(Just keep in mind that hosts can't prevent the general membership from alerting on anything to go to jury. You probably know that, but just in case others don't: even though groups are safe havens, any DUer can alert and jury on posts in groups.

In any case, we will block red-baiters and other forms of disruption.)

I've noticed that the rules are subject to personal interpretation which can vary widely. It just seems to me that red baiting ought to be a taboo in general but it appears to be encouraged.

In other words, if conservatives want to hate on Leftists, go post on freeperville etc., and critique of American Foreign Policy ought to be freely discussed as we do domestic policy.

It seems that the only time GD pushes back against red-baiting is when accusations of being a Red are leveled against politicians.

Not so much when it goes deeper.

It seems hard to explain that you can't have it both ways...

Ok, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration but not by much!

Not by much.

Stone has a rebuttal to his critics on his FB page, I'll add it in here:

https://www.facebook.com/TheOliverStone/posts/902035439820756

"‘Nightingale’ in Ukraine

For those of you angry with my analysis of Ukraine yesterday, please try to understand the bigger picture I’m offering. I have no brief for Viktor Yanukovych, he may well be the most corrupt president Ukraine’s ever had. Ukraine has a dramatic history of corruption. That is not my point. How Yanukovych was removed is -- and although many (perhaps a majority) of Ukrainian people wanted him out, there is ample evidence of pro-Western, third party interference, beginning with Victoria Nuland, John McCain, USAID, National Endowment for Democracy (who apparently organize very well on Facebook and Twitter), etc. Why for instance are so many policemen dead and wounded, and yet no one has investigated this in the new government?

The other point to consider in the big picture is US involvement with Ukraine going back to 1949, when the CIA and strongly anti-Soviet Defense Secretary James Forrestal created a guerrilla army codenamed ‘Nightingale,’ made up of ultra-nationalist Ukrainians. The Nazis originally set up the prototype of this militia up in 1941 to wreak havoc in famine-racked regions where Soviet control was loose, carrying out the murder of 1000s of Jews, Soviets, and Poles who opposed a separate Ukrainian state.
Beginning in 1949, for 5 years the CIA parachuted Ukrainian infiltrators into the region. To the Soviets it was as if the US were infiltrating guerrillas into Canada or Mexico.

The big picture is the US has never given up on using Ukraine as a launching pad to the underbelly of the Soviet Union, now a reduced Russia. This Cold War 2.0 policy continues in a most deadly fashion, and whether they know it or not, the Ukrainian civilian population in the middle has suffered greatly from this ideological crusade."

I haven't been following this issue for months, but he brings up points worthy of discussion among progressives, imo.

I think it is a function of thousands of people, new people entering all the time,

Except for a few who I have gotten to "know" thru their posts,

usually I don't know who the f**k the poster is, don't know their values, don't know if they are who they say they are, or someone else....

Makes deep conversation difficult.

So then I come to the smaller forums, but they tend to be inactive.

oh well...

Although I always keep in mind that no matter how logical socialism is to me, to a lot of people it's still conflated with the "Red Scare" propaganda. And with the Ukrainian situation being so murky and also the subject of "Red Scare" TYPE of propaganda, I could easily see it happening.

I mean normally sane posters wind up ignoring or making an exception for the Ukrainian government's fostering of open fascists in positions of power simply because they are against Putin and the Russian Federation. It's one of those situations that seems to have hardened positions all around and people wind up talking past each other rather than to each other.

Here's the link: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026029087

Stone isn't defending Putin, yet the reactions to his remarks wrt to our role in events is beyond the pale. The rationalization for locking was based on "Conspiracy Theory".

Obviously, someone in power of such decisions is woefully misinformed or uninformed on the matter.

I mean who needs RT when one only need to reference former Secretary of Defense and Former Director of the CIA, Leon Panetta's public remarks wrt to our "efforts" in the region.

Seems to me that source alone should suffice as "legitimate".

I'm still scratching head over that one.

There are too many people stuck in propaganda...from their grandparents' time.

The smearing of Putin, the man who has kept us all out of WWIII, is absolutely indefensible, but it is all one hears on the M$M.

It is frightening to find such closed minds on a supposedly open-minded website, but there it is, every single day. Many moderators (not all) are just as bad as the propagandists.

I'll ask...how has he kept us out of WWIII (which, I suppose if he hasn't started could be argued)

Or are you yankin' my chain?

and the rest of the world supported Putin. Hence, the PNAC is reduced to fulminating in the fringes, out of public view.


Putin's also checked the Ukrainian gambit at every turn, showing a maturity and finesse in STATESMANSHIP which the world hasn't seen in ages. He knows his stuff and he protects his people.

The PNAC is itching for a fight they can win, since they haven't won in Iraq or Afghanistan or Latin America, and the constant thwarting of their schemes leads the WH to indulge in public tantrums on the two-year-old level.

The pressure on Obama to produce something other than droning the occasional Muslim wedding party must be intense. Obama hasn't demonstrated the steel nor the support to resist such secret lobbying for evil. He can turn down the voters without raising a sweat, but his corporate masters?

Putin hasn't got corporate masters. He prosecuted them, put them in jail, stripped them of assets. That's the difference, in a nutshell.

Good answer. I like the way you think. I'm gonna be watching you." - Sam Kinison from "Back to School"

which hasn't quite come to that. The current version of the Cold War 2.0 is a result of f**ked-up policies, IMO fueling predictable paranoia ginned up by the West vis a vis NATO and so called "democracy" programs on behalf of U.S. imperialist ambitions which was entirely predictable. A Clash of the Titans one could say on a somewhat limited scale. (non-nuclear so far)..

.

i am grateful there is ONE adult, at least, in the room.

the dude's got "manly" issues of some sort, insecure - kind of reminds me of Bush/Cheney et al.

On the other hand, we're constantly giving him reasons to be overly paranoid.

on this website. The best we can do is keep it out of this group. The site as a whole now has virtually no moderation (except for a jury that will possibly hide your post if you call someone a poopy-head ~ other than that it's pretty much free reign). Sadly this site went downhill fast with lack of moderation because now the right-wingers are getting a free ride to spread their propaganda.

Virtually most of my jury requests are on alerts of this absurd nature.

On the other hand, Red Baiting? No Problem! They don't even blink an eye..

Well, I guess I just needed to vent a little.. thanks for the sounding board..

sometimes I need to know I'm not alone.