Chat with Dan COLLINS

10:07 AM Dan: Barrett, I'm sorry if I've offended you, but look . . . I'm a minor presence on the intarwebs, and on Twitter, and yet I'm asked continually to justify the behavior of my acquaintance. Recently, for example, Tommy Christopher was on about Rush Limbaugh, I think it was, saying something stupid that might discourage people from donating for Haitian relief. Simply as a matter of my perceived political sympathies, since I don't listen to radio unless I'm in my car, and I don't watch TV, I was told that it was incumbent upon myself either to defend or denounce some kind of nitwit proposition. And when, having complied with this imperious request, I asked what did he think of Martha Coakley's role in the Amirault case, he said simply that he was unfamiliar with the facts. This was after I'd gone to his site to read the entirety of the screed. So, please excuse me if I think it's entirely a mug's game, this business of being asked to pronounce on the mreits or demerits of whoever it's assumed you're related to by some mutual sympathy. And Charles doesn't particularly anger me; I just think that he's become a bit of a drama queen. I think that his behavior towards commenters has been unseemly. And I think that like Jeff, he has become obsessed with the issue of "loyalty."