Talk:David Frum/Archive 1

Archive 1

October 2006

I've removed the following from the article:

Rumors persist that, given these concerns regarding Frum's personal agenda, that Frum was fired by 2002 [1](White House Letter; the New Washington Whodunit: The Speachwriter Vanishes, NYT Times, March 2, 2002 "Mystery surrounds sudden departure of David Frum, one of White House speechwriters; intrigue is reinforced when Frum's wife Danielle Crittenden sends e-mail to friend giving her husband credit for Pres Bush's 'axis of evil' phrase in his State of Union address on Jan 29; Frum claims he resigned and was not fired")

First, the source is locked behind the "Times Select" barrier (which, IIRC, covers only opinion pieces, not news items, making the source less reliable).
Second, Frum demolishes this claim in The Right Man. (See pp266ff of the hardcover.)

I've also taken a blatant piece of POV out of the article, which survived almost a month[2]. Not good. I found a better link for the BBC appearance. I'll watch that video when I'm somewhere with free bandwidth, and see if we're quoting him accurately.

Cheers, CWC(talk) 18:42, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Neocon

Frum is a neoconservative, not a conservative. --HowardJ87 13:27, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Since Frum is a neocon and not a real conservative, there has been considerable conservative criticism of his views. I thus created a section of links on conservative criticism of Frum, and included these articles:

Conservative Criticism of Frum

• The Axis of Amnesty Is Back, But So Is David Frum by Steve Sailer.
• David Frum’s Right Way To Talk About Immigration: Don’t! by Sam Francis.
• Frum’s Flimflam by Ilana Mercer.
• Jews And Immigration: Stephen Steinlight Said What? David Frum Spoke Why?' By John White.

--HowardJ87 20:00, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

...and I'm afraid I've removed that subsection, because External Links to attacks like that are not acceptable. See WP:EL and WP:BLP.

Anyone curious as to why paleoconservatives so strongly detest Frum need only read this NR essay from 2003. Ouch! CWC 06:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Frum on Abortion

Our description of Frum's view of abortion is taken things he wrote on his NRO blog in November 2003. Unfortunately, NRO's redesigned website no longer gives access to individual posts from that time. Instead, we can only link to all of Frum's posts from September 29 to November 12! Bah! NRO didn't even add anchors (shame! shame! ;-]), so I suggest searching for "Partial Birth" to find the relevant posts.

Thanks to a good edit by user 24.69.65.70 (talk · contribs), our article now summarizes this as:

Frum has stated that he does not categorically oppose first trimester abortions, but believes in state-by-state regulations on the matter.

Here's an excerpt (too long for the article) from "Partial Birth II", dated 7-Nov-2003:

while I am not pro-life and do not think it would be wise to try to ban abortion in all circumstances, I welcomed the partial-birth ban as exactly the kind of restriction that would help ease the country’s angry divisions over abortion. (For the record, and to answer those who asked, I think restoring the right of states to regulate abortion would be another helpful measure. Roe v. Wade was not only terrible law but a destructive federal over-reach.)

Cheers, CWC 13:09, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't know how this reference got screwed up. I fixed it, on April 25th.and again on June 11th. -- Geo Swan 14:00, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Please explain more fully

I recently added a bunch of material concerning an article Frum wrote on the Guantanamo captives.

Another wikipedian excised that material , with the edit summary "rm hostile WP:OR. See WP:ATT and WP:BLP."

I frankly can't imagine how the excising wikipedian came to the conclusion that my contributions violated any of the wikipedia's policies. I call on the excising wikipedian to explain the reasoning behind their excision more fully.

In general I would encourage excising wikipedian to consider making an effort to explain the reasoning behind their excisions in more detail. I'd like to suggest to the excising wikipedian that extensive excisions, explained solely by brief, cryptic, edit summaries, will serve as unfortunate triggers to hostile edit warring.

I'd like to suggest to the excising wikipedian that they consider using tags, like {{fact}}, or {{cn}}, when they have a concern that a passage may not measure up to WP:OR -- instead of wholesale excision.

The excising wikipedian didn't offer any clues as to which portion of the material they chose to excise they thought violated WP:OR.

