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Posted: 2017-08-04T13:34:14Z | Updated: 2017-08-04T16:22:37Z

After the election of 2016, as many others, I was surprised, disappointed, and fearful. So as a result I frequently liked or shared a number of the liberal sites of Facebook . There were just a few progressive sites that showed up on my Facebook page and I would respond to them.

Now eight months later it seems that the number of those democratic, progressive, liberal sites has multiplied ten-fold. They almost seem to dominate my entire Facebook site. Many of them have shown up uninvited by me and unacknowledged by me.

The thing that is a bit disturbing is that the claims and the statements that are reported on these more liberal sites are, indeed, almost fake news. There is the constant refrain that something has happened that will surely bring the current administration to an end. This new event that is breaking news will be the end of atheist Trumps presidency. Or maybe, one of the children will be expelled from the White House, or the smoking gun on Russian involvement has just been discovered. Every day these kind of extreme exaggerated claims are put forth on these liberal sites. The claims they make are seldom supported by stories from the major news sources of the New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR or BBC. These liberal sites seem to be contributing to the climate that encourages this great debate about what is fake news and where is honest reporting. These sites may think they are inspiring the liberal base, but this hardly seems the best way for that to happen.

The other thing that is appearing is the consistent commenting on these liberal, progressive sites a barrage of alt-right attacks. A negative, vile, locker room attack is now the first comment under each of these liberal post. The impression that is given is that this is an organized and systematic program of insulting the posts and the people who read them. The names of the people who post these nasty and hateful comments are not your standard, normal names. These comments have no content other than curse words, vulgar slurs on the people who like these sites and to gloat that the atheist Trump will be president for eight years.

In this nasty and deeply divided society, with all kinds of people and ideas trying to manipulate the public, one has to wonder whether the Republican party has enlisted a group of people to be active in attacking these liberal sites or whether perhaps the liberal sites themselves have put these vile comments there to evoke from the readers more responses and more participation.

As Kris Kristofferson said it is getting harder to separate the winners from the losers, the good guys from the bad guys.