And we are called the "angry left?"

[question everything]

Someone posted what I thought was a nice summary of Andy's battle with cancer, and the link was... the freepers'! I thought that it was very decent post - for us and for them - and clicked on the link. Well, the post itself is from the Seattle Weekly http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0527/050706_news_andy.php (and an epilogue http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0528/050713_news_andy.php )

What shocked me were all the hateful responses that followed.

This was my first - and last - visit to that website. I know that here, too, we often have very hateful, some would call them irrational, posts about the current administration, about the right wingers, etc. And, I suppose, they have similar about the liberals and Kerry and, of course, the Clintons.

But to pour so much bile into Andy and his friends and all of us that tried to help him? What is it to them? Even if the whole thing were a scam, it was our money, it was this website. What is it to them?

I barely got to the end of that thread and closed that window and ran to wash my hands with soap and water and take some fresh air outside.

How closely they followed the different threads here so that they could throw some of the posts back at us. How they were angry that Andy got some benefits from Medicare "their tax money." Someone needs to show them that famous map about givers and takers states.

And then there is another website, by Fred Grandy that, again, took its time to read all the posts here and, supposedly, filed a complaint with the FBI. Again, what is it to him? It was our money and we gave it freely. If you are going to this webpage, please, try not to open any thread. Their software actually counts how many views each post has. Please, don't give them this satisfaction. I read a couple, I think, but mostly reading the subjects was enough, again, to make me sick.

They are not even "angry right" they are just loathsome.

[havocmom]

1. They call us 'the angry left' cuz it is a talking point put out

by their masters, they cannot fathom nor spell 'righteously pissed' and they are infantile freaks who cannot accept that their actions deserve angry responses. Taking responsibility for their actions is not their strong suit.

Hey lurking freeps: we are under no obligation to be polite to hateful cretins. Dish out hate and anger and we will NOT turn the other cheek. Get used to it.

[newswolf56]

2. A newcomer here, I was only vaguely aware...

... of the Freepernoids and was wholly unaware of their repugnance. Nor -- sadly -- was I aware of the late Andy Stephenson and his struggle against cancer. But now having visited the Freepersump to see its venom for myself, I am appalled: I have not witnessed such raw froth-at-the-mouth hatred since I infiltrated a Ku Klux Klan meeting 40 years ago. Suddenly I understand not only the true magnitude of the Christofascist malevolence BushCabal has unleashed on the nation; I also (and for the first time in my life) understand precisely the emotions that motivate Leftists to proclaim what became the basic rule of the people's courts in Russia, China, Cuba and Vietnam: "oppressors have no rights."

[frictionlessO]

3. Wow a life changing event for you, eh?

You sound like an old school reporter, would love to hear more about your infiltration.

Also would love to see you expand on that last line a little bit more, if you would be so kind?

[newswolf56]

5. Am indeed an "old school reporter," but can't elaborate...

...much on the Ku Klux Klan episode because the details would blow my (already tenuous) anonymity. Suffice it to say that it was in the South of the Civil Rights era (where I was fortunate enough to be working for a liberal daily), that the assignment gave me a chance to meet Grand Dragon Robert K. Shelton face-to-face and witness his hatemongering first-hand, and that it generated a page-one story -- in retaliation for which the Klan fatally poisoned a beloved dog I had raised from puppyhood.

As to the "oppressors have no rights" stance, I don't remember the source but it was long ago. My best guess would be Felix Greene, some of his reporting on China or Vietnam -- or maybe one of several works I read on the Russian Revolution and the subsequent civil war. Out of curiosity, I Googled "oppressors have no rights": most of the links seemed to be to Rightist commentaries on Marxism.

(Unlike far too many self-proclaimed Leftists, I do not automatically "hate" all conservatives. But -- another characteristic of the "old school reporter" -- I have no use whatsoever for hatemongers regardless of their politics. And the Freepernoid hatemongering against a dying man is surely among the most roach-dung-despicable modes of "discourse" I've ever seen: literally -- at least in my estimation -- on a par with gloating and jeering at a lynching.)

[DIKB]

4. Well then.

A somewhat belated welcome. I've been here almost 2 years now. It's sad that you had to visit FR, but people need to do that to see just what we're dealing with in this country. Apparently there is also a "site that will not be named" (I have my suspicions, just not verified)

And you can check out the ultimate example of their sadism, an attack on a dying man. scamdy.com

[newswolf56]

6. I never doubted the magnitude of Christofascist hatred in...

...the Bible-belt and in those other parts of America where it has taken root. I am no idealist, and have no doubt about the patriarchy's geometrical intensification of the human inclination toward evil: note in this context the obscenity of thermonuclear weapons built in the precise image of Yehveh. But to read comments from individuals who actually begrudge a dying man his Medicaid pittance -- a pittance that is never more than meager and is always doled out with maximum maliciousness -- this was truly stunning, rather like discovering that I share a neighborhood with people who, for pleasure, secretly beat and rob cripples. The Freepernoids' greedy rants about "tax money" confirm the infinite malice I am increasingly convinced is the wellspring of the entire Bush agenda.

In any case, thank you for the welcome! My greatest regret is that I did not discover this site a couple of years ago.

[question everything]

7. What a wonderful post for someone relatively new..

When we collected the funds for Andy last April, some of us also approached friends who are not DU members, via our private emails.

Earlier this evening I contacted them again, told them about the sad ending and just provided the links for the Seattle Weekly, above. And one of them replied back: why would people fight for him not to get help?

How does one answer this? I just replied that they are hateful and deranged and even told him the paypal story that I was not aware - since I did not donate via that route - until earlier today.

I do remember Andy missing his appointment at Johns Hopkins and had his surgery about a week later - this, after we knew that every day counted, that the physicians who viewed his chart moved his surgery ahead by a month. I did not know that the reason for the confusion at John Hopkins was problem with paypal releasing the funds because... one of the freepers donated and then told paypal that it was a fraud.

How low can one get?

[newswolf56]

8. Thank you. Malice of the magnitude directed against Andy...

...suggests boardroom-organized retaliation a la the Karen Silkwood case or the vendettas against organized labor and the Civil Rights Movement. Now I am suddenly very curious just what Establishment interests and/or monopolist plutocrats Andy Stephenson's voter-rights campaigning might have threatened. I have neither the money nor the resources to pursue that question, and the fashion-tabloid quality of what passes for "alternative journalism" in Seattle surely minimizes the likelihood of enlightenment from those quarters, but perhaps someone with the stature and financing of a Seymour Hersh will take up the story. If the campaign against Andy were orchestrated from some clandestine throne of privilege -- and that eBay ploy convinces me it almost certainly was -- it would surely not be the first time the Internet has been perverted to the oligarchy's darker purposes.

Once again, the grim and frightening suggestion our adversaries' ruthlessness knows no limits.

[Swamp Rat]

9. Welcome to DU!

:hi: Great posts... nice to read somethin' by a "writer." :)

I, on the other hand, am not so verbose. :D