Did the excising wikipedian have a concern that the material he excised was in violation of policy by offering the names of the men that Frum profiled? Frum identified these men by their captive number. their "ISN". We don't know why Frum didn't offer his readers the names of the men he profiled. Frum could easily have looked up their names on either of the official lists the DoD released, on April 20, 2006, or May 15, 2006. If the excising wikipedian had explained the reasoning behind their excision, would they have argued that supplying the men's names were a violation of WP:NOR?

I would suggest including the men's names fully complies with WP:ATT#Reliable sources: which states:

"Edits that rely on primary sources should only make descriptive claims that can be checked by anyone without specialist knowledge."

No special knowledge is necessary to find the names of the nine captives whose captive IDs Frum offered.

Should those names have explicitly cited the DoD's official lists? I didn't think this was necessary. The wikipedia's own articles about the nine men whose transcripts Frum summarized each cited one of the DoD's official list of captives. I thought, I continue to think, that this was sufficient attribution. If the excising wikipedian disagrees I would point out to them that this interpretation of policy would have resulted in the number of references in the article ballooning -- one for Frum's article about the captives, one for the list, and one each of the captives whose transcripts Frum summarized. Taken to its logical extreme this interpretation would result in the size of the entire wikipedia project ballooning, out of control, as all the reference sections ballooned and overwhelmed the actual information the wikipedia was created to present.

The excision included this passage:

Worth noting is that captive 581, Abdur Sayed Rahman, one of the captives whose testimony Frum was most critical of, was one of the 38 captives who the DoD acknowledged had never been an enemy combatant at all.

I await the excising wikipedian's explanation with great anticipation. This passage clearly cites its source for the information that Abdur Sayed Rahman was cleared. Is the excising wikipedian going to suggest that this passage violates the portion of WP:NOR that proscribes "novel synthesis" of previously published facts? If so I would suggest to them that this would be an unsupportable misinterpretation of that policy.

The War on Terror is a controversial topic. Great care must be exercised by editors to conform with NPOV and the wikipedia's other policies. I do a lot of editing on this topic, and I do my utmost to do so in full conformance with every wikipedia policy. However, I recognize that none of us can count on succeeding in fully conforming to policy 100% of the time. For this reason it is important to make an effort to take every civil specific challenge seriously. We are all going to have systemic biases, biases we are unaware of.

I am therefore going to repeat myself, and urge the excising wikipedia, in the strongest possible terms, to make a greater effort to explain themselves, when they think they have a valid concern about another wikipedian's contributions.

We don't usually put the references on the talk page. But I think it necessary to do so here, because the excising wikipedian neeeds to see that there wasn't any unattributable material in the section they excised.

Collegially, Geo Swan 12:09, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Response

I said here that I'd try to reply Sunday but I've run out of time. Sigh. I should be able to tackle this Monday or Tuesday. I apologise for the further delay. CWC 17:59, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

The basic problem with this material is that it counts as "Original Research", but Wikipedia is not a publisher of original research. (Warning: the phrase "Original Research" has a very Wikipedia-specific meaning here.)

This surprises a lot of people. (It surprised me when I started editing here.) Surely Wikipedia is a vehicle for reporting the truth? Well ... no, it's not. We aim to report what "Reliable Sources" ("RS"; another Wikipedia-specific phrase) have said, not what we who edit here have worked out.

The "No Original Research" (NOR) rule is quite strong: we are not even allowed to put facts together. See the WP:SYN section of WP:NOR. Here's a good example (which I've stolen from user:Slrubenstein at Wikipedia talk:No original research#Novelty in Synthesis):

The ICC classifies X as genocide; according to Joe Smith, Nonsuchistan did X, therefore Nonsuchistan is guilty of genocide.

WP:NOR forbids writing "Nonsuchistan is guilty of genocide" unless we cite a source that says outright that Nonsuchistan is guilty of genocide.

Yes, this is complicated. Just to make things harder ;-(, the policies are being redrafted at present. I suggest people skim Wikipedia:Attribution (ignore the name, it's misleading), then read Wikipedia:Attribution/FAQ carefully, then read Wikipedia:Attribution again.

What I've written so far applies to every Wikipedia article. There's another important policy, Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons, that applies to statements about living people on every page on this website. Basically, it requires us to be extra-cautious about saying negative/"controversial" things about people — for example, not writing anything negative unless a RS has already said or written it. (By the way, the thinking here is not "we don't want to sued", but rather "we don't want to hurt people".)

