My experience at a Minnesota politics blog.

[Nitrogenica]

In Minnesota there is a blog called Minnesota Democrats Exposed, a very popular blog that is more or less a right wing propaganda repeater. It is run by a popular rightie here named Michael B Brodkorb.

At a more Liberal Blog, Minnesota Publius, there has been a long history of bloggers from MDE who would post rude and often offensive posts, a lot of them, and in my opinion they were mostly trying to "poison the well". "http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/poisoning-the-well.html"

The operators of the site as a policy do not censor posts, so this behavior has gone on for years. I sometimes over the years got irritated, and sometimes fought back with my own posts, especially the Summer of 2004.

Recently, every day with no let up, our local blog was being bombarded by right wing trolls. Every post, without fail, would be followed with a barrage of right wing talking points and name calling. I don't know if they're fighting extra hard to get ready for the Republican National Convention here next year or what, but they have been relentless. Logic and reason are lost to many of these trolls, they just smear and smear and smear.

Recently a post about Al Franken brought the following response from Micheal B. Brodkorb again, he was a busy guy on this blog.

"Al Franken supported the war in Iraq, but now he wants to cut off funding for the troops. That is a big flip-flop."

He posted this smear against Franken over and over and over again, replying to every critic with a sort of "But that's what Franken said!!" The mods removed most of his repetitive posts the next day.

After four years of arguing with these people, and him, I finally resorted to one of the lowest arguments I've ever had. I did what a rightie does and picked on his appearance. I am somewhat ashamed, but I've had it up to here (gesturing) with these people......so I posted.......

~"Flip Flops” are so easily pointed out.
Here’s one of Bush’s.
BUSH FLIP: A week after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Bush said he wanted Osama Bin Laden “dead or alive.”
BUSH FLOP: But he told reporters six months later, “I truly am not that concerned about him. It’s not that important. It’s not our priority.”
Any questions, Michael B(ald) Brodkorb?~

That's right.....I called him BALD!! What was I thinking? No offense to anyone here who is bald, I am a bit thin on the top myself. Anyhoo I said I'm not proud of that post. We've all heard plenty of insults directed towards Democrats based on appearance alone from the right, and those smears, unfortunately for America, worked.

Here's Mike's pic.



Anyhoo, that was 3 days ago, the last time he's posted on the site, and it seems almost all the right wing trolls are gone. I find it hard to believe it's because I called him bald. Maybe this is just coincidence. It is one big break from the trolls, and the quality of the conversations on that website have gone up dramatically the last few days.

How many of us have been close to that tipping point lately? I would imagine, because of poor public opinion, there are many more righties close to the tipping point than Liberals.

[dflprincess]

1. I think we've all faced that temptation and even given in to it

I sometimes feel driven to post comments at the Big Question blog on the Strib's website. I recently posted a comment about Bushco ignoring the August 6 PDB and someone responded with one of the dumbest "it's Clinton's fault" arguments I've heard. I've practically been chewing on my fingers to keep myself from going back and telling the guy he's an idiot - I suppose I could try to come up with an intelligent response, but even if I limited it to monosyllabic words this troll wouldn't understand it.

You should post this in the Minnesota forum as well. Micheal B. Brodkorb apparently checks out that forum occasionally. When Kirby Puckett died I made a snide post about hoping that baseball or new stadiums wouldn't be mentioned at his memorial service at the Dome. Brodkorb picked out that post and added it to MDE with the headline that Democrats (in this case Democrats being only me) were trying to politicize Puckett's memorial. I sometimes forget that sarcasm or irony are totally lost on the wingnuts.

And didn't turn out the he's a paid operative for the Republicans?

[mzmolly]

2. So Al Franken believed Powell and he admitted he was wrong on the war.

Coleman was a Democrat when he was initially elected Mayor of Saint Paul, isn't that a bigger "flip flop?"

So you called him a "bald" sorry, but big deal. If that's all it takes to scare the trolls away, brava! I spent one day at a Conservative Cult Forum and was called much worse. ;)