Mission Statement & Blog Commenting Guidelines

This post was last revised on 8/18/2016.

My mission statement was originally written when my blog was new and George W. bush was preznit, so my "mission" at the time was not the same as it is today. Simply discussing politics is the mission today; as opposed to slamming the ex-preznit. Don't get me wrong, I still have, and plan on, posting commentaries in which I bash bush, but they will be infrequent seeing as he is no longer in office. Be aware that I am a Progressive Democrat. All political posts on this blog will be written from that POV.

Comment moderation is now permanently enabled. For the first 7 years of this blog I never used moderation but, due to issues with blog trolls (TOM, Steve and Luke), I have reluctantly adopted a moderation policy.

Current Blog Commenting Guidelines

[1] I reserve the right to publish or not publish any comment. This includes publishing comments from people who are banned. If I ban you, then publish one of your comments later, this does not mean you aren't banned! Banned individuals will remain banned (which means most of your comments will likely NOT be published) until/unless I lift the ban. Comments being published (if the banned individual decides to keep submitting comments) do NOT mean the ban has been lifted. It ONLY means I've decided to let that particular comment through.

In regards to me publishing or not publishing at my discretion, all other rules are subordinate to this rule. This is the only actual "rule". The rest are only guidelines. Meaning, if I say a comment will not be published (in any subsequent guideline) I may publish it. That doesn't mean that the guideline should be ignored. Or, that I'll always publish and disregard the guideline. It ONLY means that I reserve the right to publish or not publish any comment.

[2] Comments from people with Blogger accounts that are set to not display their profiles will be deleted or not published. If I look at your profile and see a page that says "Profile not available" your comment will not be published. It appears as though certain individuals have been playing games and changing their profiles to impersonate others.

[3] In regards to the impersonation of others, or ID Spoofing... any comment that has (in my estimation) been submitted by a spoofer will be removed. Any complaint from the actual account holder (as best I can determine) is grounds for the removal of a comment and the banning of the person making the comment.

[4] Personal attacks are discouraged. I'll allow some pushing of the envelope so long as nobody goes to far. Excessive vulgarities and insults based on things the commenter would have no way of knowing about the person they are insulting are strongly discouraged, including racial epithets. Some leeway will be given but if you go to far your comment might not be published or it may be removed. I think that where the line is can be determined by rational thinking people.

[5] I would PREFER that anyone commenting to my post indicate that they have actually read it. This is the entire point, after all. I write, you read and share your opinion. Going off topic is OK if AT LEAST your first comment addresses the content of my post. One sentence, then you can respond to things others have written or go off topic. But please be aware that if you comment and make it clear that you didn't even read the title of my post... it is possible I could delete what you wrote. Agree or disagree, either is acceptable. BTW, if you say something like "this post sucks", I have no idea if you read what I wrote. You can say the post sucks, but you should say WHY you think so. This is, however, only a request and will probably be ignored by some.

[6] No publishing of the same diatribe to multiple posts, even if the topic is the same/similar. Multiples will be deleted (I'll leave the one left in response to the the newest post). Also, Comments should be original, or at least modified to mention my post (indicate that you read it). Comments (or entire posts) found elsewhere on the internet (cut & past jobs) will be deleted. I might miss that what you published has been duplicated elsewhere, however. I'm not going to be checking every comment published.

[7] No deleting of comments! If you hit the publish button be aware that your comment was sent to me via email. If you want to revise a comment once it has been published to fix spelling errors, or even if you've decided "I shouldn't have said that"... then fine; delete your comment. But it MUST be replaced with another. If you do not replace it I will repost the comment I received via email. I'll allow a reasonable amount of time for revisions.

[8] Any Spam that makes it past Blogger's filter will be deleted by me. I monitor comments, so really, why waste your time? We all know what Spam looks like, so no need to try and be clever with a generic comment and a link to your webpage. I suspect that much (if not all) this Spam is automated however, so this rule is likely useless. Bots don't follow rules.

[9] Anonymous commenting is no longer allowed thanks to the antics of the blog attacking shithead Steve.

[10] "Dead horse" topics may come up from time to time that I might decide to end discussion on. If, in my estimation, the dead horse has been beaten long enough I may decide to cut off discussion. So far this has happened exactly once and I do not see it happening again. The one dead horse topic I am banning discussion on is any discussion regarding the blogger known as Rational Nation (RN) and certain objectionable comments he made, with the sole exception of comments concerning RN that are submitted in response to the post I authored on the incident that triggered the controversy surrounding RN (see here if you want to know what I'm talking about.

[11] I reserve the right to rewrite or revise these rules at any time.

Old Mission Statement & Blog Commenting Rules

The purpose of this blog is to discuss Politics, The current state of the world, and, in particular the evil and corrupt Administration of George W. bush. George W. bush is by far the worst president our nation has ever seen, and, it is my belief that he may very well bring about the destruction of our great nation, the world's first constitutional and democratic federal republic. Since Mr. Bush assumed office in 2001 he has pursued a reckless course of illegal preventive war. Instead of protecting us, the Bush Administration's policies have increased worldwide animosity for the United States, which has increased terrorism.

As you may have guessed, I am a liberal Democrat. Like-minded individuals are welcome to join in the discussion. Republicans are also welcome, but should be prepared to be ridiculed and insulted. I want to be up front about the fact that I don't like Republicans in general - although I reserve my full animosity for the fools who call themselves Republicans but voted for and support our current leader. How can real conservatives support the fiscal irresponsibility of the Liar and Thief George W. Bush?

I encourage any wing-nuts who might be reading this to take it as a challenge - post here if you dare. There are few rules for posting here. First of all, excessive profanity won't be tolerated. I may delete a post is if it is by someone whose SOLE purpose is to be annoying and disrupt discussion. Other posts which I may delete include any which are COMPLETELY off topic or make no sense. Also, please don't post if your ONLY purpose is to promote another blog or sell something.

Finally, I ask anyone reading this to please post! My goal here isn't only to get people to read my rantings - I look forwarded to some spirited discussions. I'll give it some time, but if nobody joins in the discussion this blog probably won't last long. Also, please check out the links in the sidebar. I believe these Liberal blogs are well written and highly informative. If you agree with my assessment of the Bush Administration, I think you will find these blogs very interesting.

SWTD #1