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My Wistful Dreams of RedState…

By: conservativecurmudgeon (Diary)  |  October 15th, 2012 at 10:19 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Ah, yes, I remember when…

My mouse would wander over to the RedState icon on my favorites bar, and I would click…

Heartlander would have an incredibly moving story about the unspoken and devastating effects of abortion, and the diary would have fifty-some “Recommenders”, and a comment thread that would wind on and on.

The thread would feature a flame-war between aesthete and Tbone that went something along the lines of one accusing the other of being offensive, and unable to grasp the gravity of the Diary, but– later on– one would see that Tbone’s latest Diary had been recommended by aesthete…

“All for One”, seemingly…

The Divine GameCock argue for this in one diary entry, and encourage that in the next. ColdWarrior would post one of his endearing diaries about getting off our dead butts, and change the Republican party from inside the room. Of course, there would be the requisite pile-on telling him to buzz off, already, the mantra is getting a bit stale, man. But, of course, everyone knew he was right, even if he seemed a Johnny One Note at whiles…

Then acat would post a recipe for Momma’s Southern Cole Slaw, and the world would be set to rights.

There is so much depth, so much strength in the vast RedState Army… But, at the same time, it rather had the same feeling of heading down to the City Park and enjoying a free concert in the Band Shell put on by the local Dixieland Ensemble.

At once intimate, and then again having to power to reach me in a way that very little else on the internet could. A family, in a corny and inarticulate way.  But that really isn’t the right word either.

But, where once there was passion and strength, there now seems to be listlessness and ennui. What once was a warm summer evening at the Band Shell is now a noisy outing at the Mall Multiplex. I can barely read the agate-type of the Diary titles, and I sure as heck can’t see how many folks have commented on them without squinting. Comments from streiff that are perfectly sane and rational have 32 “down” marks a couple of minutes after he’s posted them. Half the folks commenting have names that look more like ATM PIN numbers

God Bless Erick, but I rather have the feeling of reading his own personal correspondence nowadays. I mean, he’s got some terrific insights and a valuable chair in the Republican box-seats, but, c’mon. Sometimes his latest entry is tired re-take on Sean Hannity, sometimes it’s brilliant. But, pace Barack Obama, there’s a lot of brilliance out there…

And I kinda miss it.

Ah, yes. I remember the good old days of yore. And I’m still hopeful they might one day soon return…

COMMENTS

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  • mrsemptybucket

    glad to read your diary this evening…while I’m not a long timer at RedState you express perfectly how it used to feel upon arriving at RedState each day, sometimes several times a day. I miss it very much. It took weeks to get disqus to recognize my handle only by adding mrs to it. I miss my emptybucket handle! I miss being able to jump into a conversation, i miss knowing NOT to jump into a conversation. RedState isn’t really anything close to what it was. I have asked to follow a few names that I used to talk with if only to find them easier as that is the one thing I miss most…conversation with the same folks who many times think exactly the same way i do…the Conservative way. In my very humble opinion, this change to RedState was not an improvement to the community aspects of our comaraderie with one another.

    • gawken

      We here do tend to resist change, heck, we’re conservatives. But when you scroll down 40 or more diaries, and see that the vast majority of them have ZERO comments, then it should be obvious that there is something very wrong with the new format.

      • mrsemptybucket

        I used to start with the recommended diaries and read down and then I’d go to the other diaries and read from the bottom up. I miss many features of the old RedState. It’s not that I resist change, I know what I like and it is sadly now missing. This doesn’t mean there are some new features that are very nice…give me a few and I’ll think of them…oops. As someone who eyes start hurting about 15 minutes after arriving at RedState from the brilliant white background, and not having anything on the front page work when I click on it except the “read more” hypertext, and disqus allowing my comments to receive down arrows from all over the net, and, oh I am sorry this is starting to sound to negative and I really want RedState to continue for us Conservatives. However, yeah, when you read down the other diaries and there are all zeroes for comments it means we are writing to ourselves I guess. The other day I had 2 brilliant thoughts (my opinion) but when I posted the second diary the first one disappeared. Geesh.

        • lineholder

          You can’t post two diaries in one day, emptybucket. I found that out on the day that posted the GOTV diaries.

