn't mean that they find YOU to be of no particular value, merely that comment from their own honest and individual perspective. That's the nature of discussuion, dialogue, and informed debate.

If all you have is something to say about someone involved in these discussions here kindly spare yourself and everyone else any further wasted space and genuinely unnecessary scrollwork and simply keep your fingers off the keyboard.

No one will ever miss them when they're not here and they're definitely distractraction and deterrent to a proper dialogue when they are.

N'uff said?

11/14/2006 01:45:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A little bit of digital cleansing never hurt anyone JW.I don't know how you do it but I respect your drive/zeal/work ethic etc and yet despise your politics.

In short you have set the benchmark for a labour of love and you can write but I guess you know that.My journo friends despise blogging "why should I write for no reward" all hail the newflesh and the infotainment industry dictated by the advertorial mandarins.

Consequently people like yourself have led the second wave of New Journalism online.

I believe all of us here hardcore and dilletante wrestle everyday with a mass media which for £40/$60 a month shits down your neck and informs you at the same time.Two good to be true I know.....

Case in point that Chinese tank photo.Iconic image or iconic objective sham.The tanks were stationary and cropped from the image were the huddled groups of students sitting down.

The tank was there but was not advancing or being faced down this was the calm before the storm not an act of symbolic resistance.Projections a bitch folks just like WWII and the Greatest Generation rap.8/10 Whermacht casualties were on the Eastern Front and private Ivan faced some 220 divisions unlike our boys in the France who faced 28 divisions.

It took a totalitarian state to defeat a totalitarian state and I feel this lesson has been learnt by the ptb as regarding China.

The real nasty shit from Tsquare was the pictures of the dead piled high in lockers/freeezers/trucks etc.I was exposed to this in a collection of censored press photos collected in book form.

RE:Shrub is there a cyber version of a dry drunk ? or is he truly the worlds first colonic pregnancy?

One last thought has anyone else realised that the comments section is a valid arguement against democracy/tyranny of the masses.Just a thought -toodle pip!

11/14/2006 03:08:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

i'm not sure, foxy, whether you mean *post* or *not* post about shrebby's leaving, but i figure it isn't your blog anyway so what the hell. i think it IS good to post about excorcising shrub's troll for the simple reason that he had an adverse effect on the conversation, imo. besides, who would want an idiot who clogs up the combox with his own inane ramblings, day-in and day-out, doubtless spending hours and hours of his own haunting this site and *then* shoots off this bull when he gets cock-blocked the first time:

"I know I couldn't justify the added time and expense of all this and consider myself a good Father."

fuck, he was the resident poltergeist! he never went home! and now he wants to cast stones at the blogger who spent much time creating a forum he liked to monopolize? does he not see the obvious contradiction here? or this gem, classic shrub:

"..is it something more nefarious, and you don't need funding cuz you have a source, already?"

time to whip out the pop psychology! because EVERYONE else has a problem, never shrubby! 'they're all against me and jeff never did anything to stop it! jeff, why-oh-why don't you love me? you never stood up for ME. you must be connected to the ptb!' (hey, that rhymes..)

anyway, what a sick freak. but just so that i'm not talking 'bout him 'behind his back', here's a last shoutout to shrub:

"how serendipidous, shrubby, your timing your exit with a bunch of bad apples in washington; it'll be a warmer winter without you or a republican congress! i *would* wish you a happy holidays, but you--like them--were a nihilist, so what-the-hey, it just good to see you go on your sour way."

(shit--that rhymes too!)

11/14/2006 03:19:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I normally sidestep forum politics, wary of the unavoidable distorting lens effect that occurs in such an insular environment, but I can only hope the troll calling himself "shrub" doesn't return. We're supposed to refrain from labeling one another, which is good in general, but the guy was an obvious troll from the word go, and I stopped reading anything he wrote a long time ago. Scrollwork, indeed. He was choking the comments section, to the point that I was going to suggest to Jeff that he do what Billmon did, and kill the comments altogether. No matter how much abuse was heaped on him, he never went away, which made me think he was a paid troll, not just an individual with a personality disorder.

Internet trolls fit the persona described by Scott Peck in 'People of the Lie' pretty well: others are always to blame. Peck pinpoints this as a characteristic of evil people, or what we might call sociopaths--always playing the blame game. It's damn disruptive in real life, and it can be death to a forum, particularly one like RI where people are led towards inquiries that might hilight personal vulnerabilities.

