"I made the assumption that since two managers were present during the entire exchange, they condoned that behavior."
I think that this is really the crux of the problem. Your assumption. When people read, or participate in a conversation, they don't read or hear every word. Did it ever occur to you that, if there was a personal attack on you, that they failed to see it?
Also, in chat, there can be a lot of things going on such as different people saying different things and people whispering. There have been times when I've said some inappropriate things on the board because it was supposed to be whispered or because I had one or more whispers going on, my focus was divided between the main board and the whispers.
"Sorry if you feel that this wasn't a public issue. I felt it was. Whether that is inappropriate or not is a matter of subjective opinion, and I happen to disagree with yours."

The reason that it's not a public issue is because it involves chat and chat is supposed to be private and, because of that, any discussion here is very limited. I don't know how many times I've seen people try to use the boards to complain about chat especially when I was a manager. The problem is that, because of that issue of privacy, there's no way to discuss what really happened without crossing those boundaries. That is why to complain publicly about things that happened in chat is like trying to catch the wind. More on this later.

"Ana made several comments between Clue's rants. So, at the very least, she was intimately aware of what was going on and chose to ignore it. She waited until I responded and I was booted IMMEDIATELY afterwards."

So are you saying that Ana was playing favorites, that she saw Clue make personal attacks on you, and that she was waiting for you to respond just so she could pounce on you? I'm asking, not accusing. However, if that's not the case, it sure sounds like that is what you're saying and then you owe Ana an apology. If it is the case, then do you really think that it's appropriate to publicly post it on these boards? What would be appropriate is to privately complain to management, and then if you received no satisfaction, and you were in fact verbally abused and a manager did play favorites, then you'd have a legitimate gripe. One reason for keeping it private is that, if it is an accusation, it's a very serious one and it's important to keep the discussion somewhere where it won't be clouded by fog so that the facts get separated from the opinions. However, by your own admission, you haven't done that.

"There's certain "stick together" mold among a small group here, and perhaps I'm too pessimistic, but given at least one manager was witness to the entire thing, I felt it would go nowhere."

While, when members of the management team tend to be defensive when the management in general appears to be getting slammed with no concrete evidence other than general statements that management is unfair or plays favorites or that there's a clique.

"Yes, the issue at hand is that Clue is receiving special treatment."

Then, don't you think that the appropriate action is to privately complain to management before you make a big stink about this on the boards? Yes, I know that Ana is a member of management, but I think that you know the rest of the managers well enough to know that they are fair people, and therefore you would be taken seriously providing you were specific in your complaint and that is another reason why manners such as this are best handled privately.

"of the three instances the only time a manager intervened (aside from Ana's defense of Clue) was when Ron was present."

How long have you been here, about 3 or 4 years, and you're complaining that 3 times you felt that you were treated unfairly and, because of that, you feel picked on, and think that it's appropriate to leave because of personal attacks on you. Justin, if you scan the boards on the c site, you'll see that the managers of this site, myself included, have been personally attacked and picked on many more times than three and we had to power delete those posts or even ban those who made what were often baseless and false accusations, but we didn't do it. In fact, for myself, I learned that the best thing I could do for myself was to not respond to them and let them vent and the whole thing died.

"it seems to be a pretty cut and dry case of a manager acting as a "friend" first and as a "manager" second. THAT is my complaint."

To you it seems to be a cut and dried case. Without knowing the facts and it's not appropriate to post the facts publicly, and without having been there, I don't really know. What I do know from my experience as a manager is that most of the time, when people complain that they're being verbally abused or flamed, that they either did something to provoke it or that it was a case of very strong disagreement with them and, in their minds, disagreeing with them is abuse. Generally, when there are personal attacks, they do occur on both sides and the idea is to do whatever can be done to stop them and I've found, once again from experience, that the most effective way to do this is privately.

"This matter of favoritism was eventually going to become a public issue."

It always was and always has been, and there's nothing that management can do about it. They can't please everybody and, if they tried, they'd end up pleasing nobody.

Particularly in disputes between members, no matter what management does, at least one party in the dispute is going to feel that they were treated unfairly. Even if some sort of disciplinary action is imposed on both of them, at least one is likely to feel that the other should have received more severe consequences.

Justin, honestly, I don't know whether or not you were treated unfairly or not. What is clear to me is that your own action and lack of action were primary contributors to the most recent problem and that the lack of action on your part, in particular, was based on certain assumptions that may simply not be true.

Also, let me say one more thing. I hope that you realize that I don't consider you my enemy nor do I hope that you consider me yours. I'm not writing this to slam you or shame you but simply to point out that you had and continue to have better alternatives than the ones you've chosen so far. In general, almost everything I've said to you has been said to me at one time or other in my life and, while it stung at the time I heard it, today I am thankful that someone cared enough about me and valued me enough to be honest with me.