      • jamesm

        Conservatives love change! Goodbye Barack. Conservatives are like target shooters. When you hit the bullseye why would want to miss the target? Keeping things that are dead-on correct is great. Eliminating the good is always risky and usually a long term disaster.

      • Bill S

        Even in the old RS, many of the user diaries never received comments. It’s actually gotten better here of late. Before the user diaries list was fixed, that was obviously a problem. Now that the list of User Diaries is the default in the Redstate Community box, they’re getting more visibility. The one missing thing is still the Recommended list. Several of us (here behind the scenes) have griped about that, but it hasn’t been fixed. I have no idea when that’ll happen.

        • Mike Ferguson

          Agreed Bill, I truly do miss the Recommended list.

  • Melody Warbington

    Nice to see a familiar face at the mall, ‘curmudgeon. Not much more to say.

    (rightwingmom52)

    • kipling

      One of the problems is exemplified by the fact that Melody received -14 votes for simply saying hi to cc. The level of intellectual discourse here has crumbled with the new system. The voting system was one of the first things management promised to fix. A lot of those promises have fallen by the wayside. Even simple issues go untended. We are now at least two months into the new design and the fonts still do not always work on the front page and front page stories are often duplicated.

      • streiff

        This is the problem. Disqus is a separate business entity and we are asking them to change some of their business model to accommodate us. Quite honestly, I don’t know that they will. The voting system sucks a big one. A month or so ago I left a note welcoming a long absent member back and I drew IIRC 127 down votes.

        Disqus remains monumentally unconcerned about user privacy. For instance, anyone can follow you and receive all your comment on all sites. You don’t have a vote on it. But their business model is built around a clown car of commenters who migrate across blogs interacting with each other, not with the blog community.

        Rest assured the down votes aren’t being applied by RedState members. The front page has turned into a slow motion tragedy for reasons that no one can explain.

        Hang in there. I can assure you the frustrations you feel are also felt by the moderators.

        • kipling

          Thanks streiff. I frequent the Big sites and several others that use Disqus. I have noticed the clown car you mentioned. I will hang in there. You keep up the good work. I have really enjoyed your posts of late.

        • http://libertynews.com/ mbecker908

          And streiff, just to beat my dead bloggy horse again, the “problem” most certainly is not new look and feel nor is it Disqus. The problem is the content, mostly from the front page – not including you, the crank (who’s probably having a bad week for other reasons), Neil and the Coffee and Markets guys.

          Look and feel is nothing more than a matter of habit, most everybody will get used to it. Disqus is a separate issue and it’s pretty obvious that nobody at Redstate had anything to do with either decision. Even Disqus, while I’m sure it’s a nightmare for mods, is really no big deal beyond picking up troll “followers” that you can’t block.

          • Finrod

            My problem with the look and feel connects into recommending diaries. The one thing I always liked about the old format was that the user populace here always had a voice with the Recommended Diaries; when the frontpagers got off onto a tangent that the userbase didn’t like, sure the front page would as always primarily reflect the opinions of the frontpagers, but there was always the Recommended Diaries list there prominently at the top right of the page, where contrary diaries could be voted up as kind of a Greek chorus counterpoint.

          • http://libertynews.com/ mbecker908

            Don’t get me wrong Finrod, I don’t like anything about the “new” RS. I especially took umbrage at Erick’s comment that he sat down with a blank piece of paper and a pencil and designed it. I may be old, but I’m not THAT old.

            Bottom line, L&F is something that some people will leave over, others will be attracted to. I agree about the Recommends, but oh well, life goes on. There’s always a trade off on L&F and how commenting works and those things are always going to be trade offs that don’t much impact traffic on a long term basis.

            Content, on the other hand, will make you or break you and that is my real issue with the “new” RS. Along with new L&F, etc, we got the “new Erick” – who will insist he’s not changed, though everybody in the room knows the truth.

          • mrsemptybucket

            This is a great comment MB! Wish I could get my thoughts so clearly expressed! I am hoping those of us who stayed will somehow figure out a way to connect somewhat like we used to. I admit I am following a few familar to me, not to stalk or interrupt but just to find the comfort of reading comments from those I know. Especially when they agree with me. LOL. Hey there is another mbecker type handle is that you also? I had to add mrs to emptybucket to get disqus to recognize me. It kept telling me I was already registered, but wouldn’t accept my password. FinallyI gave up and created mrsemptybucket. It’s the little problems that make life interesting…NOT

          • http://libertynews.com/ mbecker908

            Always been 908. There are some comments that for whatever reason floated up M_Becker and it appears I have a mystery stalker with that screen name also.

