One often-quoted FrontBurnervian (when will the DMN political reporters find sane people to talk to?) doesn’t disagree with my points on Laura Miller but says:
…so long as you have a relationship with Ray Hunt, you need to disclose that every time you make a comment. You have a vested interest. You are not an impartial commentator.”
Ray Hunt invested in the original D Magazine in 1974–and made it possible, thank God. I worked with him closely for ten years as we built the company, and I enjoyed almost every minute of it. But our business relationship ended in in 1983 or 1984 after I moved to New York. That was over 20 years ago. I admire him extravagently. However, he and I disagree on public policy matters about as much as Laura Miller and I do.
But there is a larger matter here. Some people are incapable of separating the personal from the political. That produces the wackiness–and the accusations and conspiracy theories–that so often characterizes local politics. If one were to believe a certain group of busybody activists, nobody has clean motives, nobody operates from principle, and nobody is free of personal entanglement or profit motive. For them I can only recommend therapy. The rest of us can get on with the debate.
