Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Hillary Rodham Clinton/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted 01:32, 14 October 2007.

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Self-nomination, but previously urged by several others, such as User:Vimalkalyan [1] and User:Turtlescrubber [2]. This article has current WP:GA status, acquired in June 2007. Its basic structure has been in place for much longer than that. It has recently been upgraded in several areas to meet FA levels, such as in the consistency of its cite formats. The article is reasonably stable given its subject, and I believe more stable than most of the articles for other major 2008 presidential candidates. Wasted Time R 03:12, 1 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose

— BQZip01 — talk 16:53, 1 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support

Well, not being as well versed in FA requirements as User:BQZip01, I still think that this article is FA worthy as it is one of the best political articles on wikipedia. User Wasted Time R is really pushing this one forward and methodically taking this article to the FA level. I am confident that any problems that do arise (see above) will be swiftly dealt with. I give my full support to moving this article to FA status. Turtlescrubber 16:21, 2 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Moderate support. The article is generally quite impressive, though it meets some criteria better than others.

  • 1a: The article is fairly well written, but perhaps by necessity addresses many unconnected topics one after another, making it hard to say that it is truly "engaging". In the longer sections "first term", "second term" and "presidential campaign of 2008" there are places where my eyes start to glaze over.
  • 1b: The article is quite comprehensive. Whenever missing information was pointed out in the last talk archive, the deficiency was addressed... unless it was there already.
  • 1c: 264 references! You've raised the bar.
  • 1d: Neutrality is hard to be sure about, but any bias is not extreme. Certain Wikilinked terms such as "cottage industry" and "boogeyman" perhaps seem out of place and might be taken to disparage opposition unfairly.
    •  Done The "bogeyman" term is in common political usage, refers to figures of both parties, and is used in the article cited. You are right that the "cottage industry" term and claim was not cited; I have added one, that uses that term and validates the point being made here. Wasted Time R 01:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1e: Seems stable.
  • 2a: Lead is fairly good, but doesn't summarize the "first term" section at all.
  • 2b: The overall organization is fairly good.
  • 2c: Reference formats seem good.
  • 3: Images seem a bit sparse, but perhaps the need for a good fair use rationale limits potential additions.
    •  Remark: You ain't kiddin'! I would love to have some better images, especially from her infamous 1970s/1980s fashionally-challenged era. Nada. And we have it lucky, with her being a government figure. There are plenty of articles on entertainment world figures — Natalie Portman is a good example — where the articles have never had a single good photo of the subject. Wasted Time R 01:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • 4: The summary style isn't perfectly consistent. The "Presidential campaign of 2008" section is more than a summary, for instance when it starts talking about polling results in six states, etc. The "Awards and Honors" section has no summary at all, not even a number of awards or most prominent award.
    •  Done I've added a summary to the 'Awards and Honors' section. Regarding the 'Presidential campaign' section, I've moved some of the detail out into the separate campaign article. However, note that the "first six states" polling information is a summary of the poll graphs found in the campaign article. Wasted Time R 13:27, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Last but not least: I think that in light of campaign finance issues and just plain fairness, that it would be wrong to run one candidate as a feature article close to an upcoming election but not others. A clear, consistent policy on the topic may be necessary to protect Wikipedia's reputation and tax-exempt status. Mike Serfas 01:54, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be clear, the FAC process is separate from the "Today's Featured Article" schedule. So promotion to FA doesn't mean the article will be on the Main Page anytime soon necesarily. Also, I personally wouldn't call say it is "close" to the election. It's still 13 months away. We can still have our own article quality standards without being politicized. -Fsotrain09 17:11, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not saying her article shouldn't be featured or even that it shouldn't appear on the Main Page soon afterward. (Still, don't forget that she hasn't won the primaries yet!) But my main concern is that maybe her article is featured on the main page shortly, but her opponent's article becomes featured later and ends up on the Main Page the day before the November election. In any case I think that Wikimedia should decide on a consistent, legally safe policy on candidate Main Page articles now (even if it is to intentionally disregard the issue), so as to avoid any allegations of partisanship or censorship that might arise if someone felt that he had to change the "Today's Featured Article" schedule at the last moment. Mike Serfas 20:23, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. I think it is well written, but given that she is a political candidate some care must be given to avoid any potential issues of partisanship and might fall under the Equal Time Rule, for example, during Ronald Reagan's political campaigns, if a station aired one of his films, it would have been required to offer equal time to Mr. Reagan's opponents. Arzel 04:44, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The Equal-time rule refers explicitly to radio and television broadcasts, and may not even extend to cable television.[3] I fail to see how it could possibly extend to websites. And even if it did, I think Wikipedia would be considered a "documentary" and be exempt. The issue of Reagan's films, and now Fred Thompson's Law & Order episodes, lies in the context of entertainment programming. Wasted Time R 11:01, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't claim that it does, only that it be made clear beforehand that it doesn't. For the most part it does read as a documentary, however there are also some of her political platform issues regarding her presidential election that might be viewed as promotion of an individual candidate. I'm just saying that WP should be careful so close to the primary elections and the presidential elections. Arzel 22:37, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"Equal Time" doesn't apply, and shouldn't - it would be hard to provide an entry for a Taxpayer Party candidate as long as the Hillary Rodham Clinton article. My main concern is that the Wikimedia Foundation is a 501(c) public charity prohibited from political activity. I'm not a lawyer, but by all accounts I've heard the decision on how much political activity of what kind is acceptable before an organization loses its status can be quite arbitrary, based on vague criteria, of which campaigning for a specific candidate at election time is one of the most severely interpreted. An ancillary concern is that if Wikipedia gives one side of the political divide enough ammunition, it could find itself a handy target. If an anti-Wikipedia sentiment is allowed to gain traction it could become virtually impossible to eradicate, leading to a continuous stream of real vandalism - not just schoolkids blanking pages, but serious efforts by trained adults - as well as professional legal attacks and smear campaigning. For these reasons and simply as a matter of reputation, Wikipedia must ensure that its featuring of candidates on the Main Page is not perceived as biased. Mike Serfas 07:01, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support, I find the article well written and sourced, plus the dedication that Wasted Time R has put into covering and fixing whatever concerns have araisen is outstanding. I srongley suggest that editors who vote oppose on an FAC, to take into consideration a reconsideration of their vote once their concerns have been taken care. I have often noticed cases where an oppose vote has reamined even after concerns have been taken care of and the reason for the oppose no longer exsists. I believe that this practice is unfair to the nominator (and I'm not directingthis comment to anyone in particular). Tony the Marine 18:53, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, 1a, the prose is regrettable. Here's a sample passage:

  • Examinations of the May 1993 firings of the White House Travel Office employees, an affair that sometimes became known as "Travelgate", began with charges that the White House had used alleged financial improprieties in the Travel Office operation to give the business to Arkansas friends of theirs; over the years the investigation focused more and more on whether Hillary Clinton had orchestrated the firings and whether she made true statements regarding her role in them to investigating authorities.
  • Any chance this article will get the kind of *thorough* examination at FAC that was given Ronald Reagan? Rhetorical question. Much work needed on the prose, and the sourcing should be at least at the same level demanded of Reagan. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:00, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • That is both grammatical and unambiguous. It does not ring well, and "the business" is, while clear in context, unidiomatic; but I would not expect the nominator to be able to figure out what Sandy's objection is, or how to address it. I'm not sure which of the possible improvements Sandy wants myself. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:57, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I reworded the Whitewater etc section a bit to try to address what I think might be objections to the way it was phrased. I'm also not sure what you're getting at, Sandy, regarding the prose, so more specifics would be very helpful. (And not all of us were involved or are familiar with the Reagan FAC, so I hope whatever happened there will not have an impact on what happens here, other than to assure featured quality all around.) Tvoz |talk 23:32, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • SandyGeorgia is right that the sourcing level for the Whitewater and other investigations section is a little low. Partly this is because I did a lot of work on some of the specific articles for those investigations, and hoped that the sourcing inside them would suffice, but that's not the way it works. I will add citings as necessary. Wasted Time R 23:47, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments - nearly there. The only thing letting the article down is issue with prose. It is a bit choppy both in terms of clauses and paragraphs - I've gone about massaging it a bit but I'll list some things I think need a bit of tinkering from the main contributor. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:20, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The subsection Second term has a few stubby paras that should be combined -snetence 1 and the last para. Try and make it into some larger paras, either by combining or expanding/deleting.
In the lead, why not have the exact date in began her career as a lawyer in the 1970s ? It looks sloppy and there would be no added length by having exact date.
The Clintons had lost their late-1970s investment in the Whitewater Development Corporation;[126] at the same time, Clinton partners in that investment, Jim and Susan McDougal, operated Madison Guaranty, a savings and loan institution that retained the legal services of Rose Law Firm and which later failed. - this sentence lost me a bit - "their partners" for "Clinton partners"? and as written it doesn't clarify why it was controversial.

