PS.

I just had an idea. I think we should click on the ads that we do agree with. That should support both sides.

Yay, nay?

Wow, this seems a little over the top. Maybe it's just my lack of wisdom since I'm still a baby but it seems over the top.

Any website has to make some kind of profit. It costs money to host it, buy the domain, set up the database, host the emails, pay the designers, programmers, etc.

Some of you need to show some appreciation for the work that goes into doing something like this.

If seeing some bad ads once in a while support this site and get it on it's feet, I'm all for it. It isn't possible to filter every single ad. It seems like a waste of time and energy to complain about petty things when a bigger goal is staring you in the face. As the site grows, hopefully too will its sponsors and then we can talk about being picky.

But for now... please just relax.

You guys really need to chill out about this issue. I don't even know why its being made a big deal.

Google automatically takes the content of a page and shows relevant ads. If your talking about McCain, then guess what, thats what ads your going to see.

As a professional web developer I can tell you how much of a hassle it is to sit there and sift through all the URL's that you might want to censor on adsense. Also, after you censor the sites that are deemed offensive, more websites show up every day. With the political niche, there will always be new sites advertising about candidates that may not necessarily be supported here. They would have to sit down all day looking for URL's to ban. What a waste of time and resources.

Lets also talk about the ads you see. I can almost guarantee that none of the advertisements you see are actually from the McCain HQ. These are just other web developers trying to cash in on a popular topic of the day. Chances are most are silly arbitrage websites or affiliate offers to vote for who you want as president. They aren't anything of substance, and won't stand a chance to convert anyone to another candidate -- especially not people who visit this website.

And just to express this point, I highly doubt that BTM is making any serious money on these google ads. Thats not why the administration has chosen to keep the ads up.

I'm also not sure I'm too keen on the idea of censoring political entities. This website isn't about Ron Paul himself, its about the message of freedom. It seems rather contradicting to impose censoring on the advertising.

My 2 cents...

Why is it that somebody seems to always has a better way and then always has to run off their credentials and how they can do it better?
There was a guy over at the Daily Dose that did the same thing. This add thing seems so trivial. All I have to say is that its a free? :) country, you want to Break the Matrix? Only takes a few dollars to buy a domain name. Then you can hire and manage all the people you want to your liking.

Rick, Shelley, and the rest of the admin here, perhaps this will help the caustic crowd to realize maybe Google isn't so bad afterall?:

Campaign Contributions by Candidate

Ron Paul's top 4 campaign contributors
1. United States Army
2. United States Navy
3. Google
4. United States Air Force

McCain’s top 4 campaign contributors
1. Merrill Lynch
2. Blank Rome LLP
3. Citigroup Inc
4. Greenberg Traurig LLP

Obama
1.Goldman Sachs
2.University of California
3.Ubs Ag
4.JPMorgan Chase & Co

Clinton
1.Goldman Sachs
2.Citigroup Inc
3.Morgan Stanley
4.EMILY's List

It is evident that big finance and lobbyists are behind all of the candidate’s donations, with the exception of one. Ron Paul has the most donations from those folks serving in the armed forces, and the people at Google. The common man supports Ron Paul. The wealthy elite support ALL of the other candidates.

Furthermore, here's an article decribing a bit more about Ron Paul's opposition supporters, as it elaborates quite a bit about them below:

Economic Problems are profitable for the World and International banks:

"Deceit, Deception and Distortion Being Used
To Expand the ‘Game Called Bailout’ - The Global Financial Crisis"

