Happy 2nd Blog Birthday to MJ @ Impossible Scissors!

Lime Shurbet is giddy with joy to welcome back GAYPATRIOT to his namesake blog! He should have never had to leave in the first place, but now he is back where he belongs. Now, get in there, GP, and give ‘em hell!

I am fighting a delinking urge at the moment. It is purely an emotional reaction, of course, and I will likely do nothing as it is one issue, but to say I am miffed at GOPBloggers is an massive understatement.

Yesterday morning I noticed nothing at all on their blog about two Republicans coming out within 24 hours of each other so I fired off an email that basically said “WTF?” I got a “we didn’t hear about that” email and a request for links, which I forwarded. 24 hours later, has there been any coverage on GOPBloggers? Nope. Nada. Zilch.

One has to wonder, “WTF?” guys.

Have you created your South Park persona yet? Have you added it to the gallery yet? Well, what are you waiting for?

So what the hell is this nonsense? Speak your mind and get the boot because you don’t agree on the Terri Schiavo issue?

If you believe that it would be wrong for a court to disregard the law and rule in favor of Bob and Mary Schindler who want to artificially keep the body of their brain-dead daughter alive, your blog isn’t welcome on HundredPercenter’s blogroll. If you think that it is wrong for judges to rule on personal convictions instead of simply applying the law, you’re gone.

[...]

Why, it’s a veritable “who’s who” of the libertarian-leaning blogs! When you get right down to it, it’s the people who don’t feel that they need to impose their moral ideology on everyone else.

Read more here and here

Some people are intent on cutting off their ideological nose to spite their face.

Be sure to check this out. I am still going over it myself so I will be commenting on it later after I have had a chance to read it thoroughly.

**UPDATE** 7:15 AM

Ok, I have read it. This wasn’t an interview [update: in the "classic" sense]. Interview transcripts have the actual questions and quoted answers. This was the recounting of a phone conversation. (Note: this isn’t a slam against R cain, I just think interview transcripts should be a little more formal. I applaude his effort in interviewing speaking with Rogers.)

I only have two questions and they are both for Michael Rogers.

1. Did you record the conversations with GayPatriot, his secretary, my ISP, and R Cain @ Central Front?
2. Will you release those tapes to the internet so people can judge for themselves your motives and intent?

It seems simple enough to clear this whole thing up, doesn’t it?

Reporting? Yeah, keep telling yourself that.

Thanks for the image Sherry! Explanation.

**UPDATE**

By the way, you are more than welcome to answer the questions I sent you and I will be happy to post your responses. That is, unless, you don’t feel “the truth” is worth taking the time. And yes, I changed the title – it just seemed more fitting.

Well, it would seem hosting does indeed matter! I emailed Hosting Matters (thanks for suggesting that Mark!) and asked them to review the content I had posted. Here is their response.

Content cannot be defamation by definition unless it can be shown that the content is inherently and deliberately untrue. In your particular case, a simple google of “michael rogers gay” brought me to an article by The Independent (UK) about the very bullet points you have listed in the graphic, with quotes from him related to that subject. Further searches reveal other stories by regular journalistic outlets as well, with and without quotes. Suggesting people email him to voice their opinion of his actions is also not an actionable offense, since a look at his own site has links for email to the addresses you have listed – since he is inviting contact via email, and lists available addresses, your posting of them poses no violation of any of our policies or of any statutes. It is your opinion that his actions are as you describe them, and people are free to agree or disagree as they see fit, and post their own opinions, if they’d like to do so. In addition, there is nothing in your graphic that urges any violence against anyone – it reads, in fact, more like the sort of online boycott calls that go around from time to time. Therefore, we would take no action related to complaints by the individual about this item on your page other than to suggest he take it up with you.

Regards,

Abuse Investigations
Hosting Matters, Inc.
http://www.hostingmatters.com

Looks like I won’t need those other 99 shutdowns and moves any time soon.

First, let me thank everyone that emailed me to express his or her support. I especially want to thank my fellow conservatives out there. As I have said often here, I have experienced more hate in the Bay Area as a gay conservative than I ever experienced growing up in Texas as a gay man. Once again, you have reinforced as right the decision I made last year to switch parties and leave the Democrats to wallow in their self-destructive path.

As for the site, it has been down for most of the day while I switched hosting providers (morning here on the left coast). Michael Rogers apparently contacted my hosting provider, StartLogic, and had my site pulled for “defamation.” Here is the email from the provider:

Hello,

Unfortunately, we have been forced to suspend your domain account for the following reason:

Legal issues with defamation of character by the domain of limeshurbet.com. The person in the issues is about is Mike Rodgers. The “hit list” poster is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.

For more information about this suspension, please contact abuse@vdeck.com. Thank you.

Regards,

vDeck Abuse Department

The “Wanted” parody is not a “hit list.” It did list the contact email addresses for blogACTIVE, along with a specific call to email him in protest of his terrorist tactics. But it made no mention of threat and nothing defamatory. Besides that, Michael Rogers needs little help from me showing people his true character.

The “Wanted” parody stays. I stay. Gay conservatives stay. I will not be silenced, Michael Rogers, if I have to get shutdown and move to another provider 100 times. I will keep moving and making sure people are aware of your terrorist tactics in outing good, well meaning Americans because they do not follow your radical agenda or follow your fascist ideology. “Think this way or else?” I think not.

I am gay. I am a member of the Republican Party, and I am not going anywhere.

It seems I wasn’t the only one that smelled something fishy. It seems Rogers has taken to terrorizing his critics at work.