Now, it's possible that someone who counts as a WP:RS has made this argument about David Frum's report from Gitmo, in which case we can write something like "The New York Times says Frum ...". Alternatively, if a notable pundit has written about this, we can quote them: "J Bigname Blogger accused Frum ...". But if no "Reliable Sources" have said anything, Wikipedia should not say anything either. (OTOH, I expect Sourcewatch would happily accept this material.)

I hope this helps. These odd-seeming rules seem bizarre to most people at first (eg., me) but if you watch them in action you'll see that they do produce better articles. I regard this as an emergent phenomenon. Cheers, CWC 16:23, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I looked for your reply a couple of times. But it seems I had stopped looking before you were able to find the time. Well, we are all volunteers, who do this in our spare time.

I think I know what is meant by original research here on the wikipedia. I confess, I hadn't paid much attention to the wp:syn clause until I encountered someone with what I regarded as a very idiosyncratic interpretation of wp:syn, which, if applied everywhere, would gut the wikipedia.

IMO the paragraph I added is not original research, it is merely collation. I do not believe I drew novel synthesis between existing acknowledged facts. I do not believe I added any new, uncited, unreferenced conclusions or interpretations.

That Abdur Sayed Rahman was not a terrorist is not my opinion. It is not the opinion of some pinko nut writing for a left-wing scandal rag. It is the official position of the Department of Defense. And I didn't assert that the Rahman wasn't a terrorist, I cited the DoD that said he wasn't a terrorist.

I was puzzled to read your comments, since it reads as if you thought I had introduced uncited opinions, and referenced unreliable sources.

I couldn't find the passage [[user:Slrubenstein wrote, that you were trying to draw to my attention. The closest I could find was [3] FWIW, this is a better way to cite specific passages from talk pages, that might be archived by the time your reader looks for them...

I am in agreement over what I think is your most important point -- the importance of keeping original research from wikipedia articles. I just don't agree that my contributions to David Frum are not in compliance with that principle.

Cheers! Geo Swan 07:12, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

This edit has the edit summary, "remove original research, per talk". Hello? User talk:Chris Chittleborough has stated his position. I have stated mine. But User:Jayjg hasn't stated one, or responded to my last comment. So, I think his or her edit summary is provocative. I call on Jayjg to explain themselves. Remember, WP:NOT#wikipedia is not a battleground.

Cheers! Geo Swan 23:43, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Good point about diffs being better. (That quote has probably been archived now.) I'm afraid I still regard what user:Jayjg removed as WP:OR, though. Cheers, CWC 04:50, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

It's obviously original research for a couple of reasons. First, it says "Frum implied that he had caught all nine men in obvious lies"; according to whom? This is obvious original research. Even worse, "It introduces an argument, 'without citing a reputable source for that argument, that purports to refute or support another idea, theory, argument, or position"; that's straight out of the WP:NOR policy. You've gone to an article by the Washington Post in an attempt to refute Frum's argument; but the Washington Post article doesn't refer to Frum's argument at all, that's your doing. If you want to refute Frum's argument, or criticize his editorial, you need to find a reliable source that has done so. You can't make up an argument. Jayjg ^(talk) 02:56, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

User:Jayjg was more specific than User talk:Chris Chittleborough. He objected to the statement: "Frum implied that he had caught all nine men in obvious lies." According to Jayjg this is "obvious" original research. Forgive me, but I have got to wonder if Jayjg actually read the paragraphs he excised. Frum himself called the captives testimony "deceptions" and "inventions". I cited Frum's own article. And I quoted the passege where Frum characterized their testimony as deceptions and inventions. Is Jayjg really asserting that the statement he objected to needs more than the cited direct quote to Frum's own writing? I am going to include Frum's own statement here.

"But what’s the excuse of those in the West who succumb so easily to the deceptions of terrorists who cannot invent even half-way plausible lies?"

IMO the wikipedia's readers should be entitled to make up their own minds as to Frum's credibility. Frum called the testimony of these nine men "deceptions". He mockingly asked for the excuse of those who succumb to their deceptions. I agree that including my own opionion as whether Frum's characterization of their testimony was fair or accurate would violate WP:NOR. But I dispute that informing the wikipedia's readers that Rahman's Tribunal concluded he should not have been classified as an enemy combatant is an assertion of an opinion.

