We recently received a message from one of our visitors expressing dismay at some of the commentary at TheNewsBlender. Upon discussing it with him, he has agreed to allow me to address his concerns in the form of an editorial (although he wishes to remain anonymous, which we will respect), First, I’ll present his letter, and then follow it with my response.
Message from Anonymous Visitor
Hey yall,
I really do appreciate all you do here in providing this site, but I’ve been a little taken back as of late by a few things. Before I went off in the comments, I wanted to give you all a chance for comments. I am really concerned about a few things.
First and foremost, I came to this site because I couldn’t stand TRS with all their Trumpinistas or whatever you want to call them. When you brought up something that may be slightly against Trump, you were attacked. It drove me here where I thought we were a group that, based on our values, couldn’t support Trump based on who he has been throughout his life. I felt like some of those common values were the Constitution, truth, honor, objectivity and common decency. I realize they are not laid out that way in any place, but I felt this belief usually ended up with most alignment towards the constitution and mostly disagreement to democrats as a general rule. I appreciate the DBAJ policy, but I question where the right and left of that are.
As of late, I do not know up from down here. People are nearly 100% anti Kavanaugh and mostly anti Ted Cruz. I do not understand this. These are men. They have faults. In the case of Kavanaugh, while you may not be his biggest fan due to rulings and statements he has made, he is the man of the hour. The way the politics are being played with accusations against him lead to many questions. The first being, what really happened, if it did at all. I will be the first to say if these allegations are proved – he should not be on the Supreme Court. But with that said, we really do not know and should not make any assumptions since I understood this site to be about truth and values. Unless we personally know Kavanaugh or his accusers, what ground is there to stand on to substantiate the accusations against him? Yet the comment section of this site is riddled with anti-Kavanaugh speak. Some of it is directed to the way the Republicans are handling the situation which I could see as fair game, but the question of the politics that are being played by the Democrats often gets over shadowed. They have had the information about Dr. Ford for over a month and did not bring it up till the last minute.
These assumptions or judgments delivered in the comments section are toxic to what I thought this place stood for. People are talking about voting for Beto in TX. REALLY?!?!?! He is anti gun, pro abortion, and pro amnesty. How can anyone say they support the Constitution and support that guy? If you don’t feel like you can support Cruz, then don’t vote for him. But it seems maddening to vote for someone who is clearly against the Constitution as it is.
Add this to the assumption of guilt in the Kavanaugh case is mind boggling to me when there is no corroborating evidence. There needs to be more evidence before we crucify the guy.
I guess the point of my contacting you is to figure out whether I need to delete this site from my regularly traveled news sites. What does this site stand for? Is it just a lynch mob of people spewing things into the comments? That is not my idea of a healthy way to spend my time nor devote my brain cells to. I feel like many people are being jerks and should be called out for it.
Bottom line, I came to this site because I thought it would raise my knowledge and intellect because it would figure out the facts and then use reason to find an honest conclusion. I saw this site as not just bowing down to the current administration without becoming democrats or worse. I question what the point is vs TRS when the comments section has become so vitriolic as of late.
I do not mean to be a downer, but these are my real concerns and I hope this email finds you well and my language expresses my thoughts accurately and you conclude this email is not out of anger. Please contact me if you have any questions or comments.
Cheers,
Anonymous Visitor
My Response
Hey AV,
Thanks for your message. I appreciate you reaching out to us rather than posting this in the comments where things could quickly get out of hand.
I understand your concerns and I agree with much of what you said in a general sense. I can tell you that I am personally 100% about the Constitution and liberty and free-market economics. In other words, in no way do I support the Democrats. I can tell you that the people behind this website and most of the visitors basically feel the same way, although some are expressing it differently than I would. That said, we also do have some regulars at TNB that are actually Democrats. We do not discourage them from being here and participating in discussions (in fact, we actually encourage it and are glad they are here), as long as they are civil and respectful, we believe that leads to better dialogue and it give us a chance to persuade them to our point of view (we are devious that way).