Anyway, have a go at these and I'll see if I can find some more. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:28, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the two short paragraphs in 'Second term', they don't combine well with anything else. I agree that too many short paragraphs is generally not good, but there are occasions where they encapsulate a particular subject or point well, and after all that's what a paragraph is supposed to do. Wasted Time R 18:53, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding '1970s', I reworded the intro to avoid that. Wasted Time R 18:53, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Reworked Whitewater section with these comments in mind. Tvoz |talk 18:13, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Tvoz. I have added some explanations to the Whitewater part to try to make clearer what the allegations actually were. It's hard, because I'm trying to keep a narrow focus on the Hillary issues, and not the sometimes-connected, sometimes-separate Bill issues ... trying to fully understand Whitewater will give anyone a headache, which is partly why the Whitewater (controversy) article is so messed up ... but that's a target for another day. Wasted Time R 18:47, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I see almost the opposite issue with the prose in some sections--several complex compounded sentences in a row. It's somewhat difficult to follow the train of thought in sections like "Lewinsky scandal", for instance. Of course, the explanations for things like the impeachment are complex, but there is probably still room for improvement in readability. Some more idiomatic phrasing, if possible, would also help. But everything else looks good. -Fsotrain09 14:36, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Reworked Lewinsky section to improve clarity (I hope). Tvoz |talk 18:37, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment The section is much clearer, thanks. I've just got one question about the statement "Overall, her public approval ratings in the wake of the revelations shot upward to 70 percent, the highest they had been." 'Had been' since the start of the first presidential term? Since Bill Clinton had been in political office? I assume its the former, but stating that would be better. -Fsotrain09 08:01, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I believe it's the highest they'd ever been and changed it as such, based on another reference (also added) which says her approval "peaked" then at 71%. Tvoz |talk 08:23, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose While it is well sourced, it is heavily unbalanced towards supporting her, when it should be NPOV. I would like to see a "criticism" or "controversy", seeing as she is a highly controversial figure. Carbon Monoxide 23:05, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your comments. It would help if you could point out what controversy or criticism you think is missing. To name a few things the article does cover: changing her name just to help her husband get elected, her work for a radical law firm, her work for an ultra-establishment law firm, her failing a bar exam and never telling anyone, her being on the Wal-mart board of directors and never speaking out about their anti-labor practices, Tammy Wynnette and baking cookies, her spectacular profits from cattle futures, Whitewater billing records that mysteriously reappeared, Travelgate (where she came as close as you can come to being indicted without actually being indicted), Filegate, grand jury testimony, staying married to Bill after Monica, carpetbagging in New York, and the Norman Hsu fundraising episode. What else would you like included? Wasted Time R 23:33, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'll abstain for the time being. Better then I thought on that part, though. Carbon Monoxide 23:39, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Second look, and answering some earlier questions. Throughout seven FACs, every word on Reagan was scrutinized and every possible excuse was drug up to keep it from being featured. Let's see the same kind of review here, to assure FA quality. For example, there were repeated objections that the Reagan—a two-term President and according to polls one of the most highly regarded Presidents—article was bloated and too long, so it had to be cut down constantly to conform to WP:SIZE guidelines (specifically, text favorable to him was repeatedly asked to be cut). This article is 10% larger than Reagan on readable prose and exceeds prose size recommendations at WP:SIZE. The article is overlinked to the point of impeding readability; pls see WP:MOSLINK and WP:CONTEXT. Words commonly known to most English-speaking readers need not be linked, the same word should not be linked several times in the same section, and too many blue links to irrelevant terms dilute the high-value links and make the article hard to read (for example, surely most Wiki readers know what a salmon is and don't need to detour there when reading about Clinton). Unnecessary listiness in Political positions should be converted to prose. There are still copyedit issues; with just a quick scan of the prose, one can easily find redundancies and informal prose (Clinton has served on five Senate committees with nine subcommittee assignments in all), strange formatting (in the bulleted list right below that, switch in tense at ... replacing an earlier assignment from 2001 on the Committee on Budget), and some focus on reducing peacock terms and stating criticism factually is apparent from only a quick glance ("investigating the health issues faced by 9/11 first responders, eventually earning the praise and union endorsement of New York City's Uniformed Fire Officers Association and the Uniformed Firefighters Association for her 2006 re-election bid.[168]" —there is no mention of praise in that citation, in fact, there is only one statement by a firefighter which doesn't seem to warrant the word "praise"). From the other direction, there's also favorable spin on controversial items; notice the wording "which, years later while she was First Lady, was suppressed at the request of the White House and became the subject of mystery).[19]" Mystery sounds like a very favorable spin on controversy, deception, or whatever words the source actually uses, and it's a Clinton-friendly source. Again, scholarly sources were demanded for the Reagan article, and certainly there are more scholarly analyses on the hidden thesis than MSNBC news. Please run through the entire article again to tighten up the prose, ce, remove peacock terms, eliminate overlinking, and trim up the size to conform to WP:SIZE; there are plenty of daughter articles where text can be trimmed to (for example, there's an article for her Presidential campaign, this article is a bio and need not go into so much detail, that's one example only). This article should at least be held to the same standard the Reagan article was on size, sourcing, prose, balance, and criticism, not run through FAC on fan support. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:22, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • SandyGeorgia, thank you for your detailed, specific comments, which I and others will be addressing. But to a couple of your general points: I have no idea why Ronald Reagan had such a hard time at FAC. If it's because people were punishing the article because they didn't like Reagan's politics, then shame on them. But that's no reason to treat another FAC with the same incivility. And I have no idea why you think this FAC is being "run through on fan support"; so far there are only three supporters and the FAC seems headed to failure. Wasted Time R 15:45, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • I doubt we need be concerned this article will be treated with the same incivility that Reagan was treated with; that trend usually runs one direction only. My point is that scholarly sources, following size guidelines, and due weight to criticism were demanded of Reagan just as they should be demanded of Clinton. Clinton, because of the nature of Wiki, will not receive the strident review Reagan did. That's no reason to let a less than stellar article slide through. This article can benefit from the level of scrutiny that was given Reagan's article: the same demands about scholarly sources, balance, and bloated size. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:36, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Quick reply on one point to SandyGeorgia (haven't looked at the rest in depth yet): the footnote currently numbered 169, not 168, is the one that has the praise and later support of the firefighters' unions, and that correct reference has been at the end of that sentence since I posted it. I can see about moving it closer to the word "praise" - but it The praise is indeed in that reference and I think is an important point, so I don't think that critique was valid. Tvoz |talk 20:38, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • And this highlights why we really shouldn't use sources like Newsday.com (Bill Moyers et al) for a bio that has easily accessible, numerous more scholarly and less biased sources; it smacks of cherrypicking to use a specific word. If you're going to use something like Newsday, why not balance it with the equivalent article at Newsmax, which pointed out that it was a hastily arranged event, designed to exclude the rank and file who didn't support Clinton? The NY Times used the "praise" word, while obliquely highlighting that the rank and file officers were missing in action. Using a one-sided report from a biased outlet like Newday.com isn't what this level of bio should be using (admittedly, the NY Times slants as well, but at least they mentioned the missing rank and file). The Times article is available online; there's no need to use an inferior source just to put forward the "praise" word, when other sources acknowledge that the rank and file were not happy.[4] [5] If you're going to run sources like Newsday, balance them with sources like Newsmax. Better yet, eliminate the peacockery (there were "issues") and use the highest-quality sources available. And mention the rank and file issue. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:36, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • SandyGeorgia, your attempt to paint The New York Times as a biased, pro-Clinton source is laughable. What single media figure caused the Clintons the most grief during their time in the White House? Jeff Gerth. Who did Gerth work for? The New York Times. How many times are Gerth articles or the Gerth co-authored book referenced in this article? At least 20. Wasted Time R 00:45, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • SandyGeorgia, you are off-base in a couple of respects here. First, Newsday.com is just the website the original cite was at; the story in question was from the AP. Second, Newsmax didn't even have a reporter there; their "story" just quotes from the New York Times story and then analyzes/spins it against Hillary. That's pretty lame. I'm willing to use a Newsmax story as a cite if it appears some real reporting went into it, just like I will (and have) used Fox News, Washington Times, New York Post, etc. But a lot of Newsmax stories are just either AP rehashes or partisan hack attacks. Wasted Time R 02:41, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Finally, I see no evidence that the endorsement event was "designed to exclude the rank and file who didn't support Clinton." All we know is that it was a low-key event with not many present. The rest is speculation. I've added the NYT cite you found, but otherwise I don't see any change on this being warranted. If you can find a story with some real facts and investigation that says the rank-and-file still hated Hillary but the union leadership chose to be politically expedient and endorse her anyway (which might well be the case for all I know, union leaderships have been known to become out of touch with who they represent), then we can revisit this. Wasted Time R 03:18, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Further on your media bias kick, I do not accept your denigration of Bill Dedman's report on the Hillary Wellesey thesis matter. He's a Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter, whose account of the whole affair makes clear that the Clinton White House were paranoid idiots for suppressing the thesis in the first place. I don't know of any "scholarly" treatments of the thesis yet, and I see nothing wrong with relying upon Dedman's story. Wasted Time R 04:49, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • SandyGeorgia - can we try to look at this article on its own merits and not compare it to whatever happened at the Reagan FAC? Maybe they were right, maybe they were wrong - but it sounds like this article is being held to a standard that you objected to on Reagan, but now are going to insist on - I'm not sure why. Specific suggestions about this article will be much more useful than general comments about standards - as I said earlier, some of us know nothing about what went on there, and shouldn't have to. And I do object to your characterization of cherrypicking, or suggesting that I used that source (AP, not Newsday, as Wasted said - are they "inferior" too?), "just to put forward the praise word". That is an unwarranted and unfounded accusation (as was your earlier claim that "there is no mention of praise" in the source provided) - I'm more than happy to also include the NYT reference and others if they are found to be relevant. (I don't have a problem with there being "too many" references.) This article has more than its share of negative material about Hillary Clinton, some of which is a stretch in my opinion - and the passage about the booing incident is a case in point - on its own it was without context and seemed to be there just to say something negative - Gerth's speculation as to the reason for the booing is just that, speculation by someone with a POV about the subject. So balancing it with information about the firefighters' unions' later support is appropriate. As for scholarship - Hillary's story is ongoing and much more recent than Reagan's - look at the dates of some of the scholarly books about Reagan - they are written after some time passed and perspective on his life and career was gained. You're not going to find the same number of scholarly treatments of events that have just happened or are unfolding, so we have to rely on newspaper accounts and the like. (You mention that you're sure there are scholarly references to the masters thesis matter - do you know of any?) Wasted is right that we have a broad range here - the Washington Times and Wall Street Journal, to name two, are hardly part of some kind of liberal pro-Clinton fan group. We are quite aware of the need for neutrality and also fairness - and that no more means cramming in whatever negative things that can be found as loading up fluff. Finally, on specifics - "mystery" has been replaced, and many wikilinks removed - still working on that. You mention peacockery but I don't know what you're referring to when you point to '(there were "issues")' as an example - could you be more specific please? Tvoz |talk 05:48, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • A couple of other follow-ups on SandyGeorgia's specifics. The two problems with the committees description have been fixed; thanks for pointing them out. You say that we should go through the whole article to find more of these ... alas, having worked on this article forever, I can't "see" faults like these well; that's why it's great when others point them out. However, regarding your issue "Unnecessary listiness in Political positions should be converted to prose," I have to disagree. Unlike biographical sections, this section is about the presentation of a variety of data points, and thus lends itself to lists or tables. Indeed I've just changed the political spectrum analyses to be a list as well. It's much easier to assimilate the data that way. Wasted Time R 10:19, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Coming back to SandyGeorgia's desire for scholarly sources, there has been a lot of such work published regarding Hillary as First Lady and the gender/sociological/communications-related implications of her role. The article's 'Cultural and political image' section now references several such works. Wasted Time R 21:12, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment on size Does this really need to be 133K? That's bigger in total size than articles on two-term presidents. Granted most if it is in refs, which brings up another point. Does this really need 248 refs? There are so many it makes it hard to read the prose. Rlevse 16:23, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Regarding both your and SandyGeorgia's comments about the size. I measure the readable prose size as 58K, excluding any of the prose in footnotes. Using WP:SIZE's "rule of thumb" guidelines, this falls into the high end of the "May eventually need to be divided (likelihood goes up with size)" range. My feeling is that this "eventually" depends upon what happens in this election cycle. If she gets elected President, then obviously the whole article will have to be drastically reshaped, with summary sections made for everything in order to make room to cover her presidency. If she doesn't get elected, and remains a Senator, then it's possible the article can keep its current structure, with possibly just the Senate section being spun off into a daughter article.
