Talk:Sherrod Brown/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Sherrod Brown. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

David R. Smith

I believe it is unfair that all candidates in this Senate race have articles except for David R. Smith.PedanticallySpeaking 15:56, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Such a complaint belongs on the talk page of the campaign article. John Broughton 18:19, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikilinking of children

I think the link for "Emily Brown" (his daughter) is incorrect? It redirects to Emilie Brown who does not appear to be his daughter? 12:37, 12 August 2006 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.254.224.212 (talk • contribs)

I've fixed this. Kids shouldn't be wikilinked at all if they aren't already notable. John Broughton 18:19, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

What kind of Links should be allowed?

I am taking down the link for http://cleveland.indymedia.org/news/2006/10/22896.php/ as it is an unreliable source and highly biased.

However, there is another biased site linked; Brown's Blog. This brings into question what links are appropriate for Wikipedia. I can't find solid Wikipedia policies on determining which links should stay and which should go. For now, I'm taking both, if you can provide a supporting policy or a good argument feel free to revert and use this talk to discuss it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dr. Eggman3 (talk • contribs)

Wikipedia's policy on external links can be read here. We also need to apply wikipedia's policy regarding living persons regarding any links to slander sites. Regarding sources, see the policy here. Brown's own blog might be OK--but to be balanced we should provide to the same for DeWine. Blogs by others should be removed. The best links/sources to include are well known, neutral news outlets, the individuals official sites, and analysis by non-partisan organizations. Hope this helps. -MrFizyx 04:19, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

The blog for Brown IS okay on his website, just as a link to a candidate's campaign website is okay. And for balance, any blog BY DeWine should be in HIS article, not in Brown's article, just as the practice is that there is no link to an opponent's campaign site if the opponent has a wikipedia article (which has that link).

I'm putting the Brown blog back in. Please discuss further here if you are considering removing it. John Broughton | Talk 12:39, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the clearing that up. That is what I intended DeWine's blog (if such a thing exists) belongs in the "Mike DeWine" article, not here. -MrFizyx 12:48, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Accident?

In one of their debates, when DeWine mentioned (alleged) missed votes by Brown, he said he didn't count votes not cast due to an "accident" Brown has. Does anyone know what that accident was? It might be good to include in this article. --Mr Beale 01:37, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

 He was in a car accident in 2000 or 2001 and broke several vertebrae in his back.  Will try to find a source.  Remember hearing about it during the campaign.

Trivia

Removing POV meant to make Limbaugh look bad with POV Media Matters source. Regardless of the fact that this event occurred, this isn't trivia. Typos and corrected mistakes are not worthy of a "trivia" section. Zz414 16:57, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

110th Congress

At the bottom of this page, there is a box that lists the 110th Congressional delegation from Ohio, and I can't edit it through this page, and I don't know how to edit it outside this page. There is a huge mistake in the box, saying that the 18th District will be vacant, and that is not true. The 18th District will be represented by Zack Space. Someone should fix this immediately. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 164.107.214.143 (talk • contribs) .

Fixed. FYI, in normal circumstances (like when a page isn't protected), you can edit the page and then go all the way to the bottom of that screen. There, you'll see all of the templates which are transcluded on to the article. (In this case, it was Template:110th Ohio Congressional delegation). —Wknight94 (talk) 15:10, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Controversies

It is my feeling that the "controversy" section of this article should be removed, and for the following reasons: 1)Controversy sections are, unless absolutely necessary, generally frowned upon on this site, as they tend to attract trolls. 2)The "controversies" noted here are all without merit - most would belong under a category like "mistaken identity" rather than controversy, if they were not completely unnecessary. Barring a full removal of the cat., my plan B suggestion would be splicing the info into the article proper, and removing the controversy section title. Any other opinion on this is appreciated.--Jackbirdsong 08:12, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree with what you say. Here would be my solution..... This page lacks a lot of information as is, in specific the Senate campaign. All those controversies could be wrapped into one sentence under the topic of obstacles he had to overcome. We also don't have any funding information. I would be glad to research these things, but I want another persons approval or suggestions before I do so. Bobbyd100 06:27, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

My suggestion would be to add more information on his background, his policies, and his general political trajectory before occupying more of the article with senate campaign info. However, you should go ahead and add anything that is referenced properly that you see fit - it might be a good idea to take a look at other American senators' pages on this site for perspective and format. As far as the aformentioned section, if you want to move and compact the "controversies" that would be great, or let me know and I can take a shot at it.--Jackbirdsong 01:58, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

The current controversial remarks section should be removed. It's dated, Brown has already retracted his remarks, and its persistence is clearly designed to be an unwarranted and non-neutral attack on his character. Other politicians, such as Jason Lewis have made far more inflammatory remarks which are routinely removed from their wiki articles. It seems that democratic politicians are held to a much higher standard than republican politicians, seemingly a result of right-wing bias from the editors here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2607:FCC8:944A:C400:DFA:1F58:76F2:99D2 (talk) 02:44, 21 July 2018 (UTC)

