<table> </table> John Long, publisher of the local magazine <em>Camp</em>, contacted me recently about an April 21 story that looked at the upcoming race between Sam Graves and Kay Barnes.</p><p>Under the category &#8220;Potential embarrassments,&#8221; &#8220;Her picture on the cover of a gay magazine&#8221; is listed as a Barnes liability. That magazine was <em>Camp </em>&#8212; and Long notes correctly that &#8220;embarrassment&#8221; is very much a relative term.</p><p>&#8220;There was absolutely nothing for Mayor Kay Barnes to be ashamed of or embarrassed by, in allowing us to stylize her for a cover of <em>Camp</em>,&#8221; he wrote. &#8220;Would you have said the same thing if Mayor Kay Barnes or any Kansas City mayor appeared on the cover of a publication serving the African-American or Latino communities?&#8221;</p><p>I think this is a very good point &#8212; though don&#8217;t get the impression that the story meant to imply that the cover was intrinsically a bad thing. True, it&#8217;s a political liability in a certain sense, but only to people who care about such things. Many Missourians wouldn&#8217;t be concerned in the least that a politician would participate in a lighthearted photo shoot for a magazine whose primary audience is the gay community. <em>The Kansas City Star </em>is a general-interest newspaper, aimed at serving the interests of the widest possible audience. But that doesn&#8217;t mean that journalists should ever make assumptions about any group, majority or minority.</p><p><strong><span class="subhead">An unnecessary connection</span></strong></p><p>Former Kansas City park board member Frances Semler e-mailed me Thursday morning, pointing out a brief mention in that day&#8217;s paper that she found egregious.</p><p>A story about Dan and Debra Engravalle, a couple singled out by Mayor Mark Funkhouser as happy new Kansas Citians in his State of the City address, detailed criminal charges against the couple in New Jersey. Semler&#8217;s problem was with the story&#8217;s final sentence: &#8220;Funkhouser previously came under criticism for failing to vet a park board appointee.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;I feel that I have been treated unfairly by <em>The Kansas City Star </em>in the past,&#8221; she wrote. &#8220;This paragraph compares my good name to two criminals and implies that I have some record also. I demand an apology.&#8221;</p><p>I can see her point, though the story doesn&#8217;t use her name or directly suggest she has a criminal background. (Charges were dropped against Debra Engravalle, though her husband was convicted and paid a fine.)</p><p>But ultimately, I&#8217;m with Semler that the sentence seemed like unneeded piling-on in a case that&#8217;s vastly different from the controversy involving her perfectly legal membership in the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps.