From the Editor: Out with the old, in with the new! As things change, we’re still here for the long haul!

You might notice that I’ve got a couple of ad spots that have opened up for new advertisers; One I’ve been assured is coming soon from a new advertiser, and another couple of them have been talked about.

If you’re interested in advertising space, on February 20th, aside from a few (as in very few) top level ad positions available, I will be opening up a chunk of advertising real estate where the Newsmax feeds are. These once held some interesting national political items, but they’ve now all become ads for age treatments and reverse mortgages. So I put in my notice that I’m reclaiming that space.

Otherwise, I’m more than pleased our current set of sponsors are going to be hanging around for a while. South Dakota War College continues to be the state’s longest standing and regularly published political website. And we’re not going anywhere for the forseeable future.

Unless I someday win the lottery. And then all bets are off.

Absent a massive financial windfall that would send me into hiding, we’re starting our 11th (wow!) year here at Dakotawarcollege, and we’re entering what should be an interesting election cycle, and the eyes of the politically active and community opinion leaders will all be pointed here in 2016 to this website as we see the elections for the state’s new set of political leaders.

Of course, after 2016, we start moving towards the big Kahuna – the slobberknocker of elections to end all elections (at least until another 8 years go by) – 2018, where our state’s political titans will be battling each other in political primaries.

And we could not do it without you, the reader. Thank you so much for your patronage, and for keeping a close eye on South Dakota Politics.


Pat Powers ProfileAbout the Editor

Pat Powers is the editor & primary writer of Dakotawarcollege.com, and has been in involved in state Republican politics since 1988. in 2005 he founded the South Dakota War College blog, and since 2009 it has regularly been named by the Washington Post as one of the nation’s top state-based political blogs.  Pat is a veteran of numerous state political campaigns, including 2 gubernatorial contests.

12 thoughts on “From the Editor: Out with the old, in with the new! As things change, we’re still here for the long haul!”

  1. –And we could not do it without you, the reader.

    As a regular DWC reader and commenter, I would encourage you to be more active in addressing the respect that some fail and refuse to demonstrate to others. I’m not suggesting censorship, just simple and clear posts re-directing comments that lean towards the personal. It’s one thing to flesh out inconsistencies or mistakes in other’s views, it’s quite another to respond with bitterness.

    Part of that respect is to rein in Mr. Jones. He has repeatedly deleted entire threads that he arbitrarily and without explanation, considered inappropriate–I am not referring to profane, sexualized, or otherwise inappropriate language–he simply deletes what he does not like. Look, if one wants absolute control of the responses to a topic, then why bother starting it? If he wishes to post a topic, and only allow comment he sees fit, then tell us that. You and I can both see that several readers are tiring of this shtick. While one is entitled to run a blog as one wishes, such censorship is disrespectful of and demeaning to your loyal readers.

    –Thank you so much for your patronage,

    It’s a two-way street.

  2. Andrew Shear,

    In a post about Jimmy Carter’s cancer diagnosis, asking for prayers, and som information about long lived and multiple ex-Presidents living (http://dakotawarcollege.com/do-you-know-who-was-the-first-president-democratic-president-i-ever-met-bill-clinton-jimmy-carter/), more than once I warned you negative personal comments about this ailing man would not be permitted.

    You not only persisted but resorted to calling me names. So, as warned, I deleted all your comments. As retaliation, you responded to my comments for days with more vitriol because I censored your personal attacks on Jimmy Carter.

    And now, your obsession continues. A few weeks ago, I wrote a tribute for former long serving public servant that ended with a traditional prayer for the recently departed. You copied and then bastardized a traditional Christian prayer to make further attacks on me personally.

    I hope you aren’t upset by my referring to you as your given name. It honors your parents as I am sure they are proud of you and what you write and wouldn’t want you being ashamed of your name.

  3. — And we could not do it without you, the reader. Thank you so much for your patronage, and for keeping a close eye on South Dakota Politics.

    You have the opportunity to demonstrate your appreciation of your readers.

    Are you sincere, Mr. Powers?

  4. What IS your problem, dude?

    Anonymous

    January 16, 2016 at 10:44 am

    “Mr. Jones:

    Its clear that you have confused religion with church.

    Noone has slandered any one else.

    Why not accept the correction instead of being such an a-hole? You of done this on other topics. What is your problem dude?”

    Folks are tired of his shtick.

    Do you truly appreciate the patronage Mr. Powers, or just spewing meaningless gas to cover the disrespect of this guy?

  5. Here is my favorite Andrew Shiers post of all time:

    “We have done some interesting internet research on Troy Jones and Bill Fleming. When copying and posting their longer comments into turnitin.com, one gets a probability of 85.76% that their written by the same author. Its interesting considering this little tag team here. Noone really cares though.”

    Besides agreeing on virtually all political issues, has anyone really confused Bill’s short, pithy comments with my long rambling commentary? You don’t have to have been here long to know we not only communicate differently, disagree, and are two different people.

    You can watch Andrew in classic form here: http://dakotawarcollege.com/augie-gop-watching-the-debate-tonight/#comment-665738

    Andrew contributed 29 of the 83 posts on this thread.

  6. Incline, O Lord, Your ear to my prayer, in which I humbly beseech Your mercy, that You would place the soul of Your servant, which You have allowed to harden with bitterness, into the region of peace and light; and unite in the fellowship of Your Saints. Through Christ our Lord,
    Amen.

    Great prayer.

  7. Speaking of Bill, where did he go?

    He probably tired of same old paranoid routine.

    He’s here. Somewhere.

  8. Back to the Future—-PP I remember Schoenbeck calling me about 10 years ago about something political and after hashing that out asking me if I’d seen War College. I responded by asking; what the heck is War College?
    Two days later he called me again and asked if I’d gone to the WAR page. The rest is history and you opened up this haystackers eyes in ways nobody else ever could have Pat.
    Thank you for your intense honesty and friendship.

  9. Incline, O Lord, Your ear to my prayer, in which I humbly beseech Your mercy, that You would place the soul of Your servant which You have allowed to depart from this world, into the region of peace and light; and unite in the fellowship of Your Saints. Through Christ our Lord,

    The prayer as blessed/used by the Church is a great prayer (what Is written in the post above is not the prayer of the Church) as it is based on Psalm130 with a connection to Psalm 42. It is a prayer of penance and for Mercy (Psalm 130) said from a perspective of humility, a posture of almost unworthiness to even make a petition to God. Because it is a prayer for the recently departed, the person praying is in grief (the abyss/depth looking into the abyss/depth) which is how it connects to Psalm 42.

    One could spend an hour just contemplating the first word and what a humble petition/attitude toward God.

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