In order to get a good idea of what we are attempting to do at TheNewsBlender, I invite you to visit our About Us page, if you have not already done so. This page gives our mission statement,
Mission Statement:
TheNewsBlender
We promote Founding Principles by providing a place for discussion and education through community building and civilized debate.
and also provides detail on our philosophy on providing content,
Most stories on most media outlets are factually accurate as far as the facts that they present, but the same story covered on a liberally-biased news outlet will be presented with certain facts that play to their bias, and will be covered by a conservatively-biased news outlet with the facts that represent their bias.
TheNewsBlender
In order to get all of the facts, one must view both stories and attempt to pull out all of the facts and dismiss anything that may be biased opinion. That’s what we will attempt to do at TheNewsBlender.com.
and finally, we disclose our bias,
We believe the public would be much better served if everyone recognized their biases and made an attempt to disclose them. In that vein, most of the authors and contributors at The News Blender have a conservative world view.
TheNewsBlender
We believe in the principles that founded our Republic and the Constitution that was created based on those principles to protect our rights. As our mission statement above indicates, we will attempt to make the case for those principles through this website, while welcoming and encouraging respectful discussion.
That said, as you are aware, it is very difficult to balance all of that in the crazy world of Trumpism. We do our best. But we are definitely not here to cheer-lead for one side or the other. We attempt to cut through the partisan garbage and try to point out the facts as we see them and then provide a platform for civil, respectful discussion about it. Along the way, we add in some editorials and commentary that provide our opinions on the topics in order to jump-start the dialogue (and we also invite anyone else to submit their own editorials or rebuttals to ours). That’s it. Everything else is driven by the visitors.
As a little background on where I’m coming from, my biggest problem with Trump is that I believe that he is destroying any hope of returning to our sound, Constitutional principles and will be ushering in the rise of the Democrats, and worse, the increase of progressive socialism. So for me, personally, voting for Democrats to stop Trump from ushering in the Democrats makes little sense, because it’s actually voting for what I feared the most.
But now we have a dilemma. We are in strange times…uncharted territory. What do we do about Trump and the pathetically corrupt and dishonest Republicans that are covering for him? The one thing that Trump has done for us is to expose a lot of people for the dishonest phonies that they are…despicably mimicking Trump and acquiescing to Trumpism. I can’t tolerate that.
Trump is a lying, self-serving demagogue who is destroying important relationships with allies, and doing things such as destroying trade agreements that could take many years to recover from. He is cozying up to brutal dictators at the same time. Nothing he says is honest, including the exaggerated claims of his accomplishments. Yet the Republicans in Congress do nothing and the people on the right amazingly fall for it. This presents as dangerous a situation as having the Democrats in charge, although in different ways.
I honestly don’t know where to go from here.
Some at TheNewsBlender believe that we should vote for the Democrats because the current version of the Republican Party needs to be defeated. Most here do not want to see the Democrats in control, but see no other option to remove the scourge of Trumpism, in the hopes that once eradicated, we can rebuild a true Constitutionally conservative party. I am not to the point of voting for Democrats…yet. But these damn Republicans push me away more and more each day.
Now, to briefly address a couple of your specific criticisms…
Cruz was my guy. I believed in him. I trusted him. I campaigned for him and donated money to him…multiple times. I told everyone who would listen that he was the real deal…that he has never let us down…that he was the guy who could lead us back to the Constitution. But there is no doubt that he has changed. There is no doubt that he has abandoned the principles that led me to him and has taken up the Trump way. I’ve written about these unfortunate changes in Cruz here and here.
So we feel deeply betrayed by everyone who we respected and listened to for the past 30 years. Many of us have become extremely cynical and want to see the Republican Party die a slow death because of that. Rush, Levin, Cruz, Evangelical leaders, and so many more. They have fallen to Trumpism like dominoes. Why? For many, it seems to be all about the Supreme Court appointments. We are essentially selling out everything for that.
Which brings us to Kavanaugh.
