Talk:Barack Obama/Archive 74

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Freemasonry

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I need proof that the fact which I attempted to add is either gossip or original research, or at least the requirement of for it to be not construed as such. Plasmic Physics (talk) 19:57, 27 March 2012 (UTC) See WP:NOR & WP:V.--JayJasper (talk) 20:03, 27 March 2012 (UTC) Actually, no, you call for "proof" is about 180 degrees off the mark. You need to cite reliable sources that discuss Obama's alleged freemasonry in depth, and then make your case that such an allegation is of enough importance/significance to a president's biography that it warrants mention here. Tarc (talk) 20:14, 27 March 2012 (UTC) Why didn't you ask for a citation in the summary then? I never alleged that he is a freemason, note the keyword 'not' in the first section of the statement. Plasmic Physics (talk) 20:18, 27 March 2012 (UTC) There's lots of rumors out there that he is a Marxist Muslim, shall we include those in the article as well and it'll be ok as long as we make sure to say "not" ? The overall point here is that dumb rumors of the president in a secret handshaking society is so ridiculous that I can hardly believe we're here actually discussing it. Tarc (talk) 21:41, 27 March 2012 (UTC) Can we be serous for a moment? I'm not adding a rumour. You are missing the point of the statement. The first section is to explain the relevance of the following section. Plasmic Physics (talk) 22:16, 27 March 2012 (UTC) To be clear anything controversial (and this is easily controversial) is going to need to be covered by reliable sources (ideally more than one) before it can even be considered for addition to the article. Simply stating that Obama being a freemasion is not confirmed does not permit an unsourced claim to that effect. The most relevant policy would be WP:BLP since the removed statement alleges that Obama is lying about his religion without any solid evidence to back it up.--174.93.169.157 (talk) 01:36, 28 March 2012 (UTC) Specifically, what do I cite: the unproven allegations of freemasonry, that the grips are of a freemason style, or that he performed those grips? Plasmic Physics (talk) 08:15, 28 March 2012 (UTC) I believe we are discussing this edit which added "While it is not confirmed that Obama is indeed a freemason, he has been witnessed to make public use of several documented freemason 'grips' when meeting certain dignitaries.". And the question concerns what needs to be cited? My question is, why is this nonsense being discussed at all? Please save text of the form "it is not confirmed that X beats his wife, but..." for blogs, not an encyclopedia. Johnuniq (talk) 09:03, 28 March 2012 (UTC) Stop being a troll. Plasmic Physics (talk) 09:23, 28 March 2012 (UTC) You seem to be the one trolling here. It's unbelievable to me that a user with over 8,500 edits, who has been here since 2007, does not understand the basic Wikipedia guidelines of reliable sourcing or BLP. It calls into question the many edits you have accumulated so far. If you don't know the problem/s with your edit, read the links you've been given and do not edit any articles about living persons until you fully understand them. Dave Dial (talk) 14:53, 28 March 2012 (UTC) I suggest we close this discussion. The proposed material clearly fails BLP policy, has not gained any support or sourcing for inclusion, and discussion seems to be deteriorating. If any good can come of discussing the need for sourcing, that's best handled on user talk pages if at all. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:08, 28 March 2012 (UTC) Support closing, per Wikidemon.--JayJasper (talk) 17:10, 28 March 2012 (UTC) Yes, it's obvious that POV rumours are being pushed. No value for Wikipedia here. HiLo48 (talk) 19:37, 28 March 2012 (UTC) Specifically, what do I cite: the unproven allegations of freemasonry, that the grips are of a freemason style, or that he performed those grips? Please answer the question, it should not be this difficult. Plasmic Physics (talk) 21:12, 28 March 2012 (UTC) How about this; look for a source that discusses Barack Obama and "freemasonry grips", read through our reliable source guidelines and see if what you find would satisfy what those guidelines call for wrt reliability and such, and then bring that here for discussion. Tarc (talk) 21:21, 28 March 2012 (UTC) I will happily do that once I know what I should refer to in the citation. Plasmic Physics (talk) 21:27, 28 March 2012 (UTC) You will need a reliable source, as Tarc and others have suggested: that is what you must "refer to in the citation", not your own opinion or analysis. Acroterion (talk) 21:33, 28 March 2012 (UTC) That is not what I meant, refer to my last posted question. Plasmic Physics (talk) 22:30, 28 March 2012 (UTC) The edit shows all the hallmarks of conspiracy theory. It's not new for allegations of Freemason involvement in the United States government - in fact, it's nearly two hundred years old - and the construction of the edit - "it has been shown that Obama uses certain grips" is also written in the tone of conspiracy, with all the evidence that it entails; it's very common for this to be the height of evidence for conspiracy theories (c.f. "I can tell by the pixels" for birthers). Closing. Sceptre (talk) 22:53, 28 March 2012 (UTC) "While it is not confirmed that Obama is indeed a freemason, he has been witnessed to make public use of several documented freemason 'grips' when meeting certain dignitaries." The preceding statement was previously removed for not being cited. Prior to being cited, there needs to be an indication of exactly which fragment(s) of the statement is in question. Once this is been indicated, a reliable source can be be selected which explicitly cites the particular fragment. Please do not post comments which distract from the aim of this discussion, which is the establishment of a cited unbiased statement. Plasmic Physics (talk) 00:51, 29 March 2012 (UTC) All of it is problematic. If you can't provide a reliable source, there is no point to this discussion. If you do not understand Wikipedia sourcing and biographical policy, or are unwilling to take the trouble to do so, then there is no point to this discussion, which is wandering into disruptive behavior on your part. Acroterion (talk) 03:52, 29 March 2012 (UTC) Do you not understand that I am attempting to provide a reliable source? I'm trying to go through the trouble of exploring concerns to formulate a solution, and comments like yours are distracting other users like Tarc from making useful contributions. If there are many more distracting interuptions like this, an administrator may be neccesary to mediate a discussion. Plasmic Physics (talk) 04:55, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Lede

Why doesnt the lede have any footnotes?!!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.2.129.217 (talk) 06:58, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Because the lede is a summary of the content of the article, and the body of the article is fully referenced. Editors here agreed by consensus that inline references were not required in the lede (per WP:LEDECITE) and that they would cause it to be unnecessarily cluttered. I still think there is too much blue-linking in the lede, personally. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes I agree that there is too much blue linking. How do you suggest we go about removing blue links? 129.2.64.165 (talk) 18:34, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I'm not advocating the removal of any blue links from the lede. I'm just saying that my feeling is that there are currently too many. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:02, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

ok,sorry for assuming otherwise-honest mistake129.2.64.165 (talk) 23:09, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps, we only specifically mention the most important results: stimulus and capturing Bin Laden as well as mentioning that there were several other developments in foreign policy and domestic policy.129.2.64.165 (talk) 18:44, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Inclusion of polling numbers?

Has there been previous discussion about including the approval poll numbers in the lede?!!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.2.129.217 (talk) 07:16, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps include the comparison with the average job approval of previous presidents.link — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.2.129.217 (talk) 07:26, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I don't think it's a good idea to add ephemeral data to the lede. Per policy, the lede is a summary of the most important points of the article, and we don't even have short-term polling data in the article. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:29, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

It is important to understand that this a biography of a living person. As such, the article is essentially a summary of Barack Obama's entire life. Job approval numbers are transient figures specifically relating to Obama's presidency. Such numbers are more useful when placed in context. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:48, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

In that case, have removed some of the transient figures specifically relating to Obama's presidency which are not placed in context. Specifically, theses images:1 23129.2.64.165 (talk) 19:54, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Are you serious? All three figures relate to the text and none are transient. -- Scjessey (talk) 21:57, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I must not be understanding you correctly. How would data like high and low job approval rating be any more transient than data covering unemployment and Maximum Out-of-Pocket Premiums for Eligible Individuals in 2014 under PPACA, by Federal Poverty Level?

The data in the figures will become out of data quickly just as polling numbers would. If the figures can be incorporated into the text, then so can the polling numbers.129.2.64.165 (talk) 23:03, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Conclusion

Do most blp end so abruptly? Why not include a section detailing the recent developments in his reelection campaign like the remaining republican candidates?129.2.64.165 (talk) 23:29, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I wouldn't think so, because that's not really about Obama. It would perhaps be relevant in the article about the election. HiLo48 (talk) 00:12, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Biracial

Obama is actually the first biracial president, not the first African American. To identify him as African American is an insult not only to the multiracial community but also to his mixed heritage. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aketract (talk • contribs) 10:42, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

We've had this discussion many times here before. African-American is the term predominantly used in the United States when referring to a black person. If it is what most reliable sources describe him as and it is what the person uses primarily to describe himself, then that is what we go with in an encyclopedia. The "Early life and career" section notes his mixed heritage, the information is not hidden or excluded in the article. Tarc (talk) 12:24, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

uhh? What? That is terribly circular logic but incredibly off the mark. He is also widely considered to be muslim, but we know that is inaccurate and incorrect as well. The article should read "He is widely considerd to be the first African American president, his mother being white, father and African immigrant" or something to that effect. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.181.12.111 (talk) 20:10, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Then why not omit the words "african american"? Or at the very least mention that he is the first biracial president? Why should we go by public opinion? Shouldn't be strive to for accuracy? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aketract (talk • contribs) 13:53, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

While it is technically correct that Obama is bi-racial, he is normally described as African American. Indeed, he describes himself in that manner. With Wikipedia, verifiability always trumps accuracy. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:43, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Note that the term African American refers primarily to ancestry rather than race. Obama is African-American the same way Bobby Jindal is Indian American, and Bill Richardson is Mexican American. Also see Q2 on the FAQ.--JayJasper (talk) 20:16, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Since this is such a controversial topic shouldn’t the individuals who have the keys to this particular page at least site something in regards to “public opinion” or Obama discussing that he is African-American rather than biracial? It would make the statement more in line with verifiability since "any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable published source." Further the presidency is bigger than any one person, they are inserted into the historical framework. Meaning what Obama thinks and public opinion are both irrelevant; he is both the first biracial and African-American president, when the next biracial president is elected his Wikipedia page will not say he is “the first biracial president” because Obama never claimed it. --Redpanda1 (talk) 13:29, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

"Biracial" is just not a very notable descriptor, really. The "firsts" among the major classifications of American minorities...African-American, Hispanic, Asian, etc...are what are newsworthy. Tarc (talk) 14:16, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Not newsworthy? A quick search with "Obama biracial news" gives 680,000 hits. --Redpanda1 (talk) 19:02, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

"News" does not equate to "google hits, first off. Second, if one looks at what the hits are actually, y'know, hitting, much of it is just discussion on if African-American or biracial is the better term,few actually use the term "biracial" independently as a descriptor of the president. Oh, and that is before the search results quickly get to charming stories about Rush Limbaugh and the "biracial oreo" comment. Tarc (talk) 19:32, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Uh . . . so first you want evidence for a claim that (A) Obama thinks this or that (B) public opinion in general thinks that -- but then you say that (A) and (B) are irrelevant. You may have a good point, but if so I really don't know what it is. Please think about it carefully and express it cogently. -- Hoary (talk) 14:22, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Sigh... So (A) since there is going to continue to be an argument on this page if Obama is African-American OR Biracial then there should be a citation of a proper source that discusses this issue for verifiability. And by the way (B) it is more historically accurate to say he is the first African-American AND biracial president regardless of what we all think because they are both noteworthy if for no other reason then the level of discussion on Wikipedia and in the 'real world."--Redpanda1 (talk) 19:02, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

It is irrelevant regardless of what you think, I'm afraid. African-American is the milestone of choice by reliable sources. That's all there is to it. Tarc (talk) 19:32, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

So what does it take to get you guys to cite something when you should be citing it according to Wikipedia standards then?--216.83.101.146 (talk) 20:31, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

It is cited (currently reference 106) when it is mentioned in the paragraph "2008 presidential campaign". It isn't cited in the lede because nothing is, per WP:LEDE ("The presence of citations in the introduction is neither required in every article nor prohibited in any article.") and the prevailing consensus. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:40, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Modify Lede

I think the lede could be improved by including brief information about his parents. This information is included in the lede of almost all blp. Why not insert it in the middle of this sentence at the *:

Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Obama *is a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he was the president of the Harvard Law Review. 129.2.64.165 (talk) 18:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Completely disagree. The lede is already quite extensive and there's no reason at all to put information about Obama's parents in it. -- Scjessey (talk) 21:59, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Scjessey. Tvoz/talk 08:14, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

Potential Bias Regarding Unemployment

I understand that the unemployment issue has been central to Barack Obama's administration, but I feel that this article is not presenting a neutral point of view. Two of the three diagrams in this article are related to unemployment and are both used to support Barack Obama. Not only that, but there is criticism from various sources regarding the accuracy of these statistics including scrutiny by Sean Hanady and Stansberry & Associates Research and Investment firm. Because the federal government considers someone unemployed only if they are receiving unemployment benefits from the federal government, people whose benefits have expired (but are still unemployed) are considered employed. This practice produces an unemployment figure significantly lower than the actual unemployment rate. I understand that you might not count this as credible because I have not listed specific sources, but I urge you to look into this issue yourself. Regardless, having the majority of the diagrams in this article related to unemployment presents an unbalanced point of view because there are several other diagrams which readers will be interested in (and are not at all trivial), particularly charts regarding the national debt or the price of gasoline within the last four (or more) years. I understand that I have not been very formal, but please consider my opinions and do not immediately discredit my arguments because of this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.217.197.21 (talk) 21:29, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree 100%129.2.129.220 (talk) 03:12, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, let's see the specific sources. (By "Sean Hanady", do you mean Sean Hannity? By "Stansberry & Associates Research and Investment firm" do you mean an outfit run by Porter Stansberry? I don't see how a publication by either would be a reliable source.) The US government is of course very largely responsible for its national debt, but I wonder why you bring up the price of oil. (Do you have in mind taxes on oil?) -- Hoary (talk) 03:28, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

The burden of proof should be on the one trying to change the unemployment statistics, especially if they can't even spell Hannity's name right. & of course that's the opinionated gentleman from Fox (Fair & Balanced "News")V Schauf (talk) 05:26, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

"Improve this page"

I just wanted to ask why there is that annoying "improve this page" banner on this article. At first I thought it was a new policy for all sprotected articles, but George W Bush doesn't get one... disabled it in my preferences but is there a relevant discussion somewhere for including it? It's not as though the "edit" and "talk" tabs are hard to find or anything, I do hate flashy banners and other such scripts on articles... IforgotAboutSemiProtection (talk) 12:15, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

I'd like to know too - and not a good idea for an FA on article probation, if you ask me. Tvoz/talk 07:57, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

"economic policy" section

A couple thoughts. One, regarding the image (Image:UR_BLS_Jan09_Jan12.PNG) of "unemployment rate", the scale is totally misleading, despite the data being accurate. I realize they're trying to put the emphasis on the change that occurred while he is in office but starting the graph at 8%, I think, makes it difficult to read and to keep in perspective.

Second, both sections on unemployment have accompanying photos, but no such image accompanies the section on the national debt in between. I really think a graph similar to the two already displayed in that section, showing the public debt before and after his inauguration, would be appropriate. IforgotAboutSemiProtection (talk) 12:28, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

100% agree. The image is very misleading. The scale and starting points should be changed. Or else, we will be forced to remove it.!!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.2.129.220 (talk) 16:03, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Excuse me - "they're trying to put the emphasis"? AGF please. Tvoz/talk 08:12, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

Domestic Policy

There is nothing in the Domestic Policy section about the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012. This is huge. Why is not included? Elodoth (talk) 15:49, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Who says it is "huge"? Do you have reliable sources saying this? And is it "huge" in relation to Obama's entire life or his presidency? Remember, this article is a summary of a larger body of articles covering Barack Obama, and the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 is already covered in Presidency of Barack Obama. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:59, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

chicago job title again

check the archives for many discussions about this

i've been around the block a couple times now changing his job title to lecturer (which was his job title and reflected his duties) from teacher /teaching variants. teacher implies a spot on the faculty (at least part time) and i'm fairly sure he wasn't faculty. i could be wrong. i work at a uni and am aware of the stratification. it offends some academics to see uncredentialed folks get such promotions. the continued job-inflation by some editors seems to be hagiographic and against NPOV. Cramyourspam (talk) 20:53, 13 April 2012 (UTC) The fact that you say that means you are well aware of the multiple discussions and subsequent consensus on the matter. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:19, 13 April 2012 (UTC) And, it is clearly explicated in the article and notes. Tvoz/talk 07:26, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

Proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I am here to launch a proposal to ensure that the article on Obama can be 100% NPOV. I am a Liberal myself (and a pretty extreme one at that) and after reviewing the article, as well as numerous [http://www.wnd.com/2009/03/91114/| articles bashing Wikipedia's Obama article as being not NPOV], I am proposing that we create a "Controversy" section. Again, this is an attempt to make sure that ALL readers are satisfied and ALL points of view are covered. I again want to point out that I am a Liberal and I like Obama, but controversies exist, and we have rules that are designed to provide an encyclopedia experience that satisfies all users. This article doesn't cut it right now.

Now. My idea is that we create a section that factually and non biasedly states the critiques that some have had with him. If you disagree with me then that's fine, but I would like to know why.

This is for the goal of Wikipedia. Not my pollitical satisfaction. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 18:35, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

This has been discussed at length repeatedly. It might be a good idea to check out the the archives concering this topic to see if you have an argument in favor of such a section that has not been sufficiently addressed in prior discussions.--JayJasper (talk) 18:42, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Also see Q6 on the FAQ for this article.--JayJasper (talk) 18:45, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

WorldNetDaily, are you kidding? They're the ones that staged the fake Wikipedia incident that lead to article probation and the arbcom case. Might as well toss in Weekly World News (Obama was born on Mars) and the Onion ([1] Obama is a cactus) if we're going there. We're here to create an encyclopedia, not to placate readers who may subscribe to WP:FRINGE politics. There are entire articles elsewhere in the project devoted to their hi-jinx, a subject notable in its own right if not relevant or significant enough to include in a biography of the President. - Wikidemon (talk) 20:10, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Look at the top of this page. Many news outlets (nearly every single one that reported on this article) has criticized the neutrality. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 20:13, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

The thing is, you're not really bringing much to the table, and citing a bad web blog like WorldNetDaily as an arbiter of what "bias" raises huge red flags around here. Concrete suggestions will generally merit concrete replies, while vague generalizations are usually met with vague dismissals. If there is a specific passage in the article you find problematic, by all means point it out. Tarc (talk) 20:19, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh OK. Then explain to me why all of you got so defensive when I brought this up? Past discussions say that "There has been no notable controversies with Obama." Oh really? What about all the hype with his nationality? And why does the article about such controversy not get linked to from this article? And why does nearly every single article about most politicians highlight their factual goods and bads while this one only highlights the factual goods? Why does there seem to be so much guarding over this article? You know what? I came here to propose a decision to make this article suit the site rules, and you are all being too strung on your bias towards the article that you fail to see the big picture. Wether you like it or not, any editor who dissagrees with a proposal to improve an article's overall compliance with the rules of the site is breaking the rules in my opinion. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 20:58, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

i'm no republican, but it seems to me that hagiography is okay in the obama article, but anything potentially non-positive is readily removed --all declared debated and resolved long ago. and/or fringe. the article's key editors will never yield. and, that said, anyone suggesting WorldNetDaily is a reliable source needs to rethink that. Cramyourspam (talk) 21:16, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not saying it's reliable, but simply that it criticizes the article, which is true. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 21:23, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

OK so Obama can't have a controversies section but at the other extreme end of the spectrum, Rush Limbaugh can? Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 21:26, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

What people are trying to say in response is that this is not a forum for general discussions about Obama or Wikipedia. Please make an actionable proposal (something a little more concrete than "let's add a controversies section"—add what for example?). Johnuniq (talk) 21:42, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not here to fucking gossip about him. I'm here to assert that my stance on that this article is violating a rule. If you can't obviously see that then you need to read more and not try to stop me by blasting irrelivent rules.

For example, look at this article. it is not linked to from the main Obama article and is therefore a WP:CFORK violation. I could count so much more too. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 21:54, 17 April 2012 (UTC) We have an article for numerous controversies surrounding him and yet, no mention in the main article is present. [2][3][4][5][6][7] Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 22:06, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Please see the box at the top of this talk page (just above the table of contents): "This article has been placed on article probation". Edits and comments regarding this topic are required to be of a higher standard than what is tolerated in other topics. Discussion works best with specific proposals—are you suggesting that each of those topics be mentioned in a controversies section here? As one example, birther claims are not usable in this article as to do so would give undue importance to a fringe belief. Johnuniq (talk) 22:19, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Controversy sections are a bad idea in general. They're crap magnets. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:34, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't care about the article probation or if you think controversy sections are crap magnets This is an encyclopedia. We have rules. "Higher Standard" does not mean "Rule Free" you can't just go twist rules to make an article suit your point of view. We have articles here that describe notable incidents regarding a major pollitical figure (Obama). These are not linked to from the main article. You are all doing a WP:CFORK violation. Controversy sections are not "crap holes" they are factual sections that are designed to factually show issues that are part of a person's biography. It improves the overall encyclopedia. Life is not butterflies and flowers. There are problems and those who cannot accept that need lessons on life. Obama's presidency has not been butterflies and flowers either. This article is written as though it was. That violates the rules. There needs to be a solution. I proposed one. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 23:30, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Please do not make accusations about other editors here. We are not biased, the article is not biased, we are not breaking rules, and we're not some kind of pro-Obama cabal. Further complaints like that are not going to convince anyone to change their opinion, and will probably lead people to tune out and/or close the thread as a failed proposal. You don't have to care about article probation, only to heed it. The reason we are defensive is that the article has regularly required defending - the log of editors blocked for behavioral violations, particularly trolling and sockpuppetry, is well into the three digits and we've collectively lost hundreds if not thousands of hours dealing with the mess. The question of including the conspiracy theories in the article has come up a number of times before. It's a fair proposal but any mention would basically be half a sentence and a link in the public image section, and it has not gained consensus. The questions of adding a controversy section or intentionally biasing the article to be more negative have come up many times and been soundly rejected as POV and unencyclopedic. Thank you for your concern but as far as I can see there is nothing new to discuss that would merit a reconsideration of the long-term consensus on the matter. As others have said, if you have a specific suggestion of content to change that you're willing to support with sources and a content argument let's hear it. - Wikidemon (talk) 23:57, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Then why is an opposite POV vio on Obama not a problem? The mess going on is one you made yourself by trying to be so sparkle sparkle That's why so many people are writing that stuff in the article! Their point of view is not satisfied so they bash him! Most are newbies who don't know any better and just add their critisicisms. Don't you understand that adding a section about controversies would make the vandalism you deal with go down? Open your eyes. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 00:16, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(before edit conflict) There's nothing to be gained from this line of discussion. Your speculation about what went on here for the past 3-4 years is flat wrong, and even if the questions were patient and respectful in the asking it's probably not worth retelling the history of this article's troubles. Other than a small amount of deleted stuff it's all there in tens of millions of bytes of edit histories, there for the discovery. There is no specific or viable proposal for changing article content here, much less something that convinces me that one is in order. I'll keep an eye on things to see if anything emerges. Meanwhile I'd prefer to go back to the sidelines and leave it at that. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:59, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

To adress Wikidemon here is what I have to say. 1. Your opinions are not changeable because you have a WP:COI

2. If you are defending ANY article then you are pro-it.

3. Probation does not mean 100% pro-Obama edits.

4. As noted above, the article gets vandalism because people's views are not expressed. So they express themselves. By the way, nobody forces you to defend the article so you don't HAVE to.

5. It is a fair proposal isn't it? BTW, it would be a full and well written PARAGRAPH. Not half a zzzzzz......

6. Add a "Controversies" section with mentions of The citizenship conspiracy theories, Religion conspiracy theories, Bill Ayers controversy, and the Jeremiah Wright Controversy, with the possible mention of the "Shark Fin Soup Restaurant" controversy <- Just a thought. ANYWAYS all of those things except the soup thing all have articles and those articles have sources. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 00:36, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

You need to tone the language down and back off from these constant accusations of bad faith. If your goal is to inject non-NPOV content from absurdly unreliable sources such as WND, then you're never going to succeed. Sorry, it's just never going to happen. --Loonymonkey (talk) 00:43, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

No. I WANT TO AVOID non-nopv edits. I would NEVER add stuff from WND. I would add the same or similar content used in the Wikipedia articles describing the controversies that are considered to be NPOV.

