Moderateman, clearly this has touched a sore nerve with you as this is your second post about Smirking Chimp. As I said before, I can't speak on behalf of the site as I'm not an admin- I go there to read the articles and if something really peaks my interest I may add a coment or two from time to time. I can understand why you don't respect SC, considering your less than stellar welcome for which you do have my apology, in all sincerity. You are absolutely right in your opinions that you have been treated unfairly.
With that said, please allow me to explain my position. I love the Smirking Chimp because it is a voice of dissent against the Bush Administration, and unapolagetically looks at news in a very different light than the mainstream media. Quite often it reports on stories that only recieve passing or little mention in MSM. Quite often the essays go completely contrary to both Republican and Democratic talking points. I do not agree with everything that's posted there. Many of the people that frequent SC are tools when it comes to their dealing with people who have differing opinions, this I do not deny. I do not take the information on SC as gospel simply because it is left wing. If anything, the articles and postings there have taught me that you should not blindly believe a piece of news because it is "right" or "left" wing. Everyone is free to think for themselves, and when you read a piece of news there should be a bit of critical thinking saying "do I believe that? Do I agree with that?"
About 2 and a half years ago I was reading a blog by a lady in Iraq named riverbend, in which she stated her opinion of the 'benevolent' occupation of her country. I followed it until a few months ago when she had to shut down as her family was leaving the country due to death threats- they were sunnis living in the wrong neighbourhood, time to go. To the best of my knowledge she has no overt political agenda (and if she does, then all the power to her) but it was just a blog about the hell hole that the country has become, the nightmare that the regular average person has to go through just to get a tank of gas or buy groceries without getting blown up. Anyway. Her opinion of events certainly differed from that of Fox news, let me tell you! I also have several close friends from the middle east, and boy did they ever open up my eyes to the difference in news reporting over there. And Europe too, for that matter. Hell, even the Russians and the Chinese have some pretty decent reporting going on- granted their good media is all about international events outside of their borders, and domestic news is still your time honored issue of pravda propaganda but you get the picture. But back in good old North America (I say that because unfortunately most Canadian media is heavily tied into or owned by the same American conglomerates) the news was tickety boo. Yes, things were not going all that well in Iraq, yes it was unfortunate that people are dying, but hey look, Justin Timberlake just exposed Janet Jackson's boob on live TV!!!!! Oh the humanity.
So where am I going with this nonsensical rambling? Well I was getting awful fed up with the garbage the news outlets in North America feed to the people. And it's just that, garbage. You know why? Go to a dozen different news sites or papers and chances are you'll see the same 15 or 20 odd "big" stories of the day, sure each site or newspaper may tell it in a slightly different way but it's become one big homogenized product. It didn't use to be that way- newspapers and networks used to actually send investigative journalists out en masse to dig down and get the scoop, and sometimes their reporting would differ a hell of a lot. Now it's almost like there's some dude sitting at a big desk who says "okay folks, this is today's news! and make sure you downplay the importance of stories X, Y and Z while emphasizing heavily on stories A, B and C!" (At a typical newsdesk that's called an editor, but when you have an editor for an entire continent's news its' called cencorship or propaganda)
So I figured there had to be voices of dissent out there from within North America. Surely not all 330 million people in US and CA were sheeple were they??? So I found Freerepublic, and a couple of other right wing sites. Although I disagree with most of the ideas espoused there I found it refreshing that people were stating their opinions, many of which differed from the official, accepted version of events. And to be honest some of the ideas championed on those sites I do agree with. For example I believe we should follow the UK's example and put cameras in all public places (but that's another story)
Then I found Democratic Underground, but to be honest I was turned off by it in their overt support of the Democratic party. DU is a site that unabashedly supports the democrats and will rarely post something that will go against the party line. Too often, they make concessions in an attempt to rationalize much of the BS that has become the democrats- if you want a case study about sticking to talking points and pandering to the ruling politicians of the party instead of telling it like it is, go to DU.
So then I found the Smirking Chimp. Now first off, next to the title you see a picture of Bush's smiling face, and a laughing chimp. From this, one can infer that the site is HEAVILY anti-Bush. Is it a radical left wing site? Sure. Are there a lot of angry lefties there? Yes, and I'm not defending them or their lack of decorum when dealing with others. SC (in my humble opinion) is a site that is dedicated to documenting the crimes and slights (whether they be perceived or real) of the Bush Administration. The republican party is a major target too, but believe me the democratic party gets badly roasted by them on many occasions as well. Many of my favourite writers post on there, but there are days when the articles posted are the same old anger re-hashed, or I flat out disagree with. Of special interest to me are the economics articles, where you will find some very good arguments for the current housing bubble collapse and market turmoil that go beyond the ridiculously simple "poor people with bad credit are to blame!!!"
Something that you have to understand about a lot of angry lefties, especially the ones at SC (and farbeit for me to speak for them) is that they believe that this world is seriously screwed up, and that if things don't change soon we're all going to be in a world of hurt. Well hell, doesn't that just sound like freerepublic??? Sure does, in a way I guess. Many also believe that most western governments have a long, long list of crimes against humanity that require correction (not to say that non-G8 countries don't) that have never been publicly acknowledged. Many are very pissed off that Iraq was invaded in the name of their country (but that is not my place to say as I'm not American) and are even more pissed off that American troops are still stationed there. Many also believe that we are seriously screwing up the planet, and that if the current system of capitalism goes on eventually we'll destroy the very ecosystems that keep us alive. There's a great book by a former Marine general name Smedley Butler called "war is a racket", written in the 1930's which espouses a lot of these ideas of injustice. Anyways, I could go on ad nauseum if given the chance, and look forward to the possibility of debating these topics with the good folks at Joe User.
In summary to my nonsensical rant (there's that famous liberal irrationality for ya), I love the Smirking Chimp because it is a voice of dissent in a world of media conformity. Many of the posts and articles don't hesitate to ask uncomfortable questions, but regardless of one's political affiliations they are questions that need to be asked. In regards to why there are so many angry liberals ready to attack anyone who argues against their views, it's not right nor justifiable by any stretch of the imagination. But then neither are people from the right saying that all liberals are irrational, or just want to give a bunch of money to lazy poor people etc. But that's an entirely different topic which would require much more time and effort to write about than I possess tonight!