Like someone noted above, consider this not just an exegesis, but an exorcism.

11/14/2006 03:46:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Speaking of graphics, please consider uploading more of them to your cafe press store... some of them would look especially cool on a notebook.

11/14/2006 04:27:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Will you be joining your friend?"

"time will tell about the circus & the wishing well?"
Jimi Hendrix

Seriously Hildy, my work life is spent getting spit on by retarded folk. More & more I fail to see the point to sitting at home & getting spit on by retarded folk online or watching them spit on others.

Since I don't prefer big mushy goodbyes we'll just leave it open for now, 'kay?

But if our paths never ever cross again Hildy 'ol buddy 'ol pal, understand that it was totally your pleasure not mine.

Shrubster, one last hurrah pal.

You obviously made your mistake by posting about the erotic nature of female fencers.
That, my friend, is obviously nonsense.
Now if you would have posted something about the erotic nature of shape-shifting satan loving nazi lizard fencers then that, my friend, would have been far from nonsensical & , most likely, sparked an entire thread of like minded gasbags sharing their deepest cut&pastes about shape-shifting satan loving nazi lizard fencers.

See shrub, there are rules & rules must be followed.

11/14/2006 04:27:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Did this Shrub guy deserve such vitriol for (a) things he said here - quotes please by way of illumination - or (b) because of the way he interacted with people here - examples please?

As someone new to this blog, I'm just interested to see what you get excluded for, form or substance.

11/14/2006 04:33:00 PM  
Blogger Tsoldrin said...

Why ask for a spoon feeding when all the comments are right there for you to read for yourself? Go, read, and make your own determination.

11/14/2006 06:24:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Richard, you're an f'ing genius!!

Rock on

voodoochile

11/14/2006 06:26:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Is it me or has anyone else noticed that 9-11 truthers, conspiracy guys and gals, and otherwise intelligent people with intelligent criticisms of the previous congress are now silent with the criticism because "our saviours the Democrats are back, yippie!!"? It appears that our delicate coalition of Constitutionalists, libertarians, democrats...who were once all united is now falling completely apart. It appears that this election has done what it needed to do, quiet enough people so that we can now go into Iran. Check out the news, Obama and Clinton are the leading proponents of attacking Iran. I'm not saying Neocons don't want this, hell, its their idea as well...I'm just frustrated. We're not out of the dark now, its actually getting darker. People feel the system is now all of a sudden "legitimate" now that their side has won. That's bullshit, get over it people and grow up. Stop thinking in dualist, binary thought. Use some "maybe" logic (to borrow from RAW). "Maybe" the two parties are the same.

11/14/2006 06:35:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

First off, thank you, Jeff, for providing so much information in one place and congratulations on the new site. I have waited until now to post because of the way it seemed that every new post was sandbagged by folks who seem to see any opinion counter to theirs as a direct affront to their very being. I have learned that the best way to avoid a negative exchange is to do exactly that... avoid it. Many of those commenting were pulled into exactly the same pathology they were condemning. That, my dear friends (and I am not being sarcastic, I mean it) is hypocrisy. The "Leggo my Ego" stuff is ruining the comments and making those who would like to comment take pause. Please consider the central point in educating yourself requires humility and through this we all grow collectively.

I love all of your insight and views, dear friends. It feeds my brain and soul. So if we could get back to that, it would be greatly appreciated.

"Real ability is to respect relative truth without damaging oneself by refusing to realize that it will be superseded. When you observe that today's controversies often reveal not relevance but the clash of the untaught with the wrongly taught, and when you can endure this knowledge without cynicism, as a lover of humankind, greater compensations will be open to you than a sense of your own importance or satisfaction in thinking about the unreliability of others."

-Idries Shah, 'A Perfumed Scorpion'


Love and respect to all of you.

11/14/2006 06:37:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Old Floyd Smoots said:
I was banned because Jeff didn't like things I said, too. I don't like Shrubageddon simply because he used much of his time to disparage my God and His Christ. I don't expect any readers to come to R.I. looking for supernatural or spiritual salvation. However, I always felt that there was something wrong with Jeff allowing any/many of his "members" (of which I used to be one) to bash the hell out of Jesus, Christians, fundamentalists, etc.; but, for GOD'S SAKE, DON'T say anything disparaging about Jews, Pagans, Wiccans, Muslims, Buddhists, and the rest of the whole "spiritual community" of Man. I guess that list now includes Lady Fencers.