    • Regarding the large number of references, yes they are a pain — they drive up the apparent article size, they cause slow rendering of the article in Firefox browsers, they make the edit view of the article horrible to look at ... but what else to do? I used to avoid the {{cite}} template for citations, since it is horribly verbose and chews up space, but I had to convert to it for FA. I tried leaving out references for things that were covered in daughter articles, but someone above complained about that. As I read WP:BLP and other guidelines, everything's gotta get sourced. If there are specific places where you think the references are excessive, let us know. Wasted Time R 17:05, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I highly doubt all 248 refs are truly needed.Rlevse 17:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, Wasted, I look at readable prose size per WP:SIZE, which does not include refs and other overhead. And Reagan was forced to toe the 30–50KB readable prose limit, because a rush of editors wanted the nice things said about him by reliable sources removed, while they wanted more criticism (usually by non-reliable sources) included. Balance and neutrality are equally at issue here. With good daughter articles available, surely you can find a way to keep Hillary within the guidelines that applied to what polls and reliable sources described as a very popular President, by trimming about 10%. The way to avoid a big chunk of different references is to use a few high-quality sources (like scholarly books, where you only need to cite the page number in each note, the book once in the Source section), rather than giving the appearance of cherry picking by use of marginal sources like Newsday.com. A lot of individual cite templates really chunk up the overall size, while relying on book sources can chop as much as 10KB off of your size, and result in a more balanced, scholarly article. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:25, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
SandyGeorgia, if you look at the References more closely you will see that I've used lots of book references, just as you describe. The three books most heavily used are Bernstein's biography, the Gerth-Van Natta biography, and the Roger Morris Clintons biography. I think it's safe to say that Hillary isn't a fan of any of them, especially the last two. I've also used Hillary's autobiography in places for simple biographical facts and for her perspective on events; being quite self-serving (as are almost all autobiographies), it isn't reliable for much else. Wasted Time R 03:24, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
By the way, Wasted, you do not have to use cite templates for FA; I don't know who gave you that idea. I didn't, and I won't, because they chunk up the article size something awful. Of course, now that you've converted them, you're kinda stuck, but if I had my druthers, I'd ask someone to write a script that un-cite templates so we could knock 10 to 20 KB off of every FA that used them. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:46, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Now you tell me! ;-( There aren't many tasks I've hated more than rewriting all those refs into cite template format. Ugh. Live and learn ... Wasted Time R 03:26, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You could subst the templated references.--165.173.137.96 16:01, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia:Template_substitution#Templates_that_should_not_be_substitutedKmarinas86 04:55, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I certainly had that impression when you were reviewing Barack Obama's FA status in January, Sandy - I don't recall anything being said about not having to use the cite templates then. Perhaps I missed it. An advantage of the cite template of course is its rendering refs in a consistent manner throughout an article and across articles. I am also not sure why there is so much concern about size - I don't want articles to be unwieldy, but in this environment space is much less of a concern than it is in paper. Tvoz |talk 05:48, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It has to do with style; one must ask themselves "what is the most efficient way to word this"? More often than not, a looong article contains prose that can be edited/condensed to help a reader get more out of the piece in less time.DMCer 07:34, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oh yes, I totally agree with that - cutting out the fat and tightening prose is important; my problem with an over-concern about space is about cutting out content for the goal of shorter articles, not about editing for conciseness which I wholeheartedly support. Tvoz |talk 20:07, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Query As Clinton is currently running for president, I feel that this article is inherently unstable. If she were to win.... Perhaps FAC would be best reserved for a less tumultuous time in her life? Awadewit | talk 01:52, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Almost all of the presidential campaign happenings go into the daughter article Hillary Rodham Clinton presidential campaign, 2008, not here. This will continue to be true until late into the general election next year, assuming she gets the nomination. If she does get elected president, then you are right, the article will have to be significantly restructed. But that is over a year away. If you have followed this article's recent history, you'll know that all the editing has been to improve the article overall; the changes in the article to follow currently happening events has been limited to a few additions to the 'Senate second term' section and one addition to the presidential campaign section. Wasted Time R 02:10, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • I think if we are saying things like "If she does get elected, the article will have to be significantly restructured", then we should wait, at least until after presidential election. Awadewit | talk 18:49, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Any of the presidential candidates' articles would have to be significantly restructured, if they get elected next year. So what you're saying is that over the next 13 months, none of the most highly visible, frequently read articles in Wikipedia can be marked as being of the best quality possible? That seems kind of lame. And by the way, don't look now, but Barack Obama is already FA. Do you propose to start an immediate FAR to strip it? Wasted Time R 19:01, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • That is exactly what I am saying - I don't think articles can be featured when they are constantly changing or will obviously change in the future. It is one thing to say that all FAs should continue to improve their language or to include new scholarship, but those are much smaller changes than what is happening or would happen to the Clinton article. I'm sure my views are a lot more extreme than others - I happen to think that articles on people should not be featured until they are dead and there is real scholarship written on them and their legacy is clearer. However, as I am pretty sure that this view is a minority one, I have simply suggested that we await the outcome of the election. If Clinton is not elected, we are on firmer ground saying that her article won't have to be completely rewritten. If she is elected, well, waiting seems like the most respectful thing to do. Otherwise, the article will essentially just be news. Since FAs are supposed to be stable and Clinton's article will undoubtedly be dynamic (in the best way), I just thought that waiting seemed wise. I am not going to oppose based on this. I just think that it is something the editors and reviewers should consider. I was surprised that the article had been nominated. I would not have thought that the Clinton editors would have wanted to nominate the article yet. Awadewit | talk 19:29, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Needs a lot of work for FA, not there yet. Compare this article with FA of Gerald Ford. The Clinton article is more of a newspaper than an encyclopedia. There are some negative things that are not in the article that should be if it's a balanced newspaper. There are a lot of things that aren't encyclopedic that are in there. The long text about her first and second term as Senator seem almost like a campaign ad and not a biography that will last decades, like the Ford one will probably do. For equal time, look at Lyndon B. Johnson's article. Like Ford, it is timeless unlike Clinton. I don't want to get into a shouting match because every sentence in the Clinton article, someone wrote and will violently defend. Due to her presidential campaign, there is edit warring. This disqualifies it for FA. Note that not having a FA doesn't mean we hate her or that she is bad. The article on Jesus is not a FA. If we make it a FA and she becomes president (very likely), it will be very difficult to substantially change. Then we will have a 2nd rate article permanently in wikipedia--it will never reach the standard of the Ford and Johnson articles. For this reason, let's keep it a GA and don't memorialize a bad version unworthy for posterity.Mrs.EasterBunny 23:10, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thank you very much for your comments. First response: I'd like to know specifically what "negative things" are not in the article. I've tried to include every negative thing that is of some significance and passes WP:BLP muster ... so I'm very interested in knowing what's missing. Wasted Time R 23:29, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Also note your statement, "Due to her presidential campaign, there is edit warring. This disqualifies it for FA." First, there hasn't been much of any edit warring about her campaign. Second, all sorts of hot subjects have become FA; you really think Israel and Pakistan, to pick just two, never see edit battles? Wasted Time R 18:45, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I realise that I have no account here, but I feel I must oppose this nomination on the grounds that an FAC is supposed to be stable, as in not prone to major changes. Hillary is currently a presidential candidate, meaning that the page - no matter how well it is currently cited - will be subject to radical changes in information as the monthes go by and the election aproaches. I would suggest trying again after the election, until then though, I recommend that this nom be pulled. 129.108.206.192 18:25, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • You look suspiciously like a sock — nobody makes their first-ever edit talking about FAC stability criteria. Wasted Time R 19:06, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Also, you are incorrect that the article will be subject to radical changes over the next 13 months. Only 5% or less of the article pertains to her running for president; the vast majority covers her life before the campaign, and will be stable. Most of her presidential campaign developments are covered in Hillary Rodham Clinton presidential campaign, 2008, not here. Wasted Time R 18:30, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Just because I have no user name does not mean I have not editted here before; there are a large nomber of ISP adresses for the Net, and not all have been used here. I have contributed here before, mostly in an "if anyone wants my opinion, we/you should ____" capacity. As for the points you rasie: I admit that most of the article will remain stable; what concerns me are the hardcore democratic party followers who will attempt to make Hillary look better than she is and the equally large number of republicans who will attempt to do the exact opposite. Most of that will proabably happen elsewhere (you mentioned other pages which I am sure have seen election vandalism even though the vote is still a year away); however, I still beleive that even with the other pages this one will not remain stable for the 13 monthes it will take the U.S. to complete the election cycle. Now as I noted, I have no account here, nor do I have any desire to create one (friends of mine have created accounts here and had trouble editting in peace, or so they say), and I respect the fact my two cents on the matter may be swept aside since there is no user name to go with the comments (that usually happens anyway, so I won;t feel bad if I see a repeat preformance here). All I wanted to do was to point out the fact that FA class articles are supposed to be stable, but due to circumstances beyond your control I do not feel this one will be stable until December of next year. 129.108.206.192 23:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Yeah, like all controversy will stop if she becomes president (or not), right...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Under what circumstances will Israel and Pakistan remain stable? Because nothing ever happens in those parts of the world? What about Big Bang or Planetary habitability, it's not like any new discoveries are being made in cosmology, right? What about Lost (TV series), it's not like the final seasons of that series are going to change anything, eh? What about Gwen Stefani, she's planning an early retirement so that nobody has to update her article? Or the Chicago Bears, they are dropping out of the NFL? And none of these subjects have any supporters or detractors with strong feelings, right! None of them have ever seen an edit war! Your model of "stability" is unsupported by existing examples of FA articles, which all of these are. Wasted Time R 00:21, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support in principle. That is to say, many of these points are trivial, but others should be fixed, and will improve the article. When that is done, it will certainly be better than the average article we promote, which is all we should reasonably require.
I trust there will be no more commentary of the form: Ronald Reagan got mauled, so this should; it is too easy to mistake that for WP:POINT. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:05, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