By the way, Wikipedia is not censored. Added in this pair of edits by Hghyux

Hghyux: I'm here to assert that my stance on that this article is violating a rule: My most charitable inference from this (and other evidence here) is that you are very confused. If you have a proposal, type it in, print it out, revise it, make sure that it makes sense, and only then post it. -- Hoary (talk) 00:50, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm completely in agreement with A Quest For Knowledge, who said above "Controversy sections are a bad idea in general. They're crap magnets." I will support any moves to remove them from most articles. HiLo48 (talk) 01:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

(after multiple edit conflict, addressing original poster) No to Ayers, Wright, and Chinese Soup, for reasons extensively discussed before - they are far too tenuously connected to the biographical history of the President, and could only be presented in an encyclopedic fashion as part of telling the history of election-year partisan campaign politics, something that would require a foundation far too long for this article. I'm probably in the minority but I would go along with a consensus to mention the birther and secret Muslim thing briefly as part of a political smear and disproven fringe movement affecting public perception, but I'm in the minority and such proposals have not gained traction before. Either way, no to treating them as bona fide controversies, criticisms, or questions of fact, they're simply not true and any encyclopedic value there is in the coverage of American mass culture and politics (which is why they are better presented in separate articles closer to those subjects). You didn't have the benefit of my caution above before writing points #1-5 so I'll make it as clear as I can: speaking for myself, please do NOT impugn my integrity as an editor here - I doubt the other editors are too swift on that either. - Wikidemon (talk) 01:05, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

There will never be a "controversies" section in this BLP article. The sooner that demand is dropped, the better. Tarc (talk) 01:07, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

The opening stance on the Obama article with wether each claim is (F)-neutral fact, (PF)-positive fact, (NF)-negative fact

Barack Hussein Obama II (i/bəˈrɑːk huːˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/; born August 4, 1961) is the 44th and current President of the United States.(F) He is the first African American to hold the office.(F) Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.(F)

Born in Honolulu, Hawaii(F), Obama is a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School(PF), where he was the president of the Harvard Law Review.(PF) He was a community organizer in Chicago before earning his law degree.(F) He worked as a civil rights attorney in Chicago and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004.(F) He served three terms(PF) representing the 13th District in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004.(F)

Following an unsuccessful bid against the Democratic incumbent for a seat in the United States House of Representatives in 2000(NF), Obama ran for the United States Senate in 2004.(F) Several events brought him to national attention during the campaign, including his victory in the March 2004 Illinois Democratic primary for the Senate election(PF) and his keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004.(PF) He won election to the U.S. Senate in Illinois in November 2004.(PF) His presidential campaign began in February 2007,(F) and after a close campaign in the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries against Hillary Rodham Clinton, he won his party's nomination.(PF) In the 2008 presidential election, he defeated Republican nominee John McCain,(PF) and was inaugurated as president on January 20, 2009.(F) Nine months later, Obama was named the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.(PF)

As president, Obama signed economic stimulus legislation in the form of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the Tax Relief,(F) Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization,(F) and Job Creation Act of 2010. Other domestic policy initiatives include the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act,(F) the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act,(F) the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010(F) and the Budget Control Act of 2011.(F) In foreign policy, he ended the war in Iraq,(F) increased troop levels in Afghanistan,(F) signed the New START arms control treaty with Russia,(F) ordered US involvement in the 2011 Libya military intervention,(F) and ordered the military operation that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden.(PF)

TOTALS:

NEUTRAL FACT-19

POSITIVE FACT-9

NEGATIVE FACT-1

POSITIVELY BIASED BY 8 CLAIMS.

The opening stance on the GW Bush article with wether each claim is (F)-neutral fact, (PF)-positive fact, (NF)-negative fact

George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946)(F) is an American politician(F) who served as the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009(F) and the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.(F)

Bush was born in New Haven, Connecticut.(F) He is the eldest son of Barbara Bush and 41st President George H. W. Bush, making him the second American president to have been the son of a former president.[4](F) He is also the brother of Jeb Bush, former Governor of Florida.(F)

After graduating from Yale University in 1968 and Harvard Business School in 1975, Bush worked in oil businesses.(F) He married Laura Welch in 1977(F) and ran unsuccessfully for the House of Representatives shortly thereafter.(NF) He later co-owned the Texas Rangers baseball team before defeating Ann Richards in the 1994 Texas gubernatorial election.(PF) In a close and controversial election, Bush was elected President in 2000 as the Republican candidate, defeating Vice President Al Gore in the Electoral College.(PF)

Early on, the Bush administration withdrew from a number of international treaty processes, notably the Kyoto Protocol on global warming.[5](NF) A series of terrorist attacks occurred eight months into Bush's first term as president on September 11, 2001.(NF) In response, Bush announced the War on Terror, an international military campaign which included the war in Afghanistan launched in 2001 and the war in Iraq launched in 2003.(F) In addition to national security issues, Bush promoted policies on the economy, health care, education, and social security reform.(F) He signed into law broad tax cuts, the PATRIOT Act, the No Child Left Behind Act, the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, and Medicare prescription drug benefits for seniors.(F) His tenure saw national debates on immigration, Social Security, electronic surveillance, and enhanced interrogation techniques.(F)

Bush successfully ran for re-election against Democratic Senator John Kerry in 2004, in another relatively close election.(F) After his re-election, Bush received increasingly heated criticism from across the political spectrum.[6][7][8](NF) In 2005, the Bush Administration dealt with widespread criticism over its handling of Hurricane Katrina.[9][10][11](NF) Following this and other controversies, as well as the growing unpopularity of the Iraq War(NF), Democrats won control of Congress in the 2006 elections.(F) In December 2007, the United States entered its longest post–World War II recession,(NF) prompting the Bush Administration to enact multiple economic programs intended to preserve the country's financial system.(F) Though Bush was popular in the U.S. for much of his first term,[12](PF) his popularity declined sharply during his second.(NF) He was a highly controversial figure internationally,(NF) with public protests occurring even during visits to close allies, such as the United Kingdom.[13](NF)

After leaving office, Bush returned to Texas and purchased a home in a suburban area of Dallas.(F) He is currently a public speaker and has written a book about his life entitled Decision Points.[14](F)

TOTALS:

NEUTRAL FACT-16

POSITIVE FACT-3

NEGATIVE FACT-10

NEGATIVELY BIASED BY 7 CLAIMS

So as you can see, there is bias in the Obama article and bias in the bush article. I say we change this. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 01:16, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't see the problem. We don't count facts as negative or positive and try to achieve some sort of an artificial balance. That WOULD be POV. Your classification of many of those facts as negative or otherwise is meaningless. Bush WAS "a highly controversial figure internationally". Obama isn't. It's completely true that Bush's "popularity declined sharply during his second" and it would be ridiculous to leave it out. Where is the problem? HiLo48 (talk) 01:34, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I have brought this dispute to the mediation cabal so we can find a dispute resolution. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 02:04, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Ahhh . . . you may wish to make the appeal that you have posted there look a bit more comprehensible and persuasive. (You're asked what steps you've already taken; you reply that this appeal is your first step. You list ten users as exemplifying a list of ten users. Etc.) -- Hoary (talk) 02:24, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

−

it is looking like that one user's wish for a controversies section won't go anywhere. that's probably good. it is interesting though to go to the w bush article and do a find-search for controv in order to catch every version of controversy (singular, plural) and w has at least seven or eight: gitmo controversy, u.s. attys controversy, fisa controversy, judicial appts controversy, etc. many link off to sep articles on the subjects. the obama article has just one controv and it is not about obama but refers to how obama dropped rev wright after wright made controversial remarks. it is POV to assert that obama has done nothing potentially controversial. just to name a few possible examples: the appointing his own healthcare advocate to scotus, the unread healthcare bill, repealing DADT, leaving iraq, the pre Beer summit comments, the Joe the Plumber income redistribution comments, naming rev wright his spiritual advisor and then disavowing him, returning the uk's churchill statue, bowing to foreign monarchs, appointing policy tsars outside of the usual oversight process, extraordinary tidings to goldman sachs, family vacation expenses, not-investigating black panther party polling place activity, suing arizona, investigating arizona officials, leaving af-pak, taxing in 2010 for health benefits to start after 2014, appointment of accused marxist/terrorist personnel. just to name a few. don't get me wrong: i like obama. i voted for him (there i said it). i'm not saying i see those items as controversial-as-in-bad, i am only saying that some folks on the right and center might see some of those as controversial. to be fair we ought to look more closely at the article's tone and perhaps link to a controversy or two. maybe try a 4:1 bush/obama controversy ratio just to get started. Cramyourspam (talk) 02:29, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

^100% READ MY MIND Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 02:42, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay, this is just getting into WP:NOTAFORUM territory. We're not here to discuss your personal feelings on Obama or some inane chatter you read on this or that blog. You do realize that many of the "controversies" you just listed are debunked myths, half-truths or outright conspiracy theories, right? --Loonymonkey (talk) 02:56, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

A major challenge with articles like this is separating Republicans vs Democrat political exchanges from what might be true controversies. In any party political system, it's the job of those not in power to find fault with those in power. That doesn't mean that all the issues they raise are true "controversies", and are often more related to hatred of a party than true faults with the incumbent. That Bush was controversial internationally, and Obama isn't, is just fact, not POV. That Bush's popularity declined in his second term is just fact, not POV. HiLo48 (talk) 02:49, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I smell a resurgence of election year trolls trying to change the article into an conservative attack piece. Maybe they might be some old POV-Warriors. I especially love how one has to claim that they are 100% liberal to make their POV comments seem acceptable. 74.79.34.29 (talk) 11:30, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I am not conservative I am very liberal. Doesn't it bother anyone that nearly every single news article on this article is about how the article is positively oriented? I'm not a troll either I'm actually an established user who reverts vandalism. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 14:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Comparing Obama to Limbaugh isn't going to get us anywhere: Limbaugh is one of those people who will say something controversial or even borderline misogynist/racist/etc and say, "I'm only asking questions". Obama is a politician, for which doing that would be surely political suicide. We're best off looking at other politicians' articles; Mitt Romney is the best example. We don't harp on about how it's so controversial how he passed a health reform bill that is functionally more left-wing than Obamacare, even though that was a key issue during the primaries (and the evident proof that he was a RINO). The conservative players in American politics want Obama to do a Gitmo but all it looks like is Vince Foster for a new president - which, I might add, doesn't even get a mention in the Clinton article. Because it's now getting to the point where opponents of a politician will throw everything - even his wife's once-a-month trip to a burger restaurant - to see what sticks. Criticising Bush for the fact his wife ran a stop sign 50 years ago never happened... well, except that for that one time.

Especially in an election year, we need to treat the candidates as neutrally and drily as possible. And especially on a featured article. If an article came to FAC with such a section, I would oppose it without reading as it prima facie violates NPOV. The existence of controversy/crticism sections/articles, by default, gives negative content a place to ferment without allowing the positive content its suitably weighted response. Criticism of YouTube, when it existed, was full of baying about how content was or was not on YouTube, with no mentions of YouTube's actions in response. Hell, at some points it dedicated paragraphs to a redesign that people didn't like. All such articles and sections tend to that. It is impossible to have a neutral controversy or critcism section, and nearly impossible (unless there's, you know, an actual controversy) to have a neutral controversy article.

Oh, and the existence of such sections in articles doesn't mean this article should have such a section. Wikipedia articles are a race to the top (fnarr), not a race to the bottom. Politician articles should emulate this article or John McCain (both FAs), not this article should emulate Nicolas Sarkozy (B-class, note the neutrality tag). It's why "What about X?" is not just an AfD fallacy. We should all, Democrat or Republican, communist or capitalist, male or female, black or white, aim to have neutrality for all articles, especially for the concepts we are opposed to. I'm a member of the Liberal Democrats here in the UK, but I helped review, and push the article for Ed Miliband, the leader of a rival party, to GA standard, precisely because I didn't want to put my opinion of how effective he is as a party leader into the article. It'd be lovely to have some visible editors in the conservative mainstream helping with this article, as a cross-ideological unity breaking what may look like an echo chamber, but from experience, most of those editors aren't really interested.

If you believe that content is seriously missing, then bring it up and discuss it without alleging stuff like liberal bias, because the people who maintain this article won't be able to differentiate you from the right-wing trolls that try to use this as an attack piece (such as this shit). A lot of us have been maintaining this article since the 2008 election, so we often short-circuit discussions which even look fishy to save time arguing over whether he's black/mulatto, etc. But if someone calmly comes and says "what about this?", helps find sources, and above all else, is fully co-operative, then you have a better chance of seeing the content in the article. For example, I think the health care reform section needs to discuss the PPACA lawsuits, but I recognise this is a high-visibility article about a high-profile person, under semi-protection and article probation. For that reason alone, I would personally go to the talk page and work with those who maintain the article. Hope this helps. :) Sceptre ^(talk) 13:17, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Ahh... "political suicide" eh? So you admit that the article is biased? It doesn't matter what you think. I am not adding POV material. Just a neutral paragraphs that says some of his mistakes. Whether you like it or not, mistakes are fact and can be included. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 14:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC) (Note: moved down to ensure cohesiveness. Sceptre ^(talk) 14:43, 18 April 2012 (UTC))

All I want is the article to be neutral. As of now it is not adhering to NPOV and needs to be fixed. I don't care how. Just that we come to a solution to fix the positive orientation in the article to a neutral orientation. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 14:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

It would be political suicide for Obama to, say, call Sandra Fluke a slut. Hence why politicians that do do that don't last very long. Santorum was humiliated at the next election and ended lost in the political wilderness for several years after his comments about homosexuality, for example. But neutrality is not an zero-sum game, where positive facts must be of an equal number to negative facts. We do say in Richard Nixon that he helped Sino-American relations, as that was a good thing. But we don't balance out Watergate by saying that he was scared of the communist liberals, etc. Watergate, I should add, only constitutes a small part of his presidential biography on Wikipedia, and that was a scandal that resulted in the only presidential resignation in history (and may have resulted in the only removal in history, if you believe he jumped before he was pushed). That's why we should talk about his conflict with the Republicans over legislation, but in the context of a polarized and rightward-shifting Republican Party, because that is part of his presidency. Not stuff like the birth certificate, or his religion; no-one serious actually disputes that he was born in Hawaii and is a Christian. Sceptre ^(talk) 14:43, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I swear this is so stupid that I have to go through this just to edit the article. Good luck to you all. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 14:37, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Hghyux - I made explicit responses to a couple of your criticisms, when you compared the Dubya and Obama articles. (You made a lot. I don't have as much spare time as you.) You have not responded. Prove that your interest is in Discussion, rather than just dictating. HiLo48 (talk) 16:37, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

My simple response is that while we don't try to achieve an artificial balance, this shows the dramatic differences between the openness of saying controversy to Bush yet it is very closed with Obama. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 17:06, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

No, that's just another repeat of your original broad, sweeping complaint. You did not respond to what I said. On this page we are supposed to discuss. You're not doing that. HiLo48 (talk) 17:17, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Sorry if you don't like my answer but I'm done here. Hghyux (talk to me)(talk to others) 17:28, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Edit Request on April 19 2012

Could be nitpicking here, but in the Domestic policy section it says "The most recent increase in the U.S. debt ceiling to $14.3 trillion was signed into law on February 12, 2010.[152] " which is clearly outdated. The ceiling was most recently raised on January 30, 2012 to a $16.394 trillion. http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/charts/charts_debt.htm Kinda scared to change anything myself so if one of the other editor could update it, it would be appreciated. --DeliciousMeatz (talk) 05:19, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Birthplace

There is a at least somewhat credible belief held by many that Obama was not, in fact, born in Honolulu, HI, as the article states. This issue has been one of effect during the time of his campaign for president to the present. This article should include this issue, in a neutral way, for it to be complete. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.180.63.137 (talk) 17:09, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

See Q5 on the FAQ and note that there is an separate article on that subject, see Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories.--JayJasper (talk) 17:40, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I recommend to the OP to never accept "facts" delivered by someone's political opponents as being likely to be in any way true. There are always better sources. HiLo48 (talk) 22:28, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Misleading graphic

I was quite puzzled by the graphic on health care costs. It says "Maximum Out-of-Pocket Premium as Percentage of Family Income and federal poverty level, under Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, starting in 2014" which to me said that as the level of poverty rises, people will be asked to pay more!!

This cannot be so. The entry should be amended as follows (I think) "Maximum Out-of-Pocket Premium as Percentage of Family Income and by income level expressed as a % of the FPL, under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, starting in 2014" I had no idea what FPL meant so a link to the article would be helpful.

I don't know if anyone would have the time to do this. but I think it more sensible to label the x Axis as "level of poverty (income as a % of fpl) and reversing the sequence on the x axis so that it shows increasing poverty not reducing poverty. The graph would then slope down. The graphic would then become more intuitive (i.e. the poorer you are the less you will have to pay as a percentage of your income. The overall graph could then be given a much more meaningful main title such as "Effect of subsidies on premiums paid by the poor". This would be much more intuitive to read in my opinion than that which is there currently.84.250.230.158 (talk) 16:05, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Eyes needed at 2012 BO campaign article

Would be helpful to have more eyes on Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2012 regarding POV fringe nonsense regarding the campaign slogan. Tvoz/talk 07:12, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 9 May 2012

Add the following to Obama's wikipedia page, under any relevant section:

On May 09, 2012, President Barack Obama announced his support for gay marriage, becoming the first sitting U.S. President to endorse equal status for same-sex couples.

Such002 (talk) 20:24, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

 Done by Cadiomals. There have been some edits that added it to the lede, but since it is his "personal opinion" rather than any policy change, that's really not appropriate. This is "no big deal" in Obama's life and not worthy of mention in the lede.  Frank  |  talk  21:49, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Not sure I agree, Frank, that this is not a big deal in his life - in fact I think the historic nature of this statement is a bigger deal to his life than it is to policy. I expect we'll be adding it to the lede, and I support that, but would wait for some analytic sourcing that goes beyond just the announcement. As for policy, it remains to be seen what effect it has. But as he himself has described this as his personal evolution, I think it is not correct to say it isn't worthy of mention in the lede of his biography - for whatever reason it took him a long time to get to today, and today's announcement was not casual or offhand - it is a major shift in how he has described his fundamental personal beliefs, and that is central to a biography. Tvoz/talk 22:17, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

You make a fair point. It's probably worth some discussion here; media attention to this blows it out of proportion, I think, but...that doesn't mean it's not worth mentioning somehow. Given that he has gone to some effort to say it's a personal opinion and not a call for federal legislative change (and not likely to be one), and further that he thinks states ought to make their own decisions on the matter...I don't know that it is really a big deal. (See this ref for the big caveat.)  Frank  |  talk  22:33, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

It's important to remember that this article is about Barack Obama, the very well known and internationally very highly respected person. It's not really about current politics in the USA. (That stuff is in the current election article.) Obama's announcement on gay marriage is major international news, because it comes from him, and from the President of the USA. It's highly notable, and really should be in the article. HiLo48 (talk) 03:15, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I propose mentioning President Obama's support of same sex marriage in the lead. As a major policy move, being the first President in history to support same sex marriage while in office, and the major coverage it is receiving, it seems like a small mention in the lead paragraph added to the other accomplishments mentioned seems merited. Naturally we should be selective of what we include in this section, as it shouldn't become clogged, but I think this is definitely worth a mention. Thoughts? --Politicsislife (talk) 03:32, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not especially convinced that wide coverage automatically equates to notability, and since this is a restatement of a previously-held position, one could say it is completely political rather than any real significance to the man himself. Nevertheless, I do see the point about him being the first sitting president to espouse this view and find the current entry in the lede appropriate.  Frank  |  talk  11:29, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

It was added to the lead again, and I don't disagree that there should be a small mention of it there, so I tried to "fit it in" where it seemed most appropriate (without undertaking a complete rewording of the paragraph). As others have pointed out, it may not be "a big deal" to some editors here, but I assure you there are millions of Americans who believe the history of civil rights in the United States is a very big deal. I'd suggest it's probably a good idea to take a look outside of ourselves before we decide what's "overblown" or "not a big deal" for other readers. I don't have all the sources at my fingertips, but all day yesterday it was touted by numerous news sources as "historical" and was equated to Lyndon Johnson's stand on civil rights in the 1960s. I think there are several quotes from Michael Bloomberg and several other high profile politicians and historians basically saying the same thing, and I dare say, it will most likely be one of the things he'll be most remembered for 20, 30, 40 years from now, long after most of his official "policies" have long been forgotten. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 11:45, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

To reiterate: I may not be entirely convinced, but I'm not angling for removal either. Note my previous strikethrough above; my position has evolved. :-)  Frank  |  talk  13:42, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Ah, Frank, good one. Ain't evolution grand? Tvoz/talk 05:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with all of this and like how you included it. Good job!--Politicsislife (talk) 20:15, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I'd again like to highlight, especially in response to Crakkerjakk's comment about "millions of Americans", that millions of non-Americans have been influenced by this too. I heard it mentioned twice by our national (government) broadcaster's radio news service here in Australia 16 hours apart yesterday. (It's Friday here now.) When any US president speaks, much of the world listens. When Obama speaks, it's even more likely. Those who hate his party in the US may find that hard to swallow, but it's true. HiLo48 (talk) 20:52, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit war of first sitting vs. first African American president in gay issue

We can read in the first page on this article that "In May 2012, he became the first sitting U.S. president to announce his support for the legalization of same-sex marriage."

On the other hand when I inserted this text: "First African-American President of the United States supporting the legalization of same-sex marriage: Barack Obama" on List of African-American firsts they have deleted this text twice. Why can we see this double standard? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.186.102.17 (talk) 01:03, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

• I quote: "He's the first African American president anyway, you can't put everything he did "first" that doesnt have to do with him being black". For instance, he's the first African-American to be a president and use the facilities in the White House. Drmies (talk) 01:06, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I agree, his support of same sex marriage is not associated to the issue of race to anywhere near the same level as him becoming President so it is not necessary to mention his race in this context. As mentioned the article does not bring up his race for other first either. For example, the article does not say that he is the first African American to sign a bill into law or give the State of the Union address.--174.93.169.157 (talk) 02:42, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 11 May 2012

Under the sub-heading "Family and Personal Life" there's a photo of the Obama family. The description says it's in 2012 but if you click on the picture it takes you to the source link and there it says it's from the 1st of September, 2009. A little bit confusing, if you ask me. Which is correct? It seems like the 2009 date is the correct one.

Thanks!

173.29.222.186 (talk) 03:35, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

 Done:The devil is a lie. But you're right, the source states it's from 2009. Dave Dial (talk) 04:04, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

General lack of criticism in the article not consistent with NPOV

The level of criticism in the article seems extraordinarily muted. I looked through it. Here are the references to criticism I could find. In each case, the reference to the criticism is brief and indirect. The actual criticism of Obama is typically not even stated.

