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rgbecker

(4,806 posts)
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 11:19 AM Mar 2012

Very disturbing - Trouble posting a comment on Yahoo!





I just had a very disturbing experience on the internet. I read a short, 2 paragraph story on the Yahoo.com web site about a CBS poll that was headlined “Poll: One in Four Americans Want Supreme Court to Uphold Health Care Law – Report’ National Journal.” I read the poll on the CBS site and decided to comment on the Yahoo site, drawing attention to the fact that actually the Headline was misleading. My comment was as follows:

“ Read the Poll. This is another case of bias in the headline. Actually only 38% want to overturn the law. But of the 47% who disapprove of the law, 76% want to require insurance companies to cover those with pre-existing conditions, 65% want to reduce the “Donut Hole” for prescription drugs and 56% want to allow children under 26 to stay on parents plan. But all of this is mostly nonsense as 48% say they don’t understand how the health care law will affect their family, answering; “No, it’s confusing.”
Meanwhile, if you scroll down you’ll learn that 69% think the US should not be involved in Afghanistan and only 23% think we should.
The supreme court should be ruling on whether we should be required to pay for a war the majority doesn’t want. “

It appeared that the comment was posted, but when I returned to the site to see if there were any replies, I found my post had not actually been posted. So I reposted it. Again, it appeared as posted, but when I refreshed the site, it was gone. I reworded it. Again, not posted. Very odd.

I then posted the following statement to see if it would be posted: “Obama is a fink”!
Well, it made it up, no problem. Then, again I tried a short comment about the misleading headline, and “read the poll”. Again, not posted. So I tried this one “ My grandma died because of Obamacare!” Posted! No problem!

I just wasted an hour trying to get my comment to post, but was only able to get a few scraps of the poll up and a lot of tea bagger hyperbole quotes up, but never was my whole comment allowed to remain posted.

Am I losing it? Could someone please check to see if they can get a post up similar to mine above to stick on this Yahoo page? Does this explain the skewed opinion that shows up on the Yahoo comments for every news article they post? I know newspapers will often not print letters based on the content but somehow I thought the instant online comments were pretty much not censored/edited. Is this what you thought? Am I just an old naive boomer ready for the trashheap?

Here’s the link to the Yahoo webpage and the CBS poll. You’ll see my posts under “Roger”.

http://news.yahoo.com/poll-one-four-americans-want-supreme-court-uphold-200929734.html

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57404836/cbs-news-nyt-polls-3-26-12/?tag=contentMain;contentBody

Let me know how you make out.

ON EDIT: Just tried again! Must be a different censor...the post went up! YIKES!




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freshwest

(53,661 posts)
1. It's a cesspool designed to manufacture consent. It's why the right does shell posting and uses bots
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 11:32 AM
Mar 2012

Nice try, but the site is likely administered by right wingers. They are paid to skew search results on google/yahoo.

lukkadairish

(122 posts)
3. I as well
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 11:39 AM
Mar 2012

HuffPost was becoming increasingly annoying.....you can see the bias, but they have 'lets be fair' hours where their posts will be just enough to satisfy one who only visits every now and then.

RKP5637

(67,032 posts)
7. Yep, I've had that happen to me when trying to respond to McCaffrey's questions on the
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 12:04 PM
Mar 2012

Situation Room. I quit bothering.

RKP5637

(67,032 posts)
6. I'm not surprised by any of this. The internet is becoming/is a cesspool in many areas, a spewer
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 12:01 PM
Mar 2012

of propaganda.

I've tried to post things before on various sites, well written and not inflammatory, and they have never appeared.

We live in a land of delusions and illusions impacting the political scene. It's often very discouraging and frankly frightening. Too many in this nation are swayed by too many half-truths and outright lies.

TreasonousBastard

(43,049 posts)
8. I have similar problems on several yahoo groups...
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 12:25 PM
Mar 2012

and they are about birdwatching, astronomy, or other completely nonpolitical topics.

Sometimes, if I post through email, using Thunderbird, I get a reply saying that I violated some "community standard" while other times nothing happens. I suspect there are glitches in their software, not some great conspiracy.

Yooperman

(592 posts)
9. I did see your post... only a one liner though..
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 01:21 PM
Mar 2012

"Actually only 38% want to overturn the law."

That is what I saw ... I gave you a thumbs up for what it's worth.

YM

ProudToBeBlueInRhody

(16,399 posts)
10. Yahoo comments don't always pop up right away
Tue Mar 27, 2012, 01:26 PM
Mar 2012

Often I get a notification a day later for something someone replied to that I never saw go up.

Why bother......just a bunch of idiots yelling the n-word anyhow.

RKP5637

(67,032 posts)
11. I've quit responding in any user groups other than DU. There are just way
Thu Mar 29, 2012, 12:00 PM
Mar 2012

too many fools out there with no goal but to create dissension and to post idiotic childish and ignorant comments. One of the greatest offenders of education, logic and civility IMO is Topix. I think it's often filled with hoards of trolls. IMO Yahoo Answers runs a close second ...



MineralMan

(146,192 posts)
13. So, your anti-Obama comments were posted?
Thu Mar 29, 2012, 12:21 PM
Mar 2012

How nice. If you're having a problem posting comments on some website, posting comments that are ugly that do get posted doesn't seem to be an ideal solution to me. I don't know, but that seems not to be the best approach, somehow.

MineralMan

(146,192 posts)
14. Further, your original comment was posted. I just read it. Here's what it said,
Thu Mar 29, 2012, 12:24 PM
Mar 2012
Read the Poll. This is another case of bias in the headline. Actually only 38% want to overturn the law. But of the 47% who disapprove of the law, 76% want to require insurance companies to cover those with pre-existing conditions, 65% want to reduce the “Donut Hole” for prescription drugs and...

aint_no_life_nowhere

(21,925 posts)
15. The old yahoo message boards used to be a Bush bashing festival
Thu Mar 29, 2012, 01:12 PM
Mar 2012

Before they eliminated those boards several years ago, I'll bet there were at least five liberal postings for every conservative one. And I think a lot of DUers were on those boards, just from judging how funny the comments often were. I'm not sure why they took those boards down, but I haven't been back.

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