I am also one of the few, besides Antiaristo (Hi, John) and a few brave others to ever identify my real name on the site. It's Alexander F. Mutter of Portsmouth, Virginia, USA, for you who never knew, and those of you who have forgotten. As a 58-year-old military veteran of one of the PTB's useless wars, I'm just not that godforsaken AFRAID of the damnable "men in black". They can kiss my ass just before they strap me to the electric "fun machine".

In a small small way, the blog has come to resemble just a wee bit of the M.S.M., because the speech here is "free" only as long as you don't piss off the Atheist In Charge.

Still, Jeff, I read your writings regularly, and I never leave them without some new and important information that is essential to those of us who want to know "What's Really Going On Behind the Curtain". Ergo, I thank you muchly for that. Well, as Forrest Gump once said, "And that's all I have to say about that.". To quote Mr. Spock, "Live long and prosper.".

11/14/2006 06:44:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Old Floyd Smoots said:
I was banned because Jeff didn't like things I said, too. I don't like Shrubageddon simply because he used much of his time to disparage my God and His Christ. I don't expect any readers to come to R.I. looking for supernatural or spiritual salvation. However, I always felt that there was something wrong with Jeff allowing any/many of his "members" (of which I used to be one) to bash the hell out of Jesus, Christians, fundamentalists, etc.; but, for GOD'S SAKE, DON'T say anything disparaging about Jews, Pagans, Wiccans, Muslims, Buddhists, and the rest of the whole "spiritual community" of Man. I guess that list now includes Lady Fencers.

I am also one of the few, besides Antiaristo (Hi, John) and a few brave others to ever identify my real name on the site. It's Alexander F. Mutter of Portsmouth, Virginia, USA, for you who never knew, and those of you who have forgotten. As a 58-year-old military veteran of one of the PTB's useless wars, I'm just not that godforsaken AFRAID of the damnable "men in black". They can kiss my ass just before they strap me to the electric "fun machine".

In a small small way, the blog has come to resemble just a wee bit of the M.S.M., because the speech here is "free" only as long as you don't piss off the Atheist In Charge.

Still, Jeff, I read your writings regularly, and I never leave them without some new and important information that is essential to those of us who want to know "What's Really Going On Behind the Curtain". Ergo, I thank you muchly for that. Well, as Forrest Gump once said, "And that's all I have to say about that.". To quote Mr. Spock, "Live long and prosper.".

11/14/2006 06:53:00 PM  
Blogger Tsoldrin said...

On the election thing...
I see a near universal 'I told you so!' 'Two sides same coin!' 'Left-Right Paradigm!' cry going on nearly everywhere I read. I just want to point out what would have happened if things went the other way. If the Neocons had won, one or both of two things would be happening.
1) People would scream bloody murder about stolen elections, possibly shaking off enough apathy to raise enough of a fuss to give an excuse to institute martial law.
2) The Neocons would have taken it as a mandate to make war and continue their war on the constitution. Likely right now we would already be in yet another war and there may well have been (more) roundups of dissidents (bloggers).

So, while far from a victory, I think these elections were at least a bit of a tourniquite and with luck may be a stepping stone.
---
On the 'other' issue...
This blog has soured me on the whole idea of anonymous unmoderated comments, of which I had previously been a big fan.
For a while now I have harbored a suspicioun that there is an active effort to lower the signal to noise ratio here by incessant bloviating, wholesale pasting of unrelated material and topic hijacking. I'd hate to throw another technical monkeywrench into the mix, but I would highly suggest for the new home a comment rating system where obvious banditry and irrelevance could be rated below the common visible threshold.

11/14/2006 07:41:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

...and the painted ponies go up and down....

11/14/2006 08:33:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Tsoldrin said:
"So, while far from a victory, I think these elections were at least a bit of a tourniquite and with luck may be a stepping stone."

Well put, excellent points, especially what you said in quotes up above. I am mainly concerned that people will get complacent with the resistance now that "their" party is in control.

11/14/2006 09:42:00 PM  
Blogger foist lastus said...

WTO Announces Formalized Slavery Model for Africa

"The initiative will require Western companies doing business in some parts of Africa to own their workers outright. Schmidt recounted how private stewardship has been successfully applied to transport, power, water, traditional knowledge, and even the human genome. The WTO's "full private stewardry" program will extend these successes to (re)privatize humans themselves.

