Not Mike..   But that's not at all how I read what he wrote..  Tho,  I'm sure you read it that way.

Of course many negatives about Trump should be discussed here. I will do my best to explain what is not acceptable, some of it new.

mojo,

As you know, I took you out of a life time ban imposed by the previous moderator, knowing exactly why she banned you..........for similar stuff that's going on now. 

I actually have a soft spot for you and a great desire to keep MarketForum open for ALL comments, especially those that I disagree with...........which was my policy for months, thinking that if I posted a bunch of interesting non political stuff(which is what I tried to do last Summer) and invited thousands of people to come here, they would ignore the divisive political battles and choose the good stuff.

I was naive to some extent in not appreciating:

1. How even more obsessed people have become over Trump, to the point that it controls their views on everything political. Trumps position or whether it's good or bad for him outweighs commence sense and whether its good or bad for the country.

2. This has resulted in those that are  the most obsessed with hating Trump, believing anything that is negative about him like members of a cult...........even if it makes no sense. 

Added: The constant posting of this stuff and divisiveness has been a big turn off to many. Would people come to pray at a Christian church that has wonderful services but sometimes featured 2 guys having a fist fight in the far corner because one of them believes in Allah? and the pastor telling them to just ignore it? We go to places on the internet that we have a connection with. Some people that don't hate Trumps guts, find it hard to connect here with so many "I hate Trump's guts threads"

I'll give you an example to relate to mojo, with your post last week from RawStory. Despite the fact that the vast majority of border patrol workers and those that represent them have said over and over that they want a wall/barrier...........THE experts and powerful evidence of the wall there now, being effective, you posted a story that stated this: "However, this is not just a personal mental crisis but a national public health and international security crisis. A most vivid depiction of his mental crisis is his “irrational” wall. You might say that he is trying to achieve two things: trying to steady himself through the image of concrete barriers, and trying to contain his “base”, which is beginning to slip away."

A ludicrous pile of dung, making other similar absurd claims from a so called expert that clearly has the mental issues based on their statements.   I put one of those statements in quotes for you to understand what dung is going away immediately and posters, even those that I have a soft spot for will also go away if they keep posting dung.

3. I am sure that you are sincere mojo. You seem like a pretty nice person and I would probably enjoy having you as a friend, in person if politics never came up. However, as a friend(not foe) I am telling you point blank that you have a problem when it comes to discussing politics, specifically with regards to Trump. Not just the extreme nature of your views but the manner in which you try to force the crazy stuff on clear thinking posters here. Again, I know that you believe every word of it. As the moderator, I can't let my friends drag down the forum with stuff that only contributes to hate and divisiveness. I could actually tolerate something from that category when there are rock solid authentic facts to back up the position.

4. Which leads me to defining what will always be allowed. Anything and everything that has authentic facts or powerful evidence to support the position or discussion.  Even stuff that does not, sometimes, if it allows for a golden opportunity for the other side to show it to be fraudulent by providing the facts to bust it.  Climate change is a perfect example. I have welcomed all the alarmist stuff and in fact encouraged it and get excited when somebody posts it. Each time, it gives me another opportunity to share the authentic climate science with the data and observations to prove each and every element of the position. After I post the authentic facts, guys like frey and cliff continue to post stuff, trying to catch or bust me........until I beat them to death with authentic data. If I didn't enjoy being questioned like this, I would not be constantly highlighting my top 4 threads being questioned like this on our welcoming page. We should always be able to question everything and discuss it respectfully.

5.. In climate change/science, it has been completely turned into divisive politics, where I can quickly win disagreements, misunderstandings by introducing  legit climate science to the discussion on climate science.

 Unfortunately, there is no such thing as Trump science. It's divisive politics on both sides. There are often some powerful authentic facts, like the wall stats or immigration stats or border security opinions but then there are distorted realities which easily capture the belief of others, like Mexico was supposed to pay for it, or its immoral or its too expensive or walls don't work.  No reason why the wall can't' be discussed here, even if one side won't believe the legit facts. 

On discussions like this, the moderator needs to do a better job keeping the discussions focused on the issue(s) and facts. I have tried to intervene numerous times on things like the wall by presenting authentic facts and was accused of not being a moderator by the side that disagreed. Get used to it. Facts and truth matter here, as well as sources and intent. Also the tone and direction of the discussion when it comes to Trump. Clearly,  I believe the majority of stuff about Trump that comes from the political activist tv station CNN or  Rawstory is rubbish. If you post something very divisive and hateful from those sources that is pure speculation with no definitive rebuttal(from me or others) than it may go bye bye.

