I have the opposite knee jerk reaction and see people openly talking about their biases and dubious incentives to be an indication of honesty and forthrightness. It's when people make a big song and dance about how pro-independance they are and make a whole song and dance about it that I get suspicious. It reflects not just a lack of honesty towards others but even a lack of honesty towards oneself and an inflated view of their own ethics.

Vertically EVERYBODY with a conflict of interest will put their finger on the scale given enough opportunity.

Yes the candid approach is great, similar to the Intercept, but read elsewhere in the article about the how they haven't followed through on not covering these things. That's very bad.

Abstaining from topics where you have conflicts of interests IS integrity.

Strive for, yes.

Expect others to believe you are striving for integrity and journalistic independence?

I don’t reckon that’s going going to work.

Better off, in my opinion, to be honest about it.