"Full, untrammelled stewardry is the best available solution to African poverty, and the inevitable result of free-market theory," Schmidt told more than 150 attendees. Schmidt acknowledged that the stewardry program was similar in many ways to slavery, but explained that just as "compassionate conservatism" has polished the rough edges on labor relations in industrialized countries, full stewardry, or "compassionate slavery," could be a similar boon to developing ones. "

http://www.gatt.org/wharton.html

11/14/2006 10:03:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

old floyd,

jeff never banned shrub, and he never banned you from the looks of it. neither have i heard him refer to himself as an atheist, but maybe you can enlighten me in that regard.

and while not an atheist or an agnostic myself, i don't think religious proselytism suits RI, whether you're recruiting for God Almighty or star trek's spock...

11/14/2006 11:45:00 PM  
Blogger iridescent cuttlefish said...

Okay, I'm puzzled. Granted, I'm not an old-timer here at RI, but I've been posting for a good half year or so, and I don't understand where all this disinfo/troll/psy-ops/thread-hijacking crap comes from. I don't remember any of it even a few months back, except as some sort of joke--are you people really urging Jeff to censor the comment fields here? To what purpose?

I can understand why Jeff has taken some lengthy, irrelevant cut & paste jobs out in the past (they're not comments), but what's with all this talking about each other that's going on here? This is what kills the conversation--the incessant speculation over who is up to no good. If we limited our comments to discussing the topic at hand and points made/not made in reaction to it, we wouldn't need any bloody internet police.

It's beyond ironic for this forum to fear anarchy so much it was willing to sell some liberty in exchange for a little law and order. The same über-irony that is characterized by the many recent complaints about the quality of the conversation declining (because it's full of complaints about the quality of the conversation declining.)

Here's my suggestion, for what it's worth: put up or shut up. If you have something to say, great. If it's going to be some bitching about some person posting here (as opposed to an idea, which is always fair game), spare us the indulgence of your urge to kvetch. We have an omnipotent narrator, after all; if Jeff doesn't like something, he can take it out (without all the vigilantes making citizen's arrests...)

11/15/2006 01:16:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

thanks foist, that's hilarious!

shrub if you do return your first post will be a sincere (i know it won't be easy for you) apology for the crude attack on jeff. or you lose a kneecap.

11/15/2006 01:17:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well Oarwell...

It would seem you and I have very different ideas and experiences insofar as to what any so-called trolls actually are although I'd definitely bow to your demonstrated expertise in their care and feeding... "no matter how much abuse was heaped on him..."....hmmm?

Do you have some kind of difficulty in logically assembling facts when they are right under your nose and spilling off your own keyboard?

Any trolls are only a nuisance to the extent they can get a rise out of others. There's nothing they hate more than simply being ignored. For the most part that is simply the sadder story and central fact of their daily existence... being ignored and being unable to do anything at all about it. They do what every child does in that case, it's called "acting out".

Unfortunately these aren't children but adults who have no other outlet for such behavior than the anonymity that cyberspace gives them to give vent to all those pent up frustrations that can never be voiced in the company of others in their Caspar Milquetoast lives. They are simply too afraid.

It has nothing to do with "evil" it's simply an ego problem and their immature ego isn't satifsied unless everyone is simply talking about them. They need to be at the centre of attention somewhere, somehow, sometime and they can't control just how very desperate that need is in them.

The content of any talk about them isn't important to them in the slightest, only the subject of it...themselves. Finally!

Now we all have far better and far more interesting fish to fry than "carp", or wasting our time discussing anyone who's determined to be the resident expert on the subject of "carping" here.

Nature as they say abhors a vacuum and someone will always turn up to attempt to fill that vacancy, long term or on rotation. Take your pick. The more people who visit any site the more you can bank on that equally trite little fact...hmmm?

Any degree of success always meets with it's fair share of spoilers, green-eyed monsters and malcontents as everyone has had more than an ample opportunity to notice by now.

Any continuing success will be determined solely on the ability the participants to rise above that little fact of life on planet earth, not wallow in it.

Now one thing is certain, most trolls consider their feet to be firmly on the ground rather than the more obvious fact that they are clearly made of clay. It's not that they won't join in or even that they really don't want to, the truth is they simply can't and don't know how.