          • mrsemptybucket

            I think I knew that other handle could not be you as the comment content didn’t sound like you.

          • Bill S

            If you have a “regular” Disqus ID and the Redstate-pseudo-ID … and you used the same email to register with Disqus and with RS, then there is the chance that on occasion your Disqus ID would wind up being the “posting ID” for RS comments.. That would only happen IF you told Disqus to “link” the two IDs AND IF you forget to sign into the RS site before commenting.

            This happens to me on occasion – my RS login will time out (for whatever reason) and I’m not logged in – but I can still comment, since I’m signed into Disqus. So on occasion, I’ll accidentally post a comment as “RedstateBillS”.

          • http://libertynews.com/ mbecker908

            Thanks Bill. I did link ‘em and I suppose my “old” Disqus ID could have been M_Becker, it’s not like I’d remember setting it up :) .

          • lineholder

            Hey, becker. So, you have a stalker now, do you? Gekster and acat would be envious, LOL.

            Missed you guys, becker. Good to “see” ya’ again.

          • http://libertynews.com/ mbecker908

            Actually, s/he has gone into hiding for the last week or so. I Franz-ruled it.

        • tnfriendofcoal101368

          Strieff you’ve hit the issue, Disqus’s business model is completely incompatiable with what RedState was/is. They can’t fix it because it is totally against their culture as a company so they don’t understand it. It would be like Disney complaining to McDonalds that all the burgers taste the same at McDonalds Disney as every other McDonalds. The response would be “of course they do, that’s the point”.

        • Finrod

          I actually like Disqus, at least on sites that aren’t RedState. The problem with RedState using Disqus is that RedState already had a large user base, and it seems like Disqus is best used for sites that don’t already have such a user base. The result with RedState going Disqus is that I have two userids: my RedState one, and the one for all the other sites I visit that I’ve been building up for over a year now (last I checked, I’d made ~1500 comments and had gotten about twice as many likes). I have seen Disqus sites where you could vote up posts but couldn’t vote them down, the only negative option being reporting a comment to the moderators (not sure if anything kicks in automatically or not with enough reports).

          • mrsemptybucket

            just curious fin, what sites are you finding an interest in? I gave up the ones that seem to have no moderators and the ones that allow spam posting. Would enjoy another site to interact with Conservatives, would you mind sharing?

        • Bill S

          seconded.

        • Mike Ferguson

          I would like to second this and renew my “Disqus is the eternal suck!” comment.

      • Melody Warbington

        Read between the lines, kipling. On 9/27/12, there were 5 diaries submitted by members about activism – 2 by lineholder, 1 by civil truth, 1 by American Majority and 1 by me. lineholder’s provided volunteer information for all 50 states. Not one was promoted to the front page.

        So, really, there’s just not much more to say. Makes me wonder if the guy who runs the joint thinks stories about iphone reviews are more important than motivating people to work for the Romney/Ryan win.

        • mrsemptybucket

          Hit the nail on the head Melody! The diarists outside of the front page are basically talking to themselves.

          • westcoastpatriette

            It’s why I stopped writing diaries, emptybucket. Feels like I’m talkin’ to myself…something I definitely don’t need to be doing. :) )

  • http://libertynews.com/ mbecker908

    Erick who?

    I’ve been here long enough to remember when Erick wrote some biting pieces, taking on the non-conservative wing of the Republican Party and he was never shy about outing the media in their constant upholding of the “principles” of the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.

    Those days are long over. Given the lengths he recently went to in order to protect CNN and company’s use of polling data that anybody with a very elementary knowledge of statistics, polling and arithmetic could see was being purposely slanted to Obama. Then, on the heels of that supreme effort in proving that he’s a media blowhard, he defends the BLS and their latest unemployment report.

    Thankfully, streiff has stepped up, along with Repair Man Jack and the guys from Coffee and Markets so there is still something worth reading at Red State.

