Longtime DUers: When did DU show up on Roveco's radar screen?

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

(This is in reference to the attempt by Faux to discredit DU).

Was it the overnight discrediting of Parlock? (Dude with the crying daughter whose "sign was torn up by nasty union thugs" who's been part of multiple such incidents over many years, always involving his kids and a Dem rally)

Was it something else?

[Maiden England]

1. My bet would be the sinclair thing. (nt)

[ck4829]

2. Th 1st time I even heard of DU was from a post that...

had Michelle Malkin as the author.

She was talking about how the DU'ers were talking about John Ashcroft.

At this time I was a Liberal, and so some time later, I checked out DU and joined.

[IronLionZion]

3. Jan. 21 2001

The day DU was born (I think) and Bush was installed as chimp-in-chief.

[Bouncy Ball]

4. I don't think it's so much DU

(though I'm sure they just HATE DU! LOL!) but I think they really hate the internet, period.

Think of how many stories were broken on the internet, or how many were CORRECTED on the internet and then the stories and/or corrections just flew like wildfire and actually affected the news we see on TV?

That will start happening more and more. This place and others like it are the equivalent of a HUGE open-air Speaker's Corner, where EVERYONE can get up on the box and air their views (here it would be progressive views, of course).

And that runs contrary to what they want. Freeperville, they don't care about because those people would *get in line* to perform certain....um...ACTS on ANY elected repuke or talking head repuke on TV.

[annabanana]

6. they hate ALL the internets....n/t

[yardwork]

5. The Sinclair campaign would be my guess - because it was effective

I've only been here for about nine months, but in that time I've seen a lot of obvious disruptors sent here to cause trouble. I'm guessing that most of the tsunami posters were disruptors, given the job of posting idiot comments that the rightwing press could use to discredit DU.

I have a feeling that rove and co keep a close eye on all the liberal boards and blogs, but our power has been growing in the past year. DU was right on top of a number of issues that threatened the rightwing stranglehold on the news:

BBV - yes, there has been controversy, but we're still known as a major clearinghouse for information about election fraud.

Sinclair - DU helped organize a very effective campaign that is still ongoing and still having an impact (see Staples decision today).

Parlock - His photo was brought here by an obvious disruptor but it backfired. DUers busted Parlock and neutralized his future impact. It also shone the light on rightwing disruptors posing as "union thugs" at political rallies.

Berg beheading - the video was brought to DU by "helpful" new posters who quickly disappeared when a lot of us pointed out odd discrepancies in the video, notably the fact that it was filmed in Abu Ghraib.

Dan Rather - DU helped out some Atlanta attorneys who crawl around on FR pretending to "discover" things that the White House feeds them.

And so on. Yes, I have a feeling that DU is a thorn in Rove's side.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

11. Good point.

[Stephanie]

7. AWOL - during the campaign

We were the AWOL clearinghouse until they neutralized it with Rather.

[w4rma]

8. When the occupation started going badly, as DUers had predicted. (nt)

[Bouncy Ball]

9. You know what's great?

I go around with a democraticunderground.com sticker on my vehicle and I know a lot of other DUers do, too.

More of us should. Hell, I'm going to order a DU t-shirt now, so more people can see the address.

[Mike Niendorff]

10. I think progressive forums have always been on the RW hit list

They've been attacking and disrupting progressive dialogue on the net (and elsewhere) for as long as I can remember, even going back to my days on Usenet in the mid-90's. The difference with DU is that Skinner's moderation model effectively counters their standard disruption tactics, and this has allowed a community to genuinely take root here in spite of all the nasty stuff these people have thrown at us. So, now they're looking for a Plan B, and they're having to fall back on more subtle methods of harassment and disruption (primarly, imho, by trying to inject disinformation and paranoia, trying to bait people into taking extreme positions, and by trying to hijack and redirect discussions that pose problems for RW propagandists).


MDN