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So, let me get this straight. Norway, Spain and Ireland have recognized a Palestinian state. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, and other Middle Eastern states have not. Egypt will not allow Palestinians in Gaza a temporary safe haven in the Sinai. None of the signatories to the Abraham accords have repudiated them. Yet the anti-semites in Europe seem to think they know more about the Middle East than the Middle Eastern governments that govern there. Is this not a curious thing. Many students and other Westerners seem to think they know more about the Middle East than Israelis and these Arab governments. Maybe they are missing something? Maybe its that the folks in the Middle East who have skin in the game, including Arabs, understand the threat Hamas, Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood actually pose to the region.

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I eagerly subscribed to TFP believing in it's claim to offer a fresh, unbiased perspective on current affairs. Sadly, I've been disappointed. The editorial commentary is rife with the same ol' lefty eliteist pejorative adverbs and adjectives. The use of the term "Normie" is a prime example - as if the vast majority of Americans are somehow just one category of wild ass whackos parading around with signs and chants. Normal people are just that - normal. We are not the equivalent of BLM, PETA, LGBTxxx, etc. We are the baseline, the bulk of the distribution curve against which everything else is measured. To demean that is to betray the claim of objectivity offered in TFP's original proposal. I have placed TFP on probation. I hope for better.

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TFP is owned and run by Bari Weiss and Nellie Bowles, two lesbians in a gay marriage who used IVF for Nellie to conceive, carry and deliver their first child, a daughter. Nellie is now heavily pregnant with their second child, obviously also by IVF. They’re California Democrats who may now be registered Independents. This should have been known to you when you subscribed to TFP, in which case, I don’t understand your opinion that “normal people” doesn’t include LGBTxxx. Admittedly, Bari and Nellie are a bit anti-trans insofar as that includes gender transition for minors and trans women usurping women and feminism (the variety of feminism that Bari and Nellie ascribe to). Nevertheless, you should have known all this going in, so why does it now surprise you?

If you want a good idea of what Nellie, at least, believes in, get a copy of her recently released book “Morning After the Revolution” (borrow it free from the library). I think she’s suitably anti-BLM and anti-WOKE for you, but you’ll just have to get over the LGB phobia or unsubscribe.

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Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy for me :)

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Jr. is in favor of abortion up to and just before the moment of birth? You down with that partner?

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The filthy rich Kennedys only enter politics as a hobby.

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Dear Iran,

I am so sorry that Raisi apparently didn't suffer much when his helicopter crashed.

Perhaps if you had spent Biden's generous gifts on helicopter maintenance rather than training and arming terrorists, you might still have him around to ensure that your women don't get the dangerous idea that they can think for themselves.

Congratulations on increasing the gap between yourselves and North Korea for the title of Lousiest Sovereign Nation in the World. I hope you are rewarded with numerous academic transfers from our Ivy League universities. They need some new slogans for their next campout and 20-minute hunger strike.

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founding

Maybe my reaction to you doing the same.

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I agree that the administration offering condolences to Iran for the death of a mass murderer is disgusting. I don't think it matches the opinion of most Americans. Something which I think comes closer to doing that is the call from Iowahawk for Americans to celebrate with five days of helicopter jokes. I have read several good ones at various places, but my favorite so far is the following:

"As Allah as my witness, I thought Iranian presidents could fly."

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Thanks for posting the Lucy Letby update. Very credible reporting. Interesting about the clamp down on press reporting.

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I object to a Jew writing about the Catholic Pope. Sincerely, a protestant. PS-this is a joke, please don't ban me or cancel my subscription.

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Draw and quarter. No Jew jokes

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“Raisi’s “mixed” legacy: Speaking of things I can’t believe actually happened, here’s the BBC’s take on The Butcher of Tehran:

On the one hand, a lot of torturing and murdering of dissidents. On the other, and I wish I were making this up, “some reform in processing a backlog of court cases.” Tough to know how to weigh those against one another.”

“Sentence: hanging! Next…”

“Sentence: rape then shooting! Next…”

“Sentence: beheading! Next…”

Now that’s the way to process a “backlog of court cases”. Liberal democracies should take careful notes.

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Not for nothing but I always saw the spike of kids doing puzzles, crosswords, and boardgames similar to AA folks picking up a smoking habit. They are trying to ween themselves off an addiction to social media us older folks let them develop in childhood by adopting something that gives their compulsion something else to do. But what do I know, when I have asked people just always say "Who doesn't like puzzles!", which to me sounds like "No thanks, I am trying to quit." from the movie Cold Turkey. :)

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I know that Bowles reads them on TGIF. She has very rarely commented or "liked" a comment. But clearly she reads them.

There has been a lot of complaint external to SS to moderate and even internally on SS from other authors. Matt Taibbi has stood tall and explicitly said no commenting policy.

Immagonna guess that Weiss, et al., think the comments are what others cite to label her right wing. I am sure she is bothered by that, but she needs more backbone. And she needs to explain things to her employees. This is not the NYT - though at times it seems headed there.