    Hopefully, Erick is going to get a full time gig with CNN or MSNBC and he won’t have time to continue to embarrass himself here.

    • kipling

      I too was surprised by his defense of the bogus polls and the unemployment report.

    • Common_Cents

      It’s probably time for someone else to pick up the grass roots conservative activist torch. RS activist conservatism disappeared during the Republican primaries, yielding to more neutral horse race horse race caller, yukking it up on CNN, not using the opportunity for defending/inspiring activist conservatism. It hasn’t been back, save for a diary or two on media bias, well, ummm.. until the apology diary. How many front pagers on GOTV? Getting involved in local party? Tea party activity? You know, the old mission of RS grass roots activism stuff…..etc….

      • kipling

        Those days are gone. EE has become the establishment and RedState was just his launching pad. Grassroots activism has given way to the corporate slick newsletter.

    • gawken

      I would pay good $$ to see EE on MSNBC,,

      • Common_Cents

        we don’t need another Joe Scarborough.

    • http://beaglescout.wordpress.com;http://news.unifiedpatriots.com/ Beaglescout

      Does anyone else remember “Operation Leper”? EE wrote several posts excoriating Nicole Wallace and Steve Schmidt, the ringleaders of the abysmal McCain campaign who blamed Sarah Palin for losing apparently because she was simply too Sarah to become their buttoned down milquetoast version of her. And now I see Wallace and Schmidt on the talking heads shows, apparently getting some kind of traction in this new race despite having had the responsibility for running the absolute worst presidential race of all time. What happened to operation leper? Why has even EE forgotten it?

  • kipling

    I miss the old days too. Not much else to say. I read the shiny newsletter but the community is gone.

    • mrsemptybucket

      hi kipling! how on earth can you have 11 down arrows for this comment? Except for the old system having to be rebooted every morning we might still have that community going. At least that is one of the reasons Erick stated was their biggest problem. Before he could post his daily area the system needed to be rebooted as it had crawled almost to a standstill. For those of us ignorant of servers the easy answer is, reboot the system every 12 hrs instead however I know that is over simplified and probably was discussed by those in the know as a possible option before our switch over to disqus.

      • Mike Ferguson

        The down arrows are probably Daily Kos trolls.

        • streiff

          exactly right. Somehow they haven’t figured out it doesn’t matter here.

  • http://www.TerriersOfTheRight.blogspot.com Flagstaff

    I missed my first Gathering this year, not by choice but by necessity. Will my obit say that I attended “all but one” of them?

    Curmudge, the reference to Dixieland was incredibly apt. Dixieland is polyphonic music, you could even say poly-melodic. Each instrument, the clarinet, the cornet/trumpet, the trombone, the sax when present, each of them plays a different melody line which amazingly fits together with all the others to produce a glorious sound, bigger than all its parts, and that is precisely what this website should be doing.

    They tell us that all is well, that eyes on the page have never been more numerous. I hope so, but like you, I’ve found it hard to deal with the new format. Commenting yes, but diaries no, until tonight. We’ll see how it goes.

    Meanwhile, let’s hope the leader finds his glasses and his baton, that dissonance is held to a minimum by the skill of the musicians in the band, and that more of the old members of the Preservation Hall Conservative Exposition Society can find their way back home.

    If I could give you a Recommendation, I would.

    • tngal

      No Reco’s here, but you can “star” CC. I just added mine, so there are 11. The star thingy is to the right of the word “comments”.

  • dudette

    i think the new website and its format which hides the diaries from initial view is toblame…i would wander around the old site a lot because everything was on view. i really dislike this generic look; may be cleaner but less spontaneous and less accessible

  • Ausonius

    “Even a genius can have an off day.” – Wile E. Coyote. One assumes that the intelligent people at RedState had just such an off day when they decided to use the present format and “look.” :)

    The explanation that RedState is struggling to evolve to a better format sounds reasonable. Crashing servers were the main reason for the change, as I recall the explanation from Mr. Erickson.

    Yet I do not see any improvement in the site as a result of the changes. Certainly things are different, but are they better? Perhaps the wizards behind the curtain have an easier day as a result. That is not to be discounted. Still, it is regrettable that the changes chased away a good number of good people.

    Obviously I have stayed around, despite disappointment and the numerous frustrations in dealing with the site now.