*Oppose FA status for an article that is not an FA article I will support when it is FA quality. This article is full of fluff, even though it is very long and a result of a lot of hard work from many people. It doesn't qualify because of edit warring, it's just that one side has been very persistent (look the the edit histories) and the other editors just give up. The talk page archives are full of examples. The article is full of campaign material. Granted, Hillary is a reasonably good candidate is no reason to let FA requirements side.

For example, the article said she helped get funding for the WTC. Look at the reference (#185). It is a speech at a dedication. Of course, they are going to say nice things about the senior politicians. What reliable sources do we have that prove that if Hillary had a stroke and was in a coma that NY wouldn't have gotten the money? OTOH, some editor looked hard to find that reference so it's proof of hard work. Yet, hard work is not a reason for FA.

That's just one example. There are probably a hundred other similar examples of why it shouldn't be an FA.

Another example is around reference 113 (numbers change as edits are added but usually not too much). The sentence seems to imply that the Hillary health care plan caused a large Republican win. That's piecing together several references to imply a conclusion that no political commentator has made. The result is POV. I don't know whose POV or even if it was an intended POV, but not FA material.

Now, look at the Bill Clinton article. That is a much better article and even that is not an FA. It summarizes major and pertinent legislation, not fluff like the WTC comment in Hillary.

This is a splendid opportunity to improve the Hillary article. If we want to keep the fluff but make it a FA, then we could split off into sub-articles. The goal should should be to make it like an encyclopedic biography, not a press release bio.

