User talk:Geo Swan

User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2004
User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2005
User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2006-January-to-June
User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2006-July-to-Oct
User talk:Geo Swan/archive/2006-October-to-December
User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2007-January-to-June
User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2007-July-to-September
User Talk:Geo Swan/archive/2008

comment

Please note.

Ah, I see I wrote to you about adding guys to this category already.

I continue to think adding any Guantanamo captive to this category, who haven't faced credible charges of terrorism, is a huge mistake. If you check the allegations against them, you will see most of the Guantanamo captives who have been added to this category didn't even face allegations of terrorism during their Combatant Status Review Tribunal.

I'll meet you part way. I'll remove this category from hald the inappropriately placed articles, and let you remove the other half. Agreed?

Cheers! Geo Swan 15:11, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Replayed on discussion page Ammar (^Talk - ^{Don't Talk}) 15:24, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

CSIS for once, not CIA

It just caught my eye that "a CSIS operative named only as "Mike" gave testimony at Trial of Mahmoud Jaballah, December 17, 2001, Page 330. Check out http://financialservices.house.gov/media/pdf/021202se.pdf and search for "Khadr", you'll see his testimony/statement. Thought it might be worth two minutes of looking-into, though I'm not going to add it to {{DCSIS}} with quite so little information sadly. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 07:44, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Aha, Toronto Star article mentions a CSIS agent testifying in Toronto against Jaballah, could be the same guy...though here he's referred to as J.P. and portrayed as seemingly ignorant about Islamic extremism...admitted his experience came from reading The Economist, about 35 with 12 years in counter-terrorism. No indication if it's the same guy or not. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 07:56, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Oddly, this transcript seems to be the CSIS agent proving his inexperience as related in the earlier article, but here he is "Dave", not "J.P."...but after referring to himself as a "Middle Eastern expert", he says that Iran is Arabian (not Persian), can't give an estimate of the population of Egypt or name any North African countries. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 08:43, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Oh come on, "P.G." has testified against Hassan Almrei, Mohamad Harkat and Mahmoud Jaballah. You coy devil, what, we have one CSIS agent who knows everybody held under security certificates? "Random" point of interest that Philip Gibson was the Director General of the CSIS Comms Branch before he got his name replaced by "Secured Information" - perhaps the newspapers are misreporting him as an "agent" and he is in fact their main media/courtroom liasion? That might make more sense. shrugs. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 08:39, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

My apologies for spamming your talk page last night, sometimes I just seem to use it as a sandbox Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 04:45, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Bathurst Inlet

I was just looking over the bit you added about the deep water port and I'm sure the references say six groups in the consortium but it doesn't seem to identify which six. In the FP trading desk link it mentions Rio Tinto Plc and BHP Billition Plc as members. It also mentions Zinifex Limited, Sabina Silver Corp and Tahera Diamond but it's unclear if they are members of the consortium. In the star.com link it appears that Kitikmeot Corp want to build the port with public/private financing. Mentioned there are Sabina Silver, Zinifex Ltd, Rio Tinto Inc, Miramar Mining, Dundee Precious Metals, BHP Billiton and DeBeers. But it's still not clear who is part of the consortium and what they are willing to fund. Cheers. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 03:29, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Ah. I am glad you found it interesting. I was going to give you a headsup, but you found my references first. Shall we cut the table back to those firms mentioned in both articles? I thought about writing to info@sabinasilver.com -- an email address my web search threw up. The Geo coords for the community of Bathurst Inlet place it about half way down the inlet. I wonder if the inlet starts having too many navigational hazards south of there.

I created some other maps. I think the existing maps were uploaded in error. If they were "all rights reserved", we can't distribute them under a free liscence.

I cam across the link to the Bathurst Inlet story when I was looking for more information about Harper's most recent announcement on Arctic patrol frigates, and an Arctic deep-water port. Iqaluit no longer has it sewn up. I agree with the commentators who feel the CCG should continue to play a big role in asserting sovereignty. Have you read any of the articles the Canadian American Strategic Review, and SFU, has published about Arctic issues? If not you should take a look.

Yes, sure I can rename the map.