They consider themselves rejected before they've even begun and are determined to capitalize on that as a sop to the very same insecurity that has made them feel that way about themselves in the first place.

To somehow prove that despite believing that they can't be important to others in any way they can at least make themselves important to them.

They attempt to cover that foregone conclusion about beoeving that they're not important or believing that they don't have anything worthwhile to say and all the attendant worries and insecurities that go right along with that by simply going on the attack.

It is "they" and not we who simply don't "get it" but their ego refuses to be placated and they'll keep right on turning up like the proverbial bad penny to try and and add about as much worthless currency to any discussion desperately trying to impress that little fact that is them upon us.

Now the fact of the matter is that any airs they put on are clearly visible and staged. They do not have a higher opinion of themselves than anyone else or they simply wouldn't do what they do. Their problem is exactly the opposite of that or is that just too very difficult and profound to grasp?

Now you fancy yourself to be intelligent fellow yet you do not see this. Instead you pursue a course that is predicated on the very position that you and others do think higher of yourselves than such unfortunates. "They" do not belong...hmmm? "They" should be banned...hmmm? "They" are not like us, and so unfortuantely it goes.

So you reinforce and feed the very insecurity that makes them feel the lousy way they do about themselves and make them even more determined than ever to whatever they can to countertact it.

Now there is no more pertinent topic than understanding human behavior. That is the very core and lynchpin of every single topic discussed here.

That understanding starts with yourself. There is nothing in you that doesn't exist in every other human being and nothing in them that doesn't have some counterpart in you. You avoid or ignore that greater fact at the price of your own growth and development as a human being.

By rejecting and ostracising the very understanding which does explain what is going on if you were but willing to recognise it in yourself istead of feeling so compelled to deny and disown it. That's an immature ego at work too.

Now the balance of your personal talents, abilities, and inherited birthright is uniquely your own but never what simply comprises it. No one ever gets more of some human aspect good or bad that they don't get some lesser of another.

So anything you think displeases you in others avctually stems from your own source of it. We do not hate or despise others so much as we transfer the way would hate or despise ourselves for behaving in a similar fashion or for giving in to whatever weakness they themselves seemingly have. At the very same time we voice that anger or outrage we also smugly tell ourselves in no uncertain terms that we of course are natuarlly better than they are...hmmm?

Not luckier, not more fortunate, not that our existence has been totally different in every concievable way. Just we ourselves are simply made of better or different stuff. Outrage and conciet go hand in hand and either can serve the other as far as massaging your own ego is concerned.

Now the balance that keeps any of us in place isn't the same kind of balance others either inherited or have come to know through their own experiences.

The experiences that are equally unique to each of us in forming our personality and character or giving us whatever solid ideals and principles we fancy ourselves as having can be tragically distorted or missing entirely in the lives of some others and through no fault of their own. Just because you can rise above certain weaknesses doesn't mean that everyone can. You had to have help, they obviously still require some. Do you intend to try and correct that imbalance or simply add your vote to make it worse?

So you keep that uppermost in mind and use that information when it comes time to determine how you should respond to it.

Just remember that there's a human being on the other end of any words you read who have valid reasons for giving them even if the words themselves don't seem to convey it. There's more than one way to read my friend.

Look into your own heart and honestly consider what might make you say the same things if you genuinely want to know the truth behind them.

That's the first step in any form of communication. The common ground on which we share our percieved differences.

Those differences are only due to perspectives and not what any of us are or might become in this life.

11/15/2006 01:33:00 AM  
Blogger Sounder said...

proteus said;

"Please consider the central point in educating yourself requires humility and through this we all grow collectively."

I would like it if you and a hundred others like you were to find opportunity and inclination to post here.

My POV; All of us are operating from an inadequate knowledge base. Positive oriented people know and are comfortable with this limitation, while negative oriented people tend to deny this limitation, as they overstate their relative truth observations.

And thanks for the Idries Shah, well placed.

"Real ability is to respect relative truth without damaging oneself by refusing to realize that it will be superseded."

This sounds like the middle path or the third way.

11/15/2006 06:00:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

While first reading through the comments posted and coming upon Shrub and his adios, I must admit that at first I was overjoyed.

I disliked you Shrub, immediately from the word go. And the more you commented the more I disliked you. I hated your soldier bashing and your love of America bashing.

Could never find words as eloquent as you to counter your attack. And your thumb your nose attitude at the great unwashed "common people". I pictured you as some rich, snobbish, elite who could easily send all of us "common people" off to camps.

