I was just reading some of the vitriol posted in the right wing   
    echo, about the Chick Filet issue. That got me to thinking about   
    how the right wingers love to paint anyone not in their group as   
    liberals and smear them with much worse.   
      
    This led me to think about the conservatives who used to post in   
    Fido. People like Frank Scheidt, John Fitzgerald, Peter Brady,   
    and more I can't even remember any more. Frank was a devoted   
    conservative, even Bush supporter till the bitter end. Yet,   
    because he would not goose step with the right wingers they   
    pushed him out of right wing echos. Peter Brady was a hard core   
    conservative, and more intelligent than any right wingers I see   
    in Fido now, yet he was firmly dedicated to substantive debate   
    devoid of personal attack.   
      
    John Fitzgerald was another case entirely. He was perhaps the   
    most hard case conservative I have seen in Fido, but he was also   
    capable of reasonable consideration of other points of view.   
    John was also someone who would conduct decent, and friendly,   
    conversations with those they disagreed with.   
      
    All three of those were people I would like to sit down to   
    coffee with. Opposed to those you have the right wingers who are   
    left in Fidonet. They consider personal attack the normal mode   
    of conversation, smear perfectly acceptable, and find if   
    offensive if you show they have distorted or misquoted someone.   
      
    The right on Fido is no longer made up or conservative, but   
    right wingers who cannot accept that others not only have   
    legitimate views, but they can't deal with being proven wrong.   
    To them truth is a variable, not a constant, and it changes to   
    meet their point of view.   
      
    This is sad, but is also, I believe, a major factor in the   
    decline of Fidonet.   
      
    This is sad, and I have no idea how to recruit rational   
    conservatives to join the debate.   
      
   BOB KLAHN bob.klahn@sev.org   http://home.toltbbs.com/bobklahn   
      
   ... Patriotism is not sending others to fight and bleed and die.   
   --- Via Silver Xpress V4.5/P [Reg]   
    * Origin: Fidonet Since 1991 And Still Here. Join Us: www.DocsPl (1:123/140)