4/4     So why do people debate politics on the motd anyway?  Is it just
        three people who stupidly fall for each other's trolls?  Do you
        think that you are going to bring people around to your opinion
        by posting absurdly leftist or rightist propaganda, and flaming
        the hell out of people that disagree with you?  Are you just
        bored at work?  Are you naive enough to think that, in spite of
        the fact that you've been doing it for YEARS, shooting your
        mouth off in a small private online forum is going to make a
        whit of difference?  Are you just idiots? -genuinely curious
        \_ I don't know about you, but I learn things by reading and
           considering other people's points of view. The axis of
           considering other people's points of view. The range of
           political ideas is considerably more complicated than the
           binary leftist -> rightist axis you describe and while I
           am not a conservative by any means, I have probably become
           more moderate by reading ideas here. Sometimes I am just
           trolling, sometimes I am bored at work, yes, but more often
           am interested in exchanging ideas with other people. As
           far as the "small private ... forum" part, what are the
           alternatives? Have you tried posting to other online forums?
           90% of the stuff is puerile insults. There are plenty of
           insults on the motd, but at least most of them are clever
           or backed with some kind of reference. -motd liberal
           \_ agreed.
        \_ From a conservative: There are several reasons for posting on the
           motd.  First, all of us are here posting due to boredom to some
           degree or another and I don't mean just the political posters.  As
           far as why the political postings, on my part it is because this is
           one of the few places on campus where one can have a political
           discussion which doesn't instantly turn into "well, you're just a
           nazi fascist racist so there!".  And lastly my long term goal is to
           see people such as the motd liberal posting above say they have
           become more moderate by reading ideas here.  Compared to the
           typical Berkeleyan or San Franciscan I'm very conservative.
           Compared to the rest of the country I'm anywhere from moderate to
           liberal.  This leads to the last reason for my posting.  I find the
           extreme left postings funny and amusing.  They don't seem to have
           any idea just how far left they really are.  As source material for
           my discussions I read multiple websites from the entire spectrum.
           I read foreign websites.  I read the left wing weeklies in the City
           which call the Chronical and NYT a bastion of right wing oppression
           and ultra conservatism.  I have a reasonably decent understanding
           of the thought process of the left and the right and those z-axis
           folks as well and am perfectly happy to bag on any of them when
           they get really stupid or use poor rhetorical techniques.  Anyway,
           what would you rather be all over the motd?  Sports scores, stocks,
           and when the next kernel update will be ready?  You can get that
           crap anywhere.  Politics is about people.  People are way more
           interesting than that other stuff.  I ignore the things I find
           boring.  I don't delete them.  I don't comment on them.  I simply
           page down over them unread.  If the politics bothers you so much, I
           suggest you do the same.  Oh yeah, it isn't just 3 people.  It's
           *very* easy to track who is posting to the motd using user level
           available system tools.  Start tracking for yourself.  --motd cons.
           \_ I couldn't have said it better myself(although perhaps I could
              have been more brief.) I'm really amazed that poeple can see
              all these interesting politics threads and actually prefer
              some shit about pine, followed by a personal attack on pine
              users.  Why don't they just go to usenet? -another motd liberal