Pitchforks And Torches Coming After Watchdog

A couple of weeks ago (February 22) Watchdog posted “First Two Naperville Council Members ‘Lose Their Seats And Stand’ ” The gist of the posting was about foolish statements made by two city council members, Patty Gustin and Patrick Kelly. It ran its course with a slightly higher than normal number of hits.

Then all of a sudden, over the last few days, emails and comments to the posting poured in, and folks were not too-happy with Watchdog. The reasons were two-fold, 1) Watchdog was perceived as a fan of puppy mills, and 2) Watchdog was mean towards city councilwoman Patty Gustin. Surprisingly, every negative comment was from the female gender.

Some of the comments included:

• I don’t follow this mean spirited, out of touch, out-of-context site.
• This article is a joke.
• You are absolutely twisting her words.
• You think you are funny but you are not.
• You are what’s wrong with journalism.
• You ‘doctored’ Gustin’s comments.
• Shame on you.
• You sound like a paid lackey for the mayor.
• Are you nuts?
• Your understanding is very twisted.
• Try to be honest the next time you create a sentence, please.
• Why pick on Gustin?

And my personal favorite was “You are a mean person!” Wow, that one was brutal. I’ve never seen myself as a mean person. I see myself as a simple guy, sitting at a keyboard, commenting on what I hear and see during city council meetings. It’s so simple. Include a video clip or two, and bingo hit the post button, and let it roll out.

For years I typically would not reply to comments in lieu of having readers respond to each other, choosing to be the swizzle-stick rather than getting involved in a snowball fight or chair-throwing incident. However this time, I did respond to each comment which seemed to further enrage readers to the point I was looking out my window waiting for a mob of torch-wielding people carrying pitchforks and high-stepping towards my home. I was hoping that if need-be, my two poodles could help defend me.

It appears things have simmered down. however things could intensify again with two scheduled upcoming postings involving Gustin. One is about Gustin offending two council members (Brodhead and White) with a foolish remark, and the other showing Gustin having no respect for her own well-being regarding the Corona-virus.

Those two postings with video embeds are just too good to pass-up, unless another council member can do or say something even more entertaining or outrageous in the next few weeks. Gustin provides too much material. That’s what happens when someone talks too much.