That kind of corrosive supiciousness is the problem.
For the most
part our administrators, those who are involved in backchannel
operations, are the best and the most trustworthy we have.
I suspect that people are far more suspicious than is warranted by what
actually goes on, but I think we can agree that suspicion is distracting and
damaging. If admins made it an explicit practice that they would communicate
privately only about certain, clearly defined issues; it might reduce some
fo the mystery (though I'm sure some suspicion and paranoia would always
persist).
I am curious, however, what is the measure of the "best and the most
trustworthy" admins. My observation is that being elected to an admin role
depends on not having too many detractors; and being deadmined is a result
of truly egregious offenses. The corollary to that is that an editor who
wants to be an admin must avoid contention in order to be elected; but can
let loose once he/she is in. I'm not saying that it's common, but it bothers
me to see how a lot of well-meaning editors can't bombarded when they ask to
become admins by people they've had content disputes with; and then see that
established admins more or less abandon the caution that got them their role
to begin with.
Leif