Wasted Time R and Tvoz has edited this a lot. This is not directed at you. Congratulations for your effort. Maybe it's the nature of the beast (presidential candidate) that makes this a hard article to write for FA status as we are tempted to include a lot of info and delete out a lot of info, etc. 7F 20:05, 10 October 2007 (UTC) [reply]

  • If we want this to be an FA, let's organize a FA task force on the talk page. It can be done but will require weeks of hard work. I only cited 2 references as problems above but I these were the first 2 that I looked at randomly. So 100% of the citations I looked up have a problem. Hardly FA material. Let's withdraw this FA and get to work adding and pruning. We can keep the pruned material in sub-articles, if desired.7F 20:09, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As below, I do not agree that this FAC should be withdrawn - we are making progress, working in a collaborative manner, and what's needed are specific suggestions here, not a task force. Tvoz |talk 20:30, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
7F, thank you for you two specific comments. The article is correct in these matters, but I agree these specific citations and explanations could be stronger; I will fix them up this evening. Wasted Time R 20:45, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Even though 7F was a disruptive sock, there was some merit in these two specific comments, and I have now strengthened the wording and/or citing in both places. Wasted Time R 04:15, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]


Summary of concensus
Wasted Time R and Tvoz are the only big supporters of the FA. Tony the Marine also makes a supporting comment. Most everybody else either opposes it or has suggestions for improvement to make it get to FA status. The concensus is not to make it an FA.
So let's stop any potential fighting, end the FA, and listen to the concensus. Let's start a concentrated effort to make it FA status and revisit the issue in 6 months, sooner if progress is faster. I will begin the FA Task Force on the talk page now. 7F 20:18, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Forgive me, but I think this comment is out of line - the process is ongoing, there have been suggestions made and met, and there is no need to interrupt it. You seem to be new here - or at least you are editing under a new name - so it might be a good idea to sit back and wait for the process to unfold rather than trying to stop it. Tvoz |talk 20:28, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
7F, beyond what Tvoz said, you would have more credibility if you knew how to spell "consensus". Wasted Time R 20:50, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

::::My idea is a good compromise. Several editors vote "no FA". You and Wasted Time R are vocal proponents of FA with the marine guy also for FA. My idea is to say let's work together to make it an FA using the newly formed FA Task Force. If you don't want to participate in the FA Task Force, nobody is forcing you to do so. This way we get the FA but get a FA-worthy article rather than falsely award it FA status (but we don't kill it like the oppose voters are heading). Who you should be fighting for is article improvement, not just the FA stamp of approval. I nominate Wasted Time R to be Chief Copy Editor (and spellchecker) for the FA Task Force. 7F 20:52, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Striking out comments by and to sockpuppet of banned user attempting to evade his ban. Tvoz |talk 21:39, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Removed strike outs to make it more legible.UTAFA 22:58, 10 October 2007 (UTC) I find it very incivil for so many sock accusations (at least 2) against people others don't like. I am not voting on this issue. UTAFA 23:00, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This has nothing to do with who people like, UTAFA, it has to do with a person who has been banned coming back on under a sockpuppet name - perhaps more than one - and posting here in interruption of this ongoing process. I have stricken the comments of that sock again, and ask you to leave them stricken. Tvoz |talk 00:05, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Turns out UTAFA was the same dumbass. Turtlescrubber 03:57, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

*Comment. I've made a suggestion on the discussion page of this article. If this article is going to be featured on the front page, it needs some work. MD12752 04:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, welcome back. Turtlescrubber 04:11, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

:The comment was "Under the first lady section, traditional duties, the second paragraph is totally unsupported by any references. If this is a good article, this is an example of not a good paragraph."

True enough. This will freak out Rlevse above, who thinks there are already too much references in the article, but I will try to add them. Wasted Time R 04:21, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
 Done We had them there and they fell off somewhere down the road - I reinstated the references. Thanks for pointing it out. Tvoz |talk 05:08, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

*More work needs done to improve article We should look globally at each section. For examaple, the section of her 2nd senate term. It list the follow in sentence form, of course.

1. supported a February 2007 non-binding Senate resolution against it, which failed to gain cloture.
2. voted in favor of a war spending bill that required President Bush to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq within a certain deadline
3. called on the Iraqi Parliament to replace Nouri al-Maliki as Prime Minister of Iraq
4. Clinton voted against a Senate resolution condemning personal attacks on Petraeus, which passed 72-25.
5. called on Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to resign
6. Clinton vowed to introduce legislation to statutorily expand this timeframe (Goodyear v. Ledbetter).
7. Secure Borders, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Reform Act of 2007, Clinton cast a number of votes in support of the bill
8. high approval ratings

IMHO, that's a poor summary of her 2nd Senate term. It misses the essence of her term. I remember a lot more of what happened during her second term and the one's listed are not even the highlights. MD12752 06:16, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If you "remember" the second term so clearly (it began all of 10 months ago!), perhaps you could share with us what the "highlights" were. Wasted Time R 12:30, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's coming within a matter of minutes as it has happened on another page. The people who are bent on getting a featured article star (for what? for show?) accuse me of being a sock. If they really wanted to improve an article, they would work on the article, not accuse others. My ideas speak for themselves. Those that have no ideas merely attack by saying "he's a sock!". A constructive person would focus on the message, which is article improvement. MD12752 07:04, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Struck out the third iteration (7F, UTAFA, MD12752) in 24 hours of sockpuppet posting in evasion of ban. Tvoz |talk 16:07, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose because the lead should mention her being a witch. No, actually, that's just a vanity link of mine for those with a sense of humour. Rest assured that, as one of 50,000 Ron Paul supporters, I will be happy to use only valid, well-precedented stall tactics to slow or prevent FA status. Agree that the level of nitpickiness should be at least that of the Reagan and Paul articles. So let's see. I won't be reading more than a couple of sections at a time for health reasons, but I may continue this list on-off as time permits.