Cheers! Geo Swan 06:30, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the map. It might be useful to contact Sabina or one of the others like BHP or Rio Tinto. All of the ones mentioned will benefit from the road and port but it would be interesting to see who is the main backers. I'll have to check out the articles you mention as I haven't read them yet. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 20:19, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

A request

Would it be possible to get Image:Communities where Inuktitut is spoken.png changed to "Communities where Inuinnaqtun is spoken". Inuinnaqtun is an official language in both the NWT and Nunavut, althought some say it's only a dialect of Inuktitut. Inuktitut is spoken from Gjoa Haven to the east. Thanks. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 04:44, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Guantanamo captive's uniforms

A {{prod}} template has been added to the article Guantanamo captive's uniforms, suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process. All contributions are appreciated, but this article may not satisfy Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and the deletion notice explains why (see also "What Wikipedia is not" and Wikipedia's deletion policy). You may contest the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why you disagree with the proposed deletion in your edit summary or on its talk page. Also, please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Even though removing the deletion notice will prevent deletion through the proposed deletion process, the article may still be deleted if it matches any of the speedy deletion criteria or it can be sent to Articles for Deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. If you endorse deletion of the article, and you are the only person who has made substantial edits to the page, please tag it with {{db-author}}. --Finngall ^talk 17:31, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

I apologize if the tag seemed to be too quick. On one hand, I am fully aware of my tendency to be a little quick on the trigger with tagging new articles that I run across while patrolling the new page list. On the other, Wikipedia has yet to devise a "list of articles that have passed a suitable grace period", so the other list is all I have to go on if I'm going to be doing this sort of thing at all.

I'm not psychic--I can only base an assessment of an article on what's there, not on what's going to be there, and I can't predict whether or not a "first draft" is going to be improved at all, except that from my experience, more often than not they don't get improved. The solution to this is to not post an article before it is complete--that's what the "show preview" button and subpages are for.

Furthermore, that first version of the article seemed sufficiently incoherent to me that the debate in my mind wasn't whether to prod it or leave it alone, but whether to prod it or speedy-tag it as nonsense. I'm still dubious as to whether the subject of Gitmo uniforms merits a whole article by itself, but now that the article has been improved substantially I'm not going to press the issue by sending it to AfD--after Sherurcij cleaned it up and added to it, I dropped it from my watchlist and moved on to other things.

Anyway, I hope you better understand where I'm coming from here. Our goal here is the same--making this a better encyclopedia. Thanks, take care, and here's hoping that the whole issue soon ceases to be a current event and becomes merely a matter of history. --Finngall ^talk 16:33, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay. Thanks for the civil reply.

That no one has gone to the trouble of providing a tool for listing articles that were newly created some reasonable period of time ago was no excuse for the other nominators to have chosen to ignore the recommendation of {{cfd}} and {{csd}} to allow a grace peiod

My number one compute had to be retired early. I am using my number two computer, a 1 gigahertz machine, with limited memory. The policy recommends nominators accommodate people like me who have to save often, because of limited resources. I am drawing your attention to this aspect of the policy because your recommendation is not only counter-policy, but it is not really an option for me, and, I believe, many others.

I think compliance with the policy requires new page patrolers like you to make accommodations for editors like me, and not vice versa.

Cordially, Geo Swan 17:08, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Guantanamo detainees missing from the official list

I'm reluctant to put this up for deletion, but to me it is irredeemably original research by synthesis. I understand you disagree, and there is little point in each of us repeating our positions. Could the material be merged somewhere? Tom Harrison ^Talk 18:10, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

re Dilawar

I'm not challenging that, but I think it's a bit over the top to assume their motivation, and put it in a disambguation page with no reference. The phrase "for kicks" seems too unencyclopedic (I'd even say too informal) for this topic. The current wording gets the point without being sensational (the point here being primarily to tell different people with the same name apart) while the article specifies the details in a more formal tone. Most encyclopedia articles should have a certain formality to them; if they're about a victim of a violent crime, then even more so. -Steve Sanbeg 15:37, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Guantanamo captive's uniforms

Hi Geo Swan. You are off to such a great start on the article Guantanamo captive's uniforms that it may qualify to appear on Wikipedia's Main Page under the Did you know... section. The Main Page gets about 4,000,000 hits per day and appearing on the Main Page may help bring publicity and assistance to the article. However, there is a five day from article creation window for Did you know... nominations. Before five days pass from the date the article was created and if you haven't already done so, please consider nominating the article to appear on the Main Page by posting a nomination at Did you know suggestions. If you do nominate the article for DYK, please cross out the article name on the "Good" articles proposed by bot list. Also, don't forget to keep checking back at Did you know suggestions for comments regarding your nomination. Again, great job on the article. -- Jreferee ^(Talk) 21:09, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Hunger strikes still ongoing