But now here I am, and I wonder if the Shrub is a lot smarter than anyone has given him credit for. Perhaps he is "role playing" and making us all look at the things we should all hate about ourselves.

I remember a scene from a movie called "The Seventh Sign" with Demi Moore, and right at the very end she has a vision, and over and over she is asked "Would you die for me?"

"Would you die for me, Shrub?" Cause that's exactly what all those young men and women soldiers are doing everyday. Oh, I am sure we can all twist and say they are not dying for us but for the empire. But I seriously doubt they would agree. They are dying for their Moms and Dads, their brothers and sisters, and the ordinary "unwashed common people".

Here is a link that puts it all in perspective for me
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig7/salyer2.html

And now I wonder, maybe Shrub and Richard, you are a lot smarter than any of the commenters here gave you credit for. Hmmm maybe you do watch movies.

I won't mind if you come back.

From one of the great unwashed. Just call me moviegirl.

11/15/2006 08:14:00 AM  
Blogger iridescent cuttlefish said...

Regardless of what they've been told to think, moviegirl, they're still dying for empire. (Why is it that you don't lament the 600,000 innocent civilians your brave soldiers have murdered? Our 3000 is, well, paltry by comparison, ain'a hey?)The fact that you can't discuss the role of imperialism in American foreign policy without being called an "America-hater" is indicative of how willingly the squeaky clean masses have swallowed the whole god & country line of bullshit. I suppose you worship at the altar of the greatest generation, too? WWII was a good war, the Big One, where they fought to protect our freedoms, just like your brave lads & lasses are doing today all over the globe?

Why don't we just make BushCo CEO-for-life of these cemented States?

11/15/2006 10:47:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

As I said, the Distorting Lens.

Silverfox wrote:

"So anything you think displeases you in others actually stems from your own source of it. We do not hate or despise others so much as we transfer the way would hate or despise ourselves"

All you write is true, and true, but, I think, unrelated. I look at the comments for information. I don't "hate" shrub: he existed in this little cyberpond only as an annoyance. Low signal to noise ratios hinder the search for info. Someone who posts ad nauseum his thoughts on what he ate for breakfast, etc., which Shrub did, add nothing to the conversation, unless it's supposed to be a form of dada.

I like dada, sure, but too much of it in a blog comments' section wears thin. Cuttlefish, you bemoaned the irony of a forum like this wanting to limit chaos, but ask yourself: if I or someone else just started posting tons of random C&Ps from the web, for whatever reason, wouldn't you object? Not because the Woild Wipe Weg isn't a good thing, in itself, but because of the low signal/noise ratio? Or what if all my posts were like this:

qweiovm[ihqewrkn[aosivalkjnoiwf[oqiegrqekoiahdfvak

Would that command sympathy, and respect? I doubt it: there's no informational content.

It's all about signal to noise. Jeff is good at what he does because he writes succinctly. Far too many blogs are just unedited word salads, and who has the time to plow through hack verbiage looking for nuggets? I don't, most people don't. If you're verbose with little to say, you'd better be a damn good stylist, or no one will want to read you (or me). Hell, even the great George's lesser works, like Wigan Pier, are a bit long-winded, and only afficionados read them anymore.

Like I said above, SF, I stopped reading anything shrub wrote a long time ago. I didn't "heap abuse on him," I just ignored him, as per the ancient internet dictum "don't feed the trolls." I exercised my judgement early on and decided that "shrub" was a troll, and, further, given his persistence, I assumed he was paid to troll. Are there not paid trolls? Are paid trolls worthy of our respect and solicitous compassion?

I could be wrong. Maybe he wasn't paid, but simply was a garden-variety troll with a personality disorder, causing him to seek attention by shitting on the commons room floor. That makes him not a colleague, SF, but a patient. People like that are sad, and deserve our sympathy, but I would prefer he goes off and posts at Neopets or some other place more suitable to his emotional age.

I could be wrong about everything. Maybe shrub was the Jeff Koons of Scatological Dadaism, and I missed the boat. Maybe he was the Marcel Duchamp of the internet, the Dali of the web.
But I don't think so.

I've "looked into my own heart," SF, and the answer, I'm afraid, is the same: I just come here for information.

11/15/2006 11:19:00 AM  
Blogger iridescent cuttlefish said...