Don't flood the Talk page with these types of posts
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
--- As multiple efforts by BP failed, some in the media and public expressed confusion and criticism over various aspects of the incident, and stated a desire for more involvement by Obama and the federal government.[191] --- Obama resigned from Trinity during the Presidential campaign after controversial statements made by Rev. Jeremiah Wright became public.[305] --- On October 9, 2009, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that Obama had won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples".[268] Obama accepted this award in Oslo, Norway on December 10, 2009, with "deep gratitude and great humility."[269] The award drew a mixture of praise and criticism from world leaders and media figures.[270][271] --- The purchase of an adjacent lot—and sale of part of it to Obama by the wife of developer, campaign donor and friend Tony Rezko—attracted media attention because of Rezko's subsequent indictment and conviction on political corruption charges that were unrelated to Obama.[292] --- By contrast, here are some excerpts from the first half of the article about George W. Bush: --- As the disaster in New Orleans intensified, critics charged that Bush was misrepresenting his administration's role in what they saw as a flawed response. Leaders attacked Bush for having appointed apparently incompetent leaders to positions of power at FEMA, notably Michael D. Brown;[189] it was also argued that the federal response was limited as a result of the Iraq War[190] and Bush himself did not act upon warnings of floods.[191][192][193] Bush responded to mounting criticism by accepting full responsibility for the federal government's failures in its handling of the emergency.[187] It has been argued that with Katrina, Bush passed a political tipping point from which he would not recover.[194] --- Midterm dismissal of U.S. attorneys Main article: Dismissal of U.S. attorneys controversy During Bush's second term, a controversy arose over the Justice Department's midterm dismissal of seven United States Attorneys.[195] The White House maintained that the U.S. attorneys were fired for poor performance.[196] Attorney General Alberto Gonzales would later resign over the issue, along with other senior members of the Justice Department.[197][198] The House Judiciary Committee issued subpoenas for advisers Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten to testify regarding this matter, but Bush directed Miers and Bolten to not comply with those subpoenas, invoking his right of executive privilege. Bush has maintained that all of his advisers are protected under a broad executive privilege protection to receive candid advice. The Justice Department has determined that the President's order was legal.[199] Although Congressional investigations have focused on whether the Justice Department and the White House were using the U.S. Attorney positions for political advantage, no official findings have been released. On March 10, 2008, the Congress filed a federal lawsuit to enforce their issued subpoenas.[200] On July 31, 2008, a United States district court judge ruled that Bush's top advisers were not immune from Congressional subpoenas.[201] In August 2009, Karl Rove and Harriet Miers testified before the House Judiciary Committee. A Justice Department inquiry into the firing of U.S. attorneys concluded that political considerations played a part in as many as four of the dismissals.[202] In July 2010, the Justice Department prosecutors closed the two-year investigation without filing charges after determining that the firings were inappropriately political, but not criminal. According to the prosecutors, "Evidence did not demonstrate that any prosecutable criminal offense was committed with regard to the removal of David Iglesias. The investigative team also determined that the evidence did not warrant expanding the scope of the investigation beyond the removal of Iglesias."[203] --- Those invasions led to the toppling of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and the removal of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq as well as the deaths of many Iraqis, with surveys indicating between four hundred thousand to over one million dead, excluding the tens of thousands of civilians in Afghanistan.[209][210][211] --- Some national leaders alleged abuse by U.S. troops and called for the U.S. to shut down the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and other such facilities. Dissent from, and criticism of, Bush's leadership in the War on Terror increased as the war in Iraq expanded.[224][225][226] In 2006, a National Intelligence Estimate expressed the combined opinion of the United States' own intelligence agencies, concluding that the Iraq War had become the "cause célèbre for jihadists" and that the jihad movement was growing.[227][228] --- Efforts to kill or capture al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden failed as he escaped a battle in December 2001 in the mountainous region of Tora Bora, which the Bush Administration later acknowledged to have resulted from a failure to commit enough U.S. ground troops.[232] --- Contentions that the Bush Administration manipulated or exaggerated the threat and evidence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities would eventually become a major point of criticism for the president.[242][243] --- The initial success of U.S. operations increased his popularity, but the U.S. and allied forces faced a growing insurgency led by sectarian groups; Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech was later criticized as premature.[247] From 2004 until 2007, the situation in Iraq deteriorated further, with some observers arguing that there was a full scale civil war in Iraq.[248] Bush's policies met with criticism, including demands domestically to set a timetable to withdraw troops from Iraq --- I will grant that Bush has been a subject of more criticism overall than Obama. Yet I find it remarkable that so many of the Bush excerpts contain direct criticisms, while the Obama excerpts do not. And keep in mind that I got less than half-way through the Bush article before deciding that I had more than enough material to illustrate my point. And the criticism of Bush does not end there; there are two lengthy cricital sections shortly after I left off. Overall, it appears that the amount of criticism in the Obama article is disproportionately small. --- In further support of my contention, here are some critical sections of the article about Ronald Reagan. Reagan is largely admired nowadays, and I think it is fair to say he is more popular than Obama. Yet look at these excerpts: --- Reaganomics was the subject of debate with supporters pointing to improvements in certain key economic indicators as evidence of success, and critics pointing to large increases in federal budget deficits and the national debt. --- Critics labeled this "trickle-down economics"—the belief that tax policies that benefit the wealthy will create a "trickle-down" effect to the poor.[139] Questions arose whether Reagan's policies benefited the wealthy more than those living in poverty,[140] and many poor and minority citizens viewed Reagan as indifferent to their struggles.[140] These views were exacerbated by the fact that Reagan's economic regimen included freezing the minimum wage at $3.35 an hour, slashing federal assistance to local governments by 60%, cutting the budget for public housing and Section 8 rent subsidies in half, and eliminating the antipoverty Community Development Block Grant program.[141] The widening gap between the rich and poor had already begun during the 1970s before Reagan's economic policies took effect.[142] However, Reagan's policies exacerbated the trend, as the 1981 cut in the top regular tax rate on unearned income reduced the maximum capital gains rate to only 20% – its lowest level since the Hoover administration.[143] --- The administration's stance toward the Savings and Loan industry contributed to the Savings and loan crisis.[153] It is also suggested, by a minority of Reaganomics critics, that the policies partially influenced the stock market crash of 1987,[154] but there is no consensus regarding a single source for the crash.[155] In order to cover newly spawned federal budget deficits, the United States borrowed heavily both domestically and abroad, raising the national debt from $997 billion to $2.85 trillion.[156] Reagan described the new debt as the "greatest disappointment" of his presidency.[132] --- Osama bin Laden would later cite Reagan's withdrawal of forces [from Lebanon--ed.] as a sign of American weakness.[167] --- Reagan believed that this defense shield could make nuclear war impossible,[188][190] but disbelief that the technology could ever work led opponents to dub SDI "Star Wars" and argue that the technological objective was unattainable.[188] --- Critics labeled Reagan's foreign policies as aggressive, imperialistic, and chided them as "warmongering," though they were supported by leading American conservatives who argued that they were necessary to protect U.S. security interests.[191] A reformer, Mikhail Gorbachev, would later rise to power in the Soviet Union in 1985, implementing new policies for openness and reform that were called glasnost and perestroika. ---

Again, I made it less than halfway through the article, and there are a large number of direct criticisms of his actions as President. William Jockusch (talk) 15:24, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, thank you for fixing the formatting, but you still haven't presented a coherent case. We don't define balance as having an equivalent amount of criticism in every presidential candidate's article. I'm sorry, but that's just nonsensical. Any events leading to criticism of Obama need to considered individually, not according to some mystical view of equality of numbers of critical comments.. If you want a particular event mentioned, suggest it in a new section. Your approach in this section will never succeed. HiLo48 (talk) 00:31, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Lol. I was the one who fixed the formatting. William Jockusch posted this about 12 hours ago and it was almost immediately closed, then reopened, and I was just fixing a glitch in the re-opening which made the section appear to be part of the "Edit request" section above it. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 03:02, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Whoops. Sorry. Well, thank YOU for fixing the formatting. HiLo48 (talk) 03:07, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

At the moment, it's not a question of an "equivalent amount of criticism." It's more a question of having any direct criticism at all. None of the four "critical" sentences in the Obama article actually states the criticism of Obama. This is in stark contrast to the Bush and Reagan articles. William Jockusch (talk) 04:50, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Oh, for fuck's sake. I repeat....

Any events leading to criticism of Obama need to considered individually... If you want a particular event mentioned, suggest it in a new section. Your approach in this section will never succeed. HiLo48 (talk) 05:09, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Lack of criticism in the section on economic policy

The economic policy section needs to contain criticisms related to class warfare and over-regulation. These are common and notable criticisms of Obama's economic policy. Therefore, they should be included. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 15:22, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

No, for reasons already discussed. Drop it. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:04, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Let me get this straight. I post a change to the article. I am told to take it to talk. I do so. And the response is "drop it." This is trying my assumption of good faith. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 16:26, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That wasn't helpful either. You came to the talk page, where your proposal doesn't seem to be gaining support based on initial comments. At that point you should let the discussion take its course, instead of continuing to edit war on the article page while making many new sections to accuse the community of things and propose the same thing again (and a bunch of other semi to nonconstructive proposals). Yes, you should drop that approach. Please listen to the community's cautions and requests here because this is heading nowhere very fast. - 16:41, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, the Reagan and Bush articles both include prominent left-wing criticisms, including how their policies were "labeled" by the left. I am proposing that the Obama article get the same treatment. I am pointing out a double standard. The double standard and its existence are important. They go to the very core of Wikipedia. That's why I'm not going to drop it. If Wikipedia is serious about NPOV, it needs to either (1) allow both prominent left-wing labels applied to policies of Republican Presidents and prominent right-wing labels applied to policies of Democratic Presidents, or (2) allow neither.William Jockusch (talk) 17:40, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Why would you choose a predecessor and try to make them look equally bad or good? If looking for parallels, why not his father? His wife? The leader of Russia, or China, or Iran? His rival for the law review at Harvard? Eventually, we'd be adding praise and criticism to every article on the encyclopedia to achieve some arbitrary level of positiveness from Charlie Manson to Mother Teresa, like a baker adding more flour, or water, to make a batter. The proposal to add criticism to achieve parity with the Bush (or McCain) articles has been discussed and thoroughly rejected many times. You can take a look in the article archives, but a caution, many of the editors making that proposal are doing so from now-banned fake accounts. It's not going to gain traction this time, and not really worth extended discussion. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:36, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

William Jockusch, quite frankly, I agree that the current version of this and several other articles on Obama, such as the article on his presidency and the article on his political positions, paint entirely too rosy a picture. A Martian who had previously known nothing about Obama or American politics would have no idea of just how difficult Obama's tenure in office has been and how widespread the dissatisfaction with Obama's policies has been among a certain group of Americans if the Martian were to get its information on Obama from WP.

However, you are going about trying to improve the article the wrong way. Creating and maintaining WP is a collective process that is based on consensus. If you want certain changes to be made to an article, you have to be able to persuade others that your way of looking at things is more consistent with their own views than is the current version of the article. Telling your collaborators that they are all biased and they are wrong, which is effectively what happens when you criticize an article in the way you have been going about it, is unlikely to win you very many supporters for your point of view. Instead of listing dozens of instances of bias, why not target just a few high-priority sections of the article and begin offering suggestions for specific changes to those sections. If it is likely that a change you want to propose will be particularly contentious, make the suggestion here on the Talk page first, rather than directly on the article page, and develop a consensus before posting the change to the main article page. With an article of such prominence as this, it's unlikely that your suggestion will be completely ignored (something that could happen on a Talk page that has far fewer watchers). Point out what's wrong with the current version of the article, explaining specifically why the material needs to be modified, and then propose the language you believe would be an improvement. For less-contentious changes, making the modifications directly to the article might be better accepted. Then, by taking the article section by section over time, you will probably stand a far better chance of having some of the changes you would like to see be incorporated. Make an effort to show that you view the rest of us as your collaborators rather than as foes. Dezastru (talk) 19:07, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

And be patient. There's no reason that all of the changes have to be made at once. If you are making reasonable suggestions, there's a good chance other editors who agree with you will eventually join in if you give the discussion process a chance to play out over a few days. Dezastru (talk) 19:10, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

To be fair. I thought William was met with a certain degree of "dismissal" when he originally tried to post here. From watching other (far less contentious) articles, I completely understand that even experienced editors/admins can get tired and "cranky", particularly when it comes to topics that have been previously discussed in depth (I fully admit my own guilt on this front, particularly late at night when it's past my bedtime. lol.) But I'm just pointing out that I personally didn't think he was being fully respected either when the discussion began (yes, less experienced editors may not understand all of the intricacies of editing a high profile article such as this one, but we were all new editors once.) I'm not taking sides or blaming anybody - I'm just pointing out that it's important for everyone to keep the above admonitions in mind, or else we can expect that people are naturally going to feel insulted and frustrated (even if they may be wrong on the technical aspects of an issue). --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 19:40, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Lack of a section on Egypt

Obama's role in Mubarak's overthrow should be included in the "foreign policy" section. Obama's attitude towards Mubarak played a significant role in his overthrow. This also had implications for Israel and Libya, both of which are covered. In addition, Egypt is a much more populous country than either Israel or Libya. It's role in the world is certainly far more significant than that of Libya. This is a further reason for the inclusion. William Jockusch (talk) 15:48, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Not sure whether this merits inclusion. If so, it would be a few words within a sentence about the Arab Spring. Do you have any specific language to propose? - Wikidemon (talk) 16:24, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I did propose some a few days back. It was reverted several times, with a different justification each time. Rather than attempting to improve the section, other editors resorted to wholesale reversion, with a different reason each time. But if the language can be improved, I would welcome an attempt to do that. It would have reinforced my assumption of good faith, rather than destroying it. The main thing that I think needs to be included is that Obama wanted Mubarak gone. Plenty of sources say that.William Jockusch (talk) 16:37, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I do not see a proposal here, but in checking I see we don't even mention the Arab Spring. We would start from there, as otherwise an entire section on egypt would be undue weight. The article's editing history isn't convenient for purposes of a discussion. Please see WP:BRD, it is a preferred editing practice. Do not accuse other editors of bad faith. That only antagonizes people. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:49, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I could certainly support inclusion of the Arab Spring. I believe Tunisia should get only brief mention. Then Egypt, Libya, and Syria should be covered more extensively.William Jockusch (talk) 16:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Immediate hatting/closure of criticism

I do not believe this hatting/closure was appropriate. See the text above. The issue is worthy of debate. I ask all users to take actions which promote debate, not actions which inhibit it. Thank you. William Jockusch (talk) 19:42, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

That will likely continue to happen if you stick to your current manner of bringing up criticism. In your hatted case, for example, you state a number of perceived issues but do not present any actual solutions or edit suggestions. You say the actual criticism of Obama is often unstated, but you fail to suggest what that missing actual criticism is in any of your examples. You also make the mistake of "other stuff exists" or "look at this article about someone else, it has more criticism." That is not a valid argument. Obama is not Bush. Obama is not Reagan. Obama has not done the same things as either of these two individuals. While I haven't looked, I'd guess that our article on Gorbachev may have less criticism than that of Stalin, as the two people took different actions while in office. Furthermore, your comparisons to Bush and Reagan also fall afoul of time. Barack Obama has not even completed one term in office. Both Bush and Reagan had two terms in office. Simply by time, it is entirely possible for them to have more criticism.

The goal is not to make every article for every president have the same amount of criticism as anyone else, therefore these comparisons by volume are not very relevant. Instead, make concrete suggestions of criticism you feel relevant to this article that is currently absent. Besides, until concrete suggestions are made, what exactly do you expect to happen? Even if listened to, you only listing grievances results in nothing changing as no one has actually suggested a change. --OuroborosCobra (talk) 20:34, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

I made several mildly critical edits. Most were reverted within the hour. I also removed the non-NPOV employment graph. Again it was quickly reverted. So I did make constructive edits, and they were reverted, with a request to bring up the issues in talk. So I made a lengthy and constructive post about it in talk, and that was hatted with an inappropriate sarcastic comment from the administrator. Though I see that someone wisely has wisely reversed the hatting. As for specific criticisms, the following are recurring themes among Obama critics. Inclusion of several of the following would be consistent with NPOV:

• Failure with the economy. His economic team predicted that if the stimulus was enacted, unemployment would never exceed 8%. Yet it quickly rose above that level and remains there today.
• Excessive class warfare rhetoric.
• Disastrous attempt at rapprochement with Iran and Syria. Outcome: both have slaughtered thousands of their own people.
• Obstructionist attitude towards some businesses. See Keystone Pipeline, lawsuit against Boeing for building a factory in South Carolina, and raids at Gibson Guitar based on flimsy justification.
• New Black Panther Case -- refusal to enforce civil rights laws against its allies.
• But above all -- failure to grow the economy. The number of employed Americans today is still lower than it was when O. took office. When was the last time that happened -- after 3+ years of a President, the number of employed Americans has dropped.

But the main point is that the article currently contains extremely little criticism. I could accept the ratio argument if the Obama article had a similar percentage of criticism in proportion to its length. However, it does not. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 00:46, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

What is this? The military approach of attacking on several fronts? I responded to your points in the thread above, and then you post here, as well as on my Talk page. This scattegun approach will get you nowhere. My advice is in the thread above. Follow it! (Oh, and my repsonse to what you posted on my Talk page is "No".) Join the conversation and discussion. If you can't do that, perhaps this isn't the place for you. HiLo48 (talk) 01:13, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not taking sides (I haven't looked at your talk page), but in defense of William Jockusch, he only started this thread after his first thread was closed (before many of us even saw it). Ok now. Full disclosure: I'm personally a fan of Barack Obama, but I can see where, in some instances, the article might need to provide a broader scope of a given subject. The difference between this article and the Reagan article (for example) is that with former presidencies we have the benefit of historical hindsight. Well respected, impartial historians have had a chance to evaluate the Reagan administration without the effects of "recentism" to cloud their perspective regarding every single thing he said and/or did. Nowadays, If Barack Obama makes a speech declaring the sky is blue, we have pundits at FOX News, and numerous other "critics" who will immediately dispute it. With the political climate the way it is today (which is very different than it was even just 20 years ago), including every single "criticism" of president Obama would make the article extremely tedious for the reader. This would mean that we would need to list Obama's position; "The sky is blue", then list criticism from the right; "the sky isn't blue at all", then list criticism from the left; "he didn't declare the sky was blue enough", on and on and on and on. I'm not saying that this is what you're suggesting, but the point is that we need to be extremely selective with which "criticisms" we begin to include. Given this, I'm more on the side of stating which positions he's taken (without characterizing whether this side or that side thinks it's "good" or "bad") and then be extremely careful when deciding which criticisms need to be included. One example was what is now known as "Obamacare". Even reputable news outlets repeatedly reported for months that something like 60% of Americans polled were "unhappy" with his health care plan while 40% supported it. Once the numbers were broken down, it was revealed that 20% of those that "disapproved" thought his health care plan didn't go far enough, which meant 60% either approved or thought it needed to go farther, leaving only 40% who genuinely thought health care was better before he was elected to office. Again, I'm not saying that you're trying to distort the issues, but I'm just using this as one example as to how easily (even reputable news sources) can distort "criticisms" just to fill today's 24-hour news cycle. I think this might be one of the reasons why there is resistance to going too far down this road in this article. Once we include one "criticism", then we need to include the counter "viewpoint", etc, etc.. I'm not saying that there should be no mentions of any criticisms whatsoever, but I'm just saying that once we begin to add detailed criticisms, the article instantly becomes three times as long (and tedious), so, in many cases, many editors would rather not go there. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 03:02, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

(to original poster) If you have any specific content you wish to propose for the article that's relevant, sourced, and of due weight, it's worth a shot. A generalized claim that the article doesn't have enough negative stuff about Obama isn't really worth serious consideration. Even if you could prove it, it's an irrelevant point. It's not actionable, and the exercise in making an article more negative towards its biographic subject, or loading criticism for the sake of criticism, is storybook POV. It's not the job of a biography to present criticism of the subject. It's to tell the story of the person, their life, career, legacy. - Wikidemon (talk) 05:25, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Believe me, I will be proposing plenty. I want to take strong issue with the claim that my point is "irrelevant." Recent polls have shown that approximately 45% of respondents disapprove of Obama's job performance. So about 45% of the US population holds a primarily negative view of the President. In a balanced article, their views would be described. Right now, all the article does is note their existence. It does not describe their criticisms of the President. 45% is a large enough number that their point of view is a major one within the population. Yet their point of view is not represented. That is why the article does not conform to NPOV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 12:49, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Careful - you seem to miss a point made above. If 45% are unhappy with Obama, that does not imply that those 45% have even one notable criticism. There could be 90 groups of 0.5% each, members of which are unhappy for different and even contradictory reasons. Some may dislike that Guantanamo hasn't been closed, some that it hasn't been expanded. Some think the stimulus is a waste of money, others think there was not enough. Some wonder why the US hasn't nuked Iran, others why they muck with the Near East to begin with. And so on. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:31, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That doesn't bode well. While individual proposals will get a hearing if well supported and accompanied by reasonable discussion, I think the community's patience level is wearing thin here, and taking a combative or rapid-fire approach doesn't work. People are not going to be swayed by any argument that we should bias a biography to be more negative or that the story of the President's life should be filtered through the lens of political campaign stories. Those arguments, in the past, created nothing but trouble and interfered with the orderly upkeep and progress of the article. - Wikidemon (talk) 13:54, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

But here is the problem, Wikidemon. I started off by doing exactly that in the case of the unemployment graph/job creation graph. The only responder supported my point of view that the graph was POV and should be removed. So I removed it. My removal was promptly reverted. In light of this, how can I believe that I am getting a "fair hearing?" — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 15:34, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I will add that very recently, the discussion on the graph issue has picked up, and that's a good thing. However, at the time I made the posts above, the situation on the graph was creating a rather strong perception of a lack of a fair hearing at my end. William Jockusch (talk) 15:38, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

There's lesson one of several, don't mistake people ignoring your suggestion for approval. The reason people ignored it is probably that it was recently discussed, that you accompanied it by unnecessary accusations of POV bias, and perhaps (without checking the history here) that people were already beginning to overload on your multiple proposals and tuning out. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:25, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

It was my first proposal in talk here. William Jockusch (talk) 05:24, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Health Care Reform section should include the subsequent legal cases alleging unconstitutionality.

The Supreme Court has taken this up, and allotted several times the usual amount of oral argument. This is a major and notable development. It should therefore be included. William Jockusch (talk) 16:13, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

The fact that the law was challenged in the SCt is worth a sentence at the end. If the challenge fails it's not worth noting more than that, because the case history and arguments in a failed case aren't terribly germane to a biography. If the challenge succeeds that would be noted, and why, and the section would be rewritten to concentrate on the provisions that survived, if any. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:06, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

OK, one response, and it's positive. Does that mean there is consensus to include this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 01:10, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Edward Klein book

In the ‘The Amateur’, American author Edward Klein’s book, it claims Barack Obama or a high ranking official in his campaign offered Jeremiah Wright 150,000 to stop giving speeches during the 2008 presidential campaign. If this accusation is true it would constitute bribery on the part of either Barack Obama or someone close to Barack Obama. As this is an impeachable act as outlined in Article II Section 4, this seems noteworthy enough to include in on the Barack Obama page. It could be something like. When Obama was Campaigning for president in 2008, many sources claim he offered a $150,000 bribe Jeremiah Wright because he believed Jeremiah Wright’s speeches would hurt his chance to become president. While still unconfirmed, if true, this is one of the few acts specifically outlined in the US Constitution as an impeachable act. --192.195.66.3 (talk) 11:20, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm getting sick of this bullshit. I'll copy across something I just posted on the Romney Talk page....

