If you have some evidence that comments and commenters are being banned because some moderators have undisclosed financial interets, state them, because we would all like to know. From what I have seen, all financial interests are repeatedly disclosed. Over the past year, in fact, the operators of this site have erred, as far as I can tell, on the side of more disclosure in this area specifically to counter vague allegations like yours.

As for "improper" debates, the site as rules, and those rules protect us all by keeping discussion civil. True, the nature of the Internet is that we can choose not to read, but the fact is that the credibility of all diarists and commenters, rightly or wrongly, get saddled with all comments. As powerful as Daily Kos is, for example, its credibility does take a hit based on the extreme posts of a small minoirty of posters.

I think poeple ought to be able to post any opinion on an issue, and any opinion ought to be subject to reasonable attack. Just leave the ad hominem attacks out, and assume that like you, people with contrary opinions are also expressing their opinions in good faith without ulteriror or nefarious motive, even if they don't agree with you.  

and maybe if you want disclosure you have an obligation to disclose your romantic connection with the person on whose behalf you are posting this?

Let's be clear

1) -personally attacking members of this community is off base, and can be grounds for being barred

2) ratings abuse will not be tolerated.  When someone goes through and systematically troll rates all the comments of someone with whom s/he is in disagreement, that is ratings abuse.  By itself that is a sufficient reason for being banned from the site

3)  a person who has been banned and who comes back under multiple ids is also violating the rules of the site

4) if you want to go to the floor of the senate and make unsubstantiated charges, run for the Senate.   This is not the Senate.  

5) And since this is a privately operated site and not an arm of any government, for your information First Amendment rights are not protected - nor are they on broadcast stations nor in newspapers.  

as for therapy, you demonstrate a classic example of projection.  Or to quote Shakespear, "methinks the lady doth protest too much."

I never claimed to have evidence, if I did, I would have posted this as fact. I sincerely hope I am wrong in even surmising this conclusion, but I feel that it has merit to consider. While it probably can be attributed to technical difficulties or over all site maintenance, the fact that five minutes after I posted this blog all comments were removed and the blog was in effect shuttered all night, does seem suspicious and adds at least an air of credibility to my statements. Again I hope I am wrong. Also,aznew, I do like to assume good intentions in everyone, even when they disagree with my views, but once I am repeatedly attacked using the very same methods my criticizer rails against in his other comments, I begin to doubt his pure intentions.

Teacherken,if you want disclosure about my relationship to GeorgetownStudent, here it is: We are boyfriends. We've not hid or denied this. I think most reasonable people could pick up on the fact that we had matching screen names and infer that there was at least some kind of relationship between the two posters. You and others are also right that GeorgetownStudent's attacks were a little out of line sometimes, I've told him so myself on occasion, but I think its very important to note that his style of argument and harsh or even bitchy comments have never been a problem before this post, when he disagreed with a supported candidate.

I also never troll rated anyone. I rated comments I agreed with, including those of my boyfriend, highly and rated comments I felt were overrated lower. Also if this is such a serious offense, I suggest you say something to the person who rated me a 0 on multiple posts, on one where even Miles rated a 2.

I also realize that it is against the rules for a banned user to simply return under a new name. No one has done this. I posted this on GeorgetownStudent's behalf, yes, but its not him. If posting something in support of another user is against the rules, I did not know it. If it is please let me know and I will never do it again.
I know this is not the United States Senate, what I meant by that comment is that if this truly a political site, then it should mirror the world it comments on. These rules do not exist in the real world of government or politics and to create a political space is childishly idealistic at best.

I understand that it is also your right as a private site to dictate what you feel is appropriate behavior on the site, but I think that a site that espouses progressive ideals should also try to live up to those ideals, even when they disagree or get a little ugly.

 This is exactly what I am talking about in this post. This person can personally attack me and get away with it, but GeorgetownStudent gets banned when he does the same thing to a candidate? Fair is fair, this guy better get a reprimand at least.

Yeah, I am a William and Mary student. I'd be happy to send you a confirmation of enrollment if you so desired. I think that sentence is perfectly fine, I've been reading a lot of political philosophy recently for a class, so maybe my writing has been picking up some of the complicated syntax found in those works. If there is something incredibly wrong with either the grammar or construction of that sentence, oldsoldier, I would love for you to point it out, but could you please be more specific than just telling me its to complicated for you to understand.  

I am simply asking you to use the kind of English preferred by Op-Ed Editors and English Professors.  No emotion on my part, people have posed as something they are not and I was just wondering.  You answered my question and I don't need proof.  Have a nice day.

If you walked into a coffee shop and started screaming at people, you'd get kicked out. You log on to RK and make personal attacks in violation of our terms of use, you get banned. The First Amendment doesn't cover abusive language -- in person or online.

I know this, you also can't yell "fire" in a movie theatre or public place, but that has nothing to do with what I'm saying. If you read what I wrote nowhere do I mention the First Amendment or even allude to it. I make a statement that in politics you don't hold your opponent's hand, use these rules of non ad hominem attacks or no personal attacks. I'm not saying that RK has any obligation to recognize these these kinds of rules themselves. But I do think its ridiculous to have a political blog that makes everyone play nice. If you have a strong enough opinion that you are willing to put it online, you should also have the guts to take what other people dish out.