CNN claiming that it was reporter instinct that led them to be at Stone's house is a blatant Trump related lie..........but the rebuttal was so powerful that it  was able to irrefutably show that as a lie and turn it into the exact opposite...........evidence that Mueller broke the law by tipping off a news station to get close up video of his FBI busting Stone, making him look like a big bad criminal in the eyes of the public and to intimidate him.

https://www.marketforum.com/forum/topic/23544/

There are some here that will never believe CNN was tipped off, no matter how powerful the evidence but as long as the evidence is there, we can have a respectful discussion that clearly shows what side is right and what side is wrong by all objective measures. 

If, however, the circumstances were much different. For instance, CNN was required to stay a block away, where the street was blocked off, following FBI protocol.  Then we have evidence that they might be telling the truth. In that case, if there is a non resolvable, divisive battle that drags on, then the discussion goes away and we go on to something less divisive.

This will be uncharted territory in moderately(as lar requested) moderating discussions to weed out those that represent never ending battles with neither side providing anything substantive to prove their side.............and maybe after the proof is provided a couple of times, its time to go on.

As always, mean, hateful and personal attacks are unacceptable. Recently, I managed to get mojo to stop using Rump in his title. I would suggest too mojo, that you and cliff stop calling President Trump "Rump" because it sends a crystal clear message to the moderator:

" Dear metmike: this is a post attacking our president and calling him derogatory names" I know that it will upset supporters of Rump on MarketForum and thats why I'm posting it"

"Are you saying that you'll no longer tolerate any negative posts about Dear Leader (Trump)? Yes or No"

Referring to Trump as "Dear Leader" in that question implies, whether you intended it to or not, that you suspect metmike thinks of Trump in those terms.  It's unnecessarily provocative, and I'm sure you knew that at some level. 

And what in the world makes you think you have the right to dictate the limits of metmike's response to your question, i.e., "Yes or No"? If you were trying to make an enemy of the moderator you couldn't have done a much better job of it.

Yeh  MO-FO !!!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JP,

I was not kidding when stating that I have a soft spot for mojo.

There are different variations of what some people call Trump Derangement Syndrome.......which is a true blue condition that affects millions:

Because I am referring to it for the first time as a result of this discussion, here is the definition(based on some opinions). 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_derangement_syndrome

The reason to mention it related to mojo is that clearly he suffers from this and must be in the top X% of those whose actions and words here are directed by "his brain on Trump" .............sort of like the old commercial showing the egg in the frying pan "your brain on drugs" (-:

Despite this, I just have this feeling that mojo is actually a nice guy in person. He posts his crazy Trump bashing articles like a good Trump hating cult member but does not personally attack others in a mean spirited way here. 

This was vandenplas's entire objective as a predator here............following the ones that he hated to threads in which he could upset them with personal and inflammatory comments. 

mojo is clearly not like that, which I appreciate. I do believe that he really wants to abide by the rules and this was why he was asking.  However, because mojo thinks the way that he does about Trump,(he probably also wants to know what he can get away with) he is going to push whatever limit that is set and try to get away with everything that he can because starting numerous Trump bashing threads every week  and selectively picking only the worst sounding articles, which only come from the sources with the least credibility is a long lived bad habit engrained into his brain that he isn't going to be able to turn it off, like flipping a switch and suddenly post things like......... fund raising to help the poverty stricken children in Central America because Trump is going to cut financial aid to those countries.

If he finds an article related to that which bashes Trump(I would actually be on mojo's side regarding that being an unethical action) he will only care that it bashes Trump. 

 I got mojo to stop calling president Trump Rump in the title of his threads immediately upon my request but instead he referred to him at tRump in the text of his threads after that because it allowed him to still sneak past the actual request that I made.....technically following it but still managing to get his Rump in. 

  I am not feeling too good about my friend mojo's future here but he is in complete control of his destiny and I sincerely hope that he can stay.

There is a positive side to this also...........seriously. There is a chance that mojo may learn to control his obsession with posting the constant hate filled, divisive Trump stuff. Actually, he will learn to do that or find another forum to post at, so this could be a really good thing for him as a person.

When vandenplas was banned, then tried to sneak back in as jaguar, I knew on day 1 that it was him but allowed it. vandenplas as jaguar behaved well for weeks and I seriously thought this was helping him to control his attacks on those that he hates here.

I told him by email that I was giving him another chance but he absolutely could not attack anybody again or his chance would be over. He and Tim got into it in an NTR exchange and Tim told him he was done with that thread, so vandy went to the trading forum and started attacking  and taunting Tim over the NTR topic that Tim left behind.