Dear George--

As you know I very much appreciate and enjoy your tireless efforts to stir things up. Not only that, but I think what you do is truly a service to the community. One counts on you to sniff out the interesting things and to encourage the s**t to hit the fan. Our body politic would be a lot flabbier without you.

Nobody's perfect though, and I do take issue with your posting on your site the anonymous remarks which were originally on the electronic chalkboard. You say that part of your self-assigned mission is to "make(s) the political process more accountable and more readily transparent." I don't think that repeating malicious sounding gossip, which is presented anonymously AND without any shred of evidence from which a person could determine if the accusations made there are worthy of consideration, helps at all in any way to make the process more accountable.

I know that it is your policy to always ask permission before you post someone's remarks for attribution and this is extremely fine of you. The fact that you can post excerpts from the chalkboard without asking permission should tell you that they don't belong on your site at all.

In these last few days of the campaign I hope that your site won't encourage the seamy side of political discourse. I truly admire them and am grateful that we have 6 candidates who are willing and able to do this extremely thankless job. Although I myself cannot begin to imagine being willing to make such a commitment of time and energy, I feel the least I can do is try to offer those who are willing to take a shot at it, a meaningful context in which to make their offer and their attempt. I think that this is what the DFC is really about.

I think you mean to do the same with your website and frequent emails, but I think you made a misstep with this posting. And if you do it again I'm going to challenge you to a duel at the Nook, twenty paces with water guns. That should take care of it.

Mary E. MacNeil (electronic mail, February 19, 2002)