This is personally to you, Miles, and I don't mean this disrespectfully, but if you can't take one college student, who espouses most of your platform and previously supported you in your primary bid's, attacks on your ideas, I fear very much for you if you ever do make it to Richmond. The down state delegates are not going to go easy on a young environmentalist from Arlington when he tries to oppose them and will much more vicious than two liberal kids from near your potential district.

Another point, I had was this, and I'm going to steal your scenario: If you walk into a coffee shop and started screaming at people, you'd get kicked out, true.  But if you had gone to that coffee shop for years and yelled at people and the owners were perfectly fine with it, but then one day you yelled at someone and they kicked you out, I think you would be a little suspicious of why they did so.

know what this diary is in reference to but the vagueness of it in and of itself is annoying. It comes off as preachy without substantive purpose. I would imagine that you could cut half of it and explain why you wrote the diary and it would be acceptable dialogue.

I can't understand why you would post a comment decrying my lack of "substantive purpose" by adding nothing to the discussion yourself.

As for vagueness, it is in response to the post "Beating an Undead Trojan House" and the actions that transpired there. Also it seems the other 3 posters had no problem understanding who or what I was talking about.

Tiderion was not a part of the aforementioned post as the other posters here were.

Let me ask you this: do you believe that Inhofe's remarks earned him any credibility with other members of Senate? Do you think it earned him any respect? In my opinion, he's not someone whose words and actions should be used as an example of appropriate behavior. The "everybody's doing it" argument is generally NOT a good one.

I've said this before, and I truly stand behind this statement, even if it is naive: personal attacks that get away from the issues cause the authors to lose credibility. If someone has a point I may agree with yet he is attacking people on a personal level left and right, I lose respect, whether it's a political figure or a blogger.

I will admit that I wondered why I couldn't see any comments last night (although I hadn't yet seen your diary.) I even thought that maybe, just maybe, it was because the personal attacks had gotten out of hand. But after a moment, I just rationally figured that it was a Sunday night, time for maintenance! And you know, this is not politics, this is a blog run by people who care about the atmosphere and want to keep people reading and posting. When people get nasty, people stop reading - it's a real turnoff. (Maybe I'm just a wimp.) Maintaining the right environment certainly gives RK the prerogative to do what it wants! To jump to this weird conspiracy theory...if you didn't have substantiation, why even go there?

I could not see comments last night, but I coupld see this diary.

Thank you for pointing that out and I mean that honestly. I couldn't see anything last night, but the actual posts and my own diary, but if others could, then I regret making that assertion. As I've said above and below, I do hope I am wrong about that part. But I still think what I wrote in the diary is at least worthy of consideration.  

No, I do not believe Inhofe's remarks earned him any respect, I'm sure it probably had the opposite effect, but that is not my point. I'm not showing his actions as the ideal or what should be done, but as an example of how things are done in the political realm.  Inhofe made these remarks and obviously no one tried to remove him from the Senate that day.

I don't like personal attacks either, in my posts I never made any personal attacks except to point what I saw as hypocrisy in the way a commentator was criticizing others for making personal attacks but then making comments that bordered those they just criticized. You are right, that when someone attacks someone they lose my respect, but thats not what I have a problem or argument against. What my problem is that I consider a political blog where you have to monitor your every word so you don't hurt peoples' feelings a little pointless. This is especially true of a posting by a candidate for delegate, as I've said before his opposition is going to be a lot harsher than either GeorgetownStudent or my comments.

If you can admit that you wondered if it was because of the comments, why would it be strange that I would also, especially since the comments were disabled immediately after I posted this blog? In my first response, I said it was probably maintenance or technical difficulty , and even that I hoped it was that, but I also think its a valid point and worth considering.  You're right that this isn't politics, but it is a blog about politics. I guess I differ from you in what I think that should mean, but I feel, as I have said before, that blog about politics should reflect the real world and not some idealized space. I mean I wish that we could all get along and be civil, but I think it is more important that various ideas are heard, instead of no one getting their toes stepped on.

As to why I went to this "weird conspiracy theory" is this: I have seen GeorgetownStudent make similar comments to the ones he made on that specific post on various other posts without out any kind of reprimand or censor, therefore it struck me as odd that the time he was reprimanded was when he attacked a candidate featured by the blog. Then as soon as I posted this diary, the comments went down; I don't think it takes a hardcore conspiracy theorist to think something fishy is going on. I never said I had any evidence, if I had evidence I would have posted this as fact and called out specific people, instead of posting a hypothesis. Thats all this is a hypothesis, one in which I think I have been civil and not personally attacked anyone. I also repeatedly stated that I hoped I was wrong, I really enjoy reading this blog and I hope its what I thought the site was, not what this has led me to  think it might be.  

It was to make a suggestion on improving your diaries in the future. I've written some bad ones so I thought I might help.

Of course, since I had no idea what you were discussing I could not add to it.

Also, I'm a WM alum. Great place.

Sorry, on the post this diary discusses, people criticized me for in their opinion not adding anything to the discussion. Then when I saw your post and it reminded me of that. I know the diary was vague, but I didn't have evidence of what I stated, so I didn't want to be to specific about what I was saying. I also mainly meant it for people who had been reading other post and didn't think that other people would be reading it.

Haha, and by the way...........GO TRIBE!!!

Providing a link would be beneficial. :P

I would link it now, but some of the comments have been deleted, so it doesn't really matter.