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070721/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/guantanamo_hunger_strikes could be used as a source to update several articles with "As of July 2007..." Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 04:55, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

DYK

On 22 July, 2007, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Guantanamo captive's uniforms, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

--Carabinieri 17:22, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

USMA's CSRT study

This is it.
I haven't had time to look through it yet but I see that their second PDF is a direct response to the Denbeauxs.
-- Randy2063 22:40, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Rahmatullah Safi

A {{prod}} template has been added to the article Rahmatullah Safi, suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process. All contributions are appreciated, but this article may not satisfy Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and the deletion notice explains why (see also "What Wikipedia is not" and Wikipedia's deletion policy). You may contest the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why you disagree with the proposed deletion in your edit summary or on its talk page. Also, please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Even though removing the deletion notice will prevent deletion through the proposed deletion process, the article may still be deleted if it matches any of the speedy deletion criteria or it can be sent to Articles for Deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. If you endorse deletion of the article, and you are the only person who has made substantial edits to the page, please tag it with {{db-author}}. Lilac Soul ^{(talk • contribs • count)} 18:06, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Coffee

Over the weekend I'm in Ottawa, so would some time around noon (or at least before 2pm...) any weekday next week work for you? I'll also draw your attention to Wikipedia_talk:Meetup/Toronto, and in case you were interested, Zaynab Khadr has signed up on Wikipedia - a good chance to try and draw her out to talk some more about what is/isn't valid information. (She's engaged in some minor "whitewashing" on her father's wiki article, though talk page discussion is clearing it up, imho) Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 17:38, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Tuesday at noon sounds fine. I'd be interested in finding out who that "important Arab" is, now that you mention it. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 04:11, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Just confirming that I still intend to be there tomorrow - probably be nursing back an iced cappucino. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 00:38, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

HH RfC

Any chance you could provide some diffs for the RfC? It would be helpful to have links to the comments you mention. – Dreadstar † 18:23, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Wow! Dreadstar † 20:22, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Good grief! Then there's also his responses to your request for civility on his own talk page, which were also quite uncivil. Thanks for adding the link to the timeline of your interactions with him. It's quite clear that his habit of incivility goes far beyond what we've experienced with the Battle of Washita River article. --Yksin 20:32, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Re:More info please

responded here -- Esemono 01:23, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Undeletion of Religious Conversion and Terrorism

Yes, I realized after the fact I should not have added to the closed discussion. I'd certainly join you in suggesting undeletion. How is it done? How do you propose to frame it? See my talk page. WiccaWeb 04:33, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree with your approach, it makes a lot of sense, I think it has the best possibility of success. It can clearly be shown that the correct process wasn't followed, so if the Admins put aside personal views, we can probably get it undeleted. That said, the controversial nature of the subject will probably result in deletion requests down the road... WiccaWeb 06:13, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Captive's library in Guantanamo

(the following is a reply to [1])

Hi, I agree that it was a copyright violation. I would have removed it from the history if possible but since the letter was there from the very first edit I couldn't do that. Garion96 (talk) 08:47, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

(the following is a reply to [2])

To respond to your questions:

1. Abdul Aziz
2. A statement by the copyright holder that the material is in the public domain or released under the GFDL. Or that it is a work of the united states federal government. Neither of those seems to be the case. I admit this is a bit theoretical but legally Abdul Aziz holds the copyright and all text posted on Wikipedia must be public domain or released under the GFDL.

That the letter was "almost certainly meant for to be made public" does not mean the letter is in the "public domain". Those two are not the same. Mind you, I think a small portion of the letter could be posted in the article under fair use. But it will have to pass the Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria. The excerpt which was used is too long to pass those criteria. Garion96 (talk) 12:40, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

from Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert Preston (military lawyer)

I am putting a comment here I was initially going to put on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert Preston (military lawyer)

• I'll repeat, it was not my intention to trigger the feeling you were being attacked.

• • You aren't disputing that Wikipedia:Guide to deletion#Discussion says: "Always explain your reasoning. This allows others to challenge or support facts, suggest compromises or identify alternative courses of action that might not yet have been considered. It also allows administrators to determine at the end of the discussion, whether your concerns have been addressed and whether your comments still apply if the article was significantly rewritten during the discussion period."
  • Are your disputing that your initial justifications fell short of being reasoned arguments.
    • Non-notable Air Force officer
    • Sure. He's non-notable

or that Awesome example of assuming good faith also falls short of being a reasoned argument on the merits of the article?

