Letters

I am writing this letter as a lifelong Democrat, former co-chair of the Southampton Town Democratic Committee and also former president of the J.P. Spata Democratic Club.

I don’t recall ever reading as condescending a letter as the one by Andrea Klausner printed last week in your paper [“Not Productive,” Letters, February 6]. Actually, I think it went well beyond condescending and landed squarely in the ballpark of insulting.

Whether out of hypocrisy or ignorance, Ms. Klausner criticizes fellow local Democrats for attacking other fellow local Democrats by doing some serious attacking herself. She accuses them of “emotional overload” as she goes on a rant further accusing them of having “unbridled rage.”

This Southampton Town Democratic Party co-chair then urges critics to turn their eyes to national politics, gardening or painting — her words — anything, apparently, but the issue at hand, which is the candidacy of John Leonard for the Southampton Town Board.

Before Mr. Leonard was chosen as its candidate, the town chair was advised by at least one former local Democratic official that his candidacy would be controversial among several high-profile Democrats and community leaders, especially in Hampton Bays, where he is better known than in many other areas in town. Some of these concerns have been raised in recent weeks in this paper, so I will let them speak for themselves.

I’d further like to point out Ms. Klausner’s apparent confusion about the roles citizens like Jose Reyes, Barbara and Stephen Ring play in local matters. She says they should try to find solutions to local concerns like clean water, traffic and housing. Does she not know that it is our Town Board that basically plays the leading role in solving these problems? What is more important than trying to elect the best people to that board? That is exactly what Mr. Reyes and the Rings, and anyone else supporting candidates in any election, are doing by expressing their views. Clearly, in this case, they are not doing it for personal or financial gain.

Watching what goes on in Washington, D.C., these days should provide us with abundant examples of the dangers of demanding party loyalty above all else by expecting party members to march in lock-step. This is not beneficial to good government in any party or at any level.

Our country and our town need every ounce of this kind of integrity we can get these days.

Marion Boden

Hampton Bays

Klausner’s letter did not appear in print last week but was published at 27east.com — Ed.