Nobody's unbiased, and anyone who pretends to be is lying to either you or to themselves. The idea reminds me of the bureaucrats who run government, appearing to be neutral while actually pushing strongly for an agenda, especially tending to promote the expansion of bureaucracy as well as the continuation of the status quo. (This largely-invisible but very powerful political force is sometimes what people mean when they use the term "deep state".) Fair moderation requires that you understand yourself well enough to know what your biases actually are, and then take conscious action to avoid letting them cloud your judgement. One's skill at doing this is totally independent of political beliefs: a radical might be able to do it, and a centrist might not.
It was incorrect for OgNasty's post in that thread about the California shooting to be deleted; I restored it. I read that post as not an ad hominem; its main point seemed to be expressing a preference for localism vis-à-vis gun control, and gun control is clearly on-topic in that thread. But my impression is that Flying Hellfish has been moderating fairly on the whole. Mistakes happen.
While Flying Hellfish is pretty far left, I am an anarcho-capitalist; I view his political beliefs as ~80% insane. Having two diametrically opposed viewpoints here is a good combination which will hopefully prevent the formation of an echo chamber for one viewpoint or another. I think that people in the last several years have become largely unable to face opposing viewpoints, which isn't good.
Mods can delete whatever they want in their self-moderated threads, just like anyone else.
Perhaps theymos should change some rules there and moderator should remove spam only. Off topic replies, trolling and personal attacks are suitable for discussion about politics, as it is crucial part of politics.
It'd be OK IMO for topic-starters to express a preference for more or less moderation. But in general, on-topicness is especially important in political discussions so that one side doesn't filibuster the other with nonsense. I'm also concerned with off-topic
thought-terminating clichés in political discussions (from all sides).
This stuff is all subjective. There's no such thing as perfect moderation, since everyone has a different idea of what perfection would be. You just do the best you can.