Why not? Because the only people contributing to such a section would be his political opponents, guaranteeing non-neutral POV. I'm not American. I cannot vote for your President. Maybe it makes me more objective. The behaviour of the opponents of Romney AND Obama here at the moment is heading down the path of destroying any encyclopaedic value these BLPs have. Grow up and treat this place as an encyclopaedia, not a campaign opportunity. HiLo48 (talk) 12:07, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

If you read elsewhere on this page, you will see that I am certainly no friend of Obama, and am arguing strongly for more criticism of him. But this simply does not fit the bill. For one thing, even if true, this would not constitute "bribery." One might argue about whether or not it is ethical. But even if not, it would not be illegal. People pay for confidentiality agreements all the time. Addionally, Klein makes all sorts of strange claims in his book. For example, he claims to have interviewed Obama's physician. Really????? His doctor gave an interview about him? Seems hard to credit. William Jockusch (talk) 14:19, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

To carry on with the two above, this info makes fun reading in a blog post. We're not supposed to be a blog, we're supposed to be an encyclopedia.--Cube lurker (talk) 14:29, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Obviously, no. Speculation from unreliable sources. Leave this one open a few more hours then close as a proposal that does not have consensus. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:53, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

William, you posted "I am certainly no friend of Obama, and am arguing strongly for more criticism of him." I have hardly ever seen an editor decalre a more blatant, non-neutral POV approach. You obviously don't understand what this encyclopaedia is, and what the requirements are for BLP articles. Please stop wasting your time and ours here. HiLo48 (talk) 18:36, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Woah, easy there. You took that comment in the worst possible way it could be taken. That says more about you than him. Arkon (talk) 18:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Bullshit. William's goal is clear. His approach doesn't belong here. This place as an encyclopaedia, not a campaign opportunity. HiLo48 (talk) 19:00, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

QED. Arkon (talk) 19:04, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

You want Wikipedia to provide campaign opportunities? If you had been paying attention, you would have noticed that I expressed very similar concerns over at the Romney article. HiLo48 (talk)

You want to continue to misrepresent peoples comments? Ease off, address the editors concerns, and ffs, go find your good faith whereever you left it. Arkon (talk) 19:12, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

HiLo48 I'm on your side here, on Mitt's page, and commented on a 3rd state politician with the same type of issues. But I too think you should AGF at least until you disagree with something he's actually trying to insert. There's silly season garbage, but there can be a NPOV need at times to keep BLP's from being hagiography's. If he's here for the second, well and good, if he proves to be here for the first, then you can start ranting.--Cube lurker (talk) 19:19, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Arkon. The comment has been misrepresented and HiLo48 would do well to refactor it at the very least. That being said, even the most cursory examination of William Jockush's Wikipedia contributions makes it abundantly clear that he's engaged in politically-motivated editing. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:23, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I just think several of us have fuses that are beginning to burn short. I don't mind explaining things to editors who may not understand all of the intricacies of editing on Wikipedia and genuinely want to edit in good faith (I'm sure we've all made our fair share of mistakes when first editing Wikipedia), but once we've explained something two or three times, people begin to get tired and short tempered. I'm just not sure what else there is left to say and I'm personally getting ready to "tag out" myself for a while.--- Crakkerjakk (talk) 20:26, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I've seen enough. There's no way I can assume good faith over any contribution here from William Jockusch. He has made his intentions clear. He is not here to make Wikipedia a better GLOBAL encyclopaedia. His garbage doesn't belong here. HiLo48 (talk) 20:42, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

You may be right overall, but in this section, he's in the right, and he agrees with you in opposing inclusion. If he's proposing impropper things above, that's where I'd rant if I were you, not in a thread where he's 100% right.--Cube lurker (talk) 20:50, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:OR in source 1, source 2, source 3 -> "frequent"

Listing a small number of sources for claim X does not support that "X is a frequent theme". There are many thousands of editorials published daily. To show "frequent", you need a high-quality source that says "frequent". --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:00, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

OK, then why not leave the new paragraph in place, but remove the word "frequent." If you had simply removed the word "frequent" without disturbing the rest of my addition, I would have had no issue with your action, and would in fact have thanked you for improving my post. That would have been a useful and positive course of action. It would have build trust rather than destroying it. William Jockusch (talk) 15:27, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Because there is no evidence that the criticism is notable or significant. Your approach would open the opportunity to insert each and every comment ever made in a letter to the editor of the Backwater Enquirer. Of course political opponents criticise actions of an administration. But not all such criticism is significant enough to include in a biography. For that you must be able to positively answer the question if this criticism has had a significant influence on Obama or his administration. This is, of course, easier in historical hindsight. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:35, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Fox News is by far the most watched TV news source. It is therefore a notable and significant source. Sure, it has bias against Obama. But the Bush and Reagan articles quote the NYT all the time, and the NYT also has bias against those Presidents. William Jockusch (talk) 15:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Just found this, from the host of the most-watched cable news program in the USA. That ought to qualify it as a high-quality source. It does not include the word "frequent", so I would have no problem leaving that out. But it is a high quality source for the class warfare criticism. http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/oreilly/2011/09/29/bill-oreilly-pushback-class-warfare William Jockusch (talk) 15:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

There were more problems with that section than one can easily list. Predominantly using Fox News attack pieces to source a biography of Obama is just strange. Use of primary sources. Messing up the citation format. Using bizarre Republican talking points, mistaking political attacks for actual criticism, and on and on. A low quality proposal in a new or out of the way article is only reasonable, you can start from there and improve it collaboratively. But aggressively inserting bad material into one of the most trafficked featured articles here? There seem to be some WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT and, frankly, WP:COMPETENCE issues. This is not a good place to learn basic editing stuff. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:19, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

If the New York Times were banished from the articles about Republicans, I could agree with you. But it is patently unfair to say that the NYT is a valid source for its Republican opponents and simultaneously say that Fox is not a valid source for its Democratic opponents. The policy should be consistent. William Jockusch (talk) 16:24, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but sources do not enjoy affirmative action. The New York Times is a widely recognised quality newspaper - somewhat on the left of the US spectrum, fairy centrist from a world-wide point of view, but in either case well-regarded for quality journalism and a separation of facts and opinions. Fox, on the other hand, is off the scale, and is famous for mixing a very small amount of fact with a very large dose of "opinion" (if it is even that, and not just rabble-rousing). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:43, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

(ec - addressing WJ) We're talking about the Obama article here, not about other articles. Be that as it may, opinion pieces on the New York Times are also primary sources that do not establish in and of themselves that there is noteworthy criticism of a subject. Comparing Fox News to the New York Times is absurd. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:45, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

If it is so "off the scale", why does it have more viewers than anyone else? Surely the total number of viewers and readers is a good way of measuring how mainstream a source is. By that measure, Fox is more mainstream than the NYT, and is the most mainstream news network. Additionally, if you look at the controversies that have engulfed the two over the years, it is clear that the editorial failures that have happened at the NYT have been much more serious, and it's not even close. That is a factual statement, which you can easily verify by looking at the articles for the two. As for respect, what you say is true among liberals, but it is absolutely false among conservatives. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 17:06, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Ergo: Eat shit; billions of flys can't be wrong?TMCk (talk) 21:27, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That faulty logic based on assumptions that many "Fox" watchers make that just aren't true. Fox is the most watched CABLE news network, mainly because they parrot what some people believe and those same people believe there is a inherit bias in mainstream media. But Fox doesn't compare to regular news viewers, where Fox receives about a third of viewers of NBC evening news. Much less the combined viewership of CBS, ABC and NBC news. And let's not even get into the total readership of the NYT. It's not even close. Dave Dial (talk) 17:37, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I admit I have my own differences with President Obama's positions on a whole host of issues, but objectively, I can recognize that nobody coming to Wikipedia gives a flying f#@k what I think, so I'm not going to waste my valuable time looking to dig up obviously biased sources to substantiate my "criticisms", just so I can stick them into his Wikipedia bio. As others have pointed out, this is one of Wikipedia's relatively few Featured articles, so you have to understand that editors watching the page are going to be extremely vigilant with regards to the edits made to it. Comparing Fox News to the New York Times is honestly just laughable. List of Pulitzer Prizes awarded to The New York Times. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 17:55, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

OK, then how about this. Name some prominent right-leaning sources that you would consider high quality. Preferably more than one. Then I'll find the class warfare there. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 18:05, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Looking for left or right-leaning publications to source material is a POV exercise. And sourced or unsourced, this kind of partisan talking point hyperbole isn't biographic. He's also called a fascist, communist, socialist, Muslim, and so on. We can source all of that, it's not even criticism. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:22, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Demon, here is the problem -- if Wikipedia is unbiased, then the number of sources that Wikipedia considers high quality should contain roughly similar proportions of left- and right- leaning sources. Otherwise, it merely shows that what Wikipedia considers "high quality" is itself biased. Unless you think that right-leaning sources are somehow inherently worse than left-leaning ones. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 19:51, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

It's important to make a clear distinction between what a given news source presents as "fact" versus what they present as "opinion". In my personal view, a "reliable" source won't slant their reporting of the "facts" of a topic by injecting "opinions" or broad generalizations into it. The same news source may also provide "opinion" pieces, but in order to be deemed "reliable", they should make every attempt to make a clear distinction between the two. This again leads to my previous point - before we open the door to present one "opinion" regarding one of President Obama's policies, we'd need to source criticism from all sides of the issue. As far as I'm concerned, in the vast majority of instances this isn't really the article for hashing all of this out. You'll notice there are backlinks to articles about practically all of Obama's policies which present a wider scope of "reactions", "criticisms", "praises", etc. - In my opinion, that's the appropriate place for them. Yes, there are criticisms mentioned on other Presidential bios, but (as I've stated before), with the passage of time comes the benefit of highly reputable and well respected biographers and historians to view an administration from the 20,000 foot level. Adding daily updates of broad general criticisms to this page would largely amount to a lot of clutter and would almost certainly get the page downgraded from it's "featured" rating.--- Crakkerjakk (talk) 20:16, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed Crakker. Fox does make precisely that distinction. O'Reilly, Hannity, and Greta van S. are opinion. The earlier programming is fact. I don't know if they do it every day, but I've heard them say this shortly before O'Reilly comes on. At any rate, opinion pieces appear to be valid sources of criticism for the other Presidential articles. For example, the Ronald Reagan article notes that critics labelled his policies "trickle down economics." It is factual that that label was applied, but the label itself would have to be considered opinion. If a label like that is fair game for the Reagan article, it seems entirely consistent to include the "class warfare" label in the Obama article. As for your assertion that passage of time is the determining factor, I would suggest taking a look at the George W. Bush article as it existed at various times while he was still President. I actually just did this. I'll spare you the details, but there was plenty of criticism in there. William Jockusch (talk) 02:08, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not an expert on the policies of the Reagan administration 30-something years ago, but "trickle-down economics" appears to have been the "opinion" of Reagan's own budget director David Stockman. This is in no way the same thing as routine mud-slinging by political opponent's spin-doctors (some may feel the term "trickle down" is a pejorative, but a rose by any other name...) It's important to keep in mind that Fox News cannot verify their own credibility. When taking a "news" source seriously, Wikipedia is likely to ask: How many Peabody Awards does Fox News have? How any Emmy Awards for journalism? How any Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Awards? How many Pulitzer Prizes? Of course there are much lighter-weight sources that haven't won Pulitzers which are used for Wikipedia, but that's usually acceptable when we're talking about "celebrity" articles (actors, singers, athletes, etc). However, this is a featured bio article about the President of the United States, not the newest starlet on American Idol. No offense intended, but Fox News is basically considered to be the ugly stepchild of the world of legitimate journalism (and that's honestly being generous). If we're looking to add "criticisms" to this bio such as Obama declaring "class warfare" because Fox News "says so" then I can already tell you that we're wasting our time. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 03:28, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Fine, name some American right-leaning sources you consider first rate sources. I'll find it there. Unless you believe that American right-leaning sources can't be first rate sources, in which case I'll take strong issue with that contention. William Jockusch (talk) 05:26, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Hm. No. Finding acceptable sources is your responsibility since you're the one who wants to write something. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 05:42, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

But here is the problem. It looks like there is a double standard on what constitutes a "first class source". Fox is by far the most popular right-leaning news source, and the argument here appears to be that it does not fit the bill. It is true that Fox has had a lot of hate directed at it from the left. But if that were the standard, the NYT would not fit the bill either, as it has been the target of plenty of hate from the right. And if you look at the actual lapses at Fox (e.e. using the wrong video of Sarah Palin, making her appear more popular than she actually is) and compare those with the actual lapses at the NYT (e.g. failure to cover two separate instances of genocide, with millions of dead each time), it is clear that the NYT's are far worse. If people on the left are refusing to even name right-leaning sources they consider to be first class sources, that underlines my point. How can NPOV be achieved if the only sources allowable for certain kinds of statements are left-leaning and centrist sources? William Jockusch (talk) 14:35, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

That's a lot of words, and irrelevant points, in defense of an untenable proposition, that Fox News is equivalent as a source to the New York Times. There is one standard, that's WP:RS and the real-world equivalent for reliable journalism. Where you get off track is seeing everything as liberal versus conservative (or the contemporary American partisan politics approximation of the same). You're looking under stones for something that is not there, a respectable source that parrots an absurd election-year talking point. You know what class warfare is, don't you? It involves violence, strikes, revolt, take-over of factories by the workers. It's not a term that any serious historian, academic, or journalist would use to describe modern American politics. That's one reason why the vast predominance of mentions are in marginal and fringe sources, it's part of the demonization of Obama as a communist, socialist, fascist, foreigner, etc. Fox News sometimes veers into that territory in articles it promotes as news coverage, and when it does that, it is not reliable. Wikipedia isn't a ratings contest, if it were we would source everything to Howard Stern and Good Morning America. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

“ You're looking under stones for something that is not there, a respectable source that parrots an absurd election-year talking point. ”

You've said it better than I have. And I honestly feel like we're beginning to talk in circles on this. As I've stated before - Even if we did find a "reliable" source reporting on the broad accusations which are constantly being thrown around by his opponents, I would still object to adding them to the article. If we're going to add these types of "editorial" characterizations (and I use the term "editorial" loosely), then we'd need to add all viewpoints on the issue (and this article simply isn't the place for all of this). We're not trying to be snobs about sources. To be clear, not every source needs a Pulitzer Prize or a Peabody Award to be "reliable". I use "fluff" sources all the time – such as Variety, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, etc, – for actor/entertainer bios. The difference is that I use them as sources for a date of birth or the announcement of an upcoming film, or album, etc, not for including partisan "opinions" into politician bios. Highly contentious criticisms (opinions) alleging "class warfare", etc, are in a completely different category than innocuous biography info such as date of birth or where someone went to high school, etc. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 19:38, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

The "trickle-down economics" criticism in the Ronald Reagan article is attributed to the left-leaning PBS. Additionally, the Ronald Reagan article says that critics label his foreign policies "warmongering", again attributing it to PBS. Additionally, I note that George W. Bush's campaign against John McCain is described as a "smear campaign", with the citation going to the New York Times. That's three cases where generally left-leaning media outlets have been cited to criticize recent Republican Presidents. In light of those precedents, I don't see how you can argue that it is not fair to cite criticisms of Obama from right-leaning outfits such as Fox. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 23:42, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Only someone who gets their news solely from the right wing echo chamber would describe the neutral, objective and impartial PBS as "left leaning". Also, the quality (or lack thereof) of other articles has no bearing on this one. If you feel other articles have problems, go there and edit them. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:53, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

The history of PBS government funding shows that they are anything but "neutral." Republicans typically want to take it away. Democrats typically want to keep it. The pocketbook doesn't lie. And don't even get me started on their generally positive portrayal of the Cuban health care system, or their failure to correct false partisan talking points from David Axelrod. I will happily concede that PBS's leftwards lean is milder than that of other organizations, such as the NYT. But it does exist and is real. William Jockusch (talk) 01:04, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

At this point this thread has degenerated into a WP:FORUM about supposed liberal bias by the mainstream American press, and the need to introduce unabashedly partisan WP:CRITICISM from Fox News so that Obama will appear more unsavory to the reader. That's nowhere close to being a reasonable approach to article discussion and editing, much less a specific changes to the article. We're supposed to use this page to improve the article. You can't get there from here using this approach, so I think we're done and ought to wind down this line of discussion as being off topic. - Wikidemon (talk) 01:20, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Demon, look. The point is simple. Either it is fair to use sources that lean towards the opposite party for criticism of a President or it is not. I'm not the one who keeps diverting from that simple issue. If others want to make it into a forum by diverting from my central point, I'm not going to stop them from doing that. But it does not invalidate my central concern, and diversions introduced by others give me no reason to drop anything. I find it interesting that none of my opponents have come out and said "It's fair to use left-leaning sources to criticize Reagan/Bush, but it's not fair to use right-leaning sources to criticize Obama." The fact that my opponents keep degenerating this into a forum-like discussion by distracting from that central question ought to be telling you something. William Jockusch (talk) 03:05, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

You can bring sources that lean toward the right, but not the moronic extremist-junk that FOX farts out to be consumed by half-illiterate crypto-racists. Is that clear enough now? Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 03:11, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Fox News is on the margins of reliability when it reports on politics and, as such, gets scrutinized whenever it makes a controverted claim about anyone. There is no policy or guideline on Wikipedia that measures the acceptability of sources by their purported partisan affiliation, nor is fairness to the article subject a measure distinct from verifiability, neutral POV, relevance, and due weight. That's not how articles are constructed in an encyclopedia. Our constituency is the reader, who should be informed according to the best knowledge at the time, not politicians vying for equal air time. - Wikidemon (talk) 03:41, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Sure, the consituency is the reader. But you appear to be making a judgment that a left-wing partisan critique of Bush/Reagan fits "the best knowledge at the time", while a right-wing partisan critique of Obama does not. At any rate, I am going to take another shot at this one, find what I believe to be the most prominent critique along those lines (which might be "Big Government" rather than "Class Warfare", but I'll look into it) and take another shot from there.William Jockusch (talk) 21:08, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

As I've already explained – A 2-minute Google search shows that "trickle-down" was the "opinion" of Reagan's own budget adviser David Stockman. The Reagan article may quote PBS (which leads every other network in Peabody Awards; leads every other network in Emmy Awards for journalism; leads every other network in Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Awards, etc, etc, etc...), but PBS is simply reporting Stockman's own words in a piece done by The Atlantic. Feel free to read it for yourself here. Your assertion that any network that doesn't parrot Fox News' POV is somehow "left-wing" is never going to hold water, so I honestly suggest you drop this pointless quest of yours to begin injecting right-wing distortions into the most prominent articles on Wikipedia. It's a losing battle and, judging by the lack of responses in the last 24 hours, other editors have decided to just start ignoring you. This should most likely be taken as an indication that people are just sick of dealing with you, and not as a "green light" to do whatever you want. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 01:30, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Yep. HiLo48 (talk) 02:10, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

You guys didn't want me putting in long lists of examples of bias. So I stuck to one. Now you are both pointing to one difference between the example I gave and the current Obama issue. Well, guess what. If one restricts oneself to a single example, a difference can be found. That is the nature of a single example. Fine. I'll post a list of them. Don't complain; by rejecting the one example, you asked for it.

Reagan believed that this defense shield could make nuclear war impossible,[188][190] but disbelief that the technology could ever work led opponents to dub SDI "Star Wars" and argue that the technological objective was unattainable.[188]

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Critics labeled Reagan's foreign policies as aggressive, imperialistic, and chided them as "warmongering," though they were supported by leading American conservatives who argued that they were necessary to protect U.S. security interests.

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Many Central Americans criticize Reagan for his support of the Contras, calling him an anti-communist zealot, blinded to human rights abuses, while others say he "saved Central America".[228] Daniel Ortega, Sandinistan and president of Nicaragua, said that he hoped God would forgive Reagan for his "dirty war against Nicaragua".[228]

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After his diagnosis, letters of support from well-wishers poured into his California home,[272] but there was also speculation over how long Reagan had demonstrated symptoms of mental degeneration.[273] In her memoirs, former CBS White House correspondent Lesley Stahl recounts her final meeting with the president, in 1986: "Reagan didn't seem to know who I was.

--

In each case, we have a label that Reagan's opponents applied to either him or his policies in the article. William Jockusch (talk) 17:28, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

The number of visits Adm. Mullen made to Israel is not worthy of inclusion in the article

This is simply not important enough for the article. It has nothing to do with my NPOV issues. William Jockusch (talk) 19:01, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. To keep the article at a reasonable length we'll have to pare down some of the less important and less relevant old stuff and make way for ongoing things. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:54, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks Demon. Could you do the honors of taking it out? I have a feeling if I try there could be trouble.William Jockusch (talk) 03:18, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Oddly Worded Sentence

"He ordered the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp[114] was unable to persuade Congress to appropriate the required funds." This is oddly worded, I think its missing a couple words. Could someone repair it? 74.132.249.206 (talk) 18:13, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. The duplicate thread was deleted and another editor fixed the wording problem. Dave Dial (talk) 18:21, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Changed it to "He ordered the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp[114] but was unable to persuade Congress to appropriate the required funds."; I think it reads better with that extra word. Good find, 74.132.249.206. Best. (edit conflict 3x) Acalamari 18:23, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Good thanks. But... is that what really happened? That sounds a little off. It wasn't that Obama acting within his Presidential powers ordered the shut down, but then Congress said we'd like to help you but we don't have the money to do that, was it? - 18:54, 16 May 2012 (UTC) (Wikidemon was here)

Yea, it sounded off by me too. But that's basically what happened. Obama ordered the closure, but Congress voted to not give the funds for the transfer of the prisoners. Perhaps there is a better way to word the issue. Dave Dial (talk) 19:08, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Off topic: Just a note to Wikidemon. Why does your name not always appear when you sign your posts? The time and date stamp appears, but sometimes your username doesn't (this has happened before in above threads on this page). I'm not sure of the exact reason for this, but it's just a little confusing when trying to follow a thread. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 21:28, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

That most likely is a frequent typo. Compare Stephan Schulz (talk) - Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:45, 16 May 2012 (UTC) - 23:45, 16 May 2012 (UTC) (typed as 3, 4, and 5 tildes). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:45, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Oh ok. Yeah. I was wondering how a time/date stamp could show up and not the name, but that explains it. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 23:59, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm a stealthy daemon, or a hasty fingered one. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:33, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Lack of a budget should be covered in the article

The Government's failure to pass a budget for three years in a row is a historically unprecedented development that should be covered. I understand that Congress shares the blame here. But it is remarkable that the Obama Administration has failed to push hard for the passage of a budget. William Jockusch (talk) 16:19, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

No, this is a fact of contemporary politics that is not biographically related to Obama. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:30, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Reagan, Clinton, and both Bushes managed to get budgets through a sometimes-hostile Congress. So stating that the lack of a budget is "a fact of contemporary politics" is bizarre. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 16:53, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

This is getting into WP:NOTAFORUM territory. The talk page isn't the place to discuss your opinion of Obama, it's for discussing specific changes to the article. Simply starting a thread by saying "This article should discuss [your opinion]" is not an acceptable way to get around this. --Loonymonkey (talk) 17:26, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

This section started off with a proposal for an addition to the article. I didn't start the diversion; I merely responded to it. I am happy to return to the original subject.William Jockusch (talk) 17:43, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Furthermore, the lack of a budget is not an opinion. It is a fact. William Jockusch (talk) 17:44, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That is exists is fact; that it is important, opinion. Tarc (talk) 12:39, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

William, this is the BLP of Obama. Your initial post highlights "The Government's failure to pass a budget". Can you see the problem? HiLo48 (talk) 12:44, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

If that's the standard, then how about including the votes against Obama's proposed budgets? This would be consistent with the Bush article, which includes Congressional defeat of his immigration bill, and the Clinton article, which includes the defeat of his health care proposal. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 14:51, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

How about this: "Republicans, focused on ensuring Obama will only be a one-term President and beholden to a pledge they have made to Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform never to raise taxes, have succeeded in blocking the passage of all of the President's budget proposals." That about covers it. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:06, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

The vote in the House against Obama's last budget was 0:414. The makeup of the House is 242 Republicans and 193 Democrats.William Jockusch (talk) 16:48, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

LOL. I assume you're being intentionally disingenuous to get a laugh, so there's mine. Says this conservatively-biased newspaper, "President Obama's budget was defeated 414-0 in the House late Wednesday, in a vote Republicans arranged to try to embarrass him and shelve his plan for the rest of the year." It's because of tactics like this one it makes zero sense to bang on about defeated budget votes. It's just political bullshit that's essentially meaningless. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:17, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Let me get this straight. You made a post which gave the false impression that Republicans are solely responsible for the failure to pass a budget. I produced information contradicting that impression. And now you say I am disingenuous? Are you asserting I should simply let your false assertion stand? Who is being disingenuous here? I would be happy to return to the original issue -- the failure of the Administration to get a budget is significant and should be included. William Jockusch (talk) 20:54, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

It is the responsibility of Congress to make legislation, and when it comes to budgets that means the Republican-led House of Representatives. It's not a "false impression", but an irrefutable fact. The failings of Republican legislators have no place in a biography that is meant to represent the life of Barack Obama. -- Scjessey (talk) 21:14, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Interesting that you keep diverting the discussion away from Obama's failure. Obama proposed a budget. It was defeated 414-0. All Democrats and Republicans were in perfect agreement. I find it perplexing that you somehow blame this on the Republicans. William Jockusch (talk) 03:17, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

It's getting really hard for me to assume good faith when I read comments like that. Was it not clear in the source I provided, beyond all doubt, that the vote was a Republican stunt designed to embarrass the President? Not even the Republican who brought the Amendment forward voted for it, for fuck's sake. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:42, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm perfectly happy to concede that the actual vote was a Republican stunt to embarrass the President. I have never suggested otherwise. But the lack of support from any member of the House for said budget was no Republican stunt. That lack of support was apparently unanimous, and would have existed whether or not the Republicans had pulled their stunt by insisting on an actual vote. Thus, the "stunt" merely made clear to everyone a reality which existed already -- namely, no one in the House wanted to pass the President's budget. And that reality is the issue. My initial suggestion was, and I quote, Lack of a budget should be covered in the article. HiLo asserted that wasn't Obama-related, which I think is a debatable assertion, but to placate him/her, I suggested changing it to the actual votes. If you have trouble with AGF because I modified my proposal to please HiLo, that's your problem, not mine. Would you help you if we return to something like the original? We could phrase it as "Obama budget proposals were not passed by Congress." Then it is Obama related, and the Republican stunt is also not mentioned, and not relevant to the statement added, as the statement would have been true regardless of whether they had pulled their stunt or not.William Jockusch (talk) 21:38, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

No, I'm not interested in enabling agenda-driven editing. Congress makes legislation, not POTUS. This biography should reflect stuff that has happened to Barack Obama, not stuff that didn't happen. -- Scjessey (talk) 21:24, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

The problem I have with that is that the Reagan and Bush examples I quoted above were pretty clearly "agenda driven." Furthermore, I am not aware of any requirement in Wikipedia that things that didn't happen be omitted. And, as usual with the endless diversions from the issue, I can find plenty of examples in articles about other Presidents that show that "things that didn't happen" can and do make the articles, such as In 2004, Bush commanded broad support in the Republican Party and did not encounter a primary challenge and this: Critics have alleged that the administration[158] misinformed the public and did not do enough to reduce carbon emissions and deter global warming[159] and even this: the House Republican leadership decided not to put Social Security reform on the priority list for the remainder of their 2005 legislative agenda.William Jockusch (talk) 23:41, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

How many times does this need to be said? What happens in other articles is of no concern. I couldn't give a frog's fat arse what it says in the Bush or Reagan articles - I don't edit on either of them. The editors of a given article form a consensus for what it should contain independently of other articles. It's time you dropped the tendentious behavior and accept that a significant majority of editors reject your agenda-driven proposals. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:24, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

As usual, you are diverting from the actual issue; to repeat; Lack of a budget should be covered in the article. Please cease the diversions and stick to the actual topic. Thank you.

agreed the last budget had zero votes from either party, most certainly notable. Darkstar1st (talk) 15:45, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps notable, but not in this article. If the budget had zero votes, it never went to Obama for signature...since the US Congress is responsible for passing laws (budgets included), the fact that it didn't pass one that was brought up for vote has almost nothing to do with Obama. If they passed one and he vetoed it...that would be another story. But not sending it to him for signature because they didn't pass one? Yawn.  Frank  |  talk  15:57, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Two(?) initiatives bearing his name.