Election History

I wrote the election history. It's a rigorous coveration of all his races taht I think all articles on politicians need. But, as for the Unavailable elections, PLEASE DO NOT ERASE. I've sent the Ohio Secretary of State's office an email asking for the OH-13 results from those years which were completely unavailable on their website. Those years the site had absolutely no results for U.S. House Races. I'm sorry I wasn't logged in when I made the changes, so that's why the changes don't show the user who made them.--68.229.147.56 01:26, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

The article says he served as a state senator in Ohio from 1974-82, but the infobox says he was in the Ohio house of representatives from 1975-82, this needs to be fact-checked. (The Ohio general assembly is a bicameral state legislature, the house of representatives is a separate body from the state senate, just as in the US Congress.) - Elmarco 16:58, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

I recommend an unbiased author add the subsection "Campaign Politics" to the heading "2012 Senate Election" with content related to alleged spouse abuse which led to a restraining order imposed on Sherrod Brown by his first wife Larke Ummei in 1986. Larke divorced Brown in 1987. Details reported at [BLACK LISTED BREITBART LINK REMOVED BY ADMIN] . Further, information available in the Wiki article for Sherrod Brown's current wife Connie Schultz should appear also in Sherrod Brown's own article, because it affects him politically. Connie Shultz is a Main Stream Media personality who was working for the Cleveland Plain Dealer in 2006 when she took a leave of absence to work with Sherrod Brown's campaign for the Senate seat then held by Mike DeWine. Connie Schultz subsequently resigned from the Cleveland Plain Dealer in 2011 citing a conflict of interest as the newspaper began daily coverage of Brown's current reelection campaign. Sherrod Brown's sponsorship of the Protect IP Act (PIPA) is also a 2012 campaign issue, following the strong opposition to that proposed legislation from Google, Yahoo, and other large segments of the Internet community. The barest mention is made of PIPA in the current Sherrod Brown entry, with no background information in this article about the controversial nature of PIPA as a threat to Internet freedom and privacy. I am politically biased against Sherrod Brown's reelection and will be happy to revise his article extensively if less biased authors are unavailable to address this issue prior to May 8, 2012. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.103.158.201 (talk) 19:15, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Couple things. First, Big Government isn't nearly a reliable enough source to support including something like spousal abuse in BLP. The other two topics you mention are covered, in as far as they relate to Brown, the subject of the article. Anything additional does not belong here, it belongs on the Connie Schultz or PIPA page. Thanks. Arbor8 (talk) 19:49, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with this. Big Government and Breitbart sites in general do not have the reputation for neutrality and fact-checking that characterize reliable secondary sources. What they write may be notable enough for inclusion but should only be presented as the opinions of the author. With respect to Connie Shultz, the allegations you cite above seem relevant but I would like to see them backed up with reliable secondary sources. Bretibart does not meet that standard.Organthief1949 (talk) 17:08, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Addition of constituent correspondence

User:Hallesister keeps adding verbatim text of constituent correspondence he/she claims to have received from Senator Brown. Similar edits are being made at Steve LaTourette. I have reverted these edits, warned the user on his talk page and proposed a compromise. These letters may have information that could be incorporated as prose, but they cannot be verified as authentic letters, and posting them verbatim does not follow the manual of style. This is my third revsion today, so I don't plan on reverting him again otherwise I will violate WP:3RR. I think the addition of this information constitutes vandalism, but I don't want to risk it. Either way, the user will be in violation of 3RR if he reverts me. Could other editors weigh in on this please, or am I off base here?DCmacnut <> 17:12, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Even if the letters were somehow suitable sources, they would be just that: sources, not encyclopedic material. The article should note Brown's political positions, not record letters whole hog. In any event, the user's failure to bring his position here is troubling. -Rrius (talk) 22:02, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Link and minor biographical point

This sentence has two problems:

>He taught at the Mansfield branch campus of The Ohio State University from 1979 to 1981.

First, it links to the Mansfield, England website.

Second, Sherrod Brown also taught at least one course (on Ohio Politics) at the Mansfield branch after he lost his reelection campaign for Secretary of State in 1990. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.124.200.245 (talk) 05:06, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Recent changes

I'd like to create an area where we can talk about the recent changes made. They seem to be rather contentious so we should discuss them here.

From what I'm seeing, most of the removals are due to information not being sourced. Per WP:BLP this is perfectly acceptable. Ultimately, removing the content is probably not in the best interest of Wikipedia, in my opinion. I think we should be attempting to find references for unreferenced information and if we can't or find references to the contrary, we can point that out here while removing the information.

The other issues seems to be related to interpretations of events and/or that the prose used wasn't appropriate for the situation. Let me try that again: the information was being improperly summarized. I think we should handle that on a case-by-case basis here.