    Whether Mr. Erickson is also evolving in his own way into a “centrist” who can hobnob with media elites on the coasts remains to be seen. Are there indications of that in some of his recent comments? A “centrist” would seem to be somebody who accepts things from both Leftist Liberals and Conservatives. What does Mr. Erickson believe which could be defined as a liberal tenet?

    e.g. Being unwilling to admit that political pressure from the administration to cook unemployment numbers is a possibility would not necessarily qualify one as a centrist.

  • Christine

    At some point (a couple of weeks ago?) there was a post from Erick where he said the development team has been charged with doing “something” about this. I got the feeling at that time that the complaints had been heard and recognized. That said…the post was not on the FP and I haven’t seen any updates since. It would be nice to know what the timeline is for a solution to be proposed and implemented.

    I’m all for change – but change must have benefits that outweigh any issues. I don’t doubt for a minute that RS really needed these improvements, but it’s come at the expense of our community. The longer the wait to resolve the issues, the more permanent the damage becomes.

    Pleading message to TPTB: Please, please do SOMETHING ASAP.

    • Mike Ferguson

      As someone who has been fairly vocal as to not liking the change, I can say that I would never believe that we are not being heard. The problem is that nothing like this happens ASAP. That’s just the truth and as much as I would like it fixed right now, it just isn’t practical. Yes its frustrating but its also true.

      I missed that post by EE, but that in and of itself is proof that they are listening.

  • funwithknives

    It is Good to See C C here and in full-throated voice. I too, miss the old not-so-far-away days when things were easy to find and readily at hand. “This place” has become sterile and forlorn, compared to it’s former self.
    I finally got my EDIT button, but I would gladly ‘kick it down the road’ to once again achieve what once was.
    I miss ‘my buds’ and those still remaining know who I am referencing. C C does most of it for me, but there are others, too. Teresa From FWT, ‘gekster’ (dude, where in Flint are You?) and many other ‘occasional correspondents’ are absent and it stings, in it’s own personal way.
    I know that this site is not mine and I am just a Remora of sorts, along for the ride and taking some advantage of other’s words & deeds. But this was a place that let me in, where I truly felt ‘as one’ and ‘at home’ and that sense is gone.
    More than likely, gauging what has been evidenced so far, it is not going to be resurrected.
    If this is ‘Better’, it leaves very much to be desired………and raises The Question of Why?
    What WAS The Point…?

  • streiff

    I’m relieved you only mentioned my “sane and rational” comments. They are much easier to keep track of than the rest of them.

    • Mike Ferguson

      Pfft, you have growled at me before, you really aren’t as scary as you think, lol.

  • barleycorn

    Great to see a diary from you Curmudgeon. You eloquently encapsulate my feelings about the current state of RedState.

    It is a mess. The diaries are poorly displayed. The comments are buried. Even the “frontpage” layout is inchoate goulash. I plan to stick around through the election but if things don’t get back to normal by then I don’t anticipate hanging around much longer.

    I say that not in a punitive sense but simply that RedState no longer fills the need. Like a burger joint that suddenly goes vegetarian it may still be a great place, but for somebody else, not I.

    • kipling

      I agree. If it was not for streiff and a handful of others, I would have left weeks ago.

  • Common_Cents

    This diary has more comments and stars than most. It should be a candidate for front page. ;) But it will get beat out by an iphone review. ;)

  • http://www.political-woman.com politicalwoman

    I’ve been at RedState now for since 2010, and have noticed the number of new people joining in the conversation, and the people who always commented and are now missing. As for the old format, it reminds me of what happened to “Taste of Home” magazine. Home cooks submitted recipes and anecdotes; reminded me so much of mom’s cooking and times around the table. Then it was bought out and modernized, lost half its readership.

    I’ve also had a couple of technical malfunctions, with posts not viewable, although they’re published. However, one is able to post more easily with pix and video, otherwise, the site has become more homogenous lately. Sigh.

  • tngal

    To be fair CC, whenever you fix up a batch of cole slaw using that recipe you mentioned, it always had cat hair in it. Not sure why.