In the "U.S. Senator: 2005–2008" section, under "Legislation", the article says "He introduced two initiatives that bore his name", then lists only one with his name in it. Has something got lost in some editing? HiLo48 (talk) 22:03, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Unemployment graph not consistent with NPOV

I believe that showing the job gains and losses in the unemployment graph gives undue weight to that statistic. I looked at the Wikipedia articles on "unemployment" and "Great Depression". In both cases, there were a large number of graphs of the unemployment rate, but I did not notice any graphs showing job gains and losses.

Making matters worse, the scale on that graph is chosen in a way that makes the job gain and loss bars appear larger than the unemployment rate graph. In other words, the more notable statistic gets less emphasis than the less notable statistic does. William Jockusch (talk) 20:13, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I brought this up a few months back, when there was a different chart, but it didn't get anywhere. I think any graph is a NPOV problem for a biography, when there exist an infinite number of factors complicating any economic data point. Public or private sector? Compared to which other presidency? At the expense of the debt? At the expense of GDP? At higher or lower wages? etc. Also note that this exact data is ubiquitous in White House promotional materials. It's just not good practice for a biography to have such a sunny use of data. —Designate (talk) 17:07, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

The chart has already been changed earlier. I didn't agree with the change and thought it was more appropriate for the Obama presidency article, but others disagreed and the consensus was to keep the current chart in the article. Dave Dial (talk) 13:43, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

The explanation accompanying the proposed removal makes no sense. The graph is a clear indication of the unemployment rate during the specific period of Obama's presidency. The numbers are the numbers, and there's nothing inherently POV about that. I do tend to think that focusing on unemployment and economics, which is a matter of the national and world economics more than one of than presidential actions, is more than a little removed from a person's biography and so is WP:UNDUE in the first place. That is how the game of politics and public perception are played, and could be mentioned in that context. I wouldn't necessarily add economic charts to this article but that's the stable version so it has consensus, any removal would require a clear consensus here to do so, not apparent lack of response to one among several simultaneous hard to fathom proposals. - Wikidemon (talk) 13:47, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Exactly. Also, the edits from the OP have almost all had the same reasoning of POV and seem to indicate a want to lay a preliminary strike for a future battle. Dave Dial (talk) 13:54, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't know what the NPOV aspect would be, but there are two problems with the graph. 1, the scale for unemployment should include the maximum value. The maximum rate was 10.1% in October 2009, so the right side should go up to the next integer, or up to 12 to remain consistant with the number scheme. 2, the origin should be the same on both sides. Granted a value of less than 0% interest rate is meaningless, but not having the origin on the same point makes the graph a little confusing, there is a perception that the unemployment rate has changed much more than it really has because the natural assumption is that the origin line for job losses/gains is the same as for the unemployment rate. It should be fixed purely for proper graphing reasons, and as someone that has had several publications regarding statistical results and reviews journal publications from time to time, I would make the author change that graph for readability before publication. Arzel (talk) 14:02, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

According to the source(Bureau of Labor statistics), the rate was adjusted to 10.0 in October of 2009. The only POV issue I see with the chart is that it should include the data available since the start of the recession(Dec-2007), to show the trend. As the old chart did. This one does give more information, and including both is overkill. So probably best to keep it in the article and explain the economic situation in the body(which I believe is there). Adding more to this BLP, and not the presidency article, seems too much. Dave Dial (talk) 14:16, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

(ec) I was mistakenly commenting on the main unemployment graph, not the change in employment graph. Indeed a far from perfect graph. It's a classic problem, showing a change and its accumulated value over time. I'm not entirely sure I agree that the unemployment rate should be made more explicit here, as there's already a separate graph for that and here it functions as more of a sparkline. It is a little confusing to put a bar chart below a line graph, though, and I'm not too keen on having so much about employment in this article in the first place. - Wikidemon (talk) 14:22, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Demon, are you now saying you support removal of the graph? Just to be clear, I would be fine with that solution.William Jockusch (talk) 18:21, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Chart makes perfect sense in the economic block of the article. It is official statistics from BLS and it illustrates what said in the block. Other presidents have economic charts too. There already was several revisions to the chart by several editors to fit all requests, so please respect their work. Innab (talk) 04:29, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Innab -- you say it makes "perfect sense", but you don't say why. I have given specific reasons why I believe it does not make sense. Namely, it gives undue weight to the change in employment figures, compared with the much more notable unemployment figures. Furthermore, another user has noted that the same data are ubiquitous in White House promotional materials. In light of all of this, the graph should go. I would lastly note that from personal experience, "respect" is in short supply around here. This may be bad, but it is a fact.William Jockusch (talk) 05:24, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

This is truthful, verifiable and reliable information from respected government agency ( Bureau of Labor Statistics ) which responsible for statistics and has nothing to do with promotional materials. Even if Obama used similar statistics in his campaign, that does not mean that we cannot use it. This is a primary economic indicators, so it is not surprising that different people cite this data. It is essential to this article as illustration of economic situation during various periods in his presidency. I have seen this chart in independent newspapers and on TV. Please do not promote your political agenda by removing others work. Innab (talk) 17:37, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

You still haven't answered my fundamental criticism -- it gives more emphasis to the less-notable statistic (change in employment), and less emphasis to the more-notable statistic (unemployment rate).William Jockusch (talk) 15:58, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

"More/less notable" according to whom? By what criteria are you determining that one is notable and the other is not? --Loonymonkey (talk) 16:22, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

For example, if you look at the article on the Great Depression, you see a graph of the unemployment rate right at the top of the article. There is no corresponding graph of job gains and losses. Similarly in the article on the Panic of 1893. In that case, there is a chart [no graph] of unemployment rates right at the top of the article. But job gains and losses don't show up at all. Going back still further, the article on the Panic of 1873 mentions the unemployment rate [with no chart or graph; just a rate], but has no mention of the number of jobs gained or lost. Based on this, it is clear that in non-partisan contexts, where, due to historical distance, no one has an interest in making one party or the other look better, unemployment is viewed as the more important statistic.William Jockusch (talk) 01:05, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

It's still not at all clear what your objection to the graph is (other than there are different graphs on other articles). Again, on what criteria are you basing your claim that the UE Rate is notable yet the Change in Employment is not (and should be omitted)? I don't really see how the data helps or hurts any point of view. Are you worried that it doesn't make job performance under Obama look bad enough? Is that your primary objection? --Loonymonkey (talk) 01:12, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

What is wrong with looking to other articles for guidance? Invariably, supporters of this or that point of view are going to take the position that this or that graph or statistic is appropriate for an article. Looking at other articles is a neutral way to get an idea of what might be fair. If I felt the worst-looking graphs were appropriate, I would be arguing for the inclusion of the ones I'm going to link below. You haven't seen me do that, have you? [The source for this particular graph has a rather strong right-wing bias, and its attribution of 2009 to Obama alone is unfair]. And then there is this graph, which again takes a rather strong right-wing POV. Again, you haven't seen me arguing that it should be put into the article, have you? William Jockusch (talk) 13:37, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Greetings. I am the creator of the graph in question, which was designed to assuage prior concerns of POV and to present essential and section-pertinent information in a concise manner. Some comments pursuant to the discussion above:

1. I don't think this violates WP:UNDUE. To the contrary, this graph succinctly presents the essence of the Economic policy section and helps ensure this FA continues to be comprehensive in its coverage.
2. By displaying both the UR (a %) and the net change (an absolute #) together, readers can more informedly interpret statistics by ascertaining the employment outcomes of Obama's presidency using two different indicators of essentially the same parameter: employment.
3. I believe displaying stats from only the timeframe of Obama's presidency, as opposed to going back further in time, is the best way to adhere to WP:NPOV and WP:PERTINENCE. Going back to any point prior to Obama's presidency (about which the section is dedicated) would require a judgment call (i.e., a POV). Nevertheless, a link to unemployment rate is strategically placed in the image's caption should the reader desire to learn about the UR in more detail or in prior administrations.
4. Presenting a more detailed analysis of employment during Obama's administration (e.g., public v. private, debt, GDP, etc.) would be interesting but would then violate WP:UNDUE. This image presents the high-level information that serves as the basis of its section.

Regards —Eustress ^talk 17:47, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Eustress. Innab (talk) 01:49, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Judicial appointments

Hi,

Many of the previous presidens have a section entitled 'judicial appointments'. There is no such section for president Obama. He ofcourse appointed 2 Supreme Court Justices already, for example. Robin.lemstra (talk) 15:20, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment Check out List of federal judges appointed by Barack Obama. Safiel (talk) 15:26, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment On further review, I see this article does lack a Judicial Summary section. I will see about inserting one similar to that in George W. Bush. Safiel (talk) 22:10, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

This is already a large article. The two SCOTUS appointments are given coverage, but I see no reason to expand that to its own section. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:29, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

POV Tag

Discussion has devolved into debates on the political leanings of newspapers and politicians' love affair offspring. The proposal to add a POV tag has garnered precious little support. Tarc (talk) 01:13, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I've removed the POV tag that William Jockusch added as it seems to be only him in the above discussions who feels the article violates WP:NPOV. If I'm mistaken, please undo. --NeilN talk to me 13:23, 17 May 2012 (UTC) 100% approve of this action. One or two editors cannot hold an article hostage when consensus is clearly against them. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:25, 17 May 2012 (UTC) I'm really getting sick of the shenanigans on this talk page, but I'm just chiming in to say I honestly don't see any NPOV problems on this page and I support the removal of the tag. I actually hate when editors slap all these various tags onto pages in general (even ones that obviously need improvement), but I really don't see any problems with this page touting how "wonderful" Obama is.. It just simply states the FACTS and lets the reader decide for themselves whether they agree or disagree with his opinions, policies, etc.. The assertion that because there are criticisms on other former politician's bios somehow means this page is lacking a NPOV just doesn't fly. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 20:06, 17 May 2012 (UTC) I stumbled across this issue and thought I’d offer my thoughts on two major points to help prevent further unnecessary conflict here. NPOV tags and other I-Don't-Like-It tags may be removed whenever there is a consensus to do so. The “consensus” may be based upon a common-sense reading of pre-existing discussion threads (a lone hold-out, for instance, who slaps such a tag in the face of a clear consensus against his or her wishes). Or the removal of the tag may be done by consensus over whether the tag is unnecessary, irregardless of whether the underlying dispute has been resolved with a clear consensus. Consensus rules on Wikipedia. At all times. For all things. The only tags that may not be removed without follow-through are AfD and MfD tags; that is not applicable here. Wikipedia’s “anyone can edit” principle of collaborative writing makes for a widely diverse editorial base where there is bound to be someone who believes that gold is a really bad thing. Because of that, it is not the job of mere wikipedians to don their powdered wigs and presume to debate over tea with their little fingers held in the proper position as to how history ought to be judging a sitting president. We look towards reliable sources for facts and we rely upon most-reliable mainstream sources such as The New York Times, Newsweek and The Washington Post for guidance as to how much weight should be given to the positive and negative issues and to help identify what those issues are. Since Obama hasn’t finished his presidency, there will be relatively few most-reliable sources that have undertaken all-encompassing historical examinations of his tenure. Greg L (talk) 22:45, 17 May 2012 (UTC) That's a cogent and sensible analysis, and it's nice to see a subtle nuanced view of how consensus works. Alas, it is a general statement that could apply to any issue on the encyclopedia, but it omits two overriding factors specific to this article. First, this is a featured article, one of the most prominent and trafficked on the encyclopedia, and a current hot-button political matter. That means we have to be particularly wary of editing process that degrades the article or mis-serves the reader, and a POV tag definitely does that. If there's a dispute we can handle it within the Wikipedia community and not mess the experience up for the tens of thousands of readers per day. And second, this article has had trouble for years with bad faith, fake, tendentious, and off-wikipedia attacks. Over the past few years these provocations have wasted thousands and probably tens of thousands of hours time of otherwise productive editors, and caused a lot of anxiety and grief. There have been hundreds of blocked and banned accounts, and as we near the election sockpuppets are becoming a daily occurrence again. We have to be quick, forceful, and matter-of-fact in clearing out that mess and not let troublemakers deliberately hijack the process and mire us. At this point (and for a long time, really), the responsible editors around here have been fed up and aren't in a mood to be lectured by well meaning newcomers, admin boards, or arbcom about one process or another. The rules aren't a suicide pact, as they say. Both of these, arguably, fit within the consensus argument, in which case there is a strong consensus here that POV tags, notice board disputes, AN/I reports, personal accusations on the talk page, attempts to add litanies of criticism, etc., can be dismissed more or less out of hand after politely (initially) informing the editor about consensus on the matter. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:55, 18 May 2012 (UTC) I agree with your conclusion (and remedy), that I highlighted, above. This is a high-profile article that attracts more than its share of hits. Ample POV-pushing has occurred on other types of articles too, like terrorism-related ones over the last few years. In such cases, far, far too much time can be—and has been—devoted to wikidrama, which tends to feed on itself if we allow it to. When the long-standing consensus view is clear and that consensus view solidly upholds Wikipedia’s Five Pillars, we can—and should—more quickly end the disruption right here, without letting the wikidrama spread and further waste everyone’s time. Greg L (talk) 20:06, 18 May 2012 (UTC) Interesting that your list of the three "most reliable sources" consists of two left-wing sources and one center-left source (the WaPo). Complaints about the left-wing bias of all three are legion in the conservative media, e.g. digitally altered photo of Michelle Bachmann on Newsweek cover. If you define "most reliable sources" to mean the "most notable left-wing sources", long-term bias is inevitable.William Jockusch (talk) 16:20, 21 May 2012 (UTC) Some perspective is needed here. What you call "left wing" is actually the center. What you call "conservative media" is actually so far to the right that if you were driving in a NASCAR race you would've hit the wall. The listed sources are perfectly fine. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:11, 21 May 2012 (UTC) You, Scjessey, are of course quite correct. Arguments such as William’s are non-falsifiable; one could point to RSs discussing how The New York Times, Newsweek and The Washington Post are all considered to be mainstream, centrist publications, but such critics would merely declare that the RS is itself a “left-wing” organization run by effete snobs. Such nonsense-traps must be avoided here or we will just get bogged down in circuitous wikidrama that would be as meaningful as arguing which of earth’s 3000 religions is the One True Religion.©™® At some point, we declare that “common street wisdom talks” and “endless primary policy debate walks.” Greg L (talk) 00:17, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Not quite as simple as all that, but I think you just proved the counter point.JOJ Hutton 19:46, 21 May 2012 (UTC) Here is a simple, objective criterion. How many times has a source endorsed the Democratic candidate for President over the last 40 years? How many times the Republican?William Jockusch (talk) 00:44, 22 May 2012 (UTC) You know, I didn’t vote for Barack and could not possibly care less how much negative stuff is in our article on him. I only care that how much we have and what it is about mirrors mainstream, most-reliable sources. Mere wikipedians have no business pretending to be cigar-chewing editors at a major metropolitan newsroom barking inquiries as to the whereabouts of Jimmy Olsen and pretending that it is within our dominion to debate what major shortcomings of a president ought to be covered here or not. Your proposal sounds fair enough. So if you know the answers for The New York Times, Newsweek and The Washington Post, I’d personally be quite interested in seeing if reality matches intuition. Greg L (talk) 02:08, 22 May 2012 (UTC) I did some googling. Here is what I came up with. The NYT has endorsed the Democratic candidate in every election since 1960 . The WaPo has endorsed the Democratic candidate in every election since 1980, with the exception of 1988, when it didn't endorse anyone. [I couldn't find their endorsements before 1980 and don't have the patience to go through one election at a time.](1, 2, 3) I was unable to find any record of Newsweek Presidential endorsements. However, I did come across their latest cover, which does give a rather clear impression: Newsweek William Jockusch (talk) 12:21, 22 May 2012 (UTC) So what? Just because the editorial board of a news organ decides to endorse a particular politician, it doesn't mean that it must be dripping with bias. These are respectable newspapers with very good reputations. Only in the echo chamber of the extreme right wing is that respectability called into question. Perhaps the NYT leans 4 or 5% to the left in the way the Wall Street Journal leans 4 or 5% to the right, but that's insignificant when it comes to reliable sources and insignificant when compared to the extremes of stuff like DailyKos on the left and RedState on the right. Please step outside that crazy bubble of Free Republic and The Blaze and get some perspective. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:45, 22 May 2012 (UTC) William, please do not add ref tags to the Talk pages. I changed your post only to include your links within the body of your text. It really clutters up the Talk page and makes it difficult to read. Regarding your accusations of bias, the endorsements an editorial board of a journalistic reference does not necessarily reflect it's bias. There are different criteria used for endorsements and making editorial decisions. In any case, even if the editorial/opinion section of a news organization is left/right, it does not exclude the source from being a reliable source. Most cities have at least two competing news organizations that have opposite political views. The Detroit News and Detroit Free Press almost always endorse different candidates, but both are reliable sources. Same with the two big Chicago papers. We differentiate between the opinion section and the news section. So this big 'conspiracy' you are claiming is just a futility. Let's move on from this silliness. Dave Dial (talk) 14:19, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Well… I appear to have walked all fat, dumb & happy into that one, didn’t I? I wholeheartedly agree with Scjessey and Dave Dial. No matter what the issue, right-wing ideology can raise points that on first-blush seem to undermine common sense. They will complain about the “liberal left” and their agendas like “global warming” and cite how *in fact* the earth’s temperature decreased from 1998 to 2008. All rational people can do in the face of a hurricane of diversion is sigh, quote Benjamin Disraeli’s “Lies, damned lies, and statistics,” and fill up our talk pages with a boring glut of “Well… that bit is true but is highly misleading.” (You can see that the earth’s temperature really did decline across that decade using those two cherry-picked endpoints.) And so it is with the fact that these centrist publications have widely endorsed Democratic candidates over the years. The far-right trumpets that fact as irrefutable proof that they have patented and copyrighted all that is True and Holy®™©. The simple fact is that mainstream publications like The Washington Post, which is physically located in the midst of the political heart of the country, tries to appeal to the middle of the bell curve with its news articles and feature articles so as to not alienate either half of its readership. So too for Newsweek. Features like editorials, blogs, guest commentary, and endorsements are understood to be persuasive writing; these centrist publications are totally up-front in declaring when they are indulging in the practice. None of my critique should be interpreted as dumping on right-wing conservatives; left-wing kooks like Rachel Maddow are as extremely liberal as Rush Limbaugh is conservative—that’s their schtick and both are financially rewarded for taking extreme positions. However, at least Rachel has an over-the-top, rather tongue-in-cheek delivery style that suggests she isn’t trying to camouflage her material as centrist. It’s quite simple: for all the shortcomings that one can point to with regard to publications like Newsweek, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal—they are all the product of flawed human beings—they clearly endeavor to appeal to the middle of the bell curve and are therefore the best we wikipedians have to look towards when gauging the balance of good and bad in a president that is encyclopedically notable. Greg L (talk) 20:28, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Dave, regarding cleaning up my post, thank you. I didn't know you could do references that way. Regarding bias, I understand the distinction between "reliable" and "bias." I further understand that the NYT meets the Wikipedia definition of "reliable", and I am not contesting that. However, when you have an editor stating that for facts and we rely upon most-reliable mainstream sources such as The New York Times, Newsweek and The Washington Post for guidance as to how much weight should be given to the positive and negative issues and to help identify what those issues are., this makes arriving at NPOV to be impossible, as they have excluded sources which give fair weight to the conservative POV. If they had listed an equal proportion of conservative and liberal sources, I would have no issue. Additionally, while I do not contest that these sources meet the Wikipedia definition of "reliable", I would strongly contest the assertion of most reliable. Just looking at Newsweek, in addition to the digital alteration of Michelle Bachmann, we have the false "Koran in a toilet" article that led to riots in which a bunch of people were killed.William Jockusch (talk) 20:10, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Reality has a well-known liberal bias. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:34, 22 May 2012 (UTC) As we busy ourselves here slitting the throats of our fellow wikipedians and trying to hasten their reward in the wikipedian afterlife because their political theology isn’t straight, why not some political fun? Scroll forward to 5:15 into it to see a jewel. Greg L (talk) 21:01, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Since who has endorsed what isn't a criteria of a reliable source in this project, your tangent regarding this topic is largely irrelevant to Obama's Wikipedia article. As your justification of POV tag's placement has garnered no support over several days of discussion, I believe it is time to move on. Tarc (talk) 13:37, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Greg -- a publication that's in the "middle" would find itself agreeing with the majority of the public. Hard to maintain that claim with a publication that endorsed (say) Mondale over Reagan, which view a rather convincing majority of the public went on to reject in the following election. Taking a straight pro-Dem POV cannot be the "middle", almost by definition.William Jockusch (talk) 21:26, 22 May 2012 (UTC) William, the consensus seems to be clear on this matter so it is now over. My 20:28, 22 May 2012 post fully addressed the issue of editorials and endorsements and yet you posted here on that point as if I hadn’t addressed it. Perhaps five short paragraphs were too many: I wrote how editorials and endorsements are examples of persuasive writing by these publications and how that is distinct from their articles, which they try to keep centrist so as to not come across as partisan and alienate a wide segment of their readership. There is no point to your further harping on this. Please don’t interpret the community’s failure to respond to your continually raising the issue as tacit acquiescence to your reasoning. Bye. Greg L (talk) 21:36, 22 May 2012 (UTC) William is missing another point. He says "they have excluded sources which give fair weight to the conservative POV." That suggests that this article's editors have given fair weight to the progressive POV, but not the conservative one. That simply isn't true. The editors have used neutral reporting (not progressive/liberal) except in instances where less neutral publications are cited for their opinion in particular. William seems unable to see the difference between using the NYT as a source of unbiased, flat reporting and using the NYT for its editorial opinion. He is suggesting all instances where the NYT is referenced should be "balanced" with a source considered conservative (and the same for other sources he sees as liberal). -- Scjessey (talk) 22:40, 22 May 2012 (UTC) Yeah, the "balanced" news section that published a story about an affair they imagined John McCain had a decade or two back, while simultaneously failing to notice the affair and love child John Edwards was having, until the National Enquirer scooped them one time too many, nice "balance" that . . . — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 00:27, 24 May 2012 (UTC) And let's not forget this gem of "balance": an examination of the entire 1,850 pages of evidence gathered by the prosecution in the four months after the accusation yields a more ambiguous picture. It shows that while there are big weaknesses in Mr. Nifong’s case, there is also a body of evidence to support his decision to take the matter to a jury. William Jockusch (talk) 00:34, 24 May 2012 (UTC) Sure. And notwithstanding the truism that “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar,” that nasty ol’ dump-on-the-Republicans, popular media that is so slanted towards the Democrats breathlessly begged to differ. Greg L (talk) 00:47, 24 May 2012 (UTC) And with that, I think we are done here. This is not a forum, and not the place for you to rail against the librul media. I appreciate your passion, but it's better directed in a more constructive manner. Maybe your should look into improving articles that you do not have a bias against, instead of trying to drag down the articles you do have a bias against. And really, if you are not going to suggest specific improvements, don't keep making these types of accusations that are designed for message boards. Thank you. Dave Dial (talk) 01:06, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Indonesia story

New York Times writer Janny Scott is oft-quoted in this article, and has something interesting to add about his stay in Indonesia. His mother DID NOT protect young Barry from the extremely racist taunts directed at him, but instead taught the little boy to treat it as a joke, or to ignore it altogether."Obama’s Young Mother Abroad" --Pawyilee (talk) 12:27, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Deficits and unsustainability belong in the article