Cheers! Geo Swan 15:53, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

If Frum described the captives testimony as "deceptions" and "inventions", then that's what he did, and that's what you would say. In any event, you haven't responded to the major issues; first, that you attempted to rebut Frum's statements with an argument of your own. WP:NOR is extremely clear about that; you can't introduce"

• an argument, without citing a reputable source for that argument, that purports to refute or support another idea, theory, argument, or position;
• an analysis or synthesis of established facts, ideas, opinions, or arguments in a way that builds a particular case favored by the editor, without attributing that analysis or synthesis to a reputable source.

You may think it is very important "inform Wikipedia readers" that, in your view, Frum was wrong, but that's just your view. Second, and we haven't even gone into this yet, why is this specific column noteworthy in any way? Frum has written literally hundreds of columns, why refer to this specific one? The reason is obvious; you saw something in this one that you didn't like and wanted to rebut it. Choosing this particular column, and quoting selectively from it, is itself a form of original research. What you need to do is find secondary sources about all of this. If that column, for example, had created a great deal of controversy, and notable sources had provided counter-points or rebuttals, then you could quote from them. But just picking a column you don't like, and trying to rebut it yourself, is original research both in the selection of material and in the rebuttal - and that's on top of your presentation of the material, which as also original research. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:46, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Just so we are all clear on this — I'd like Jayjg to clarify whether he is continuing to assert the Frum characterization of the captive's testimony as "deceptions" and "inventions" -- Frum's contention that their lies weren't even "half-believable" is not sufficiently clear for a paraphrase "Frum implied that he had caught all nine men in obvious lies".

It seems to me that both Jayjg and Chris Chittleborough are mischaracterizing what I wrote. Anyone who checks again will find that my contribution does not say "Frum was wrong." I'd like to know whether by his assertion that I "quoted selectively" from Frum's article Jayjg meant to imply some kind of intellectual dishonesty on my part? That is how his assertion reads to me. If so I vigourously dispute this implication. I didn't quote selectively. I quoted the concluding statement of Frum's article, that reiterates the article's central theme.

Why is this article any more noteworthy than any other article Frum has written? Well, I read this one. I haven't read the others, except the one Chris Chittleborough tried to cite, here, where he paraphrased Frum's views on abortion. I am curious as to why Jayjg chose to challenge my paraphrase, and not Chris Chittleborough's.

Jayjg's characterized my contribution as a "rebuttal". I dispute this. Readers can make up their own mind as to the meaning of Rahman's Tribunal determining he was not an enemy combatant. For all we know Frum includes the officers who sat on Rahman's Tribunal among those who succumbed "to the deceptions of terrorists who cannot invent even half-way plausible lies/" Jayjg is completely free to draw this conclusion.

Cheers! Geo Swan 16:53, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

If I were going to cite the article (which I would not), I would say that Frum cites specific sections of the captives' testimony as "the deceptions of terrorists who cannot invent even half-way plausible lies". Regarding the notability of this particular column, again, if it is cited elsewhere by reliable sources, then it is probably notable. Finally, what is that information about the detainees doing in the article, if not to rebut Frum's argument? Is it just random information, placed randomly there? Why is it, in your words, "worth noting"? Claiming now that your inclusion of this material was not intended as a rebuttal is disingenuous at best. Jayjg ^(talk) 18:36, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Jewishness

"David J. Frum (born 1960) is a Jewish Canadian-American former speechwriter..." So the very first thing that needs to be said about him is that he is Jewish? How is this relevant? If he was a Presbyterian, would this be noted as the first thing to be said about him? I doubt it. Explanations, please. Intelligent Mr Toad 16:20, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

It's heritage trolling, and should be removed. Abe Froman 16:24, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Exactly right. Well put. CWC 18:25, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Yet, he makes sure to tell the NYTimes he only makes Rosh Hashana resolutions, not New Year's. [[4]]Mwinog2777 (talk) 03:30, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Its in there because Judaism is a minority, and he identifies by it. BCapp —Preceding unsigned comment added by BCapp (talk • contribs) 15:33, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Is he Canadian or US?

What is his citizenship?

American; he took oath September 11, 2007. [[5]]Mwinog2777 (talk) 03:33, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Please explain more fully

I reverted two edits which I thought were poorly explained. The wikipedian who made them claimed authority under WP:WEIGHT and WP:EL for the edits -- in the edit summary.

