Unless your phone’s Canadian, I don’t see why it would matter that you’re using a phone. Phones have IP numbers, just as computers do.

I don’t think so for two reasons.

The first is that, if that were the case, all Shepherd would have had to do is to say so.

The second is, if that were the case, Shepherd’s IP number would be different each time he commented. However, it remains the same.

It’s a small point but in fairness I ought to raise it: It may be that Shepherd is browsing with the TOR browser.

That is a browser readily available for free off the internet, and increasingly popular, that protects privacy by re-routing through different countries and effectively masks the location of the computer.

Of course, I disagree with their responses (#Resist, Trump is crazy let’s impeach him, etc).

This all makes me very happy, indeed!

Exactly what I would like you to do is to stop the insults and the drama. Just make your points.

And as I’ve already said, if you say something ambiguous that is easily interpreted in a certain way that makes you look bad, just issue a correction. No need to add all the “oh, woe is me, you hate me and pick on me all the time!” business. Dropping it would be a big big improvement.

You have yet to acknowledge that the Virginia vs. Montreal thing is a bona fide reason for suspicion. If it’s not your fault it’s not your fault, but it continues to be very suspicious and odd. As I already wrote, IPs are sometimes off, but only by a few miles or even a hundred miles. Eight hundred miles? Just about unheard of.

Most of the time on this blog the comments section takes care of itself, and the commenters communicate back-and-forth with each other. I jump in now and then to take up a particular issue. If someone is insulting, though, it’s not okay. And of course I’m often on troll alert. That’s pretty much it.

I don’t know what else to say about where I am without giving you my home address. I live in Leesburg and sometimes commute to DC and Charlottesville for work. If I were clever enough to come here and fake my identity (as an anonymous anyman), wouldn’t I be clever enough to fake that too? Somewhere other than Montreal, of all places! And if I had never said a word abour where I was from, would it matter then or are my points still predicated on that too?

You really don’t understand why the Canadian thing matters? Then let me spell it out for you.

Bloggers learn pretty quickly that unless they want their blog taken over by highly destructive trolls, they have to be alert to them. One very very very strong sign of a troll is someone who lies about who they are and/or where they’re from. So if someone has identifiers saying he or she is from Canada, and that person insists he or she is from somewhere else far far away, that’s a huge red flag that they’re not telling the truth. Lying, in other words, not just about that, but perhaps about everything. Trolls do that.

It’s really very simple. I’m surprised you can’t figure out why it would matter, and that you needed to ask why it would matter.

Now, perhaps you are really telling the truth about where you come from and for some reason your computer is saying you’re coming from somewhere else. Perhaps you’re telling the truth about everything. But it’s not the most likely explanation. IP locations are sometimes off a little bit, but to be off that much is highly highly highly unusual.

In addition, you write “When I said decently I meant here on this thread. You’ve had it out for me since my first word…” Let me just say that when a person writes “Stephen, thanks for treating my decently even though we disagree, you’re the first one here” as you wrote, unless that person explains they mean on the thread, the meaning of the word “here” can easily be the blog rather than the thread. Your failure to see that is rather surprising, as well.

So no, I haven’t “had it out” for you. As a blogger I watch for red flags and you’ve given me plenty. You might, for instance, have written, “Oh, now I see that what I wrote when I said ‘here’ was ambiguous and easily could have been interpreted as meaning on this blog.” Instead, you go into victim mode.

If I “had it in for you” it would be very easy to take care of that by banning you. I’ve spent a lot of time engaging you and shown remarkable patience with you, actually, because I think at least some of the points you raise are of interest. But my patience is not endless.

Much more.