The Clinton article mentions his surpluses multiple times. It notes that they were the first since 1969. Similarly, the Reagan article repeatedly mentions his large deficits and criticisms of them. Both the Clinton and George W. Bush articles include graphs of their respective surpluses and deficits, meaning that the emphasis is even greater than it is in this article. Since the current deficits are (in GDP terms) far worse than anything that happened under Reagan, they belong. It is further notable that the Chairman of the Federal Reserve says the deficits are "unsustainable." In light of all of this, this belongs in the article, and it's not even a close call.William Jockusch (talk) 05:18, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:CRYSTALBALL and WP:NOTNEWS. The other articles have some historical perspective. We have no idea if a comment made in February will have future notability with respect to Barack Obama. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 05:44, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Plenty of criticism out there about the unsustainability of the deficits. Would you prefer a more extensive discussion? I will add that neither of the policies you mention appear to apply. I am getting tired of a pattern I am seeing of posts that allege that this or that critical addition violates thus and such a Wikipedia Policy, when a closer examination makes it clear that it does not. The notability is not related to this comment or that; rather, it is the pattern of criticism that the budget deficits are unsustainable.William Jockusch (talk) 13:01, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Again, what happens in other articles has no bearing on what happens in this one. Also, the annual budget deficit is lower as a percentage of GDP than it was when Obama took office. And most of the annual deficit is a legacy of the Bush admin tax cuts and Bush admin wars. If you want to make proposals for this article, first make sure they are actually related to Barack Obama's life in a significant way and then make sure your assertion is backed up by a preponderance of reliable sources. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:52, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Are you arguing that the Obama article is somehow uniquely unsuited to discussion of deficits? Is NPOV defined on some kind of ad-hoc basis, where deficits get significant treatment in the Reagan/Bush/Clinton articles, each of which makes the Republican look bad or the Democrat look good, but not in the Obama article, which makes the Democrat look bad? Are Clinton's surplusses somehow uniquely relevant to his life story, such that they get a graph in the article, while Obama's deficits are irrelevant and have nothing to do with his life story, so should not get a graph? William Jockusch (talk) 15:54, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm arguing that this article is independent of the others you mention, just like all Wikipedia articles. Each article reflects the consensus of those who write it. Another thing to understand is that there is considerably more material to work with when dealing with Barack Obama than with his predecessors. There are a number of reasons for this, including (but not limited to) Obama's background/ethnicity and the increased availability of online sourcing in the last few years. Not long after Obama announced his first run for President, the sheer volume of information led to the use of summary style. This article now represents only a brief summary/overview of the many existing articles on Obama, so issues of WP:WEIGHT are extremely important. Also, it is well known that the deficits that you wish to highlight are almost entirely the result of the failed policies of the Bush administration, so it seems that making a big deal out of them in this article would represent undue weight. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:06, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Of course you are. That makes it easier to bias the articles. For example, clearly the Clinton surplusses are important, because they make Clinton look good. And the Obama deficits are not important, because they would make Obama look bad. So by avoiding cross-article comparisons, you can argue that each article is NPOV. If you want to keep bias in the articles, you absolutely have to avoid comparing them to one another, or it all falls apart.William Jockusch (talk) 00:46, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

This is getting old. Actually, it got old a long time ago. We're here to discuss improving this article as a biography of Obama, not supposed bias, the need to add criticism, or trying to manipulate things to balance portrayals of Republicans and Democrats. If you have trouble with any other article, discuss it there. Meanwhile, please don't accuse other editors of bad faith. There doesn't seem to be any consensus for this right now and unless you come up with a substantive argument on why this is relevant and of due weight to the biography, there's not much point. - Wikidemon (talk) 02:41, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Demon, it would be easier to respect your admonition if you made similar admonitions when scJessey accused me of bad faith, as he does in numerous other locations on this page.William Jockusch (talk) 13:44, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

I have not accused you of bad faith. I said it was getting "really hard to assume good faith". Why? Because of your tendentious behavior, quite frankly. Because this article doesn't reflect the evil caricature of Barack Obama painted by the right-wing echo chamber, you assume it's biased and needs to be "balanced". In fact, Wikipedians have gone to quite extraordinary lengths to make this article as neutral as possible. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:59, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

(To William Jockusch). You may want to rethink your last post here. Do you really mean to suggest that it's okay to make tit-for-tat accusations against other editors because they've accused you of something? Both of those are explicitly against the article probation conditions that governs this page. You announced and vowed, in so many words, that you will advocate to make this article look more negative to Obama, something that is not a legitimate purpose for proposing biographical article content. You're on a collision course with editing process here. The sooner you realize that, the sooner you can begin accomplishing something constructive if that is your purpose. - Wikidemon (talk) 15:45, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

speaking of old, hard to imagine a user with as much exp not knowing the most basic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Lead_section#Introductory_text which specifies the need for critism, something i am unable to find, and have mentioned before. the current article reads like a wp:peacock. Darkstar1st (talk) 03:05, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

You don't have to imagine, I know. We don't add criticism just for the sake of adding criticism, in the lede or anyplace else. Please don't egg this user on. If they're going to contribute productively the approach has to change. - Wikidemon (talk) 03:16, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Why do you oppose the very guide for the lede which specifically mentions criticism? have you us believe there be none of this president, is there some other reason obscured? you answer confused me, plz state specifically which guide would prevent the criticism required by the basic lede guide. should it simply be your opinion, or the opinion of your unidentified "we", plz begone. i would also ask you hold you opinions of the laborious nature of this convo, i am equally frustrated with you, but neither rants belong here. Darkstar1st (talk) 04:23, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Guidelines follow consensus, not the other way around. Neither this article, nor most any other on Wikipedia save for some special cases like those about films, (1) add negative opinions of commentators to the lede or anywhere else merely for the sake of presenting negative views, or (2) tries to make its subject look just as negative as the articles about the subject's competitors. We, meaning the community of editors here, have already considered proposals to restructure the article this way several times and soundly rejected them. Things are added, if at all, because they are well sourced, of due weight, and relevant to the subject of the article, in this case the life, career, and legacy of a person. If you must, other than WP:CONSENSUS the relevant policies include WP:NPOV, WP:BLP, and WP:POLICY. I'm not going to debate you on this, I'm just reporting how these discussions have turned out. The editor I'm addressing is advocating vociferously and repeatedly for things that just aren't going to happen, and making accusations of bad faith in the process. Depending on how things progress, that will lead at best to people tuning out and ignoring them. That's not productive for the encyclopedia, or from their perspective either if what they're after is a change to the article. - Wikidemon (talk) 05:02, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

The lead...summarize the most important points—including any prominent controversies. [8]. are you are suggesting these issues are not controversial? did the "we" decide no controversy should be included in the lede? if not, perhaps you would add one more apropos then these you and we deemed insignifigant? Darkstar1st (talk) 05:17, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

You're quoting a style guideline. The community has decided several times, firmly, that it will not add criticism, controversies, or negative material merely for the sake of adding criticism, controversies, or negative material. If there's a significant relevant issue that otherwise merits inclusion and it happens to be positive or negative, or criticism, or praise, it's included because it's significant and relevant, not because it pushes the article in a positive or negative direction. Wikipedia's articles are written for encyclopedic value, not partisan handicapping, and the chips fall where they may. That's pretty basic. If you want to find that in the passage you're quoting, it's in there. Meanwhile, the proposer's accusing other editors of bad faith motives, demanding that this article's praise-level be adjusted, or trying to equalize Obama's image against corresponding American politicians from a rival party, are not winning or even viable arguments here. - Wikidemon (talk) 05:40, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

When writing about controversies in the lead of the biography of a living person, notable material should neither be suppressed nor allowed to overwhelm[9], you repeated that we decided to not add controversy, yet you and we do not wp:own and have been overruled. i doubt anyone reading this would agree with you there have been no notable controversies associated with Obama. Darkstar1st (talk) 06:33, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

It's really quite simple. None of the so-called "controversies" are notable enough to put them in the lede. Doing so would be a gross example of undue weight. So the guideline has been followed to the letter. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:12, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

So even though the economy has been the main issue during his entire presidency, we cannot mention it because it is a controversy that is not notable enough for the lead? How does that work? Arzel (talk) 14:21, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

The economy is mentioned in the lede. Specifically, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act. As a result, the economy is on the right track and much of the damage done by the Bush administration has been repaired. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:06, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

If the damage has been repaired then why does the economy still suck? Unemployement is still above 8% (a number Obama claimed it would not go above), and if you add in the number of people that have simply left the workforce the unemployment is well over 10%. Unemployement for new grads is something like 30%. We have the lowest participation rate in our workforce in decades. 60% of the country think we are on the wrong track, thus none of that sounds like the right track. Stating what Obama did without stating the effect is not a very neutral presentation. Arzel (talk) 15:32, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

To address various points, the community has firmly decided to reject making the article more negative as a basis for adding criticism or controversy, or to have them here for their own sake, something made explicit several times in lengthy discussion. This decision is consistent with policy across the encyclopedia, was made explicit several times and put into the FAQs at the top of this page. If you don't believe it you can check the archives, or refer to FAQs 6 through 9. I'm not going to get into a WP:FORUM discussion over whether Obama was effective dealing with the recession and stimulus programs that he inherited, but it may well be that a characterization of the economy belongs in the lede, and the fact of the deficits deserve more prominence in the article. To get anywhere, that discussion needs to be had on terms of how significant and relevant that is to the biographical story of the President, and how that could be worded in a way that is neutral and encyclopedic in tone. On the other hand, if that material is one missile among a rapid-fire list of supposed controversies proposed just to have negative material, accompanied by accusations against the editors here, it's hardly worth discussion. - Wikidemon (talk) 15:59, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

All I am saying is that if you are going to promote what Obama has done regarding the economy, you should at least point out that the economy has not improved much and that he has been plagued by continued unemployment and historically low numbers in the workforce. It is well known and not an unimportant aspect of his presidency. Arzel (talk) 16:31, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Arzel, nobody in the Obama administration ever said employment would not go above 8%. That is a lie based on this document that discussed the possible impact of the stimulus (prior to the legislation being written). And anyone with any understanding of economics who is not a Republican trying to get their man elected will tell you the country is better off now than at the start of Obama's term. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:15, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Only a person with no understanding of how the economy works would actually believe that. The large influx of printed money into our system is going to cause huge increase in inflation. Why do you think gas prices are still high? Our money is has been devalued my a substantial amount, and if not for the current failure of the EU the true effects would be immediately noticable. It is, of course, the whole point of Krugman's economic approach. Inflate yourself out of debt. Temporarily good for the government's books, but bad for anyone with assest or our seniors on fixed incomes, which includes most people. Terrible for the very poor. It is ironic that Obama's policies will do more to destroy the middle class than anything GWB ever did, all in the name of 'Fairness'. Go ahead though, continue on with your campaign for Obama. Arzel (talk) 16:28, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

The question of whether most of Obama's policies are helping or hurting things will have to wait for historians. AFAIK, it's well accepted among mainstream economists and serious commentators that the stimulus and bailout programs, which Obama inherited and continued from the Bush administration until they became politically untenable, saved the economy and a number of industries from a vastly worse crisis, at the cost of deficits that contribute to long term debt, and that the deficits and resulting debt are a long term drag on the economy that will push it over some tipping point if they continue long enough. That's all kinda basic macroeconomics, right? As President, Obama has a central role in the policy and programs, but his administration is just one piece of the machinery along with the legislature, the states, other countries, and consumers, workers, and companies that make up the economy. Dealing with the economy is one of his main job functions, and ways in which his success will be judged. So I think it's fair to say that he presided over the Great Recession, which began shortly before he took office, and a considerable expansion in the federal debts and deficits during a period of reduced (?) tax revenue and increased government spending. Whatever the pundits, political horse race handicappers, opponents and supporters, and news commentators have to say about that is spin. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:44, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Agree, not only deficits, but no budget should certainly be relevant to this president. Darkstar1st (talk) 01:06, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

OMG stop the presses; I agree with substantial portions of Demon's last comment. To wit: the bailout program was inherited from Bush. And it is widely agreed that it was necessary, helpful, and surprisingly inexpensive. [10] There is some controversy about the auto bailout in that regard, but this issue is small enough that it can probably be left out. The stimulus is more controversial in that regard[11][12]. Also I don't know how much of the stimulus was inherited from Bush; certainly large portions of it were not. Furthermore, there is this [13]. Can we actually arrive at a (gasp!) consensus on how to include this?William Jockusch (talk) 19:02, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Again, please remember, This is not a forum! It doesn't matter how you personally feel about this. This isn't a debate of political opinions. I would suggest we close this thread as it's devolved into exactly the sort of discussion that is prohibited. --Loonymonkey (talk) 19:08, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

We appeared to be making progress towards a consensus?William Jockusch (talk) 21:48, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. A strong consensus exists that the economic policy section is fine and there is no need to include any of this additional crap. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:29, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

"Strong Consensus", hello? I count at least three and maybe four users above saying it is relevant. So does "Strong Conensus" really mean "Stong Consensus", or does it have another meaning I'm unfamiliar with?William Jockusch (talk) 17:06, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

There was a strong consensus for the economic policy section as written as of a year or two ago, or whenever it was that it got a major update or last fended off one proposal or another. That's worth revisiting from time to time as events unfold. You'll find that a lot of editors are weary of jumping in every time there's a new proposal on an old matter, particularly when they come rapidly from a single editor. They'll opine for sure if you actually try to change the article or announce you're going to do the same. One thing that's definitely happened in the past year or two is that the recession bottomed out and ended, support economic stimulus waned, the parties have had show-downs over the budget and debt, and in an election year both parties are making hay where they can out of different economic and budget issues. It's reasonable to update the article to note that, to the extent it's a significant biographical matter affecting the President. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:58, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

Consensus for what? Nobody is even discussing specific reliably sourced additions to the article. You're just stating your opinions on Obama, stimulus, etc. and posting links to articles that you agree with. That's not what this talk page is for. --Loonymonkey (talk) 17:55, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

Recent news on Obama's marijuana smoking

• A User's Guide To Smoking Pot With Barack Obama. May 25, 2012. By Gavon Laessig. BuzzFeed.
• Obama’s high school pot-smoking detailed in Maraniss book. May 25, 2012. By Olivier Knox. Yahoo! News.

I think the current info in the article is a little thin, lacking perspective, insulting to cannabis users, and obvious political spin:

Obama has also written and talked about using alcohol, marijuana, and cocaine during his teenage years to "push questions of who I was out of my mind."[23] At the 2008 Civil Forum on the Presidency, Obama described his high-school drug use as a great moral failure.[24]

I suggest some more detail be added. Or at least do not just let remain only the political BS and gloss. That would not be WP:NPOV. --Timeshifter (talk) 05:48, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Give us something specific to discuss. What words would you suggest be added, and where? HiLo48 (talk) 06:23, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Maybe something about Obama's phrase "club of disaffection". That is slightly less disingenuous on his part. I don't know. Something other than just his own current BS for political purposes. Anything from the current reports from his friends from those days. They have less reason to cover their ass like Obama is obviously doing. --Timeshifter (talk) 10:56, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

i don't feel the fringe marijuana rumors are terribly relevant. got reliable sources? not sure 'buzzfeed' qualifies there. Cramyourspam (talk) 00:23, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

There is a new book that names the sources, I believe. His classmates. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:31, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I remember reading in an article about Obama how as a teenager or young adult he thought about using heroin but did not. He did use cocaine and this should be written about in the article. He even admitted to smoking pot and didn't pull a 'I didn't inhale!' like Bill Clinton who clearly did get high, but Obama said 'The point of smoking pot was to inhale.'72.78.246.21 (talk) 02:30, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

Merge discussion

per WP:SNOW, the content is not remotely suitable for this particular article. Please resolve this discussion elsewhere
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
THIS Discussion is closed as incorrect process (it constitutes a discussion to merge content where it will be deleted)--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:40, 30 May 2012 (UTC) There is no encyclopedic reason I can think of for Barack Obama on Twitter to be a separate article. If there is anything noteworthy in that article, it can be a nicely referenced paragraph in his biographical article. Arguing that splitting it off because otherwise the main article would be too big strikes me as very wrong: another paragraph won't hurt the article and you might as well argue that his legislative career, or his personal life, should be split off. These standalone X on Twitter articles are an epidemic that needs to be stopped. Drmies (talk) 16:57, 30 May 2012 (UTC) I completely agree. HiLo48 (talk) 18:19, 30 May 2012 (UTC) I agree 100% as well.--JayJasper (talk) 18:21, 30 May 2012 (UTC) There is nothing in Barack Obama on Twitter that belongs at Barack Obama. This discussion is a thinly veiled attempt to circumvent WP:AFD discussion where deleting content is discusse. Anyone who has ever edited the main bio knows this stuff does not belong in that article. I have tried to get much more important included in that article.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:25, 30 May 2012 (UTC) Agree with TonyTheTiger. There's nothing to merge there. I'd support deletion. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:29, 30 May 2012 (UTC) "There is nothing in Barack Obama on Twitter that belongs at Barack Obama". That deserves a prize for irony, or a "Hoist on your own petard" barnstar. Drmies (talk) 18:35, 30 May 2012 (UTC) I'd AfD it myself but my tools have vanished, which is akin to having one of my arms fall off. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:37, 30 May 2012 (UTC) Having 5 different Foo on Twitter discussions is not proper process. As Scjessey (talk · contribs) says above, Proper process is one AFD regading Foo on Twitter.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:39, 30 May 2012 (UTC) I have closed discussion here and removed merge tags at Barack Obama on Twitter, Ashton Kutcher on Twitter and Rihanna on Twitter. I am also watching Lady Gaga on Twitter and Justin Bieber on Twitter. There should be one discussion at WP:AFD on deleting, redirecting, merging or keeping these articles.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:56, 30 May 2012 (UTC) There should not be one discussion. Justin Bieber survived a merge discussion. Lady Gaga survived additional scrutiny at the DYK level. They should be treated separately. (That said, I think Obama and the others may survive an AfD but they need work to clearly show independent notability. Bieber has around 100 sources from media sources precisely for this reason. Gaga could probably get similar sources. Both Gaga and Bieber have the sources to demonstrate independent WP:GNG, which is a main consideration. When writing these, I mostly avoided things like Twitterholic because newspapers seemed the easier route for WP:RS and WP:GNG than Twitterholic and other social media research. --LauraHale (talk) 19:19, 30 May 2012 (UTC) There is no possibility for a merge outcome, as the content would be rejected here. Mass deletion nominations, and massively parallel procedures of any sort, are usually a bad idea because they create a lot of work and inconsistent outcomes. Five isn't a huge number, but it's still better handled as a single discussion about multiple articles. The outcome may well be that some are kept and others deleted. This is the exact sort of issue that needs to be in the applicable notability guideline, an essay, or the like to address. Do we proliferate the encyclopedia with a bunch of X on twitter, X on Facebook, X on Pinterest, X on LinkedIn, etc., do we exclude them all, or do we handle only the most notable ones on a case by case basis? But speaking of centralized discussions, nothing anybody says here is going to really shape that decision. Best head on over to that article and/or WP:N. - Wikidemon (talk) 20:22, 30 May 2012 (UTC) I too agree a merge discussion here is a proposal to merge content where it will be deleted. This page has zero chance of hosting the content at issue as Wikidemon (talk · contribs) notes. If I am wrong in closing the discussion, I accept that. My belief is that there should be a consensus reached that if an article passes WP:GNG, it should be kept. Having a discussion here is a waste of time, IMO. If a third party other than Drmies (talk · contribs) feels my strike was wrong. I should have closed it in another manner, but there is no way anything is going to be merged here.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 20:34, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

This page's archive box

The archive box seems to be a tad messed up. I'm not sure how to fix it though.--Rockfang (talk) 22:50, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

I put what I think the problem is at User:Johnuniq/Sandbox, and will notify the admin who did the edit. Johnuniq (talk) 23:19, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Transparency issues regarding the TPP not mentioned

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Closing agenda pushing nonsense. Safiel (talk) 23:29, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

---

Extended content

There is no mention of the Obama administration's refusal to make privy to Congress and the American people any text within the TPP while keeping the MPPA/RIAA up-to-date knowledge about it. Can someone mention this and how this could lead to a possible lawsuit and revolt from the American people and possible impeachment? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.17.251.213 (talk) 19:48, 3 June 2012 (UTC) Revolt? Impeachment? How do you expect to be taken seriously with such hyperbole? SMP0328. (talk) 19:57, 3 June 2012 (UTC) This is a global encyclopaedia, not an insider American political forum. What is TPP and MPPA and RIAA? HiLo48 (talk) 20:32, 3 June 2012 (UTC) The RIAA is the Recording Industry Association of America, the MPPA is probably supposed to be MPAA, the Motion Picture Association of America, and the TPP is the Trans-Pacific Partnership. CityOfSilver 20:36, 3 June 2012 (UTC) On the TPP and Ron Kirk talk pages, I just removed this user's rhetorical questions and hyperbole altogether, as it is unconstuctive. This user isn't looking to improve the articles, he/she just wants to raise awareness and get people riled up and wants this pet topic to be mentioned in as many articles as possible. The secrecy surrounding the TPP is IMHO lamentable, but if Obama hasn't commented on it or been personally named as involved in it, then it's simply not an appropriate topic for the article about him. Personally I think this whole thread can just be deleted, but since others have already commented, I guess it has to stay. —mjb (talk) 22:22, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Edit Request, regarding Sotomayor the Hispanic

Please change "becoming the first Hispanic to be a Supreme Court Justice" in the Domestic Policy section to "becoming the first Hispanic Supreme Court Justice". Using Hispanic as an adjective makes the sentence run smoother, describes (rather than defines) her according to her ethnicity and defines her by occupation, and accurately reflects the wording used in the CNN source. Thank you. (By the way, I am an autoconfirmed user, but this large article crashes my browser when I try to edit it.) InedibleHulk (talk) 00:21, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Done—cyberpower ^Chat_Offline 01:04, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Article Cleanup

This doesn't have to be a long-running conversation, but I was just curious whether there is consensus for Tvoz undoing William Jokusch's very extensive edits to the article. Part of Tvoz's explanation makes some sense -- that there were a lot of little tweaks submitted at once, which makes it hard to accept/reject them individually. However, Tvoz also said that it included major edits that required discussion and consensus. I skimmed through William's edits, and they all looked like non-controversial stuff, like changing to not leading a section with a left-aligned image, and changing an article link to the article's original publisher instead of a reprint. My impression is that they were useful, cleanup-type stuff. I'm a little new here, so maybe somebody can help me out -- what is an example of something controversial from that list of changes? Wookian (talk) 20:43, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I'm 100% behind Tvoz for undoing WJ's edit. On a featured article, it makes sense to make any changes incrementally so that it is easy for other editors to review said changes. By doing it all in one go, it makes it extremely hard to see what is going on. This edit should've been done section-by-section with explanatory edit summaries. I'm not going to comment on the value of any specific edits at this time. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:11, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

OK, so this is a standard that particularly applies to featured articles. I didn't notice/understand the "FA" abbreviation in Tvoz's comments. Thanks. Wookian (talk) 03:53, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

It's not a policy or anything, but just basic common sense. Wouldn't you agree that this diff is a real chore to review? -- Scjessey (talk) 10:59, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Of course; that wasn't my question. Wookian (talk) 14:21, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

What I was trying to say in my revert edit summary is that the edits were so massive that it was difficult or impossible to see specifically what was changing - in several places there appear to be content changes that are not just clean-up (added section about Egypt, removal of health care legal challenge for example), and in other places one would have to read word for word to see what changed, since there were no explanatory edit summaries. I'm not saying if the changes are good or not - I'm saying that it was too difficult to determine the nature of each change, so I have no idea if I agree with many of them or not. It's really just a matter of making it easier for us to work collaboratively - as SCJ said, it's not policy, it's common sense, and I'd add, courtesy. That this is an FA on a high profile topic only makes it more important that we can easily see what's being done. Hope this helps. Tvoz/talk 05:38, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

I often work in a sandbox when I'm doing a complete rewrite and then make HUGE changes to a given article with one edit (it just keeps the edit history "tidy" instead of other editors needing to sift through 100 edits from one editor). However, this is usually when I'm editing "stub" or "start" class articles with no sources (or useless sources referencing imdb, or blogs, etc). Taking something from a "stub" to a "C" or a "B" is a completely different thing than taking one of Wikipedia's most high-profile featured articles and making big changes all at once (even if an editor is simply re-arranging blocks of content for paragraph re-formatting, etc, it means viewing the edit "diff" doesn't match up for easy verification). I don't think it's an official "policy" not to do this with featured articles, but it should be. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 23:44, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining your editing practices and thought processes, folks. It's OK with me to archive this section at any time. Wookian (talk) 19:08, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Lol. Sorry. We're not trying to pile on. It's actually a legitimate question. As I said, I'll often "sandbox" an article myself to get it ready for "publication" (not just the rewriting/expanding, but also fixing all my grammar, typos, misdirected backlinks, etc, etc), so it's understandable that editors would wonder why it's not a good idea to do it here. Since this article would probably be an exception to a lot of Wikipedia's traditional procedural rules, it's probably not a bad idea to leave it here for others to see until it's automatically archived by the bot. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 23:05, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Proposal to merge Obama logo article into a section on this article