I don't have any problem with claiming authority, under a wikipolicy, in an edit summary, when the edit is truly obvious, and not open to controversy. These two edits, in my opinion, are neither.

I encourage the excising editor to return here, and explain their editing decisions more fully.

Cheers! Geo Swan 03:53, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

• That someone on a blog (not in the magazine, but in a blog) made a bogus conflict-of-interest claim when it is widely known that Frum wrote for the National Post is not notable, and the section certainly doesn't entail the weight it has in this short article. It's not even close to one of the twenty most notable things in Frum's career, yet it's the largest section of the article. THF 04:53, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
• WP:NOT an indiscriminate collection of information. There's no reason to include two negative book reviews in the external links section. If they're notable, summarize them in the main text and footnote to them. If not, they shouldn't be in the article. And they're about An End to Evil, which has its own wikipedia page, not about David Frum. (And it violates NPOV to include only negative book reviews, when positive reviews exist.) See WP:EL generally. THF 04:53, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
• Same for the Matthew Engel piece. Out of all the news stories about Frum, why this one in the EL section? To the extent it has notable information, put it in the article. At least it has an arguable reason to be there, since it's actually about Frum. THF 04:53, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

1. I agree that we gave undue weight to the rather speculative conflict of interest claim. See below.
2. I agree that those negative reviews belong, if anywhere, in the article about the book, not the author.
3. I'd like to use the Engel piece in the article, but have no time just now.

Cheers, CWC 08:10, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

---

Frum has written precisely one (1) post for huffingtonpost.

True. The article no longer mentions huffingtonpost. CWC 06:46, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Payments from Conrad Black

I've moved this section here for discussion. I think this little beat-up is entirely non-notable.

Ken Silverstein, a writer for Harpers magazine, described correspondence he had with Frum about monthly payments he received from financier Conrad Black.<ref name=HarpersBlackFrum20070529>{{Cite news

| url=http://harpers.org/archive/2007/05/hbc-90000176

| title=Black Helped Frum Stay in the Black

| date=May 29, 2007

| author=Ken Silverstein

| publisher=Harpers (magazine)

| accessdate=2007-06-13

}}</ref>

In his May 29, 2007 article Silverstein wrote:

"In the overall scheme of things the combined sums were relatively small, but I was curious for a number of reasons. First, it wasn’t clear what Frum did for the payments. Second, Frum has publicly defended Black against charges that he misused Hollinger money and yet has never, as far as I can tell, acknowledged that he received money from Hollinger. Third, Black is accused of misspending shareholder money and any payments from Hollinger to Frum, a long-time friend of Black’s, should only have been made for sound professional reasons."

Frum replied in his May 28, 2007 column.<ref name=NationalReviewOnline20070528>{{Cite news

| author=David Frum

| url=http://frum.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZjEyZjc1MmExNjlmMjc3MzA5MTlkM2JlZDgyOGQ2MWQ=

| date=Monday, May 28, 2007

| title=Full Disclosure

| publisher=National Review Online

| accessdate=2007-06-13

}}</ref>

Frum defended the payments he received, stating that they were consulting fees for an internet venture, and that the fees were comparable with the fees he had received for other consulting gigs.

What do other editors think? (BTW: please do not restore this to the article without fixing the awful writing.) CWC 08:16, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

User talk:Chris Chittleborough do you think it would be useful if you refrained from referring to other wikipedian's work as a "beat-up", or refrained from referring to other wikipedian's writing as "awful" -- at least without providing an explanation of your comments? Geo Swan 04:17, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry. "Beat-up" is a term of art in journalism, and I was applying it to Ken Silverstein's writing, not any Wikipedian's work. I've struck out the word "awful", which was an overreaction, but I don't like the "Frum replied ... column.{ref} Frum defended ...consulting gigs." structure when we could just have "In a May 2007 column, Frum defended ... consulting work.{ref}" CWC 01:59, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Criticism section: blogs not enough

In a Wikipedia article about a living person, blogs are not adequate as sources for negative claims. For this reason, I've just removed the following sentence from the article:

As have many columnists, Frum has been accused of biased reporting and misrepresenting facts in order to persuade readers <ref>(http://www.pacificspirit.com/2004/08/03/end_of_oil_and_frum_mistakes</ref> <ref>http://www.tartcider.com/blog/archives/2006/01/crime_and_embel.html</ref>.

