[Joe Ross]

I'm ambivalent about whether political discussions/political advertisement should continue on chiefdelphi. However, there is another issue that occurred it that thread that I think should be addressed.

I don't think that a moderator should moderate a thread in which he/she participates. The outside observer is left with the question as to whether the thread was locked because it became a flame war or whether it was locked because people disagreed with the moderator who posted in the thread. This sense of impropriety shouldn't exist in a serious discussion forum.

I propose that moderators should deliberately abstain from posting their opinion in potentially divisive threads. A divisive thread isn't just one about politics or religion but often occur in rules discussions and accusations against other teams. The disadvantage that this suggestion holds is that the moderators are often some of the most respected posters on chiefdelphi, and we would lose their insight in some of the most important threads.

An alternate suggestion is to not have a moderator perform any moderator functions in a thread in which they share their opinion. Rather then David closing the thread, I think it would have been more appropriate for someone else to have decided that it needed to be closed. I think that for this to work, the number of moderators on chiefdelphi would need to be increased by a minimum of several people.

Just to clarify, I don't think that any impropriety occurred in the thread, but rather that there was the possible appearance of impropriety that should be avoided.