  • jamesm

    Great diary. I have held back on commenting until now because I can not put adequately into words the essense of what is missing. It is much more than technical. I don’t feel I could properly put the loss into words, in a more elegant sense, then my fellow RedStater’s. Many posters (that are still here) have been here much longer and with a deeper connection. But to the community and the commenters: I agree with you with most all of the comments and there are 32 now.

  • mrsemptybucket

    Would like to say that this should have been promoted to the front page, maybe it has by now. Also, Streiff and Bill S moderating the comments has been one of the reasons some of us have stayed and keep trying to communicate Conservative ideas and get Mitt Romney elected. I haven’t seen anyone else moderating but Streiff and Bill S are on top of the trolls pretty much all the time. Has to be time consuming for them and I’d like to say thank you. One other thing, would someone take a moment and explain Erick to me. I came on board about a year ago and don’t know much about his background. At first I thought he was a Liberal who turned to the dark side (that would be us) but later that maybe he’s been a Conservative a long time. His most admirable columns are the ones he writes at Easter.

  • westcoastpatriette

    What did you say, ‘mudgeon? I can barely hear you. Where are you? Can you hear me, ‘mudgeon? Maybe I’ll try back later… :( (

  • stevemaley

    Change is always difficult. It’s hard to sort out what you don’t like because it’s different & unfamiliar from what is truly a change for the worse.

    I’m told that a lot of the changes that have been made were out of necessity. This little homey front porch we congregate upon is actually a pretty sophisticated IT platform, and a unique one at that. Its earlier incarnation had grown about as far as it reasonably could as it had begun to stretch the baling wire and duct tape that held it together out of shape.

    This new platform is supposed to fix all that. It’s supposed to be scalable, for growth. I hope it’s required.

    The front page is acting flaky at times. I hope that gets fixed.

    As a user I’ve been told “Don’t touch that button, no matter what you do!” Uhm, I don’t have that button. [Ooops, sorry. Slipped into html there for a moment.]

    And sorry, Disqus suqs. [I do not believe I have offended anyone with this observation.] It does not lend itself to what the contributors are supposed to do, which is to read and interact with the comments on their diaries. But then, I miss RS 1.0, when men were men and a diarist could tell which were the new entries among the comments.

  • paladin1

    CC, you have perfectly expressed my view of the “new, improved” Redstate. It has lost the feeling of community and the change has disrupted the ability to follow up on those who I either agreed with or debated. It now seems riddled with the vitriolic commentary of flamers and trolls. I also miss he ability to live-blog the debates like we did with the primaries. I seldom post anything anymore and have not written a diary since the Perry days. I do still follow as best I can but the magic has definitely gone!
    I MISS THE GOOD OLD DAYS!

  • mwmom

    I became involved with politics for the first time back before the 2008 election and I have Redstate to thank for 4 years of incomparable education and community. Although I rarely posted or even commented, I checked in with Redstate every day and spent 1-3 hours reading through diaries and comments. Seriously-every day. I was obsessed!

    Things have changed and it’s not just the look and feel. It’s the community. Longtime posters are gone. Diaries are hard to find. Too many trolls. And one other major complaint … Now comments don’t track to their location. I used to click on intriguing comments and would be transported to that comment. Now it just starts at the first comment and I have to wade through them all. As a working mom I just don’t have the time for that.

    So I’m still here, but much less frequently. I spend way more time at Ace of Spades HQ and Breitbart. I miss the old Redstate community but don’t know if it will ever come back.

  • conservativecurmudgeon

    Hello, Everyone… Good to see so many of the Old Faces in the Old Places…

    Y’all might be interested to know a funny thing happened on the way to this post: Last night, I checked in to see if anyone found the thing interesting, and sure enough, emptybucket and Melody W. had checked in, and it was a comfort to know there was some sentiment that comported with mine.

    Then, before going to bed, I checked in again, and the diary (appeared) to have been deleted. Maybe it was promoted, I thought. Eh, we’ll see– whatever…

    Then, I checked in again this morning, the diary still seemed to be gone, and I thought perhaps I’d struck some sort of raw nerve, and RedState no longer felt it could stand any critique, constructive or otherwise. Then, I tried to log in, and my Firefox browser went nuts, telling me that the western world would end if I continued in my efforts to log in.

    Eventually, I encountered the Dreaded 404 Error, and I thought I’d been banished. What could I have done to tick them all off this much? Sheeeze.