BTW, opinion columnists are expected to exhibit bias, and limits on word count often result in them leaving out facts that opponents consider important. So I'd correct that lead-in to "As is normal for a political columnist, ..."

Surely there is some more substantive criticism of Mr. Frum out there? Cheers, CWC 12:19, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

This line is back in the article, "Like most columnists, Frum has been accused of biased reporting and misrepresenting facts in order to persuade readers." Most columnists are ACCUSED of biased reporting? The claim that most columnists have been accused of biased reporting and misrepresenting the facts is unsubstantiated. I'm removing it (again). Surely there is more substantive criticism out there, but this line has to go. -Eric Silva 21:26, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

As this section stands now, I don't see much of a problem. Clearly the earlier lines referenced above were problematic, but they have been removed. Can we then remove the cleanup banner on this section? Dpetley (talk) 13:15, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Frum is delibrately provocative and therefore a criticism section is appropriate, and the section as it exists now is entirely fair.Grant Gussie (talk) 16:17, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Gun Control argument

I've WP:BOLDly remove the following two paragraphs from the criticism section, because I suspect they give Undue Weight to one controversy.

For example, in a Toronto Star article he argues against Canadian gun and crime control policies under the government of Paul Martin, saying they do not work as well as the corresponding policies of the United States. Quoting from the article, "Toronto's 78 homicides in 2005 appears to compare favorably to the homicide totals of the three American cities cited by the Star. But those 78 Toronto homicides in 2005 represent a 28% increase over the 61 homicides recorded in Toronto in 1995. Meanwhile, the three U.S. cities cited by the Star each achieved dramatic decreases over the past decade: Chicago down 46% from 823, Washington down 46% from 365, Baltimore down 17% from 322." <ref>http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/issuesideas/story.html?id=fb715fde-9cee-42e2-ae75-81061c3cee14</ref>.

Frum's article has however been met with assertions that he has confused year-to-year variations in the number of deaths with a (non-existant) statistically significant trend. In fact, the 78 Toronto homicides cited by Frum for 2005 represent an unusually bad year, and the number in 2006 dropped back down to a more typical 69. The worst year of recent history remains however 1991, when 89 homicides occurred. If Frum had chosen to compare the years 1991 and 2006, he would have reported a 22% decrease in the homicide rate, rather than the 28% increase he claims occurred between 1995 and 2005. However, neither of these assertions would be statistically justifiable, as the annual number of Toronto homicides has in fact been constant for the last 20 years (apart from annual variation) despite a 20% increase in population during that time.<ref>http://www.guncontrol.ca/English/Home/Works/gangsandguns07rev.pdf</ref>

Can anyone find a way to summarise this? (I can't see any.) What do other editors think about the WP:UNDUE issue? Cheers, CWC 12:19, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Removing this criticism is in my opinion completely unjustifiable. Frum makes an assertion in an influential article that is completely unjustifiable. It is clearly and concisely documented. The article is quoted, as it should be. The reason it is wrong is explained in a six sentence paragraph. Too long? I don't think so. Does it violate Wikipedia standards? No. The section is fully referenced and completely factual. I can only conclude the removal was politically motivated, and am undoing it.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Grant Gussie (talk • contribs)

My argument is that the amount of space we currently devote to this gun control issue makes it look like a major part of Frum's professional life, when it is in fact AFAIK about just one of his many columns. The Wikipedia policy about this is the "undue weight" section of WP:NPOV. As I said on user talk:Grant Gussie, this is a fairly technical rule; I'm not greatly concerned about it. OTOH, linking to hostile blog posts is a big no-no, so I've removed the references to www.pacificspirit.com and www.tartcider.com.

As it happens, I know little about gun control politics in Canada, and care a great deal less.

Cheers, CWC 08:39, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Currently, a citizen of,.......?

[[ hopiakuta Please do sign your signature on your message. ~~ Thank You. -]] 23:00, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Frum's criticms of "Unpatriotic Conservatives"

There's a semi-literate ("I have re-wrote...") censoring this page about Frum, removing important information essential to understanding Frum's MO. At present the page reads as though it could have been written by Frum himself. This is not acceptable.