• • You aren't challenging whether I am entitled to ask you to try harder to use reasoned arguments? You are just concerned that the way I phrased my request wasn't tactful enough?
  • So, I am open to suggestions as to how you would have preferred to have me request more reasoned arguments.
• Cheers! Geo Swan 00:26, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Category talk:Afghan politicians

Hello, thanks alot for your understanding on the Category talk:Afghan politicians. I really appreciate your understanding. Can you also please help me out with another category? Can you please vote and comment here and here. I would really appreciate your input here. Thanks alot. --Behnam 01:19, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Abdul Aziz Saad Al Khaldi

Any idea whose brother Abdul Aziz Saad Al Khaldi is? Let me know anytime about ZK - again, preferably weekends of weekdays around noon-ish Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 01:33, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

• Sorry, I don't know about Al Khaldi's brother.
• I told her we could meet her in her neighbourhood. I'll let you know when I hear back.
• Cheers! Geo Swan 01:43, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Notability of Hafiz Abdul Basit

Hello, this is a message from an automated bot. A tag has been placed on Hafiz Abdul Basit, by another Wikipedia user, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. The tag claims that it should be speedily deleted because Hafiz Abdul Basit seems to be about a person, group of people, band, club, company, or web content, but it does not indicate how or why the subject is notable: that is, why an article about that subject should be included in an encyclopedia. Under the criteria for speedy deletion, articles that do not assert the subject's importance or significance may be deleted at any time. Please see the guidelines for what is generally accepted as notable.

To contest the tagging and request that administrators wait before possibly deleting Hafiz Abdul Basit, please affix the template {{hangon}} to the page, and put a note on its talk page. If the article has already been deleted, see the advice and instructions at WP:WMD. Feel free to contact the bot operator if you have any questions about this or any problems with this bot, bearing in mind that this bot is only informing you of the nomination for speedy deletion; it does not perform any nominations or deletions itself. CSDWarnBot 03:02, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Hi Geo Swan - As I said in my initial post, I don't see why he's any more notable than the others that have been "disappeared." The general (abhorrent) practice is certainly worth noting, but I'm not clear on why this man is especially notable. However, you're probably right that a more constrained flag such as {{notability}} would have been more appropriate. I'll bear that in mind in future, thanks for the feedback! --Bookgrrl ^holler/lookee here 02:28, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Per Nom

The guideline against using per nom states it's not a good idea if if several people already have showed support for the nominator. However, at the start of a discussion, it can be helpful to show that the deletion motion is supported. In the Silent AFD, there was an argument that the nomination was bad faith, and my support was showing I felt the article deserved deletion regardless. Anyhoo, I'm aware of the guideline, and I generally add my own reasoning to established debates. Cheers, CitiCat ^♫ 16:57, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Wikiproject:Terrorism

Greetings,

I was hoping I could get some input from you, about the proposed mergerof Wikipedia:WikiProject Terrorism and counter-terrorism with Wikiproject:Terrorism. It seems there's a lot of overlap between the two projects, and if we spent a few days merging the lists of articles, sharing ideas and collaborating on improving the same articles which both projects are focused on improving...we could really make some headway. Whether you're in favour, or against, the idea of a merger - I'd appreciate some feedback regardless. Much thanks. (By the way, don't know if you noticed but Jamal's wife is also now on Wiki - I'm thinking of doing a series of interviews for Wikinews for ZK, her and Sophie Harkat, at the very least. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 21:41, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Religious conversion and terrorism

I see there has been no action on this (and I can't find any discussion of a possible undelete). How did this progress? WiccaWeb 03:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

ZK

Can I get your opinion on ZK replacing the word "jihaded" with "shahadah" in the direct quote? She says "jihaded" in the video, and while I don't see any particular reason for her quote to even be in the article - if it is, I think it has to be an accurate representation of what she said, not what she now wishes she'd said. I hate to come down too hard on subjects on their own articles, but honestly...I'd insist on the same for anybody else...in fact I believe I had this identical argument with John Stockwell ages ago, when he wanted to change a direct-quote from his book to say "military-industrial" instead of "government" or something. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 02:17, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

I wikified it. It didn't occur to me that there was a possibility of revisionism. At first I thought shahadah didn't make sense, in context. But then I remembered the young kid, and the terrible confusion over the young kid who interpreted the word his translator used for money as the word for tomato.