Oarwell,
I did mention cut & paste as a suitable victim of the censor's knife, insofar as the censor is also editor, a function which Jeff has perhaps too infrequently exercised, doubtless in the interest of keeping the flow untrammeled. And yes, I stand by my observation on the irony of the many Barney Fife's calling for the culling of the trolls--who decides trollishness, anyway? If you recall the recent flame war started in my humble honor, some indignant person proclaimed loudly and repeatedly that I was a troll because I said that Mike Ruppert was a phony--is this the sort of policing you had in mind?

The fact is that far more noise is generated by those screaming "Troll!" than by the alleged trolls themselves. And that, my ever-eloquent friend, is the epitome of irony...

11/15/2006 04:55:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well, Cuttlefish, they're turning the lights out, and it looks like you and I are the only ones left at the bar. How 'bout one for the road?

You're right, you did segregate out C&Pers as being materially different (I think Jeff put the long stuff in the Data Dump, which isn't quite full-out censorship.) But the idea's similar: it's nice to fall upon a lively thread which, despite some inspired (interesting etymology to that word, eh?) tangentiality, or what the shrinks call "looseness of association," still somehow stays in orbit around the thematic planet.

"I can't define trollishness, but I know it when I see it." A nice workable Wiki def:

"In Internet terminology, a troll is a person who enters an established community such as an online discussion forum and intentionally tries to cause disruption, most often in the form of posting inflammatory, off-topic, or otherwise inappropriate messages."

I guess the salient word there is 'intentional.' I've gone back and looked at some posts from the past 4 months, and it doesn't seem that He-Whose-Name-Shall-Not-Be-Uttered was getting attacked so much for his ideas, as for his verbosity. And there were occasions (DeNiro to Bats in Goodfellas: "a li'l bit...") when he was less than charitable to new posters. This is by and large a pretty mellow place to chill, and the tenor of some of his responses seemed uncharacteristic, and less thoughtful than the typical RI poster. Plus, when a lot of people are telling you "don't dominate the rap, Jack," then most people either shut up or leave. HWNSNBU did neither, and that seems, upon review of some of what he wrote, to have been intentional.

Eccch, enough with it. Here's your last call:

We too, ourselves, what time we seek again
Our native skies, and one eternal Now
Shall be the only measure of our Being,
Crown'd all with gold, and chanting to the lyre
Harmonious verse, shall range the courts above,
And make the starry firmament resound.
And, even now, the fiery Spirit pure
That wheels yon circling orbs, directs, himself,
Their mazy dance with melody of verse

11/15/2006 07:54:00 PM  
Blogger iridescent cuttlefish said...

Well, Oarwell, well...I get your point, if an analysis of HWSNBN's posts do indeed indicate an intentionality to his "disruptions," but I guess I'm just a little thicker-skinned in this regard. It still seems strange to me that it came to this; let's remember that our man in the shadows took himself out of the discussion. Jeff only blocked a comment or two on the newly opened board because he found them inappropriate and/or offensive--it was the departed one who got upset and emigrated.

It's also very odd to me because the Shrubster was quite antagonistic toward my outlook, especially my unwarranted optimism, and yet we still managed to have some sort of rapport. I don't believe he was any sort of troll at all. Acerbic, abrasive, preternaturally pessimistic sure, but the trolls in my admittedly limited experience have always been extremely one-dimensional, clumsy, and above all else, obvious.

Furthermore, they were all easily dealt with since their "attacks" either defeated their own purposes by sharpening the rhetoric of the home team or simply withered away in the face of concerted avoidance. By contrast, these constant "LIAR, LIAR, your're a disinfo agent!" tags spun by the adolescents here cannot be so easily deflected by avoidance since they never offer any position to either refute or ignore. On that note, since the lights are now coming on after the last last call and we two are left to ponder our small beer in silence, I'll match your Milton and raise you one Keats:


When I have Fears that I may cease to be

WHEN I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high pil`d books, in charact'ry,
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, 5
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And feel that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!
That I shall never look upon thee more, 10
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love;—then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think,
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.

11/15/2006 08:30:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Nice. That last line should be the last post on the last blog on the last flickering computer screen at the end of the world.

11/15/2006 10:14:00 PM  
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7/19/2010 11:32:00 PM  
Anonymous justpub said...

Just Pub, a dumb return to castle wolfenstein enemy territory comic strip by feuersturm.

7/19/2010 11:32:00 PM  

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