A wikipedian removed a paragraph -- with the edit summary:

"Criticism: remove unsourced negative nonsense, per WP:BLP"

Here is the paragraph in question.

The conservative, Taki Theodoracopulos, wrote an article called "The Bum Frum." In the article, he wrote, "This buffoon was fired by the Bushies, then went around threatening to sue if someone hinted that he didn’t quit on his own. (You were fired Frum, and I welcome your lawsuit.)"

And here are some sources:

• David Frum (March 19, 2003). "Unpatriotic Conservatives". National Review. Retrieved 2008-04-25.
• Taki Theodoracopulos (April 21, 2003). "The Bum Frum". The American Conservative. Retrieved 2008-04-25.
• William Rusher (April 03, 2003). [http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=31861 "Civil war on the American right"]. World Net Daily. Retrieved 2008-04-25. {{cite news}}: Check |url= value (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)
• Vox Day (January 14, 2008). [http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59666 "Liberal word thieves"]. World Net Daily. Retrieved 2008-04-25. {{cite news}}: Check |url= value (help)

So, is it negative? Yes.

Is there really no source? No.

Is this a source that the article should use? It is unclear to me whether the exciser is complaining that the paragraph above is "nonsense", or whether they thought the Theodoracopulos article was nonsense.

I don't know Taki Theodoracopulos. I don't know American Conservative magazine. I disagree that the Theodoracopulos article was nonsense.

The article says Frum attacked him first -- and over half a dozen other people, including: Patricia Buckley, Tom Fleming, Llewellyn Rockwell, Robert Novak, Sam Francis, Justin Raimondo, Joe Sobran and Eric Margolis.

The controversy occurred in 2003, and is still being referenced in 2008. So, why doesn't it merit coverage here? Geo Swan (talk) 13:00, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely... Frum is a delibrately controversal figure. If he goes out to annoy others, the results should be reported.Grant Gussie (talk) 15:54, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

A wikipedian made an edit where they suppressed coverage of the controversy Frum triggered with the edit summary:

Criticism: clean up section. Rm. judgmental language; remove highly derogatory quote on WP:WEIGHT and WP:BLP concerns from a single critic because context is not established.

No offense, but I think this is an instance where discussion on the talk page is required. One can't discuss issues in the edit summaries, without risking triggering edit warring. And I would appreciate those who have an opinion as to whether this controversy Frum triggered merited coverage to discuss it here on the talk page, rather than make edits that could trigger edit warring.

I provided several references, in the discussion above, that do provide the context for the criticism. I don't engage in edit warring. I am not going to revert this excision, after plugging in the those references, from above, that provide the context. But I urge those with a view on whether this controversy merits coverage to discuss it here.

It seems to me that wikipedia articles shouldn't be hagiographies. Yes, let's not provide sensationalist coverage. But total suppression or white-washing of controversies the subject of the article himself triggered does not serve the wikipedia's readership, or the wikipedia project. Is this really how we want WP:BLP to be interpreted in this article? Geo Swan (talk) 10:55, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

The quote in the article accuses David Frum of being a "buffoon" among other things. For that to be anywhere near appropriate for an article (about a living person, no less) either the quote must verifiably establish that he is in fact a buffoon (which obviously is not going to happen) or else the fact the person said this has to be important and relevant of itself, something that was not sourced. To claim there is a controversy over something, e.g. a quote, you have to have a reliable source saying that there is a controversy, not proof that person A disapproves of person B. Otherwise, Wikipedia isn't a very good place for reprinting assorted personal attacks by one person on another. Wikidemo (talk) 19:47, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Please put your responses after the other participants signature, not in the middle of their comments. Comments are hard to read otherwise, once one or two other people have made comments. You put your comment in the middle of mine, which imposes an unnecessary cognitive burden on readers -- who are left wondering who wrote the paragraph you were responding to. Geo Swan (talk) 23:42, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

proper use of references

Could contributors to this article make a greater effort to use full references? Bare references aren't just ugly -- they are a maintenance nightmare, because no one can fix them if they go dark, because the lack of a date of publications, author's name, name of publication, article title all make it much harder to look for an authorized mirror, or an article with similar content. Please, please use fully populated references. Geo Swan (talk) 10:56, 2 May 2008 (UTC)