In general I think the best kind of friend we can be to other people on the wikipedia is to give them a quiet heads-up when we think they are bending or breaching the policies. But, in ZK's case, I think I might extend greater WP:AGF, and let outsiders who haven't had real contact with her, to call her on possible breaches.

I wasn't aware of your confrontation with JS. I heard him speak -- twice -- once at when I still live in Waterloo, in the 1980s. And once in 1991, at the University of Toronto. During the UofT speech I was struck by how depressed he seemed. I thought "this is a man whose mental health is at risk. He could commit suicide one day." It seemed to me that he had been confronting really terrible human rights abuses for so long that it had left him almost terminally depressed. He told a story about his son, he and his wife were driving to another teaching engagement with their 18 year old son. They were discussing politics, when his son said, "why can't I have a normal childhood? Why can't we ever talk about the normal things normal Americans talk to their kids about, like the local football team?"

No, I don't think this justifies revisionism.

Maybe you are right about ZK.

I don't know if you were following my talk page when I was having my ugly confrontations with User:Joaquin Murietta? Someone had put two images on the Carolyn Wood article. One was a still from the CBC documentary a few bad apples. The other was a reduced resolution image from the old movie Ilsa: She-wolf of the SS. JM tried to claim I was responsible for some other guy's posting of a poorly liscenced image, because I left him a note about it on his home page, and didn't immiediately tag it.

Cheers! Geo Swan 05:43, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

an oversight?

Greetings,

When you added some improvements here recently, you also removed a couple of links that looked okay to me. Was this an oversight? Cheers! Geo Swan 22:47, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Really? I don't remember doing that ... although I generally remove all external links and make them references. -- Esemono 03:32, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Joaquin

Is he using a diff of my comments to justify other edits? If so, point it out and I will certainly set him straight. Cases come through BLPN, you look them over, you comment on them, and they get archived. My comments would only apply to the snapshot of the situation that I was looking at. If they are being used elsewhere, I don't agree to that. - Crockspot 23:03, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Reply

Unless you are a sockpuppet of Don Murphy, that comment had nothing to do with you, and nothing to do with conspiracy theories. It had everything to do with people who use their websites to "out" personal information about Wikipedia editors, attack those editors, and encourage others to harass those editors in real life. Alex Jones has done that, and I was reading about incidents that make it seem that Don Murphy is also doing that. My question to Tom was asking for confirmation about whether or not Murphy is indeed doing that. I was attempting to use "shorthand" and be a little vague. - Crockspot 16:51, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• Looking at Tom's talk page, I suspect because my comment was posted after yours, that you thought it had something to do with you. It didn't. New section. Different topic. - Crockspot 17:00, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Deletion courtesy

Actually, I have no idea. I am at best an occasional nominator to the deletion debates, and if such a switch in attitude occured over the time I have been participating in deletion discussions, I haven't known about it. I've always assumed the large warning template on the templates/article/category/whatever was a pretty good warning.

Feel free to go to review. That's why it's there, after all. Circeus 03:19, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

purely procedural

Yes, my comment on the debate about Template:AfghanRefugeeCamp was purely procedural, and you can quote me on that at deletion review if you want. Basically, the debate had been open for 11 days, over twice as long as it needed to be, and in that time nobody had spoken up for the template. My concern was mainly for the backlog at TfD, and apparent inability of the admins to close what should have been a no-brainer. Xtifr _tälk 08:01, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

WP:Terrorism

Hey, I'm trying to "revamp" WP:TERRORISM and inject some new life into it, make it a more useful tool for everybody involved - was wondering if it would make sense to hijack Deletion Sorting/Guantanamo and just turn it into Deletion Sorting/Terrorism, that way more group members will watchlist it, and consequently our project will be able to better represent a knowledgeable base of academi...(Hey, what I mean to say is, more people will vote "keep!" on disputed articles, but I know admitting this on a talk page is going to come back to haunt me when somebody drags it up in six months and accuses me of vote-stacking...which I totally intend to do!). Seems like a better idea than running two "similar" deletion sorting lists each with only half as many people watching for upcoming AfDs. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 02:29, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

