"Letter to the editor" ...the editor being me.

[shirenomad]

I've been reading your live journal--more specifically your links to friends pages, over the past couple days, and I recently had an idea. I would like, with your permission, to start a weekly(?) political column using your blog as a springboard. This would entail me writing a column once a week or so explaining a particular conservative position, and then responding to their objections throughout the week (possibly in a few big chunks).

[snip]

Anyway, I perfectly understand if you think this will be too divisive or inflammatory for the content of your site. Let me know what you think.

-----

Without giving this this guy's name just yet, know that I do know him and trust him, and if he ever starts getting what I judge as "inflammatory", I will stop letting him post here. Still, I'm hesitant to do this at all until I at least know how you'll take seeing conservative essays on your Friends List every week. I've also considered giving him an LJ invite code and letting him go nuts there, though part of the reason he wanted to use my journal is to have a pre-existing audience. Either way, it's a way for the conservatives around here to get something topical... and the liberals to try and comprehend the line of reasoning that would lead an otherwise perfectly intelligent individual to vote for Dubya.

It could also be a way to have everyone kick me off their friends list. So this is what LJ made polls for:

[Poll #380196]

[EDIT: In case it helps your decision, this will be from the same guy who wrote this piece. They won't all be on that subject, of course, but you can expect much the same writing style and so forth.]

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Hi, snotty conservative potential columnist here,

First, since the sentiment seems to be universal, I'm sorry for any offense given about the Michael Moore post. I by no means meant to imply either "liberal friend of CMZ=Michael Moore" or "liberal friend of CMZ=stupid." Certainly, Wattsu, (http://www.livejournal.com/users/wattsu/2004/11/03/) for example, had a fairly rational response to the entire issue. However, I do recall reading several insanely-pessimistic-to-the-point-of-being-suicidal-posts on his friends list re: election results to feel that the comment was justified.

(Actually, re-reviewing the posts, it seems like a majority of the suicidal-crazy responses were either from various users on the uci channel, or on replies to posts of people on the CMZ's friends list rather than people on the list themselves. So perhaps the statement was overkill to begin with.)

That being said, I still think that a change for mutual engagement would be useful. As I also mentioned in my email, I've had far too little opportunity to talk with those of a liberal persuasion since graduation. Amazing how leaving college for a fairly conservative suburb will do that to you.

Anyway, Chris, I'd wait for more posts before deciding anything. And since you still haven't chosen to divulge my name (nice vote of confidence, btw), perhaps you could give them a sample of my previous writing as an example. The one on your journal, despite being a bit long, would work. Or you could give just them the Hillsdale essay, but that might give them too much ammunition. :)

[cassaclyzm.livejournal.com]

Ahh. I figured it was you. ;-)

Hi, snotty conservative potential columnist here,

*snorting my coffee* I officially rather like you.