So, what was this place like during the Bush/Cheney terror years?

I remember a thread about Rumsfeld being a reptilian alien.

There was this ridiculous picture of an extreme closeup of his eyes photo-shopped into reptile-like oval slits.

There were also a lot of hyper republican posters who have since either been banned or left. Used to see their usernames all over the place posting nonsense.

Basically 80% of ATS was made up of people who either thought Bush was the spawn of Satan or that Bush was here to save the world.

Not all that different really.

reply to post by intrepid


What Rep congress?

2008-2010 the Dems held both houses even today they still hold 2/3rds of government, and has done end runs around them.

From this perspective all I have seen is 'terrorism' for the current regime.fact is they make Bush and his regime look like amateurs.

To be clear the Bush regime sucked also.

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic


Boy I miss the good old days when we could bash the president without being called a rascist. My absolute favorite one I remeber was how somehow the letters in his name proved he was the antichrist. Then I remeber several on skull and bones and how Bush was going to usher in the New World Order I guess he should have shortened his time table.

Originally posted by WeBrooklyn
For some reason I cant link it but go to

Wayback Machine

Put this site, and when the page loads up, use the timeline up top and go to 2004, the year is just an example, I know theres good threads there from that year and traffic on ats jumped at that time. Politics and scandels, nwo, Good stuff!

Trust me you will have a good time going through all that throughout the years, I still do

Wow!!

This is wonderful! Thank you! I know where I'll be all weekend.

Originally posted by bg_socalif
It's not much different now than it was from back then. A lot of the same stuff, just change the name from Bush to Obama.

There did seem to be "Martial Law is just around corner", "Bush will cancel elections" and "US invasion of Iran imminent!" threads popping up about every other day back then though. That got kinda old.

To me the quality of threads has dropped off quite a bit. Back then threads seemed more well researched than now. Now it seems people don't fully read their own source before going off on some tangent. They just cherry pick bits and pieces to suit their view.

The boards I was on back then were extremely tough when it came to references and sourcing. Not all of them, but a few were amazing in that regard. The 9/11 debates were epic, and so much was settled that seems to pop back up here as if it's brand new, which puzzles me when I take the time to look at that forum.

That said, it seemed as if there was a heavy lean against anti-Bush posts and especially anti-Iraq War posts on the boards I worked. You could easily get banned for suggesting too strongly that the Iraq invasion's WMD charge was a lie, and if you declared that the Iraq War was going to be a quagmire, it could get real ugly and from all directions real quick for you. I just can't imagine that level of forum support for Obama if he was doing what Bush/Cheney were doing back then. I don't know. I'll have to wade through those archived threads and see what the atmosphere here was back then. It'd be good to see some healthy skepticism of the War on terror back then, and especially the Iraq War and the whole WMD claim.

The Conservatives on ATS during the Bush/Cheney years attacked your patriotism if you disagreed with their policies and called you names. My favorite was "tulipwalker" .... The "people like you" meme is/was alive and well.

I once made a conservative so angry that he threatened me via u2u and told me that he was going to shove my keyboard up my azz till I **** semi colons. I thought that was pretty clever. That member is still here but has mellowed considerably.

ATS seemed more fun back then.

I would say Bush Derangement Syndrome was very strong?

www.urbandictionary.com...
rationalwiki.org...

reply to post by NorEaster

So, what was this place like during the Bush/Cheney terror years?

Right after 9.11, the nation... for a very brief moment, set aside political divisions and united. It was similar to December 7, 1941... our country had been attacked and we were ready to even the score.

Of course, over the years, it became apparent that Bush abused the situation to invade Iraq and our patriotism was led by the nose to a preferred outcome. From that point, people began looking closer at the events of 9.11 and weighing the evidence, many came to an uncomfortable conclusion that suggested something other than the old 'official story'.

ATS is nothing more than a sort of reflecting oasis for people who feel the need to speak out but know that in the current climate... one's opinion isn't really welcomed anywhere else... especially if it doesn't toe a certain line.

Here, you have folks that think outside the official box and are not easily led down the garden path into the old rabbit hole.

reply to post by Benevolent Heretic


I pretty much agree with your synopsis of what it was like back then. The subject of the thread might have been different (Bush is going to be president forever vs. Obama hates America) but the amount of verbal and emotional trashing about seems about the same to me.

I honestly don't see that much difference between the sides (left and right) when it comes to the ability to throw a good, old fashioned, hissy fit about what amounts to nonsense in a thread.

My honest two cents. Other than the right (for the most part) is now throwing the hissy fits, I don't see too much difference between ATS now and then. Then it was the left yelling about a right wing POTUS, now its the right yelling about a left wing POTUS. I honestly don't think either side can claim to be any less venomous, nutty, or flame filled than the other.

I have been visiting this site since well before Obama, and it was a weird thing to see right-wing people come here after Obama took office, and all of a sudden they are "wide awake" to his terrorist, muslim ways.... totally blind to the previous 8 years of terror wars and fear propaganda.... It was just a bizarre thing to see....

Patriot Act, and suspension of Habeus Corpus, and warrantless wiretaps, torture, and wars based on false intel... and that whole time "Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz".... Obama takes office and all of a sudden they become constitutionalists...

And anyone paying attention at the time could see that all that happened was when Neo-cons lost the presidency, they rebranded themselves and hijacked the only successful republican's message - Ron Paul. They used Fox News to create a fake right-wing media-supported Tea Party, which they then appointed Neocon darling Sarah Palin to lead -- all while continuing to ignore Ron Paul as much as possible...

The people here at the time were like, "What, so you're awake now?"... It was literally 1 week after Obama was president and Republicans had convinced themselves that it was Obama's fault and he was the worst president ever for starting a presidency under a crashed economy-- and oh by the way I think he's a muslim--- You know, the enemy we've been taught to hate for the last 8 years.

It was seriously one of the most ignorant about-faces I had ever seen.