  • Prose quality: enh. First sentence contains redundant "is"; lead contains "United States" 5x (3 in first graf) instead of "U.S." after 1st; being married to president and being first lady is pretty redundant; many from-to periods would be better served with en dashes; "Hillary Rodham" 1x should be "she" to preclude confusion; check for consistent omission or inclusion of Harvard comma (in graf 2, add after "moving to Arkansas", or delete after "welfare of children"); trim "the events of the Lewinsky scandal"; "first First Lady" should be recast; "woman elected Senator" should be "female Senator" unless you're PC; "initially supported .. including voting for" has no true referent for "including".
    • Fixed the duplicate "is". Disagree on the "U.S." introductions, especially when at the end of an "of the" target. Ditto the en dashes; this and the "U.S." seem too terse for me, like this is a Who's Who entry, when it's not. "Hillary Rodham" use is intentional; she's that name for the first five sections of the article, readers better get used to it. "moving to Arkansas" isn't part of a series but rather the first part of a compound clause with "marrying Bill Clinton", so the serial comma yes or no isn't at issue. "the events of" removed. Nothing wrong with "first First Lady", the different capitalization makes it easy to parse. "female Senator" change made. Changed "including" to "which included", but not sure it fixes anything. Wasted Time R 02:41, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weasel wording (apologies if any consensus language doesn't carry the ball): "active in a number of organizations"; more prominent "than many before her" (what happened to "new kind of FL"?); "failed to gain approval by" (instead of "was rejected by" or "failed in"); "but she did succeed in helping establish" (instead of "but she helped establish"-- and did she?); "among other things" (What?!? Good writers hate "things"-- I see HRC also "patched things up" with Wynette); "several other investigations" (What?!?); "state of her marriage"; "considerable public discussion"; "supported some foreign, opposed most domestic", and what happened after "initially"?
    • My approach to lead sections, echoed by User:BQZip01/FA Tips, is that they are just summaries of what the article is going to contain. They are not self-sustaining Wikipedia mini-articles. Thus, they do not need footnotes. And, they are allowed to speak in generalities (weasel words if you will), as long as the body of the article supports the generalities with specificity. I do not want to get too specific in the lead, or it will get too long and grind to a halt. But I will look at some of your wording issues; I agree the "things" here is bad. Wasted Time R 23:35, 12 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Wording: changed "many before her" to "almost any before her". "Failed to gain approval" can't be replaced by your suggestions because the health care plan never actually went to a vote. Changed to "she helped establish"; body of article gives cites verifying this. The agreedly hideous "among other things" replaced by the Adoption and Safe Families Act, which was her other major policy accomplishment. (The "patched things up" in the Wynette footnote is a bit colloquial but okay by me.) Later opposition to Iraq War added. Wasted Time R 02:55, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Selectivity: being named an "influential lawyer" is not leadworthy as she is not notable for her lawyering (only slightly during Watergate) but for her offices. Since when are "major initiatives" first-lady-driven, and shouldn't that be explained in lead because abnormal, or that text dropped? "Moving to New York" was quite more abrupt than the lead's gloss would imply. "Long described as a polarizing figure" should have a very old footnote (and the lead should have several others too, a few would not distract). Straw polls should be mentioned, because Obama leads her 9-8 at this moment. Really, the whole lead doesn't give one any impetus to find out more about her-- just like her life.
    • Well, she was noteworthy for being an attorney, by virtue of her work for Arkansas' most influential law firm, her chairing the LSC, her leading the ABA initiative, her being a political power in the incestuous Arkansas political/business/legal nexus, and her being on several corporate boards. The phrase "she took a more prominent position in policy matters than many before her. Her major initiative ..." answers your question about "major initiatives". Will look at "Moving to New York". Regarding footnotes, see above; there is a whole section near the end that supports the polarization statement. Regarding straw polls, they are a self-selecting sample and thus generally meaningless for predicting election outcomes. Every legitimate demographic poll has her well ahead. Wasted Time R 23:35, 12 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Regarding "Moving to New York," I think that is an abrupt locution; indeed a previous editor tried to rearrange it to smooth it out and put the "New York" by "Senator", but I restored this, because as you say in real life this sort of did drop from the sky. Anyway the body of the article discusses the carpetbagger issue, and the subarticle on the 2000 New York Senate race (what twists and turns - I've worked on it but not quite done it justice yet) covers it even more. Wasted Time R 03:04, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Fact check: Really, attracted "national attention" as the first student to speak at commencement, really? --Or was it instead because she criticized a senator to his face, as the article adds inconsistently? Lead implies she didn't lawyer before 1975, article contradicts. And just how was she involved with SCHIP, for those who don't bother to look?
    • Very good point on the national attention/Wellesley address; I need to work on this, and strengthen the citing in the body on this. Lead says she began to lawyer after 1973, not sure why you read 1975. Regarding SCHIP, the article body - still trying to economize on space - says she was the co-major force on it, along with Ted Kennedy, which was my distillation of [6], an AP article that has the best explanation of what she did on this that I've seen. Wasted Time R 03:15, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • That Section 2 title, "Marriage and family, law career and First Lady of Arkansas", is dead in the water; it's ugly and not even parallel ("Ladyship" would be parallel, but doesn't work either). Similarly sections 3 and 5, FL and Senator, are not parallel to the others.
    • I know the section 2 title isn't great, but the others that have been tried are worse. Almost every FL article has a "Marriage and family" section in it, so I was trying to incorporate that here too. Then I wanted to capture her professional career, as well as her political position. You're right that it isn't quite parallel, but it does convey the contents. I disagree on the other point - "First Lady of the United States" and "United States Senator" are parallel titles, even if the titles take different grammatical forms. Wasted Time R 03:21, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I do apologize if any think me incivil but the one-liners just seem to roll out when HRC's smell approaches. Feel free to retaliate over at "my" article within equal bounds of incivility. I'm afraid that the remainder of this article may just go downhill from there, reading something like Living History, of which I can't do more than a paragraph at once. Wasted Time R, thank you for working tirelessly so far, but you're not near done. Tvoz, thank you as well, your edits are helpful from what I've seen. But please rest assured that I can separate my revulsion to HRC personally from my literary criticism of mediocre prose; I intend to be a friendly sparring partner for as long as I can muster the energy. Though I might contribute here on noncontroversial style issues, I don't believe I will succeed in unknotting every other problem, so will just rant here. I hope this suffices to demonstrate that, if the remainder follows the same trend, this is not a feature article by a long stretch. John J. Bulten 20:06, 12 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Respectfully, John, I'd feel better about your comments if you hadn't started the last paragraph the way you did - personal feelings about the subject shouldn't be playing a role here - phrases like "HRC's smell" don't convince me you're really just looking at the prose, but I'm interested in specific objective comments in any case, and would ask you to try not to "rant" as it isn't all that helpful. As for Ron Paul, I did some work over there a while back (in the vicinity of 150 edits on main page and talk) and found that it was nearly impossible to keep the piece neutral - any critical material was removed or spun to such a degree that I cut back my editing there, finding it too frustrating. I'm hopeful that this has improved and I will be taking a look at the FAC - but not to "retaliate", and, I hope, with civil comments. Tvoz |talk 02:51, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

After being deleted by another party, I am repeating my valid criticisms without the jokes, so it will seem much dryer. I have now been accused of trolling, but could find nothing which applied except "(mis)used as an ad hominem attack against someone whose viewpoints and input cannot otherwise be silenced". If anyone can point to specific examples where I provoke vehemence or bait argument, I'm all ears. (I'd also like that policy on wholesale deletion on talk pages of what is 90% valid criticism and 10% jokes.) But I think I've made my intent pretty plain and unequivocal: pointing out reasons this is not an FAC article. If there's hidden intent, it's hidden from me too, please advise. If you'd give me time (by not deleting my valid criticisms), I'd even be able to go through and at least do the unobjectionable grammar and condensation stuff. P.S. When asked, Wasted preferred I unload here rather than on the HRC talk page. So here is (most of) the deleted text:

Tvoz, yes, I'm very thankful for your Ron Paul work. For "smell" read "aroma". But as you can tell, my goal is to convince the audience that I'm sincere about just looking at the prose, in fact, so much so that I can freely mention my bias as well. Everyone is biased, it's important to be able to admit it. I will also admit that looking for valid criticisms while entertaining my animus is quite therapeutic; there will be strong language, but I mean it quite sincerely. But if you have anything that you feel is still nonneutral about Ron Paul, I'm all ears and will entertain any reasonable argument. Here's some more (reasonable arguments) with my wife getting into the act too:

