By Phil Kadath: For no particular reason other than I’m cleaning up the sidebar and freshening up the blogroll.
I thought it appropriate to fiddle with “The Rules Round These Parts”. This list now goes to 11.
This post will pop-up when the link is hit. Ignore them at your own peril (oooh, doesn’t that sound ominous?).
The old rules list is here (ungraciously stolen from Craig @ MTPolitics) if you wish to compare. The originals were written during the heyday of BDS and reflect that.
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1. I pay for the bandwidth and hosting, which makes this blog my property.
2. You don’t have a right to comment.
3. You don’t have a right to privacy when you’re utilizing a server that I pay for.
That means IP addresses, email addresses, etc. are all logged, and if I feel like it, I may use them.
3a. Further, any ignorant comment made may (and probably will) be subject to being publicly posted, mocked, and ridiculed.
3b. Also, if you send email to any of the addresses listed on the sidebar in the header Email Us link, I will consider that implicit permission to publish that email. (and boy, do we have fun when I do that!)
3c. Lastly, it is not my fault if you did not partake in the reading of this list before you broke one of the rules.
I put them right up at the tippy-top of the sidebar under the header. Just because you unknowingly Epic Failed twice in a row doesn’t mean we’re going to make life any easier for you. In fact, if you tell us you didn’t read this list as some sort of an excuse for your behavior, we’ll make fun of you for that too.
4. If you think I’m stifling your voice, you’re wrong. Go here or here or [ETA: Waves hands at social media generally since 2011–Davidwhitewolf] — well, you get the point.
5. I reserve the right to edit or delete comments, should I find them offensive.
While I have never done this in my seven years of blogging, there is a first time for everything.
6. I reserve the right to be arbitrary and capricious.
If you think you’ve been treated unfairly, you may be right, and you can certainly appeal my decision. I don’t know where you might go to do that, but knock yourself out.
7. Showing up out of nowhere to pimp your own blog in my comments section is truly bad form.
8a. I’m a tight-wad Conservative on fiscal matters and an utter Paleo-Liberal on social ones.
This means: 1 – I believe taxation to pay for non-Constitutionally mandated services is theft at the point of a gun by my government, and 2 – I believe in both Rights AND Responsibilities, and 3 – I want what is best for not only myself, but also for you and for everyone else in these United States.
What is inarguably best for everyone is the liberty to make their own decisions in regards to their own life and property and then suffer the personal consequences, be they good or bad.
8b. This also means that I have my own views and my own ideas that (gasp!) might actually differ from an established political party. I know that might be hard to comprehend, but there you go. Thus, when you’re arguing with me, don’t set up a straw man based upon what you assume my position is.
8c. If you don’t know what my position is and want to know, ask. I’m a very busy opinionated prick and probably just didn’t have the time to post on that particular topic/story.
9. There are multiple folks who post on the RNS frontpage.
Make sure you know which one of us you’re reading before you go off, or Rule #3a will very likely be applied.
9a. Don’t complain to me about a post from one of the other authors.
I let them onto my site knowing we might not see eye-to-eye on every issue. If you don’t like what they have to say, tell them in the comments and leave me out of it. They may or may not know how to apply Rule #’s 3, 5 and 6. However, if they ask, I don’t care who you are, I WILL tell them how.
10. Have fun. I’m doing this mostly for me. The day this stops being fun, I’m turning off the lights.
Likewise, if commenting here is no longer fun for you, then you don’t have to come here.
11. I do not take kindly to any unwanted encroachments into my personal life (this includes my home, family and employment).
First of all, you must realize that you will not be the first person to try and fiddle with my personal life because of something I wrote here. But it is said that if you have no enemies, then you are apt to be in the same predicament with regard to friends.
All threats will be treated and reacted to quite seriously. If something I wrote offended you and now you feel the urge to throw-down, post the time, place and what armaments will be necessary in the comments and I’ll be there with spectators. But understand that I am a cruel man who has been known, at times, to have enjoyed the pain and suffering of those who have wronged him. So for your own sake and the sake of those you love, do not attempt to bother my family, my home or my place of business.