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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Is Jeff running for the Council? He took the time out of his day to review this thread even though he normally only reviews the most active threads. Thoughts?

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The final thread at which I'll look today was posted in the "Metropolitan DC Local Politics" forum and titled "Rolling gun battle in Capitol Hill tonight." The original poster describes a terrifying shootout between occupants of two moving vehicles. When the driver of one automobile was shot, the vehicle crashed into parked cars. Ultimately, two occupants of the vehicle died and one was wounded. The original poster is upset that nothing had been heard from DC Council Member Charles Allen. This thread demonstrates three trends that have been dominating the local politics forum: 1) posters fixated on crime; 2) posters absolutely, completely, insanely obsessed with Charles Allen; and 3) posters posting repeatedly in a compulsive manner. Admittedly, this was a pretty dramatic incident that probably deserves its own thread, but the repeated threads about crime are a somewhat new development on DCUM. I think much of this is driven by the new wave of "crime reporters" on Twitter. These individuals devote their time to listening to police scanners and then immediately posting about any incidents that catch their interest. I've found them to play a welcome role in providing information about what is happening around us. On the other hand, posters follow them on Twitter and immediately rush to DCUM to start threads based on the tweets. In the past, these posters might not even have known about many of the incidents, let alone started threads about them. As for Charles Allen, he has become the face of DC's response to crime. That is ironic given that the Metropolitan Police Departement is under the control of DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, not Ward 6's Council Member. For all the criticism Allen receives on DCUM, he is a remarkably popular Council Member. In both last year's Democratic Primary and the General Election, he was unopposed. The angry posters on DCUM could not even convince anyone to run against him. Next are the compulsive posters. I don't know if posters have an authentic concern about crime and actually hold Alen responsible for it, and, hence, detest him, or if they hate Allen and find crime to be a good issue to use against him. Either way, the combination of crime and Allen brings out some particularly obsessive users. For context, this thread is currently 11 pages and consisting of 155 posts. Of those, the original poster is responsible for at least seven posts, which is not a lot I guess. But, another Allen critic posted at least 21 responses. A third poster — also anti-Allen — managed at least 27 posts in the thread. But, the winner of the Allen-hating extravaganza was a poster who probably wore out her keyboard posting at least 46 times. That is 101 posts just between these 4 posters. In contrast, a dedicated Allen defender managed 19 posts. The Allen supporter was convinced that he was facing off against paid trolls, but he is simply unaware of the obsessive-compulsive nature of these posters. At any rate, if you are intersted in epic anti-Charles Allen rants, this is the thread for you.[/quote]

Thank you Jeff for putting the anti-Allen posts into context. They really are like the online Libertarians.[/quote]

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