Joel: Oh yeah that's right, NickS is a great guy, and as far as I know he's still there. Welcome to OL. The article is riveting, and sickening. You believe the protests have to do with this article? And not Pastor Jones? I wonder how our MSM decides the reason for a protest, do they have translators reading the signs? I just checked OO and SDC has no posts. I thought I’d sniff out whatever got him banned. Bulwer-Lytton, isn’t that a put down? The contest isn't for "The pen is mightier than the sword", but for "It was a dark and stormy night". Anyway, she posted here for a while, I don’t recall any dustups, but she seems to have found her home over yonder. Nice to meet you, and thanks for the welcome. 1. Excellent point. I do admit that point of mine was a slight appeal to a minor conspiracy theory, that the MSM is influenced by the Pentagon. Due to their ignoring of this story, and because the Pentagon was reportedly trying to bury it, it would be a little too easy to pair the two and generate implications of that pairing, namely that the Pentagon, as part of their suppression, caused the MSM to ignore it. I admit that that is conspiratorial, I have little-to-no evidence to back that up, and I will gladly concede this point if you press me. I just find it suspicious, that's all, however I do recognize that suspicion is not evidence of anything. 2. Joel was mistaken, I was not banned, (as far as I know), but I wouldn't be surprised if they considered it. I was temporarily "banned" (kicked repeatedly) from the chat server because of my disagreement with their prominent members. The dogmatists at FO.net do not take kindly to an opposing viewpoint. I was relatively inactive on the forum itself: I was mainly present on the chat server, and I have a very low repute there now because of my disagreement with them. They of course would word it differently (malicious, flawed premises, devious, and the rest of the common Peikoffian pseudo-Objectivist slurs). I was "temporarily banned" and am now hated on the chat server because of my, repeated, admittedly occasionally vehement, disagreement with them. I unfortunately have a thin patience for stupidity, and when they dogmatically defended Peikoff and Rand's indefensible arguments, I do admit that sometimes I became somewhat emotional. I did nothing more than disagree with them however, and my emotional reaction paled in comparison to theirs, as they (Dwayne and Knast) had far harsher words for me than I had for them. After their insults began to fly, I realized that further argument was pointless, and I simply resorted to responding with "I don't think of you, Knast, so why do you think of me?" 3. She posts prominently on facebook as well. I had quite the philosophical debate with her on facebook, but thankfully it ended with us remaining on good terms. Our debate was pointless from the beginning, as our differing epistemologies (mine being Skinnerian/Naturalist, hers being Objectivist) caused us to fundamentally differ on key issues (particularly free will: I reject it, but that's another discussion for another day), so debating the matter further would be pointless. Of all the ARI-minded Objectivists, she is the only one I consider worth debating, she truly is an incredible individual: I identify with, admire, and value her as a friend. I hope that clears a few things up.