I have painstakingly and thoroughly written my views on the Kavanaugh situation through many editorials, so I don’t want to go into ground that’s already been covered. The following links will take you to those various editorials:
Kavanaugh Accuser Comes Forward
The Kavanaugh Accusations Showdown
How The Republicans Are Screwing Up The Kavanaugh Issue
Let’s Be Honest…Kavanaugh, Take IV
Kavanaugh Should Not Be Confirmed, But Probably Will Be
How Do We Determine Credibility?
What The Hell Is Wrong With Me?
As I wrote those editorials, my position has evolved based on new developments.
As a quick summary of where I currently am on the Kavanaugh issue, personally, I started off believing that if no other negative information about Kavanaugh other than Ford’s initial claims were revealed, then it was not enough to tarnish his reputation and thwart his appointment to the Supreme Court. But I also stated that Kavanaugh and the Republicans had to play this smart and take it seriously, including allowing a full FBI investigation of the accusation in order to dispel any doubts.
Their actions and additional information that has come to light during the past week or so have shifted my thoughts more toward believing the accuser. And after watching the entire hearing, start to finish, with both Dr. Ford and Judge Kavanaugh testifying, I found Ford to be more credible…and it’s not even close. Details of those observations can be read in the above editorials.
In the end, it really no longer matters to me whether the sexual assault actually took place, as far as whether Kavanaugh should be confirmed. I believe the behavior that Kavanaugh displayed and the very obvious lies that he told while he was under oath in his confirmation hearing should disqualify him from the Supreme Court.
One thing in Kavanaugh’s testimony particularly bothers me more than others. It may seem minor to some people, but in my opinion I really think it is a good indication of his character. That is the part about the entry in his yearbook about the girl, Renate.
Recall that he and a number of the members of the football team had entries in their yearbook profiles referencing the girl, “Renate Alumnius”. We all know what they were implying. They were bragging about a sexual conquest. Yet Kavanaugh claimed that it was merely a show of respect of friendship of the girl that he and the other football players were displaying and memorializing forever, and then he chastised the media and the Democrats for turning it into a sexual thing and dragging this girl through the mud.
“That yearbook reference was clumsily intended to show affection, and that she was one of us. But in this circus, the media’s interpreted the term is related to sex. It was not related to sex.” … “She’s a good person. And to have her named dragged through this hearing is a joke. And, really, an embarrassment.”
Judge Kavanaugh, Confirmation Hearing Testimony
To me, that is beyond the pale. What’s worse is that he was apparently lying about the sexual conquest as boys will do.
But it’s even worse than that.
Here’s a guy who wasn’t content to do what most scummy boys that age do…go into the locker room and brag to the other boys about his little sexual encounter with the girl…a hurtful, despicable lie, as they usually are, by the way. But he didn’t just leave it there, where it would eventually die…no, he decided to immortalize that disgusting lie in his yearbook so that it could come back and haunt the girl (and her family and kids) all over again 35 years later (and now forever in history). And instead of simply admitting his grievous mistake and apologizing for such abhorrent judgment (ironic that he now wants to be in the position requiring Supreme judgment), he lies about it, claims it was some tribute of respect, and criticizes others for dragging her through the mud!
I’m sorry, but that’s despicable.
And that’s not a judgement he made when he was 17, that was a judgment he made last week.
We can do better. We must do better. But we probably won’t do better.
In a few days, it is likely that the Republicans will push this vote through and Kavanaugh will probably be confirmed by the narrowist margin possible. And the right will cheer, believing, once again, that they are winning…that Trump is winning for them.
We’ll see…starting in a little over a month from now.
Sincerely and respectfully,
Steve Wood
P.S. This site is intended to provide information where people of all political sides can participate in civil and respectful discussion. We encourage visitors to stand up and speak out, even inviting them to submit their own guest editorials to be published. We also invite visitors to submit rebuttals to our editorials at any time if you do not agree. And I specifically and personally invite the Anonymous Visitor, or anyone else who has something to say, to write a rebuttal to this article. We will run them in the featured positions, as long as they are civil and respectful.
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