This is an interactive blog. It is not just me, but you. I rely upon and am educated by my readers through the dialectical method. I don't have one editor. I have 5,000 of them. As fellow blogger LVCI recently learned, it can be exhausting to respond to the diverse points of view.
As an opinionated person, I make things worse. I have made enemies over the years. I have also attracted a fairly large number of trolls. They sometimes try to hijack blog threads.
I will delete off-topic comments. I'm fine with a tip about a late-breaking story, but am insulted when someone rudely interrupts a discussion about a topic that I researched for several hours and then wrote as a story.
I also hate cut-and paste jobs because the person who wrote the original story deserves better treatment. But if you just post a link, it might go into my spam folder.
I will immediately delete any comment from one person who agreed in court to stay off this blog. Molovinsky knows who this person is, and he is the reason why Molvinsky has removed the anonymous option and sometimes moderates.
I will also delete any comment from another person who once threatened to kill Barack Obama when he was re-elected as the President of the United States. Molovinsky hosts the hate that still comes from this person as well as others who make ridiculous arguments about the IQs of Somalis being inferior and other such nonsense. That's just hate. Molovinsky has complained that I removed my link to his blog. This is why.
I generally will allow personal attacks aimed at elected officials, provided they are not vulgar. I tend to be more protective of appointed public officials, and will not allow snarky remarks about family members. They are civilians unless they make themselves part of the story.
I am of course fine with anonymous comments that agree with me. I am also fine with anonymous comments that disagree with me. But if the commenters get personal, I have no compunction about telling them they are cowards. If I call someone an anonymous coward for simply disagreeing with me, I am wrong. I deal with numerous comments every day, and sometimes I make mistakes. Molovinsky provided no examples of this happening, but I am sure there are likely some instances in which I do cross the line, mostly in defense of officials I like. I only mean to call someone an anonymous coward if he hides behind anonymity to attack someone personally.
Unlike Molovinsky, I write numerous articles about local races. Over the years, I have noticed that two types of races tend to attract ugly comments. The first is magisterial contests, believe it or not. The second is any race involving Justin Simmons.
In the last election cycle, in which Justin Simmons ran for re-election as State Rep and broke a pledge to serve only three terms, I published 13 stories. Almost from the beginning, the comments were very ugly, and would go on for as long as 11 days after my story originally published. At this point, the only persons reading the comments would be the candidates themselves and me. I would eventually get tired of it and close comments off completely. Even then, team Simmons would jump onto another thread and continue the flaming.
Now that Simmons is running for Congress, I am getting ugly pro-Simmons comments again. Instead of shutting down the discussion, I've opted to address all the slimy pro-Simmons comments as though they are coming from Justin himself. This has minimized the filth coming from him or his supporters.
I sometimes delete a comment accidentally. Also, there are times when a comment goes into my spam folder. I may think it is published, but blogger has incorrectly identified it as spam. I often fail to discover this for days.
My decisions regarding comments are unappealable. I will in fact delete comments complaining about my comments policy. I would rather discuss the issues, but you can always email me if I have made a mistake. BOhare5948@aol.com .
I will host no comments here because this is my blog. I set my own comments policy. Not Michael Molovinsky. Not anyone else.
