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Tikun Olam Banned at Daily Kos for Questioning Kos-Armando Conflicts of Interest
They finally did it. The folks at Daily Kos have sunk so low it’s downright embarrassing. You see, I published a post here and at Dkos a month ago or so saying that Kos and all political bloggers should maintain higher standards of disclosure in their blogs. They should inform their readers of any financial or other type of material relationship (including political advertising) with political campaigns. Man, were the Kossites hoppin’ mad. There was a tempest in a teapot that was even picked up by the right blog world to posit the ridiculous notion that my treatment signaled the demise of DKos as a political force.
Then I wrote a post questioning how Armando dealt with his own potential conflicts of interest in both his professional life as a lawyer and political blogger. This too made the Kossites hoppin’ mad. Scores of them were clamoring for me to be put in what religious Jews call “herem” or excommunicated. And that appears to be what’s happened. One of the supposed crimes I’d committed was to use Armando’s real first name in my diary title (”Armando, Political Blogging & Conflict of Interest”). You see, it’s supposedly against the rules to use a Dkos’ member’s real name in any comment, diary or story. The problem with this rule is that the very same day both Chris Bowers of MyDD (co-founded by Kos’ partner, Jerome Armstrong) and Armando had referred to me in print at DKos with my ENTIRE NAME, Richard Silverstein. So if that’s the rule I violated which caused my banishment, it’s being applied very selectively. And applied to favor the inner circle and ban the dissidents (like me). It used to be that you’d be banned in Boston if you crossed the line of decency. Now, I’ve been banned at Dkos for having the chutzpah to question the lackadaisical ethical notions of the Kos elite.
How do I know I’ve been banned? When I visit the site I no longer see a “Write New Diary Entry” link which would allow me to publish a diary. When I visit a diary or story I no longer see a “Write a comment” link allowing me to comment. I’ve written to the site administrator asking whether I’ve been banned and if so why. No answer yet.
I take my banishment as a badge of honor. I can’t think of any group from which I’d be prouder being excommunicated. Because of my progressive/dovish politics on the Israeli-Palestinians conflict I don’t often make many friends among my fellow Jews. So I jokingly refer to myself as a founding member of the Spinoza Society, an imagined group of Jewish intellectuals banned from polite society because of their free-thinking views. I’m a proud, card-carrying member of the Spinoza Society. Doubtless Armando and Kos would’ve banned the great Spinoza himself if he’d deigned to write a diary entry claiming that Moses did not come down from Sinai carrying the Democratic Party platform inscribed on those two little tablets.
Marisacat said:
Congratulations. Free of Dkos… and more importantly, free to say what you wish. LOL.
I was banned end of August 2005, after posting since Nov 2002. I inquired if a poster was an operaive from the Schumer office.
They are campaign OPERATIVES - nothing more. They have banned all sorts of people, liberals, left, centrists, progressives, Naderites, Greens… you name it.
To build a tabloid yellow sheet to support campaigns.
But Kos and the KosKidz still push “liberal”… for their businesses: They are not.
Enjoy being banned. And if C-span every runs their tapes of Spasm in the Desert, catch the Meta-Kos panel.
Be relieved. Blissed out nutters. Too many of them.
PAID OPERATIVES.
christian said:
it is an honor to be banned now as the smug kos and his crew of 20-something blogofascists attempt to silence every bit of discourse on a subject 6 of them don’t want to discuss.
if you cry foul, they call you a troll or a repub in disguise using hilarious logic. kos enjoys this policing since he’s encouraged it with the ridiculous troll-hunters he uses to enforce democratic law.
i hope that the politicos who have been using kos take a second look as the hate on that site can only be use against democrats. the self-righteous snark of some kossacks is appaling; you can only imagine how sad their human relationships are. what’s funny is that based on their own logic, somnebody like armando who shills for wal-mart would be considered the worst kind of sell-out hypocrite. instead, kos apoints him as a moderator to further ban people.
oh, i was banned for asking people to whoa down on the kill joe lieberman hate speech.
keep up the good work tikun!
Tony Schinella said:
I too have been banned by Kos for a) defending Ralph Nader, b) calling John Kerry a flip-flopper, and c) another reason which is slipping my mind at the moment. I like Mascriat’s comments here. I think he nails it right on the head.
Richard Silverstein said:
Hey, we all should start a club, say, the Banned by Kos Club. Membership requires merely that you’ve been banned by those ninnies. Some savage attacks against yr integrity in the DK comments threads would earn extra membership points.
Steve Hovland said:
I was banned for Conspiracy Theory violations today.
I too take it as a badge of honor.
The Political Spinroom on Yahoo is a genuinely free site.
KOS apparently has computers programmed to look for forbidden topics, then his little Brownshirt Thought Police descend. If they can’t silence by threatening expulsion, then they ban you.
Those policies will only hurt the Democrats over the long run.
Francis L. Holland said:
If you can’t stand Markos Moulitsas, you should definitely read the new research about him: The Secret “Family Business” of Markos Moulitsas Zúñiga is Uncovered.
If you never knew that Markos’ family received millions from the US Government and is connected to international environmental polluters, then you might want to post a diary about this at your blog.