    Then, I looked in again this evening, and noticed I could log on. Huh? And now, I see the diary is back, and there are 51 souls who have commented on it (thank you all, by the way). Where did the diary go vis-a-vis my computer for sixteen hours? Why did Firefox think RedState was a vicious, lethal Trojan Horse? Help!

    • mrsemptybucket

      Is it possible that your system, like mine does not like that RedState does not yet, even after a month, have an uptodate certificate. My computer does not want me to go to RedState and I have to override the promp and go anyway. Sure wish they’d get that dang certificate taken care of.

    • Ausonius

      Greetings ConservativeCurmudgeon! The errors and other such failures in attempting to find one’s diary and comments are not unknown aspects of the “new” RedState. The frustrations – we hope – will not prevent you from writing codgerly and curmudgeonly comments! Best Wishes!

    • lineholder

      Hey, ‘curmudgeon. Looks like I’m late to the party. Nice diary by the way. I miss the old format, too. And quite a few folks that we seem to have lost along the way in the process of change.

      I always appreciated your diaries and found many of them very inspiring. I hope you’ll continue to contribute to Red State in the same way in days to come. I truly do!!!

  • Mike Ferguson

    Good to see you CC. I share your feelings and mwmom’s post below is almost identical to my situation and feelings. Where I used to spend real time here learning and reading, now its come in scroll down, frankly see if Moe has posted anything, then I move on. my 1 to 3 hrs daily has turned into 15 to 20 minutes. While I have never posted a diary, I have commented frequently, but now its more random for me.

    I first hooked onto Redstate when I went to a friend who kept track of politics and told him I wanted to get more up to date and learn more about what was going on and driving our government down what I felt was the wrong road. (I am a Nurse so I knew to be scared as heck by the whole healthcare thing.) It was several months before the 2008 election, if I remember correctly, and without hesitation my friend said: “Yea check out a site called Redstate.com, if you are a Republican/Conservative that is the site for you and you will learn a lot.”

    Of course, he was right, over the next months and years I came to know the folks here, came to be a big fan of Moe’s particular style, “DOOOOM” just love it, made comments, asked questions, and was answered intelligently, the most amazing thing to me was when Eric, Moe, or the diaries actual writer would answer me directly.

    I give Redstate the credit for my political education and turning me into a person who voted because I was raised to believe if you can’t be bothered to drag your butt to a polling place at least once every 4 years, then you really have no right to gripe if things aren’t going the way you want them to be going, to a person who is now an informed voter who votes anytime the polls are open and takes the time to research the choices. Heck I even regularly write my Senator’s and Rep. about their upcoming votes.

    Redstate became part of my life. I felt the sadness at the shake up over the diary manipulation in which some were engaged. Then I heard about the updates that were coming to the site and as a low level computer geek, I was happy that Redstate was updating its stuff and making some changes. I looked forward to it, was wanting to see how they could improve on the community that had become part of my life.

    The best description that I have for my feelings about the change is to say that it is nearly the same as when I drove by the elementary school I attended to show my very serious girlfriend at the time, only to discover that it had been torn down and and houses had been built in its place. So now when I go home its just a place I drive by on my way to Mom’s house.

    Then the change came and with some excitement I clicked my Redstate shortcut…..to be completely honest I thought my shortcuts has messed up and I had ended up at The Blaze. I was blinded by the sterile white background and couldn’t find anything. So while I did complain, I also hung around and hoped for the best.

    The first thing I noticed was the change in the community members.
    While many of the people are the same, many are also no longer here, or at least hard to find if they are here. Something fundamental has happened with the change in the technology, the sense of community has changed. I know I am not the only one who feels this way because I have seen others voice feelings similar to my own.

    Unfortunately the most common response to voicing those feelings seems to be getting growled at by a mod and told that you are being unreasonable and haven’t given it enough time, so I stopped saying anything. Granted, I think part of the growling was just due to being over run with snap negative judgement’s and I must admit that I may have made a few snap judgement’s of my own. Alas, my tag still says Human.

    Now much like the area where my old school used to be, now this is a place that I just drive by on my way to other places. While I will probably never leave for good it is not the same and I truly, deeply miss whatever that special thing was that is now gone.

    God Bless
    Mike

    Edited by me to clarify

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