[jggimi]

Originally Posted by EverydayDiesel

i guess the question is, is the dns blocking the connection from even happening

Yes.

how do i resolve the dns www.whatever.com to be forwarded to 127.0.0.1?

Pass DNS traffic. When the client obtains an IP address, only then will it reach out to port 80 at the destination server. Which your rdr-to will redirect for you.