  • WP:LEAD says that leads are essentially self-sustaining mini-articles: "it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article"; "create a concise intro that works as a stand-alone article". FNs are not strictly necessary, but for items that (for proper context) need more explanation than the brief clauses, FNs should be used. Relative emphasis (in both lead and body) should reflect relative importance per reliable sources. "The lead should not "tease" the reader by hinting at but not explaining important facts that will appear later in the article." And all notable controversies should appear in lead; hinting at them is insufficient. This will all take awhile.
  • And excuse me, straw polls are real people really voting. Every poll type has its bias, so dismissing one type as "meaningless" is nonneutral. Wasted, did you review my link?
    • As I said in my Ron Paul FAC comments, straw polls measure enthusiasm for a candidate among the candidate's supporters, but as self-selecting samples are useless as electoral predictors. The good news is that in three months we'll have real caucus and primary results and delegate counts, and can report that rather than polls. Wasted Time R 15:13, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • After intro, the lead's org is: lawyer, First Lady, senator. Senator is shortest in lead but longest in article. Also there is no summary in lead of anything in sections 6-10, as one would expect. This gives undue weight to her most innocent years.
    • The lead does mention her campaign and her polarizing character, which are covered in sections 6-10. Since she's never been charged with a crime, much less convicted, all her years are innocent. Wasted Time R 15:13, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wikilink American in sidebar because everything else is linked.
  • Technically "United States Senator from New York" is redundant; but that might be sustainable.
  • "attracted national attention .. when she became the first student" is stretching it; the only real national attention is Life, and as I said that's for a different reason than the lead states. Please resolve the contradiction.
  • "first female partner of Rose" is not noteworthy; she'd have to be a female partner somewhere sooner or later.
You miss the point - she was the first woman to become a partner at Rose. A "venerable" Southern law firm, giving a full partnership to a woman for the first time in their history - that is notable. Not that this was her first partnership. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with Tvoz. Rose was a staid, very establishment firm, and her being even hired faced internal resistance. Defintely notable. Wasted Time R 15:13, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • "a number of organizations concerned" and "several corporate board" are completely unhelpful; even a single example in each case would be better (e.g. Wal-Mart). But even board of Wal-Mart is only borderline noteworthy.
  • "first First Lady" actually appears in the article text 6 times! Rephrase several or all. There are way too many "first"s here and some variety is needed.
  • Section 1: I do like the idea of footnote 1, so you might get away with leaving footnotes out of the lead, because it would be untoward for footnote 1 to break up the bold name in the first graf.
  • Comma after "Methodist family" to mirror that after "Chicago".
  • Her father should be "Sr." if that's what he is. "Small but successful" is amateur writing. Mother was a homemaker, so what? Change "Her father" to "Rodham's father". "Hugh Jr.", yes or no? Trim "Hillary Rodham" in next graf.
No, follow the wikilink: her father was Hugh Ellsworth Rodham, her brother is Hugh Edwin Rodham. Not Sr. or Jr. "Small but successful" is perfectly clear - what is "amateur" about it? Mother was homemaker is accurate - is it the word "homemaker" that you don't like, or do you think it's just not important who her mother was and what she did? Perhaps it's making a point that she didn't follow in her mother's footsteps - like Al Gore, whose mother was a lawyer. By the way, Dennis Kucinich's mother was a homemaker too. And Bill Clinton's was a nurse. Walter Mondale's was a schoolteacher. John Edwards' had an antique shop and was a postal worker. Ron Paul's is a mystery but his father had an eighth-grade education. So what? A biography has these details. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Hillary is possibly Native American? Too many wasted words on nationality!
Probably could be shortened, but take a look at what we've dealt with in the archives and the article's history - there are editors who insisted on detailed genealogy, objecting to anything shorter. This didn't get there by itself, and we'll have to see what will fly. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
See Fsotrain's comments below. I'm open to taking the "possibly Native American" out, but I think the rest should stay. Wasted Time R 15:32, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Who cares if she earned Brownie points or was a National Merit Finalist?! Who cares about weaselly "many activities at church and at her public school" and "a variety of sports"-- my two-year-old does all that, except for the school being public! Delete Brownie if she was a Girl Scout; delete Girl Scout if she did nothing more notable than "earning awards" (duh); delete student council if you don't know she ever held an office; and delete National Merit if she didn't get the scholarship! Even I can pad my resume better than that! BTW I hope to revisit this resume-padding issue often.
You're wrong - being a National Merit finalist as compared to semifinalist is noteworthy and not resume padding. As for sports, see below - Ron Paul's sports don't bother you, Hillary's do. Objective? Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This is not a resumé, therefore charges of padding are irrelevant. This is a biography. It describes a person's life. If person X leads a commonplace 1950s American suburban life, that tells you something about X. And like Tvoz said, being a National Merit finalist is a real achievement. Wasted Time R 15:32, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • You could spend 3 sentences on Goldwater and it'd be more interesting than the current text.
I have no idea what your point is. The point in the article is that she was raised in a politically conservative family and worked for Goldwater when she was young - and her politics evolved. Not interesting to you? So what? Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • So I take it she graduated Maine South? Specifying would be nice.
Sure, but I think it's self-evident, since she was redistricted there and the next thing we know she's at Wellseley who tend to want high school graduates. Why waste words on this? I'll look at it, if no one else has. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • First sentence another excellent wordiness example. Should become "and graduated in 1965" in previous graf, and "Rodham majored in political science at Wellesley College": savings of six words. What does "became active in politics" mean? If it means what happens in the next clause, it is redundant. Seems "Civil Rights" should be lowercase. "Subsequently" is redundant. Moving MLK meeting to "early life" would be nice if one had any detail. By the way I'm saving fact-checking, such as whether she really met MLK, for a later edition. "Affected by the death" means what? If it means what happens in the next clause, it is redundant.
    • Did some of your wording shortenings, but we have to say she entered Wellesley in 1965, because not everyone goes to college directly after high school. Actually ACRM is all initcapped, per its article, so I changed that. Moving the MLK meeting to early life means pulling in a whole level of detail about the effect that Methodist youth minister Donald Jones had on her; I'm up for it if you are. For the meeting, see Gerth & Van Natta pp. 20-21 for corraboration. Wasted Time R 15:48, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • How does one strike, at a college? Who struck? Faculty? If not, it was not a strike but a sit-in. What, not attending classes is a strike? No, that's truancy. And she got "moderate changes" out of it? What kind of resume inflation is this?
Wrong again - not a sit-in at all - read the source. Anyone who went to college in the 1960s understands how one strikes at a college - I did it several times, over several years. I changed the wikilink and target to "student strike" - you can go there and read how one strikes at a college. And it's not truancy either - truancy actually is not a concept on the college level - it refers to compulsory education, which college is not. "Moderate changes" is explained in the words that follow it - and I don't see how this is this resume padding. She organized the strike - the source clearly says and the article reflects, that she accomplished something with the strike - moderate, achievable change was her goal. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • What is the "Wellesley College Government"? I refuse to believe she was president of an entity so named, lowercase "g" or not.
It's a shame you don't bother to check your facts at all, and just shoot. Try looking at this one. Oh, guess you're wrong again. Or you can continue to refuse to believe whatever you like. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why did she need to understand her "switch to the Democratic Party" if it hadn't happened yet? All I see is step down from Young Republicans, then support McCarthy, then all of a sudden she's got a voter registration switch she needs to understand. Make the words say what she actually did; she apparently hadn't formally switched anything yet. Not to mention that interning at a Republican Conference makes no sense for understanding a switch to Democrat. There is no discussion of why attending Republican events would make one understand Democrats, which suggests a POV conclusion that Republicans are repulsive in themselves. Then she finally does decide to leave the Republicans. "she was upset over .. what Rodham perceived": obviously, change "Rodham" to "she".
    • She was going back and forth - back then she viewed herself as "a mind conservative and a heart liberal" (Bernstein p. 50). I'll work more on this portion to see if I can improve it; it's difficult to capture the essence of the switch in the limited space involved, maybe a footnote is appropriate. She has another quote about "I didn't leave the Republicans, the Republicans left me," which is a common sentiment among people who switch parties. Wasted Time R 16:21, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Stemming from the demands of some students, she became": "Student demand made her" is shorter. "Its" commencement address.
  • Whose "response" to her criticism of Brooke was worthy of Life? Was it the students' ovation? That doesn't sound like a response to "part of her speech". Oh, and what did Brooke say and how was he criticized? And who is Irv? Should I know him, does he have national attention or just a national broadcast? That whole clause is just an attempt to sustain this "national recognition". 5 minutes of fame is nothing. Do you know anyone who, on discovering Hillary in Arkansas or as First-Lady-candidate, said, "Oh yeah, that student who criticized Senator Brooke" or "that first-ever Wellesley student commencement speaker"?
  • "Worked her way across Alaska" sounds more like Lewis and Clark. "Washing dishes" is noteworthy?! I've washed dishes, where's my WP article?! And what is sliming salmon? If it's in the link to salmon which was deleted, perhaps it should've linked from the word "sliming". She shut her employer down overnight. And whatever that accomplished, and why she was or wasn't fired for whistleblowing, would be nice to know. That whole sentence is bathos.