By Joan Veon

While there are many examples of treachery in human history: those against innocent people, against those who invented something that the more powerful interests did not want to compete with, those against rulers by those who wanted their kingdom, and those against government so they could distort a country’s monetary system for their own financial gain and empowerment. In light of the expanding and evolving global financial crisis, this is where we find ourselves. In reality, we are seeing the global empowerment of a central banking system which is now global. They are now crating the conditions to give them the rest of the regulatory powers they still lack.
If one looks at the financial history of America, they will see from the beginning there was a political and financial tug of war over whether a private corporation, like the Bank of England, would control our monetary system. Alexander Hamilton favored the aristocratic tradition of central banking versus that of Thomas Jefferson who was for limited government that controlled our monetary system.
According to The Federal Reserve Conspiracy by Antony C. Sutton, Alexander Hamilton introduced a bill into the House to “grant a charter for the privately owned Bank of the United States, creating the first private money monopoly in the U.S. and which was a predecessor to the Federal Reserve in 1913. The charter of the First Bank of the United States expired in 1811. The War of 1812 presented bank supporters with a new argument—financial distress brought about by the war required financial relief in the form of a new national bank. The Second Bank of the United States was signed into law in 1816” with a term of 20 years.
It was Andrew Jackson who not only routed out the British in the War of 1812, but refused to renew the charter of the Second Bank. The goal of the international bankers from 1836 until 1913 was to get the U.S. to set up a central bank!
In the book, Captains and The Kings by Taylor Caldwell, she writes about a group of powerful insiders who run the world and control history, “They talked only of money, the greatest of powers, the most pragmatic of common denominators. It was accepted that all other things besides money and the power of money were outside the consideration of intelligent men.”
One of the main character says to a younger man whom he is educating in the ways of the world, “You will recall a discussion today concerning the dissatisfaction the [foreign] gentlemen feel for our absurd Constitutional Amendment that only Congress has the power to coin money. They are now trying to influence our government to permit a private Federal Reserve System to coin and issue and control currency, without the consent of Congress or any other governmental agency” (pp.301-302).
Only a few people today know that the Federal Reserve, our central bank, is not federal nor does it have any reserves. Its beginnings are vested in a deep cloak of secrecy by a group of bankers comprised of Senator Nelson Aldrich, father-in-law of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., German banker Paul Warburg, Henry P. Davison, partner in J.P. Morgan and National City Bank (today Citigroup), Frank Vanderlip, Benjamin Strong, and Charles D. Norton. A number of them represented J.P. Morgan while others represented Kuhn-Loeb and the Rockefeller interests.
They met on Jekyll Island in 1910 where they planned exactly how the Federal Reserve would be established. The need for the central bank, they said, was precipitated by the 1907 panic. Back then, a number of money trusts banks began to call their loans which precipitated a run on the Heinze-Morse Mercantile National Bank. The owners of this bank were concerned citizens who were trying to oppose the Wall Street money trust. Guess who won? J. P. Morgan along with Rockefeller, Harriman and Kuhn Loeb.
The Federal Reserve Act passed “with almost unprecedented speed” according to the New York Times and the House voted 298 to 60 to pass it at 11:00 p.m., Monday, December 22, 1913. The whole process of democratically controlled. Congress gave the Federal Reserve the power to control the entire monetary system of the United States. Those involved with the creation of the Federal Reserve included Kuhn-Loeb, National City Bank, First National Bank, Bankers Trust, Guaranty Trust and J. P. Morgan. If the British Royal Family was one of the largest investors in the Bank of England, I would imagine that they are also an investor in other central banks, including the Federal Reserve. It should be noted that many of these same banks are involved in today’s credit crunch. Surprise. Surprise.
According to G. Edward Griffin in The Creature from Jekyll Island, the goals of the international bankers, i.e. the banking cartel was to “involve the federal government as an agent shifting the inevitable losses from the owners of those banks to the taxpayers.” Griffin goes on to write, “The Game-Called-Bailout as it actually has been applied to specific cases including Penn Central, Lockheed, New York City, Chrysler, Commonwealth Bank of Detroit, First Pennsylvania Bank, Continental Illinois, and others (25).” Let us add Long Term Capital Management, BCCI, and now Bear Stearns. All of these owed money to the same banks which financed the Federal Reserve in the first place. Griffin goes on to write, “The history of increasing government intervention in the housing industry; the stifling of free-market forces in residential real estate; the resulting crisis S&L industry; the bailout of that industry with money taken from the taxpayer (67).”
In September, 2007, Newswithviews carried an article that I did on the fact that the sub prime credit crunch is a ruse. I basically said that all of the banks involved both in Europe and the U.S. are inter-related with interlocking Boards of Directors. In fact, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair just joined JP Morgan as senior advisor! Should I also mention that JP Morgan is closely associated with the Rothschild’s who are investors in various central banks?
What we have to understand is that in order to integrate the world economically, all that remains are the structural changes: from national accounting rules to global accounting rules, from national clearing and settlement to a global system of clearing and settlement; from national regulatory laws to a global system of regulatory laws; and to bring the U.S. into a 21st century global regulatory system by tearing down the current system and globalizing all our financial and securities laws. In other words, the very last vestiges of our economic sovereignty are being changed before our very eyes because of another trumped up credit crisis.
Global crises are only possible because the barriers between all the nation-states have been torn down: the economic, financial, economic, political, trade, legal, and intelligence. Because of this “flat landscape”, it is now possible to bring down the value of all the stock exchanges at once instead of one at a time because of the barriers! Think how expedient that is for those who are in positions of this kind of power? No longer will any government official have any type of power!
Let me also point out that we now see treasury officials and central bank ministers acting in concert. Before 1998, they acted independently; today they act and think as one.
The Game Called Bailout has just gone global. No longer will they have to worry about what country they are using for personal gain. While the Federal Reserve expanded their powers by bailing out Bear Stearns, an international bank, which is not part of their 1913 powers, it will be the same kind of Congress that will globalize The Bailout Game and now allow you and me to become the true lender of last resort as we foot the bill for derivatives, futures, options, and any other problem they can contrive.

I click em once in a while. Isn't that how BTM makes a little dough?
2 cents and all.