According to GayPatriot, who is also a client of mine, Michael Rogers called GayPatriot’s place of employment on Friday immediately following the post above and spoke to GayPatriot’s secretary and boss. GayPatriot had no idea Rogers would go to such measures and shared with me that both he and his secretary were very upset by the calls but that his boss was understanding.

Later on that day, Rogers personally called me and recounted much of the same account, adding that he had also called the police and is working with the authorities on the matter. Rogers expressed feeling threatened by the post and compared it to posts by anti-abortionists who posted the names of doctors performing them.

Rogers also said he asked GayPatriot to remove the post and replace it with a post about non-violence or he would launch a national boycott of GayPatriot’s corporate employer and pursue any and all avenues necessary to protect himself. By the time Rogers had called, GayPatriot had already made the decision to remove the post and also remove GayPatriot from the blogosphere.

GayPatriot was silenced.

This man is beyond repugnant. He is a terrorist, plain and simple. Don’t think so?

ter·ror :
1 : a state of intense fear
2 a : one that inspires fear : SCOURGE b : a frightening aspect c : a cause of anxiety : WORRY d : an appalling person or thing; especially : BRAT

ter·ror·ism :
: the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion

Terrorism isn’t just bombing innocent people for political gain. It comes in many different forms and from a wide variety of people.

So Rogers wants to try to silence critics of his terrorist tactics? Ok, try to silence me.

WANTED: MICHAEL ROGERS – GAY TERRORIST

WANTED FOR CRIMES AGAINST THE GAY COMMUNITY, INCLUDING:

• Systematically conducting outing witch hunts against gays who do not believe in radical liberal anti-American ideals.
• Repeated violations of privacy of gay Americans.
• Conducting systematic civil liberties attacks on gay Americans.

I repeat GayPatriot’s Call:

Let’s do something about these gay terrorists who have infected our community with their hatred and self-loathing bigotry of gay Americans who wish to live their lives in peace.

I urge everyone to repeat GayPatriot’s call, mindful of the need for peaceful discourse. Post this call to action on your blog. You can also email Rogers to voice your opinion of his slimy tactics at the following addresses (make sure to post these too):

comments@blogactive.com
kevinp@blogactive.com
editor@blogactive.com
tips@blogactive.com
alicek@blogactive.com
webmaster@blogactive.com

Show your support for GayPatriot by placing the “WANTED” banner from my sidebar on your blog.

GayPatriot deserves to have his voice heard! All gay conservatives have a voice that needs to be heard too! The gay community is not a “liberals only” club any more than the Republican party is for “straights only.” It is high-time gay conservatives and those that support them speak out against the terrorist tactics employed by Michael Rogers!

Don’t let Michael Rogers silence a voice of opposition. He can try to silence one – he cannot silence many.

I am gay. I am a member of the Republican party. Give it your best shot Rogers.

**UPDATE** 5:16 PM

I received a phone call via my cell phone at approx. 4:28 PM PST from Mike Rogers. Note: I have not published my cell phone number so that gives you an idea of how quickly Rogers is able to track people down with little to go on other than their name.

The gist of his phone call was to tell me I had a lot of mis-information regarding this topic on the blog and if I were interested in the truth, I could give him a buzz back. Since Rogers is well known for his telephone recording skills, I declined. However, I have offered him an opportunity to respond via email.

Mike Rogers,

In the interest of fairness, I will give you an opportunity to respond.
I will print these questions and your responses in an update to my
post.

Did you call GayPatriot’s place of employment? Did you speak to his
secretary and/or his boss? What did you say?
Did you call the police?
If you felt threatened, what specifically made you feel that way?
Do you think the gay Republicans you have outed felt that way too?
Did it occur to you that hate groups could use the information you made
public about people’s personal lives to threaten them?
Would you be open to withdrawing any complaints or actions you may have
filed against GayPatriot and call for him to return to blogging?
Do you feel that your outing campaign is honorable?
Don’t gay conservatives have the right to decide how they will fight
for equal rights?
If one of the people you have outed was murdered by one of your readers
as a direct result of your campaign, would you feel at all responsible?

Feel free to add any other information you feel is pertinent. I will be
happy to post it.

Robert Shurbet
http://limeshurbet.com

The response came from Kevin Pressman, a spokesman for Rogers.

You may interview Mr. Rogers via phone.
He does not answer questions via email.
If it will save you expenses, he will be happy to call you directly.
Please advise.

Kevin Pressman
Media Operations
blogACTIVE.com

I sent the following response:

Unfortunately, I do not conduct interviews via phone. These are
relatively simple questions. I realize Mr. Rogers is probably quite
attached to his telephone recording equipment, but email is the only
method of response I will extend to Mr. Rogers as I do not have the
ability to conduct a recorded phone interview.

Robert Shurbet

And, the follow-up from Mr. Pressman:

We are sorry you are unable to conduct an interview by phone (with out
without recording), but due to the unbelievably high number of requests,
it’s simply impossible to write written responses to all your questions.

All of us at blogACTIVE wish you the best in your future blogging work.

And again, if you would like to interview Mr. Rogers (in the same manner
that all other press do) please do not hesitate to contact us via reply
mail.

Kevin Pressman

If Rogers has time to track down my cell phone, then he has time to answer a few questions via email. If Rogers has time to spend talking to me on the phone, he can answer a few questions via email. I suspect that Rogers refuses email requests because he can’t control those and it provides a record for both sides of the discussion. But that is just my opinion.

**UPDATE** 3/29/05 2:05 PM

As noted in the comments, Rogers appears to have gotten my cell phone number from my whois record.