Maybe she should have managed the college coffee shop instead - see Ron Paul, where you apparently have no problem with the notability of his college employment. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • The Alaska thing is significant in that it shows a side of her adventurous character - she was hitchhiking some of the time, with a friend. Yes, she did get fired, I will include that, space be damned. The sliming salmon is a standard bit in her TV appearances, like on Letterman; she says it was the best preparation for life in Washington that she ever had. I was previously working on finding or writing a good wlink for it, then some other FAC commented said we had to yank all these wlinks out. Such is the whipsaw. Wasted Time R 16:27, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Notice how the Living History footnotes have a statistical clustering the closer you are to page 1? Looks like someone tried to make it through but had the same impression I did. This suggests the source was not used critically but conveniently. Dropping some of the early-page references and bringing in later pages would dispel this suggestion. How many hundred pages did she write, and the FNs stop at the 300s? Am I wrong?
    • I used Living History as a source mostly for earlyish life details, many of which were first revealed there. The further along you get, the less useful it is as a source; like just about all political autobiographies, it becomes self-serving and full of partial omissions. I don't see what's wrong with what I did; if you look at Bernstein and Gerth/Van Natta's footnoting of Living History, they follow the same pattern as well. Wasted Time R 16:11, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In short, we either continue pointing out the language, or we abandon the quest. That means either you run around from site to site looking for all the fixes and thinking you've solved the problem of mediocrity with more mediocrity, or you don't because we don't object to the rest of it and you think you've solved it because we've shut up. But rather than either, we're hopeful you get our message: this is not going to work for you at this time. John J. Bulten 04:54, 13 October 2007 (UTC) John J. Bulten 06:25, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And wouldn't you know, I even started a condensation edit in good faith, but had a power outage and lost an hour or two of work. Wasted Time. Ah well, will try later. John J. Bulten 07:39, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I find it interesting that you don't apply these same standards to Ron Paul, John - for example, your disdain about HRC's sports activities in her younger days, yet no problem with Ron Paul's running track? You reject her washing dishes but have no problem with his selling lemonade? I have trouble taking these comments seriously if you don't apply your standards with equal vigor to an article about a candidate you state here that you are supporting. But we're not writing an article about a candidate, and you shouldn't be either - these are biographies of notable individuals, and we're covering their entire lives and careers,including some material that may seem mundane, but that hopes to give a full picture of the person, whether you find her likeable, or with an aroma, or anything else. I'm sorry, but you are being too partisan here. Some of your comments are well-taken, for sure - none of us thinks this article is perfect. But I daresay you don't have a clue about who I for one am supporting in this election - you're not going to find it in my edits in this article or in the other political ones I edit across party lines. I made some comments on the Ron Paul FAC before seeing all of this here - I didn't share with the editors what my personal opinion of Ron Paul is, and it is not relevant. But your personal opinion is coloring all of your comments here, and that makes it hard for me to determine how objective they really are. I added a few specific replies above interspersed with your comments - not comprehensively at all, just a few things I see now. No comment next to one of yours probably means I haven't looked into it yet- it's very late, and I've had enough. Unfortunately you made it clear in your last paragraph that you cannot be satisfied with any number of fixes that are done - your rather insulting "solved the problem of mediocrity with more mediocrity" before even seeing any changes that are made says it all, and I think it might be best all around if you go with abandoning your quest, as you suggest - it is apparently not possible for you to be satisfied with a neutral article about a subject you so abhor, so I don't see the point in trying to satisfy you. I'll look at the comments you;ve made, because I want this article to be improved and would like to see it reach featured status. I am not at all sure that you think it is even possible for any article about Hillary Clinton to be FA status, so I don't see much point in continuing the dialogue. If you want to, and can do it objectively, we can improve the piece. If you can't, then you've made your point, I'm sure it will be duly noted by those who make the determination of what articles are FA, and the chips will fall where they fall. Meanwhile - I'd recommend that you take a closer look at Ron Paul because it needs work. And not a single comment that I made there - not one - was in retaliation (as you put it, and which illustrates your mindset on this). I genuinely want that article improved, I've worked on it, and I'm trying to build an encyclopedia which contains articles about subjects I love, subjects I hate, subjects I don't give a shit about - it's not about me. I'm not speaking for anyone else here, and probably don't represent their viewpoints. But after spending a few hours on "your" article, trying to be constructive and coming here and seeing this - well, I'm pretty disgusted and disappointed and I'm sharing it. Tvoz |talk 08:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well, please let me apologize for the mediocrity comment, as I did not intend it (consciously) as affirming that mediocrity was certain, only likely-- but the comment did imply mediocrity was certain, so it was immoderate. However I am all for the values of encyclopedia-building, equal vigor, and genuine improvement. But we must acknowledge that we do all have bias, and we do choose which items we work on and which we pass over, and that does affect which items get chosen for FA. That is, the idea of neutrality is more nuanced than many realize. I will elaborate another time, but suffice for this point that the presidential race reflects a spiritual war which I am fighting full-throttle; and that alone is good evidence that when I emit unintentional insults it is time to tone it down. As for the consistency issues, I will clarify: my disdain is for the vagueness of "variety of sports", so airy as to say nothing-- as compared with Paul's very specific activities. It's also for the exceedingly choppy and self-serving "bathos" sentence which doesn't tell me (1) why is she in Alaska, (2) why is she working (if education costs, say so), (3) why she has jobs "across" the state in one summer, (4) why shutting down the plant is notable in terms of what it achieved for her and the plant afterward, (5) what sort of picture I should draw from these bare details as provided (good complainer or bad complainer), and (6) what is sliming salmon. Remember I'm approaching this article as a first impression, though I do have a couple HRC facts under my belt. I know that much may be explained in the links, but most of these questions should be in the main text. Note I didn't argue for deleting the whole sentence; I could even grant that dishwashing in McKinley Park is a bit noteworthy. The issue is that that sentence has zero clarity. Mentioning Paul's lemonade sales briefly, purposed for college fundraising (a purpose neglected by HRC's editors), or the coffee-shop stint, showing his college interest (HRC's college interests do appear-- all political-- but the former Brownie points and "many church activities" are the vagueness I'm thinking of): those kinds of placements are much more lacking at present in HRC's piece. Please keep my comments in the context of the fact that everyone who takes any FAC action on either article does so because of personal bent, and I decided to showcase my bias rather than hide it. As I've said, I'll try to edit what I can of HRC noncontroversially, but I won't have the stomach or time to research what many of the resolutions should be. But I do have the time to compile them when they can be received as genuine concerns that reasonable people would recognize as FA blocks, especially to new readers. But I apologize for contributing to your disgust and disappointment at comments not directed at you in any way. Sure, someday an HRC FA is theoretically possible, but keep in mind, I'm only up to college graduation and I've already accumulated that many textual issues? What will come of her controversial years when I really have meat to lay into? I'm a sequential guy, and this clunky Alaska stuff is just the tip of the iceberg. John J. Bulten 10:56, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Where to begin? And I have limited time today and tomorrow. But just a general remark - Wikipedia editors face an impossible whipsaw in certain kinds of stylistic choices. For example, the "variety of sports" language came in a while back when somebody objected to the specific sports she played being listed out. Many of the other usages that John J. Bulten objects to are the results of past compromises, past shortenings, etc. If the article were done exactly as John J. desires, other serious editors would find all sorts of faults with it. In the real world, eventually the author(s) and the house editors come to some sort of meeting of the minds, the work gets published, and that's it. Here, the whipsawing never ends. Wasted Time R 13:11, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I recognize whipsaw capacity, which is why I said, "Apologies if any consensus language doesn't carry the ball." Listing the one or two sports she played most often "and other sports" is perfectly moderate. "Variety" doesn't say anything.
But in general having taken a step back I've decided that this course of action is most in line with my purpose as stated consistently: (1) read through and just list the most egregious, obfuscatory, intractable, or biased texts (while indicating just how much the remainder of the text is as equally bug-ridden (programming term) as the grafs I've done in detail); (2) post a list of significant points that are being given too much or too little weight, IMHO; (3) make a good-faith edit, but only to noncontroversial text, i.e., only deleting what a conservative condenser would find redundant, without touching on what might invoke editorial judgment; (4) leave it to you guys having made my case, unless I have fresh insights. I might add that I just found God and Hillary Clinton by Paul Kengor is being published this month; I have a print interview (Evangelical Press News) where the author says, "She seems a sincere Christian and has been since childhood [but] a major theme of the book is the total disconnect between her faith and her stridency on abortion." But I'll hold off on inserting editorial judgments (such as that cite) until I finish the tasks above and the smoke clears. John J. Bulten 01:46, 14 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ethnic origin (section break)

Comment The more I think about it, the more I think the references to and labelling of her ethnic origins should be reduced. Not every bit of her ancestry is that historically notable. English probably is, because of the association with Methodism. John J. Bulten is right, space is wasted, but IMHO its shakily verifiable pandering to the various groups, which is worse. I don't mean the primary editors deliberately did that; this is just one of the ways the article has been used by both her supporters and opponents. But at least remove her from the numerous "X-American" categories, because that really looks like ethnic boosterism. -Fsotrain09 09:08, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's common biographical information to outline the ancestral origins of a famous person, what their occupations were, what their ethnic backgrounds were, etc. I don't think any pandering or boosterism is involved. I don't care about the categories one way or another. Wasted Time R 13:28, 13 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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