I'm catching on! ;)

It seems strange to me that BTM would want to block advertisements from political parties. I know they do not agree with BTM philosophies, but isn't the site supposed to be about freedom, honesty, and openness. I have not been influenced by any of these ads as I am sure none of you have. I would like to see some Ron Paul ads or some ads from the Libertarian Party or Constitution Party though!

lol re enemies. We'll pick up plenty when we're operating in full; altho I must say I'd prefer to make them from among our adversaries. R

(This is a response to Libertas' post, little trouble with the chronological structure) Highly caustic crowd eh' Mr. Williams? Let's try not to make too many enemies (who would have thought). Let me try and quell this discussion with the little bit of online advertising knowledge I have, please correct me where I'm wrong. Right now Google owns online advertising. Visit almost any site, blog, forum discussion etc. and your going to find Google Ads. It's kind of like the "default" setting for advertising online because they are the best at the monetization part (using algarhythms to take words from each page and using those words to set up auctions for a pool of advertisers to pay for advertising spots), by their own admission, it's not perfect. But it is the best so far and they are continually updating it. I don't really know what the alternative would be so long as we don't have advertisers or sponsors that I'M aware of. (BTM is in FORMATION and it's only THE FIRST FEW WEEKS since the site has been up). I totally understand some of the concerns with the advertising structure so far, but you got to give the benefit of the doubt to those putting this site together. Give em a break, sheesh!

Rick,

I think that this is a very important issue. Personally, I'm not offended by Ukranian women; but I'm not all that happy when I see John McCain ads on this site. If I had my own firm, I would advertise here; but I am not that far along in my career to do so. I really don't know the whole ins and outs of internet advertising, but surely there are better options to mainstream political candidates.

On the more optimistic note, I appreciate your site's lack of pop-up ads and the like. More importantly, I see no ads by GE, Raytheon, Lockheed, and General Dynamics. Perhaps ol' Libertas should recognize that merit. Hopefully, your crew (Hi Shelly!) will find a solution for this problem, as integrity should be one of this sites highest goals--the mainstream press' utter lack of integrity in principle can be this site's greatest stepping stone.

I'm sure that you're trying to scrape up a few bucks to get this site up and running, but I, along with many others, are here seeking alternatives to the mainstream political effluence that is being force-fed to my countrymen. Please keep this in mind.

Goodbye, it seems, to Libertas. R

You could build the best house on the block, but if you build the foundation on a landfill, your house is still going to smell like garbage and probably fall over because it wasn't stable from the start.

You could build the best media site on the internet, but it comes as a result of poking holes in your ideals and stated *sound* objectives that resonated with a lot of people, myself included, it will meet the same fate as above. Or it will thrive in the same filth that all other media outlets are thriving in today. Foundation is everything when you start a business.

Being an organizer and "executive officer", surely you read the first BTM message that went out. Maybe you even helped write the rhetoric contained therein. The fact that you don't recognize this as a valid concern shows me that BTM's leadership lacks integrity, judgment, unselfishness, loyalty and most likely many of the other leadership traits.

If you are so over tasked, why didn't you state that from the start? Honesty is a virtue too. Surely there is one of the 2500+ users on this site with web talent that would work to further your stated agenda that understands your "minuscule" earnings. From what I've seen from the leadership around here, it's only a matter of time before the real community embedding here sees the smoke and mirrors.

It has taken multiple posts from you to get close to an honest answer to a simple question regarding your intent to stick to your stated goals, which you are still sidestepping with the marksmanship of your average politician.

clearly stated: BTM is a waste of my time. This isn't about the advertisements, it's about promising one thing, and delivering another. This is from the START. How do you not see that one compromise now to bring in minuscule profit will be the long chain of many compromises? It may seem trivial to you now, but what will be trivial in 6 months? At least our government worked at it for a few years before it fell on the path it's headed down now.

BTM didn't last a week before it was for sale.

This is an important topic everyone should read and form their own opinions on.

I will no longer use this site because it's Operating Procedure has fell far from the tree it grew from. I was deceived.

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Libertas Quae Sera Tamen

Relax, Libertas-- you're not being deceived, and the ad money involved is miniscule. Settle down and chill out-- we're still in beta, for heavens sake. Sorting thru the Adsense structuring/deletion process is simply not a priority right now. Nor should it be-- there are more important things on Shelly's overly full plate. Like I said before-- enjoy the McCain ads for awhile. It's one step at a time. Patience please. . . And perhaps a bit less vitriol might also be advisable. R

Assuming it were possible? Sounds like the type of propaganda jab that Mitt Romney used during debates to try to rally support away from whoever he was jabbing. Could you at least update your FAQ? Your sole web genius on this project that knows how to use google ads is overwhelmed is, at the very least, closer to the truth than "We haven't adopted an ad strategy" and "find amusement and enjoy the John McCain and Hillary for president ads". Come on, Rick, if you weren't making money off the ads, surely you would have taken them down.

I don't hold making money against you, otherwise you wouldn't be in business. I do hold your attempts to deceive against you.

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Libertas Quae Sera Tamen

It's not that we disagree with your point, or that we're trying to rip off the community with offensive ads (assuming that such a thing was possible). The problem is that our web genius (i.e., Shelly) is overwhelmed with tasks. Patience is a virtue. . . R