Ok, ip has had it for a while.
Pat Powers' failure to stem repeated attacks on Bill Fleming and other named commenters by bots hiding behind pseudonyms is reprehensible. Bill and others have brought significant traffic to the website that have even caused the repeated crashes of Pat's servers as SDWC sells innuendo and diatribe to the uneducated masses that make up the bulk of Republican voters in South Dakota. In stark contrast, Cory Heidelberger at Madville Times sacrifices click numbers for integrity and deserves the kind of web traffic that Mr. Powers has enjoyed through a smear campaign.
Anons and Pseudons leave open the possibility that Pat is just pumping up his posts with his own fake comments to create the illusion of lively conversation. Of course, I'm not sure Pat can be that effectively schizophrenic. The more important problem, as you rightly note, is the promotion of cowardly, irresponsible discourse. If folks want to rant and insult, they should have the guts to put their names to it. I get the impression a lot of people comment anonymously just because they don't want the boss to know they're goofing off on company time (ah, another example of Republican commitment to hard work and personal responsibility).
ReplyDeleteExactly, Cory. If Pat would assure me either here at ip or by phone that he intends to stem attacks from pseudos, there is no reason for me to go there. If only Bill would agree.
ReplyDeleteVerbal patterns are like finger prints. Old writing teachers get to the point where they can see word patterns and vocabularies that are as distinctive as fingerprints. I have noted for some time that some of the comments on SDWC are composed of the same mental perspective, the same vocabulary, and the same phrases and verbal patterns that are evident in the posts they presume to comment on.
ReplyDeleteThat, with the fact that PP will publish any kind of libel that fits his manic partisanship, has long been reason to dismiss him as of the same caliber as Sibby, who is merely an echo chamber for Limbaugh, Beck, etc.
If it's ugly, Powers will put it on South Dakota Wart Collage.
And he writes like a fifth-grader with a can of spray paint at one of those rest area comfort stations that end up looking as bad as they smell.
librl y
Pat perhaps didn't call it "War College" for nothing. As they say, "All's fair in love and war."
ReplyDeleteBut, Power's blog is not the only SD blog that allows anonymous posters with phony names to attack other posters.
I have read very few comments on any blog anyplace that have had much value if they have been posted by anonymous posters or those running under fake names.