I do not see the purpose in having this article "Obama logo", exclusively on the logo used by Obama's election campaign, I see no other articles for the logos used by other presidential candidates in the past. I suggest that the article be merged into a section on this article.--R-41 (talk) 16:16, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

I disagree for two reasons. Firstly, the logo article passes the general notability guidelines. Secondly, this article simply doesn't have any space for it (in part due to the use of summary style). If the logo article didn't pass GNG, it would make more sense to merge it with Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2008 in any case. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:27, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Oppose. I haven't researched it, but it looks like a valid "stand-alone" article, and the article says the same logo is being used again for his 2012 re-election campaign so I don't see a need to merge it here. And even if it didn't meet the notability guidelines for its own article (which I believe it does), his biography wouldn't appear to be the page for it. Perhaps the Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2008 or an article similar to it (there are so many presidential articles on Wikipedia, I can't keep track of them all), but not here. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 22:06, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Maybe it should be deleted, but not merged. There's no logical place to talk in depth about the campaign logo in this article. Trinitresque (talk) 17:49, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

I doubt a deletion nomination would succeed, as it does pass general notability guidelines. There are a handful of worthwhile articles on Wikipedia about logos - google's, for example, and Nike's. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:55, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

---

Strongly Oppose merger -- Articles like "Obama logo" exist so that this one doesn't become horrendously long and difficult to organize. Also, the logo was distinctive, and became very well-known in a way that hadn't quite occurred before in U.S. presidential politics... AnonMoos (talk) 11:01, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Request for comment

I disagree with this edit, because it goes into deep detail about Obama senior's religious beliefs while he was a child. I have never heard of six year olds "converting" to a religion. I invite you to participate in a discussion here. Pass a Method talk 17:44, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

New Party

(ADDED LATER: all below re New Party (United States), one of many worldwide 'new party' articles Cramyourspam (talk) 01:13, 3 July 2012 (UTC))

Does a subarticle to this main blp mention Obama's (admitted "informal-") affiliation therewith?--Hodgdon's secret garden (talk) 22:46, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

What? HiLo48 (talk) 23:41, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

I believe he's referring to this. SMP0328. (talk) 01:29, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I think so it is clear he was a member 22:08, 8 June 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.249.207.49 (talk)

Is National Review really an ideal, trustworthy, impartial, independent source of information on a Democratic Party candidate for President? HiLo48 (talk) 03:20, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

I wasn't using it as a source, only as a way to read the article I believe Hodgdon was referencing. SMP0328. (talk) 03:37, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

This discussion should be closed. Absolutely zero mainstream media coverage, as befitting anything written by Kurtz. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:54, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

Yes. HiLo48 (talk) 21:23, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

Have you read Ben Smith's coverage in Buzzfeed? His article (co-written with Rosie Gray) also provides a Scribd archive of the New Party (NP) Chicago meeting minutes in question. These minutes record that Barack Obama sought the NP's endorsement, joined the NP, and signed the NP "Candidate Contract". Ben Smith has been cautiously willing to contradict the Obama campaign's 2008 response to Kurtz's NP claims. Wookian (talk) 03:14, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

User:Scjessey, why did you say there was zero mainstream media coverage without, it seems like even looking? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.255.124.207 (talk) 04:51, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

ROFL. You're saying that BuzzFeed is mainstream media coverage? Why not Twitter? Or the guys at the bar? -- Scjessey (talk) 11:46, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

The National Review article is already mainstream on its own. The usefulness of Smith's Buzzfeed article is that it's an acknowledgement from a politically hostile author of Kurtz's research. The Washington Post's think tank blog similarly acknowledged Kurtz's research. You should, too. Wookian (talk) 14:01, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

In response to the original question, the subject is mentioned at Stanley Kurtz, and is under discussion at Talk:New Party (United States) where it would be most relevant if included. I just removed it from Danny K. Davis, as it is not terribly pertinent to that article and was stated as fact there without adequate sourcing. As far as google knows, that's the extent of it. - Wikidemon (talk) 14:18, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Why would it be more relevant in the New Party article than here? If Obama sought endorsement from the NP, joined the NP, and signed the NP Candidate Contract, that is very interesting and notable information that provides insight into Obama's views in the 1990's. One thing to keep in mind is that the Obama campaign has a very strong interest in silencing this information. Editors should be careful not to censor this for political reasons. At this point I suggest that it requires a conspiracy theory to believe that Obama did NOT seek the endorsement of the NP. What do you think? Wookian (talk) 14:26, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

What? That's a giant leap of a biased conclusion. Especially with everyone involved in that short-lived party denying it ever happened. Even if it were true(and that's a big if, everything I've read has all identified sources denying it), it's a blip on the radar and shouldn't even be considered here. This is nothing. Dave Dial (talk) 14:41, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

There are three assertions Kurtz makes from the meeting minutes that can be dealt with separately. First, that Obama joined the NP. Ben Smith pooh-pooh's this because people he talked to don't remember it, and sort of sluffs over the contradicting meeting minutes and other sources by pointing out that the NP was disorganized. OK. But second -- both the meeting minutes and also the NP member(s) Smith personally interviewed AFFIRMED that Obama asked for the NP endorsement. This contradicts Obama's campaign's claims in 2008. Third, Kurtz and Smith show that the meeting minutes record that Obama signed the "candidate contract". This material is doublely notable, because not only does it provide insight into Obama's political activities from the 90's, but it also is a bit of a scandal. As pointed out by (political opposites) Kurtz and Smith, Obama's campaign apparently covered up and denied facts from his past political activities. So, no, this is not "nothing". Wookian (talk) 15:00, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) It's reasonable to answer the original question as a courtesy, as many people come to this page earnestly wondering about this or that and we can direct them to the right sub-article. But indeed, there's no reasonable chance that it's suitable for this main article at this time given current sourcing. Not by a few orders of magnitude. Nearly every fact in the article has hundreds or thousands of mainstream sources supporting that it's true, and significant. This has zero as to truth, and only a couple including Ben Smith that even note that the claim has been made. That doesn't necessarily mean it's not true, it could well be true but just not something that the mainstream press considers significant enough to cover. There's a reason why this gets covered in Politico but not mass market press. Ben Smith is a politics junkie writing for other politics junkies, he's covered all the major Obama conspiracy theories. His taking an interest might establish that an issue is noteworthy enough to be mentioned somewhere in Wikipedia. Or it might not. - Wikidemon (talk) 15:14, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

User:Wikidemon|Wikidemon, I disagree with your assertion that this subject i most relevant at New Party (United States). This is most relevent here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.163.35.69 (talk) 14:25, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

FYI - Whoever is operating the IP immediately above has taken to hassling me on my talk page. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:16, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 2 July 2012

In the opening paragraph Obama is referred to as African-American. It would be more accurate to describe him as biracial. 75.75.169.134 (talk) 16:59, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

 Not done See FAQ question 2 on this page. Thanks for your suggestion, though. --Jprg1966 ^(talk) 17:05, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Is African American a correct description?

See FAQ, Q2
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
His father was Kenyan and met his very anglo wife whilst studying in the United States which makes him a mulatto, not an African-American culturally speaking or genetically speaking. There is no shame in being a mulatto, but he is not of the majority of the African-American community that are of slave stock mixed with anglo blood to more or less degree. Pretty much apples and oranges as to culture and histories. Abraham Lincoln never made a speech to free Kenyans that weren't slaves born in the 20th century. Why would it be wrong to state that he is/was the first mulatto US president if you are going to make race an issue in his election? By any reasonable reckoning, he and Malcolm X have nothing politically, economically, culturally, and not a lot genetically in common. His mom was white as white can be and he was raised in a very privledged environment by his mother's family. Snoop Dogg--African-American. Obama--Privledged mulatto. 12.207.42.206 (talk) 03:38, 3 July 2012 (UTC) See section right above this one. --NeilN talk to me 03:44, 3 July 2012 (UTC) The only way that we would be able not to use African American would be if multiple reliable sources stop referring to him as such and that is not even close to happening. Also, the term Mulatto has been considered offensive for years so there is no chance of that term being used. Finally the suggestion that Obama is not African American because he is of different he is to Malcom X is silly because it would be like saying that Ronald Regan is not Caucasian because he is not like Ozzy Osbourne. There is no rule that only people raised in certain environments can be called African American that I know of.--174.93.167.177 (talk) 03:56, 3 July 2012 (UTC) I lived in Silver Spring and DC for a number of years. The Africans and Carribeans I knew and lived amongst didn't find much if any common ground with African-Americans. I realize he partially got elected on being a "people of color" but there's a big difference between descendants of Georgia slave families and a Kenyan-American-Anglo fathered mullato with a wife as white as can be being made part of the African-American landscape. I also don't see how mulatto is an obscene term any more than mestizo. Mixed breeds are mixed breeds. He's a mutt like most of us and he very much is not a result of the machinations and slavery that brought a large portion of the people of African heritage to the United States CENTURIES before he was born. I'm a mutt. I'll say it on this wiki talk page. He's a mutt, too, but he's not of the same cloth of a Malcolm X or MLK and saying he's an "African-American" tends to imply that he is. He wasn't even involved in that struggle to amount to anything. Rich kid born in Hawaii doesn't equate to former slaves that were sharecroppers in Mississippi. What's so offensive about using a perfectly correct term like Mulatto? Friend lives in SF and they often elect people from the GLBT who don't call themselves "Southern Baptists", as they aren't. What's wrong with honesty? Much of his upbringing was not in the US and his upbringing in the US was much closer to a privledged white child, due to his parentage on his mother's side, than anything to do with being Kenyan or Marching for Civil Rights. Those are all facts I don't have to cite, as you know they are facts, so why lump him in with Muddy Waters when a rational person would lump him in with somebody with rich parents and got a pass on a lot of things like GW Bush? If you find mulatto offensive, how about "person of color" or "mixed race". They seem quite popular in the media and I have yet to see your "reliable sources" that insist on claiming a person to be something they are not. When I play my violin I don't call it a cello. When I listen to Bird, I don't call him Peter Frampton. Dictionaries aren't just for old folks and wikipedia has some flaws. That doesn't excuse intentionally mis-labeling a person's heritage.12.207.42.206 (talk) 05:21, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Question for anyone who may have an answer..............

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Why is President Obama constantly referred to as "the first African American to hold the office"? i am not being disrespectful so please do not take this as such. my granddaughter is mixed and her birth certificate says she is white. we were told that the race is determined by the race of the mother. is this something new? or possibly only in effect in VA? just curious Kathi137 (talk) 17:04, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Please see Q2 on the FAQ. Note also that the term African American refers mainly to ancestry rather than race.--JayJasper (talk) 17:07, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

And the difference between ancestry and race is? HiLo48 (talk) 18:29, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

"Race" is an invention, a function of the perception of the observer. Ancestry is a function of facts (Yitzak begat Phineas begat Herbert begat Edwin begat Josh.) --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 18:51, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WP:FORUM (again)
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Wiki editors have deemed him "African-American" in spite of him being "biracial" or whatever more accurate term you might wish to put in it's place, and you will not get anywhere trying to change their views. Kenya is on the Africa Continent and so is Libya (Citation-ANY MAP OF THE PLANET EARTH WITH CURRENT POLITICAL BOUNDARIES). A Kenyan/Anglo ancestry in the wikipedia apparently means African-American. I'd be curious if I should start to call the Libyan naturalized citizen that owns a restaurant in town and has an Anglo wife and mixed children's family "African-American". I think he would be amused and consider it wrong as they are culturally very different, just as many Africans in Africa don't think of tourists that are "people of color with African ancestry" from the USA as African. I personally spent a significant period of time in Sub-Saharan Africa and it often shocked "African-American" tourists when they were generally not at all thought of by indigenous Africans as African. Anyway, according to the powers that be, it's not worth bothering arguing with them. They just told me so above. Arguing with determined "pro" wiki editors, especially if they have all decided something collectively, correctly or not according to outside opinions, even on talk pages, isn't worth the bother. Right or wrong, it has been decided that Barry is an "African-American" and so it shall stay stated as such on this page. Editors made a questionable decision to many of us, but they have the upper hand, as if you disagree with them too much, they will try to block your IP from even saying things on talk pages. No real point in arguing, all downside and no upside to it. I don't think he's "African-American" culturally, which is a view shared by many, probably even himself. Kenyan Father. White Mother. No slave or sharecropper history. Raised outside of the country and on Hawaii which is pretty far outside the country for most "African-Americans" that aren't in the military. Hawaii: Population 1.3 million as of recent census (from anecdotal experience as a middle aged USAF brat, I'd say most of the following are US Military), 1.6% Black or African American according to WIKIPEDIA. Note usage of "Black or African American" and "23.6% from Two or More Races". Current wikipedia page. So on the page for Barry's birth he is of two or more races, in spite of ""Race" is an invention, a function of the perception of the observer. Ancestry is a function of facts (Yitzak begat Phineas begat Herbert begat Edwin begat Josh.) --jpgordon", but on his bio page he is African American. Guess y'all better fix the US census mechanism and at least the Hawaii wiki page, except you don't know what "two or more races" are in this instance, do you? But since Obama's dad was a BLACK Kenyan national (and there are plenty of White Kenyans and White Africans), that makes him black in spite of his mom being as white as a ghost in the photographs I've seen, and therefore instead of being bi-racial he's "African-American". Interesting rabbit hole you created for yourself with your statements. Part of my ancestral and current family are/were white people in Africa for centuries. I wouldn't call the ones that moved here "African-American" but one of my cousins checked that on a lot of forms and probably still does, being as he was born in Africa and lives in the USA. His direct ancestors have been in Africa for centuries. Since race is just a perception, then he's "African-American", even though he has blonde hair, blue eyes, and is of Dutch, English, and Swiss heritage, right? Nice big rabbit hole you got yourselves there. 12.207.42.206 (talk) 20:36, 3 July 2012 (UTC) What suggestions do you have for improving the article? --jpgordon::==( o ) 21:43, 3 July 2012 (UTC) I think what is being asked is to remove Afriacn American due to the users above thinking it is wrong. I think thought that the request can be safely ignored. The users main argument is that he can't be considered African American due to the fact that he is a rich kid from Hawaii and not a decendent of slaves, a claim that has not been supported by any reliable sources no anyone else in the discussion in question. On the other hand the current use of African American has been supported by multiple reiable sources as well as Obama himself and it will take a lot more than the personal opinion of someone from Wikipedia to change. The other argument is andonital evidence where the user above mentions that people from Sub-Saharan Africa don't consider "African-Americans" to be African, however this is unsourced and clearly can't be used.--174.93.167.177 (talk) 22:23, 3 July 2012 (UTC) Where is the official definition of African American that says it means "descended from black slaves from a particular part of Africa" (and probably a fair sprinkling of white European slave owners who took their pleasures according to their whims)? HiLo48 (talk) 23:30, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

PPACA

I've just rolled back these edits because they were neither neutral nor accurate. Nor were the edits supported by the source. User:Difu Wu appears confused by what the individual mandate is. It is the requirement that people get insurance, not the penalty imposed for a failure to do so. Difu Wu's edits conflate these two things. Furthermore, stuff like "coercing States to enforce the law by threatening to take away..." is clearly non-neutral. This is complicated stuff, and it is important that we get the wording absolutely right and neutral. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:52, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Difu Wu has re-reverted without making any attempt to discuss it here. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:27, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

My edits are correct on the position of the Supreme Court, straight from the slip opinion. Only two provisions of the PPACA are directly challenged and addressed by the court: the individual mandate (that all Americans must buy health insurance or pay a penalty) and the Medicaid expansion provision (that a State failing to comply with the PPACA will lose all federal Medicaid funds). The Supreme Court decided that the PPACA is constitutional in part and unconstitutional in part. It ruled 5-4 that the individual mandate is consititutional under Congress's power to "lay and collect taxes", and ruled 7-2 that the Medicaid expansion is unconstitutional and exceeded Congress's authority under the Spending Clause. My wordings is adopted directed from the court's slip opinion, including words like "coerce" (see pg 45 of the Court's opinion for example). My edit is neutral and strictly the court's opinion. Difu Wu (talk) 13:52, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

The latest version is much better, because it loses the non-neutral language you describe above. The problem with your original approach is that you used Wikipedia's voice to says States were being coerced and threatened, rather than directly attributing the language (with quotation marks and cites) to the Court. But your recent edits remove the need for that and are a significant improvement. Well done. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:44, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! I am glad we are able to agree upon an acceptable version that summarizes the Court's decision on the PPACA.Difu Wu (talk) 15:43, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I don't believe that's the case. Although the 2nd attempt was better, it was still sythesis. The last portion of the wording in particular is the opinion of Difu Wu's reading of an original document. The USSC most definitely did not state what you are claiming(referring the Medicaid expansion). It's far more complicated than that and to include your claims would need firstly a RS to confirm, and then more explanation. Which would fit better in the PPA article than here. Dave Dial (talk) 17:29, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I have removed the Washington Post reference and only sourcing directly from the Court's slip op, so it is not sythesis. The Court only ruled on the individual mandate and the Medicaid expansion provisions, not the whole law. My edit accurately summarizes the Court's finding. Those who need more explanation can click on the link to the National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius article or go to the reference of the slip opinion. Difu Wu (talk) 17:43, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, and that actually makes your edits MORE original research and synthesis. We don't need your interpretation of what the court decided here. You don't understand that? Also, this article(along with all Obama related articles) are under article probation and have a 1RR restriction. Which you are currently in violation of. I will allow you to self revert and gain Talk page consensus for your edits, and not report the violation. But you have to self-revert. Dave Dial (talk) 17:50, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

OK, I have now reverted my edit due to 1RR restriction. I must emphasize that my edits reflects the Court's opinion as quoted in the references to the slip opinion, not my interpretation thereof. Please comment on the merits of my edit here], which better reflects the Court's ruling on PPACA. Thanks. Difu Wu (talk) 18:13, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for the self-revert. I'm going to list my objections more clearly now. The USSC didn't rule that monies couldn't be withheld from States for the Medicaid expansion, they ruled they could not withhold monies already designated currently to the States as a penalty for not expanding Medicaid. That doesn't preclude the Government from denying State's that don't comply any new monies, nor does it preclude further sanctions if States don't adhere to standards already in place. In any case, one would need a reliable source to add any of that. Neither your reading of the court papers or mine is acceptable. Thanks again, Dave Dial (talk) 18:18, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. My edit says "withholding existing Medicaid funding from States for failure to comply in the Medicaid expansion was unconstitutional", which is basically the same as the actual words used in the USSC's slip op on page 4: "the Medicaid expansion violates the Constitution by threatening States with the loss of their existing Medicaid funding if they decline to comply with the expansion", and my edit is clearly referenced. Would you rather prefer using the USSC's verbatim wordings instead and putting them in quotes? Difu Wu (talk) 18:28, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

It would be preferable if you used at least one secondary source describing the action. Since the WaPo is already being referenced, if you can find something referring to the clause, include that. But make it more neutral. Such as stating that -Congress cannot take away existing Medicaid funds to penalize States for not participating in the expansion, but is free to apply new penalties, such as withholding new monies associated with the expansion-. This is going to be my last post for awhile. Medication....Have a good day. Dave Dial (talk) 20:22, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Isn't it better to quote directly from the USSC, rather than use secondary sources that might be biased? If no further objections, let's reinstate my edit but use the direct quote from the USSC with reference. The current version suggests that the USSC declared the whole law constitutional, which is not exactly correct. The USSC considered only the individual mandate and the Medicaid expansion provisions: the former it declared constitutional, the latter unconstitutional. Difu Wu (talk) 14:20, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Sorry guy, you don't seem to get the gist of WP:original research. We can't have you selectively citing portions of an original document to show conclusions. This isn't WikiHow where contributions from editors that are deemed knowledgeable in certain areas are encouraged to do the types of things you seem to believe are allowed here. It wouldn't matter if you were a judge of 30 years, using original documents and selecting portions of them to place into articles is still OR. Using a secondary source to describe the courts actions is demanded. Not to mention that your conclusions are incorrect and your "personal opinion" wrong. You don't get to bypass the reliable sources and come to your own conclusions. The fact is, the law goes into effect and has been rule Constitutional. Those are the overwhelming conclusions being written about by non-biased reliable sources. Your own interpretation cannot be included in this article by original research or synthesis. Thanks. Dave Dial (talk) 15:58, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Quoting from WP:original research: "The term "original research" (OR) is used on Wikipedia to refer to material—such as facts, allegations, and ideas—for which no reliable, published sources exist." The Supreme Court's slip opinion is a reliable, published source. Quoting directly from it is not OR. As for synthesis, that policy says "Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources." Quoting directly from the source is emphatically not reaching or implying any conclusion at all. Difu Wu (talk) 17:15, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

You needed to keep reading through the guideline. Quote: "Do not analyze, synthesize, interpret, or evaluate material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so.... Use extra caution when handling primary sources about living people; see WP:BLPPRIMARY, which is policy." -end quote. In other words, your opinion that "The current version suggests that the USSC declared the whole law constitutional, which is not exactly correct. The USSC considered only the individual mandate and the Medicaid expansion provisions: the former it declared constitutional, the latter unconstitutional", has to be backed up by a secondary source, not you linking to the USSC and making conclusions based on the decision. The facts are, the decision is more complex than you are stating. The majority of reliable sources to date have stated the law was ruled Constitutional, with one caveat to the Medicare expansion. It most definitely did not rule the expansion was illegal, it did strike the penalty for not complying as too harsh and not constitutional. Which does not preclude other penalties or sanctions for noncompliance. For this article, a short summary of the decision is relevant, and the vast majority of reliable sources have pointed to the USSC decision as upholding the law as Constitutional. The minutia is better explained in the act and decision articles. Use a secondary source, and make the wording neutral based on the secondary sources conclusions. There are many out there. The WaPo that is in the article already, the NYT has several. Thanks Dave Dial (talk) 17:38, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Restaurant owner dies shortly after meeting Obama

Not a common story. Should be mentioned in the article: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/07/06/ohio-restaurant-owner-dies-shortly-after-meeting-obama/ And some pictures: http://www.ohio.com/news/break-news/akron-restaurant-owner-dies-hours-after-meeting-obama-1.318595?ot=akron.PhotoGalleryLayout.ot&s=1.318594 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.120.163.57 (talk) 21:09, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Only if we were Fox News. Which we're not. Thank &deity. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 21:33, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Don't get too far ahead of yourself. I'm sure that in an hour there will be a reliably cited article written with tons of citations. Which will then get a PROD banner, which will then be removed. Then the article will get nominated for deletion, where dozens of fly by readers will flock to the deletion discussion "voting" KEEP, KEEP, KEEP. Only after week passes and nerves are shot, after egos get bruised and feelings get hurt, will the article become part of the Wikipedia encyclopedia. (Stop me if you've heard this one before).--JOJ ^Hutton 21:44, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Let's see: Well-sourced, definitely notable . . . if this was about Romney the article would already be written. 72Dino (talk) 22:05, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Barack Obama's fatal restaurant visit controversy ? Tarc (talk) 22:11, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

No, Barack Obama's fatal restaurant visit conspiracy theory.--JOJ ^Hutton 22:16, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, that's even better. 72Dino (talk) 22:18, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

If we're going to be "fair and balanced", we will need List of restaurants where Barack Obama has eaten and the owners are still alive. -- Scjessey (talk) 11:23, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

This unfortunate lady's story is a great topic for an "odd news" article, but doesn't seem like a good fit for notability within Obama's article on Wikipedia. That's not to say it couldn't fit in anywhere. If there was an article discussing heart disease and quoting an expert who used this incident as an example, that could be very appropriate and useful. Wookian (talk) 19:13, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

We're not going to name-drop this into heart disease or similar, that's just ridiculous piling-on because of the president's visit. Tarc (talk) 14:21, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree, perhaps my intent wasn't clear. If it was added to a heart disease related topic, it should happen organically and because a quoted expert thinks its a good and educational example of a medical phenomenon, not driven by the news cycle just for the sake of tying it to Obama's name. Wookian (talk) 14:49, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Barack Obama on Twitter

This article is nominated for deletion, and I wonder if there is a valuable information to combine and to save. This article discusses Obama's use of Twitter, and there are some interesting facts, like popularity, violating Obama's account rights, and exploiting Twitter account for political campaign use. --George Ho (talk) 06:00, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