The speed at which information is being removed, added, and reverted is hard to keep up with. I think the best thing at this point is to slow down and discuss the changes so that we can improve the article in a solid way that we can all agree upon. OlYeller21^Talktome 20:45, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I see the removal of content that isn't particularly controversial and in some cases is a matter of public record. I also see it being added back with more sources and the deletionist editor continuing to war over it. Well, here are still more additional sources for material that would simply have been removed:

For the bit about the Secretary of State races: 1982 primary, 1982 general, 1986 general, 1990 general. Is there actually any point in including these sources?—Probably not.
Regarding the DOMA vote, I would argue that despite Organthief's assertion to the contrary, a 342–67 vote shows the bill's popularity. Also, same-sex marriage was unpopular (with "against" numbers around 60), so DOMA was manifestly popular. Also, the editor's position justifies deleting "then highly popular", not the whole sentence.
Regarding CAFTA, Organtheif is wrong again. He or she says it doesn't mention Brown. Searching for "brown" using your browser's handy page search will show that it does mention him. Here's what it says: "Representative Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio organizing opposition to Cafta." That supports the central claim: that Brown led the effort against the bill.
There are thousands of sources that support the claim that he was a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (here's one). The real question is whether this belongs: it is not a committee assignment.

Those four items account for all of Organthief's six edits after he or she was reverted seriatim by Arbor8: two that were non-controversial, one that absolutely should not have been deleted in its entirety and really shouldn't have been deleted even in part, and one was supported by the source but deleted anyway. Can we just unprotect the page and let the admins worry about Organthief? It doesn't seem fair to full protect the page when one editor is being careless and disruptive. -Rrius (talk) 07:08, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

I have reverted all edits by Organthief1949. I don't feel that an article about a public figure who is increasingly coming under the microscope, should have such quickly made and drastic edits to the article without discussion. I started this section to facilitate a discussion which Organthief1949 chose not to participate in. I suggest that all major content changes be discussed here. OlYeller21^Talktome 15:53, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

No. You did not raise any objections at all until I undid your first reversion. You deleted entirely non-controversial changes that were reviewed by at least two other editors who did not agree with me on another edit. You reverted every change I made without raising any particular objections and left a very snide edit summary. i am unaware of any requirement at Wikipedia to to take every single change, even major changes to the talk page to ask for permission. If we did things that way nothing would get done.Organthief1949 (talk) 16:54, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

And I would not characterize the edits you reverted as "drastic." I simple re-organized content in a more rational manner and made other minor housekeeping-style changes in the particular edit you reverted. I also deliberately left the addition of new content to the "Controversial remarks" section in a separate edit so that other editors (I had Arbor8 in mind) could revert and discuss their objections. Organthief1949 (talk) 17:00, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Protected three days

I have fully protected the article due to an edit war. Protection was requested at WP:RFPP. The most recent dispute seems to be about Brown's participation in the CAFTA debate in Congress in 2005. The Bloomberg reference says "Representative Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio organizing opposition to Cafta, has said that more than 255 of the 435 members of the House would vote against Cafta." If anyone thinks that our article is not adequately referenced in this section, please explain your concerns on the talk page. During the protection, please try to reach consensus here. If reverts continue without discussion when protection expires, blocks would be the next step. Thank you, EdJohnston (talk) 04:47, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

I shortened the protection to one day after a discussion on my talk page. After protection ends, anyone who makes controversial changes with no consensus on the talk page will be in the spotlight. The rules in WP:Edit warring are likely to be applied with extra thoroughness to anyone reverting an article on a politician who is in the middle of an election campaign. EdJohnston (talk) 16:40, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

And so everyone is clear, waiting for protection to end and then deleting the material again would constitute edit warring. With respect to anything else, at least for the moment, it sounds as though we are in strict WP:BRD territory: if you edit and someone reverts you, you do not restore your edit; instead, you come here to the talk page and discuss the matter until there is consensus one way or the other. -Rrius (talk) 21:38, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

committees

Brown left the Appropriations Committee in the 113th Congress and is on the (arguably more powerful) Finance Committee. 74.69.11.229 (talk) 18:50, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

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Divorce

Content about Brown's divorce (specifically abuse allegations made against him by his ex-wife) has recently been added here, here and here. All of those edits have been reverted. I suggest that interested parties discuss here to gauge consensus rather than continually re-adding and removing similar info. Marquardtika (talk) 04:25, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

@Power~enwiki and Marquardtika: Thanks, Marquardtika. I recently attempted an update to some of Brown's views and also included some information about his divorce. I had no idea that was previously disputed on this same article. What struck me, however, was the fact that all my contributions were reversed, and not just that one. I hope we can reach some sort of compromise because I put a lot of hours into those edits! I'm more than happy to review the differences and trim or modify what's needed. Let me know. Thanks, JKen (talk) 14:32, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

Lead image

Following suit with Dick Durbin and Bernie Sanders, these outdated official portraits from a decade ago should be replaced with recent images. Here's some potential replacements and let's vote as to whether we should change the image. I personally prefer B.--TDKR Chicago 101 (talk) 02:07, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Option A (current; 2009)
Option B (2018; from his senate website)
Option C (2019)
Option D (2019)