Starting down the slope to moderate comments is a sure fire way to open yourself to ever more demands. Plus, Weiss should not fall for the trick of the claim that unmoderated comments on a site are evidence of the site's owner's views.

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Until Kevin Durant? is drawn and quartered in the public square I won't believe anybody would think you need banning/censoring. I'm going with glitch on this one

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No. They are doing a comment moderation program. When I finally got a response to my question, why was I banned?

Elias here from the Free Press team. Sorry for the confusion; we are still working through some technicalities with implementing our new comment policy (pasted below) on Substack. A comment you left violated that policy, which is why the comment was removed. We love spirited debate, and we're working to build a community where it always stays above the belt. We're glad you are reinstated, and thank you for your patience as we figure out these technicalities.

Of course, they never told me what comment was verboten or why I was reinstated or anything. And I asked. So then this came back when I said you should say what the comment was.

Thank you for sharing that feedback with us. I think that's a very good point, and I'm going to suggest we do so going forward. Again, we apologize for the inconvenience; we are in the early stages of figuring out this policy. Thanks again for supporting the Free Press.

So then I wrote. Well, that’s another issue you all need to solve. When rolling out a new policy or whim in this case, it would be best to have all the particulars nailed down so there aren’t any glitches. IOW don’t release something “in the early stages” of “figuring things out” until you’ve actually figured things out. All that does is irritate people who are actually paying for this.

So fun times ahead I would think (not).

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If this is going to be how it is I'm out of here.

I guess my glitch theory is kaput

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Sadly yes, and if after a couple of weeks we do not see some explanation and retraction I will be hot on your tail. But I will miss many commenters here, especially KD?

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"Fake it until you make it!" The mantra of Silicon Valley.

I suspect these children doing "moderation" are all from the Stanford Internet Observatory. Cowards all.

Bari Weiss and "Elias": Grow up, grow a spine. Get rid of moderation. You WILL lose subscribers and you will be exposed. Don't be a jerk, Elias.

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"Don't be a jerk" is hardly an explanation for moderation. Must have been submitted by one of their Ivy-educated interns who they are paying, nothing?

They should give a warning/explanation of why someone is being moderated.

I'm ok with some moderation, like when some people lash out at those they disagree with, tossing personal insults, and dropping F-bombs. But 'jerk'?

Who decides what jerky is? The teenage interns? Bari? Nellie in the midst of childbirth? Ollie tired of negative comments?

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deletedMay 22
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Fair points, but I still suspect Weiss if bothered by being called "Right" or "Right leaning".

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“Elites require control over the information sphere because their policy obsessions—on immigration, gender, and climate, for example—are not popular with the normies.” I would take it further. Elites require a total control over the information because their ideas cannot withstand any scrutiny: that men and women can change gender at will; that climate change is caused by humankind’s activity and can be reversed as we wish, and that a remedy for all social ills can be reduced to a simple formula like a struggle of oppressed against oppressing. These notions could be easily destroyed in a healthy debate. They fade and melt under sunlight. That’s why such debate is made impossible.

This is as old as the world, of course, for anyone who is willing to recognize it. How many lives were lost, families destroyed and whole countries’ development turned backwards - Soviet Russia, China, N Korea, Cambodia - when only one ideology was set as prevailing. Rivers of blood flowed during French Revolution. And it looks painfully familiar. During the French Revolution, people could not use old “aristocratic” language - it made anyone an enemy of the state. Like we have to use the right pronouns. And a citizen could get arrested and sent to the guillotine not for acting against the revolutionary state but because he/she didn’t show enough enthusiasm and cooperation. History is such a treasure, undervalued, unfortunately, or not taught enough.

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Israel should drop photos all over Gaza showing Hamas stealing the food.

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And they are rocketing the humanitarian food pier Joey built for hundreds of millions of dollars.

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What is happening now?! Every day, I read these news blurbs and I shake my head. We're going back to the stone ages. These are biblical times, where good is evil and vice versa; where Thou Shalt Nots are now Thou Shalt do (and vice versa). Where is the moral and ethical compass we have always possessed as civilized people?

Cohen may have stolen money, but is it a 30 year crime? I don't think so. We let BLM and Antifa loot and steal and we gave them a free pass. Let Cohen pay back Trump the money he stole and be done with this silly litigation.

The ICC is another global organization that should be disbanded (ie. UN, etc). How Israel is equated with Hamas is just plain stupidity. Horrendous.

How can we offer condolences to an Iranian dictator? The man is known as "The Butcher of Iran". Unbelievable.

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You do know the litigation is not about Cohen stealing from Trump.

And just what is a "30 year crime?"

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The ever senile Joe sending condolences to a mass murderer is equivalent to FDR, in early 1941, sending a birthday card to Adolf Hitler.

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Not only is Joe senile, he is flat out stupid.

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Good article but not sure I saw much evidence of the “revenge” never mind the emergence of organized resistance. Take Trump out of the equation and what have we got?

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“Bitter Clingers” ✅ How about “Bitter Klingers” for the Trans Community. God Bless Jamie Farr!

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