There is no reason to discuss information to combine and save if the article itself ends up being kept. You should probably wait until the AfD is over. Silverseren^C 06:10, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Why waiting until AFD is over? Even if kept, there is no reason to force readers into searching for a subarticle. In fact, inclusion of a summary about a subtopic helps readers decide whether to read more or to learn enough without reading further. --George Ho (talk) 06:55, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Appears to be a trivialism vis-a-vis the life and times of the President, not terribly relevant or significant to the subject of this article, whatever the status of that particular article. - Wikidemon (talk) 07:14, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm just going to leave this here. Silverseren^C 08:10, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

The history of Obama's Twitter use is good for a book, but not the encyclopedia article itself, unless relevant for the main article. --George Ho (talk) 22:43, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Well, you're not combining then, but making a summary section. And, yeah, that makes sense to do. It should be rather similar to the current lede to the article (just rewritten so it's not the exact same). Silverseren^C 08:10, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

... The article lede is bad as a summary. I guess find something that is prominent as part of a section of a subtopic then? --George Ho (talk) 22:43, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

May I add back {{summarize}}, please? Other people are favoring summarization included in this article? --George Ho (talk) 22:33, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

This article does not need any of the Twitter stuff in it, and adding anything would be undue weight. The link to the Twitter article that's in the template box is sufficient. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:45, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Use of "Dreams" autobiography as RS

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Extended content

Not trying to be a trouble-maker here, but is it appropriate to use Obama's own autobiography as a reliable source for facts of his life? David Maraniss of the Washington Post has just published a biography of President Obama that involved a bunch of gumshoe research into Obama's background, interviews with relevant parties, and attempts to trace and document details from the president's early life. Maraniss concluded that many assertions in Obama's autobiography (including some fairly dramatic elements) are in fact fictional, perhaps included to enhance the narrative. Some of the later printings of Dreams include a qualifier that some people (e.g. girlfriends) are composite, but Maraniss documents that it goes far beyond that. I suggest that "Dreams from my Father", as a work that lies somewhere between autobiography and "historical fiction" with no obvious lines drawn, does not meet the standards to be a RS in terms of seeking article material that is true and verifiable. On the plus side, new works like Maraniss' that are coming out may fill the void. Of note is that before publishing, Maraniss allegedly sat down with the president and described some of the discrepancies, and Obama allegedly said that Maraniss had basically got things right. So I don't consider this some kind of fringe objection or anything; Maraniss is solidly in the mainstream. Comments? Wookian (talk) 22:17, 9 July 2012 (UTC) is this a general question or are there any specific parts of the article soured to Obama's book that you have issues with.--174.93.167.177 (talk) 05:38, 10 July 2012 (UTC) I am suggesting that Dreams be entirely excluded as a source for factual information. It's unfortunate, but seems unavoidable based on its nature as a hybrid of autobiography and fiction with no fixed or discernable boundaries. Wookian (talk) 12:17, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Sadly, there is one really big glaring issue with your assertion: it's based on an opinion piece published in the NYT opinion blog. Plus, the people making the accusations have their own axes to grind with Obama which discredit their assertions. In the end, there would need to be a whole boatload more of reliable sourced full articles before there is any question about the reliability of the man's own autobiography. Not just a few hand picked articles, but literally hundreds of articles and years of research before people would even believe this. Plus, your editing history here on this page and other Obama related articles speaks against "not trying to be a trouble-maker." Nuff said. 74.79.34.29 (talk) 13:00, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Sadly there is one really big glaring issue with your assertation, which is David Maraness is not a Republican and has no axe to grind with Obama. It has been acknowledged by Obama himself that many of the events in the book are not completely true. In general, autobiographys should never be used for factual information on the subject since the subject, in this case Obama, had much to gain by making fictional changes to his life story. IP74, why are you defending a fiction portrayal of Obama? Arzel (talk) 13:11, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Names were changed to protect privacy of non-family members, and some people from the book have narratives that are composites of actual people for the same reason and for narrative flow. That is quite a world apart from dismissing the whole thing as fiction. Is there anything presently in this article sourced to Dreams of My Father that is contradicted by this new book? Tarc (talk) 13:22, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Some parts are fiction, like that of his grandfather. Not sure why this gets a pass from WP:SELFPUB now that we know that parts are simply not true. Arzel (talk) 13:27, 10 July 2012 (UTC) I am not aware of anything in the article that uses Dreams as a reliable source, except where the article explicitly states "Obama said in Dreams.." (or words to that effect), which is perfectly okay. This is a discussion about a problem that doesn't exist. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:31, 10 July 2012 (UTC) I agree. I don't see it being used as a hard reference in the article, but it is listed as a reference. I havn't gone through the whole article to see what, if anything, is actually being used as a source from the book, but it should probably be removed from the references section and listed in aditional reading or something like that. Furthermore, it is not an actual autobiography, it is a memoir, a subtle but important diference. Arzel (talk) 13:37, 10 July 2012 (UTC) "I agree." - *Falls off chair* - A stunning, historical moment for Wikipedia. I spent ages checking article references to make sure nothing used Dreams as an RS before commenting. It appears only as a general reference for those few times when it is quoted in the article. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:47, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Kudos to you guys for your prescience on this. A quick google search for site:en.wikipedia.org "Dreams From My Father" reveals multiple BLP's using Dreams to allege factual information. But I disagree that adding "as Obama wrote in..." lets us off the hook. If the entire book has to be regarded (by default) as fictional, then its assertions belong in the dedicated article about the book until verified elsewhere, and should not be used to assert BLP facts, even with "weasel words" included. For most readers, pointing to the President's own autobiography would add legitimacy in their minds. Therefore, for editors to do so in order to avoid the need to cite a reliable source is misleading to readers, and is exactly the opposite of what Wikipedia needs: truth and verifiability. Wookian (talk) 13:58, 10 July 2012 (UTC) "If the entire book has to be regarded (by default) as fictional" is not a position I support, and it will be quite frowned upon if an editor begins to scrape the site removing every ref to the book just because it is to the book and not because they have investigated the content behind the cite. Tarc (talk) 14:12, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Wikipedia's rules prohibit massive, knee-jerk purges in general, because they are more disruptive than they are helpful. However, one function of Talk discussion is to reach consensus about what is acceptable, and start to gradually evolve the site in that direction. I guess I should clarify -- obviously I'm not saying that I believe everything or even most things in Dreams are false statements. Rather, I'm suggesting that based on what we know now about the nature of the book, any individual Dreams assertion has a decent chance of being fictional and therefore doesn't belong in any BLP articles with no other sourcing. If Dreams is a mixture of fiction and truth without any clear dividing lines, isn't that a fair position to take? Wookian (talk) 14:29, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Let's be clear. If we are quoting something Obama said in his book, then it is perfectly acceptable to use the book as a reference for that. And the idea that the book is now regarded as "fiction" is completely ridiculous. And what do you mean by "multiple BLPs" exactly? Please give an example of where you think the book is being misused as a reference. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:38, 10 July 2012 (UTC) I already gave an example. Perform the google search I suggested, and in the top 15 results you will see Dreams quotes or paraphrases being used as factual material for some BLP articles. There may be more that don't exactly match my search. Also, I never said that the entire book is regarded as fiction, but rather that Maraniss has shown that it's a mixture of fiction and non-fiction with no clear line between the two. Unfortunately, that should be enough to place Dreams on a blacklist for Wikipedia BLP purposes. If you disagree, feel free to explain why without misrepresenting my statements. Wookian (talk) 14:53, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Don't make me do your work for you. Show me an example, an actual example rather than a hypothetical example, of where Dreams from My Father has been used as a reliable source for factual information. Don't expect me to be doing Google searches to support your hypothesis. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:59, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Would Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard be a better place to have this discussion? Ryan Vesey Review me! 15:02, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Probably not, because we are not talking about a general RS usage, but rather using it as a reference for quotes. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:26, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Source evaluation via google So, taking "site:en.wikipedia.org "Dreams From My Father" as the search parameter, let's look at the first 10 hits on articles excluding the book article itself and the cover image; Ann Dunham#Personal beliefs, a reflection on his mother's needlepoint virtues. Barack Obama#Family and personal life, discussion of maternal relations to Jefferson Davis and Native Americans. Lolo Soetoro#Marriage to Ann Dunham, his descriptions of Soetoro and his faith. Zeituni Onyango, notes that he referred to her as "Aunti Zeituni" and his visit to her in 1982. Altgeld Gardens, Chicago#Existing conditions, mentions Obama's participation as a community organizer in the effort to rid the project of asbestos. Could use an actual citation, though. Bud Billiken Parade and Picnic, cites the parade being held on the second Saturday in August since 1929. Barack Obama, Sr.#Kenya, statement that the Obama family questions the paternity of two of Obama's sons with his former wife. Madelyn Dunham, discusses his grandparents' religious views and his interactions with them. Frank Marshall Davis#Davis and Barack Obama, discusses his relationship with "Frank" in quotes which makes clear that this is one of the name-changed-to-protect-the-privacy cases (and later on notes and cites where Obama confirmed who "Frank" was), and also includes a paragraph regarding some of Jerome Corsi's claims in his book about the Obama-Davis relationship. Family of Barack Obama#Paternal relations, various family details. All in all I'm not seeing much here to get all wee-wee'ed up, to borrow a Palinism, about here. Tarc (talk) 15:12, 10 July 2012 (UTC) The last one most certainly is using the book through secondary references of DOMF for false factual claims regarding his grandfathers claim of torture by the British. There is no evidence of this actually happening, but there is a detailed paragraph in that article discussing it as very factual, along with BO's feelings about it. And why do you have to make statements like you did about Palin? Does the left never tire of attacking her? Arzel (talk) 15:22, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Because the Right never attacks Obama, right? -- Scjessey (talk) 15:24, 10 July 2012 (UTC) You are right, maybe there are 57 states after all. Arzel (talk) 15:31, 10 July 2012 (UTC) (after ec) - The point is that this: "In Barack Obama's memoir, Dreams From My Father, he describes them as 'stern Methodist parents who did not believe in drinking, playing cards or dancing.'" (Madelyn Dunham) is not at all the same as this: "Barack Obama's parents were Methodists who didn't drink, gamble or dance.[1]" where the reference is Dreams from My Father. As long as we have the proper attribution, as in this example, use of the book as a reference is perfectly acceptable. In fact, it is probably one of the best examples of a good reference for this sort of stuff you can get! -- Scjessey (talk) 15:23, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Prior to learning about Maraniss' book, I would have agreed with you. However, I suggest that Dreams crosses a line, and it is a disservice to readers who are looking for true and verifiable information to intermingle the content of Dreams with RS's, even with inline citation included. You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig; to quote an Obama-ism. ;) Wookian (talk) 15:33, 10 July 2012 (UTC) And I suggest you're wrong and are looking for nothing but a little drama-stirring as we get deeper into election season. Tarc (talk) 15:54, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Agreed. Unless there are assertions of fact made in an article which are contradicted by other, reliable sources, this is a non-issue. And, of course, the book can be used as a source for what Obama has said in the book!LedRush (talk) 15:57, 10 July 2012 (UTC) I agree with Tarc too. This has passed beyond "not trying to be a trouble-maker here" into trouble-maker territory. The presence of attribution ("Obama said...") makes it 100% okay to cite the book, as is normally the case on every other Wikipedia article in existence. Recommend this thread be closed. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:59, 10 July 2012 (UTC) Your assumption of bad faith is not appreciated. Beyond that, simply requiring an inline citation is not an appropriate technique to allow allegations that have a good chance of being fictional to leak into BLPs (am I wrong?). For the reader perusing the article, it is presented as a de facto RS. You can't roll back the clock and un-publish Maraniss' book. You can't make Dreams become a moderately credible source again. Its credibility is shot at this point. I suggest that you stop giving Dreams so much respect that it does not deserve. Wookian (talk) 16:10, 10 July 2012 (UTC) On the contrary, a person's autobiography is highly relevant to their biography. Even if it were fictionalized, exaggerated, or otherwise untrue, that in itself is an important biographical fact.- Wikidemon (talk) 16:23, 10 July 2012 (UTC) I'm still waiting to see just which parts of the article you find poorly sourced. If the article explicitly states that the information is coming from a memoir, i.e. "In Barack Obama's memoir, Dreams From My Father, he describes them as 'stern Methodist parents who did not believe in drinking, playing cards or dancing.'" then the reader knows not to trust that as gospel, but rather the view of the person who wrote it, which is still biographically important. Which sentence(s) specifically do you take issue with?--DeliciousMeatz (talk) 02:01, 11 July 2012 (UTC) Based on the significant fraudulent/fictionalized elements already identified in Dreams, the whole book has to be regarded as untrustworthy. The problem is that ordinary readers of Wikipedia won't be aware of that -- I think it's fairly unusual that a memoir this high profile would be found wanting like this. So it's really necessary as a courtesy to the reader to avoid quoting Dreams in such a way that readers would mistake it for a RS. An inline citation doesn't really solve the problem, it effectively functions in this specific case as "weasel words" building up reader confidence where little is warranted. Wookian (talk) 02:25, 11 July 2012 (UTC) Can you site any examples where the book is the only source for a factual claim in the article? --Meatz 03:10, 11 July 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by DeliciousMeatz (talk • contribs) Hi, DeliciousMeatz; if you read through the previous section and this section you will see some of the material that was highlighted as an example of using Dreams to present factual assertions. Wookian (talk) 11:55, 11 July 2012 (UTC) Can you show a place where Dreams is used to present factual assertions which are in dispute by reliable sources?LedRush (talk) 12:49, 11 July 2012 (UTC) I'm not aware of any example or I would go ahead and correct it, and then it wouldn't be an example anymore. :) But that's irrelevant to the current topic of discussion, which is whether the rest of Dreams should be trusted or not. At this point, I would reiterate that its credibility is shot, and its assertions have no place in BLP factual assertions, even with inline citation. You're welcome to disagree. Wookian (talk) 13:36, 11 July 2012 (UTC) You may reiterate it all you like, but at this point it is a distinctly minority point of view. We're not going to be conducting a wholesale removal of citations to the book, so is there anything else to discuss here? Tarc (talk) 13:50, 11 July 2012 (UTC) No, I'm not done. Question for you, Tarc: Do you (a) dispute Maraniss' research, or (b) are you saying that it's acceptable to use a book that is known to contain multiple glaring examples of fabrications and fraudulence as a stand-alone source for factual information in BLP articles? I don't see any gray area between those two possibilities. Just want to get you on record either way. Wookian (talk) 14:03, 11 July 2012 (UTC) I can't be the only one who notices that certain editors here are trying to give President Obama a pass from the normal Wikipedia rules that apply to everyone else. If you write a book, put a bunch of dramatic fictional fluff in it, and sell it as non-fiction, then it is not reliable for BLP Wikipedia usage, period. Keeping it out of the sources section and just adding an inline citation is a cop-out. It is interesting that certain editors here are basically refusing to discuss the merits of the debate, but instead getting irritated and trying to shut down the discussion. If material is included that is unfavorable to Obama, I can't help but notice that those same editors are first in line to assert the strictest BLP standards and exclude such material. Very questionable standards at play here. Wookian (talk) 14:15, 11 July 2012 (UTC) There is nothing questionable here. An autobiography is not a tome of gospel truth or a fact-checked history textbook, it is a person's story told by themselves. We use such things by noting where it came from, make clear the citation is from the book/author, and avoid using it to try to support controversial or unverifiable claims. For example, Worldnet Daily is a failure of the WP:RS policy. Does that mean we can never use it? Of course not, we can use WND to support simple matters regarding WND itself or other mundane information. We can't use it as part of, say, the birther article, because their opinion on the matter is horribly biased and worthless. Same would go for counterpunch.org, it could never be used for an article on the War on Terror or George W. Bush. Get it? Tarc (talk) 14:52, 11 July 2012 (UTC) What disturbs me about this conversation is that Wookian has actually claimed Obama has perpetrated a fraud with his memoir. I'm pretty sure such statements on a talk page are a gross violation of WP:BLP. Show me a source that states Dreams from My Father contains "fabrications and fraudulence", or consider refactoring some of your comments, Wookian. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:22, 11 July 2012 (UTC) @Wookian: Sorry, I only read about half the above discussion, so let me just cut to the chase: Is there a specific claim in this article sourced to Obama's book that is contracticted by a secondary reliable source? This is a yes or no question. If the answer is 'no', there is no need to continue this discussion. If the answer is 'yes', then please indicate the specific claim that being disputed. Thanks. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:37, 11 July 2012 (UTC) Scjessey says: "What disturbs me... fraud... fabrications and fraudulence" -- David Maraniss describes the extent of the fictionalization of the work here. He insists that the extent of the fictionalization goes "far beyond" the qualifiers in Obama's introduction, and gives some examples of the discrepencies he found. According to Maraniss, it's a piece of literature infused with substantive fictional elements to create a narrative that Obama wanted to tell, not a narrative that was true to life. To the extent that it was presented and received as factual, that was, of course, fraudulent. One may overlook passed-down family stories that Obama never fact-checked when evaluating the trustworthiness of his book, but there are quite a few fabrications that are entirely his own. So this is simply a less-flattering way of expressing the same thing Maraniss said. It seems to me that euphemizing Obama's "untruthiness" here would be an exercise in rationalizing his book's inappropriate de facto use as a reliable source. Wookian (talk) 19:25, 11 July 2012 (UTC) With all due respect, "fraudulent" is your word, not the author's. You have violated WP:BLP by stating your opinion that Obama's work is fraudulent. You've gone to great pains in this discussion thread to paint Obama's memoir (Gore Vidal said: "a memoir is how one remembers one's own life, while an autobiography is history, requiring research, dates, facts double-checked.") as a work of fiction, yet we do not use Dreams from My Father as a source for anything other than what is said by Obama in the book. That is absolutely an appropriate use. You are very much in the wrong on this and your behavior now appears quite tendentious. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:58, 11 July 2012 (UTC) Wikipedia does not consist of exact quotes of all source material. Paraphrasing is ordinary. If you accept that Dreams was presented as non-fiction, and you accept Maraniss' research and reporting about it, then I don't see what your hangup is. Are you claiming that Dreams is "how Obama remembers his own life"? If so, then you reject Maraniss' characterization. Maraniss made clear that Obama constructed significant and non-trivial fictional narratives. Much of it is "memoir" and much of it is [fictional] "literature". So what exactly is your problem? Maybe you are being tendentious. Wookian (talk) 23:42, 11 July 2012 (UTC) I am the newest guy here, so I could be wrong about this, but doesn't WP:BLP explicitly state: "Remove immediately any contentious material about a living person ... that is a conjectural interpretation of a source"? I think calling a major politician's memoir fraudulent, when the source you are using doesn't even go close to that word, qualifies as a conjectural interpretation. --Meatz (talk) 01:02, 12 July 2012 (UTC)Just me? Yes, but textual literalism about BLP is kind of risky, by that standard we couldn't even talk about BLP violations on article talk pages because to do so would be to repeat a BLP violation. So discussions about BLP would all have to be done by some kind of voodoo hive-magic. - Wikidemon (talk) 05:36, 12 July 2012 (UTC) The link Wookian gives himself is an interesting read, but an even more telling video interview. Wookian seems to be accomplishing exactly what the author of this book suggests that those in the 'anti-Obama' category may try. He suggests that those on the right will(and are trying now) to use his book to bash Obama about his memoirs, and he calls these attempts a complete distortion of his research. I would say that unless there are specific instances of citations of 'Dreams' as a source(in this article) with links to reliable sources that contradict the citations, this thread should be closed and everyone should move on. This Talk page is for discussion about specific ways to improve this article, not what it is being used for here in this thread. Thanks. Dave Dial (talk) 01:26, 12 July 2012 (UTC) Closure needed The "it's a fake" claims are part of the normal attack politics expected at this stage of an election cycle. The first reply to Wookian was "is this a general question or are there any specific parts of the article sourced to Obama's book that you have issues with", and that key question has not been addressed. It is time to close this pointless discussion. If someone has something relevant per WP:TPG to add, they should start a new section discussing specific text in the article (text that uses Dreams from My Father as a reliable source), and present a brief statement of why the source is not adequate to verify the text. If not satisfied with the response, rather than pressing some point here (see "placed on article probation" at top of this page), the correct procedure would be to enquire at WP:RSN. Before doing that, prepare for the fact that Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy where a source is evaluated as "reliable" or otherwise—a source is evaluated only against its use to verify a specific claim. Therefore, there should be no discussion of a source without a specific claim in an article—a claim that relies on the source and which can reasonably be doubted (for example, we don't doubt the name of Obama's mother). Johnuniq (talk) 04:41, 12 July 2012 (UTC) The archive reason above is an attempt to shut down what I believe is a legitimate discussion by a person who is apparently uninformed about the conversation, perhaps from not having read through all of it. I am a little new to Wikipedia, so if reverting the archive is a faux pas, please go easy on me. :) First: I did in fact provide a specific example from this article. I did so by giving a google search that also helpfully proved a side observation that Dreams is being used several places in Wikipedia to provide factual content, which answered somebody else's question. The specific one from this article is listed right here in the discussion (perhaps Johnuniq missed it) -- "Barack Obama#Family and personal life, discussion of maternal relations to Jefferson Davis and Native Americans.". And yes, I do suggest that Dreams to be an unreliable source for this detail, not because it is in the memoir genre, but because of what we learn about the drastic extent of Dreams' fictionalization in Maraniss' book. If the author felt free to fictionalize significant parts of the narrative, as Maraniss documents, then there is no reason this part is exempt. One can come up with examples where Dreams seems trustworthy (his mother's name, his birth location), but only because those are facts verifiable from a reliable source. Dreams is a heavy admixture of fiction with autobiography, or as Maraniss puts it, literature with memoir. Second: Despite some editors' inexplicable-to-me implicit trust of Dreams in this conversation, I don't see consensus for Johnuniq's suggestion that Maraniss is some kind of political operative ("the normal attack politics expected at this stage of an election cycle"). In fact, as somebody mentions above, Maraniss is dismayed to think about the hay that Republicans might make (and in fact are making all over the blogosphere and in editorial pages) in regard to his research. Maraniss himself is a journalist for the Washington Post who is simply working here as a fairly NPOV biographer. Wookian (talk) 11:06, 12 July 2012 (UTC) A new section should not repeat stuff from the last wall of text (it's only a distraction—whether I did or did not do something is not relevant to what should happen in the article). Re the above statement, the article says (with my underlining): "Obama ties his mother's family history to possible Native American ancestors and distant relatives of Jefferson Davis". That is an attributed statement noting possible and distant relations, and is not a claim of something extraordinary (which would require very good sources). Some brief thought shows that it is very likely that there are many people in the US who satisfy those claims (although knowing for which individuals it is true would be difficult), and the article merely notes the fact that Obama "ties" his mother's history—the article does not suggest it is true, nor does it suggest the claim is somehow significant. The second para above (regarding whether someone is a political operative) is totally off-topic. Please stick to what I suggested: identify specific text in the article and present a brief statement of why the source is not adequate to verify the text. Johnuniq (talk) 11:41, 12 July 2012 (UTC) Your comment here is odd, because the line of conversation you are calling "totally off topic" is one you started and I replied to (discussing whether Maraniss is a credible commentator on the fictional character of Dreams due to the political bias you apparently see him having). Wookian (talk) 11:58, 12 July 2012 (UTC) By failing to identify problem text in the article, you are merely demonstrating that there is not a problem in the article. This page is not a forum for a general discussion about a new book or its author. Johnuniq (talk) 12:08, 12 July 2012 (UTC) Well, this is at the point where simple disengagement is the best course of action. A matter was brought up, a matter was discussed, and as far as I can determined, the editor's complaint did not hit the magic consensus bar. Nothing else to accomplish here. Tarc (talk) 12:28, 12 July 2012 (UTC) For the record, I think the above is a fair statement, and it's OK with me to close the discussion on this basis, though I would like to see it left open for at least a bit in case somebody else wants to weigh in. Wookian (talk) 12:36, 12 July 2012 (UTC) Yeah, I'll weigh in. Here is a two direct quotes from WP on no consensus: In disputes over external links, disputed links are removed unless and until there is a consensus to include them. In discussions of textual additions or editorial alterations, a lack of consensus commonly results in no change being made to the article. However, for contentious matters related to living people, a lack of consensus often results in the removal of contentious matter. Not sure which is more relevant. William Jockusch (talk) 17:55, 26 July 2012 (UTC) Considering that there only appears to be one person who was arguing for not citing Obama's book and they have quit objecting for over a week it appears that the consensus clearly supports citing Obama's Book. As far as I can tell no reading of this discussion even remotely supports removal.--70.49.81.140 (talk) 03:20, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.