In reverse order

• I think the use of the deletion sorting mechanism is not considered vote soliciting -- because those with views that differ with yours have the same opportunity to see the notice as those ho agree with you.
• I don't know how many people have it on their watchlist. Maybe only half a dozen or so.
• I would certainly subscribe to a deletion sorting thing devoted to terrorism related articles.
  • I would subscribe to a new deletion sorting thing devoted to terrorism related articles.
  • I would raise no objections if you wanted to rename the Guantanamo deletion sorting thing to terrorism, to net a wider scope.
  • FWIW user:crzrussian started it. He had nominated one Guantanamo article for deletion, with the announcement that it would be a test case for the deletion of all the Guantanamo articles that were "identical".

Cheers! Geo Swan 02:46, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Re: Your help would be appreciated...

As the comment above mentions, 'If after the normal time period, there are no objections to deletion of a template, it can simply be deleted.' (Wikipedia:Deletion process#Templates for Deletion page), which this case satisfies.

As for you not being informed of the nomination, it is considered courteous to do so but it is not a requirement prior to deletion.

As for the redlinks, out of the 11 links in the template, 8 were, and always have been, redlinks and only 3 linked to existing articles. I don't know about the inclusion criteria for refugee camps, but were all those listed of significance and likely to have articles created on them in the near future? Two of the existing articles are relatively short, is there enough information and points of discussion on the camps to make them into longer articles or is that about it? Are all the camps linked, open at the same time in response to the same events? Are the camps (including the two previously mentioned) part of a slightly wider topic (such as the last statement), the article on which could include information about the camps rather than splitting them into a short article on each? The answers should guide you as to whether they need to be linked as part of a navigational template. As it stood, a navigational template with only three blue links and 8 redlinks wasn't particularly useful, and navigational templates with so few (active) links are usually deleted as the topics should be linkable through inline links making the template redundant. Depending on the answer to the previous questions, we can see where to go from here and the possibility of restoring the template or creating a template with a different scope. As for deletion review, it is up to you whether you take it there and I cannot direct you either way. I hope that helps, and let me know if you want any points expanding on. Thanks, mattbr 15:44, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

It's more the notability of the ones that hadn't been created that I was trying to establish and whether they were likely to be created. No categories were included as part of the transclusion of the template. As for the other admin, if you have concerns about their actions I suggest you raise them on their talk page. Thanks, mattbr 18:41, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

religious conversion and terrorism

So what's going on with this? Are you going to deletion review, do you want comments, or what? You've had a lot of time to review this, and to work on your alternate version but I don't see any indication that its going anywhere. Before I contact the admin who restored the page to ask him/her what is going on I was hoping you would tell me what the deal is. Thanks.PelleSmith 14:59, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Toronto Star Issue

Thanks for the response. The question you asked at the Reliable sources/Noticeboard is actually pretty irrelevant to the edit it refers to. It is relevant to the reliability of the source you have asked about, but that was not the source which I called unreliable in my edit summary. If you review the edit in question you will see two important things. First of all the primary reference was to [3] which supposedly reproduces an article from the Toronto Star. As I believe it has been pointed out to you at the Reliable sources/Noticeboard, a source that reproduces another source without the mark of authentication is not reliable. I can see how you failed to grasp that I was in fact claiming that a forum on www.canadiancoalition.com is an unreliable source for reproducing news from other sources which do not authenticate such reproduction--my comment had nothing to do with the Toronto Star itself. Again, this fact is irrelevant to the reliability of said news paper (which is clearly counted as a reliable source for news) but entirely relevant to my edit. The other important thing you will notice is that I made two other points in this edit, besides the one about said forum not being reliable. 1) I pointed out that that the words in the text I was editing were in part taken word for word from the unreliable source--as in plagiarized from the forum 2) that the only exception to the plagiarism was in fact a missattribution of quotation marks. This missattribution made it seem that a terrorism expert was saying something that actually was prose from the writer, or at least according to the forum copy that was linked. Now again it is impossible to say even if the forum copy is a good reproduction of the Toronto Star--and that is the main issue here regarding source reliability. You may also notice that after all of my excisions I actually left a reference to the very same Toronto Star piece in the entry. Why is that? Because that reference never linked to the forum reproduction. Clearly, I don't have any concerns with the Toronto Star itself. Clearly that idea is entirely misguided in terms of the edit in question. Now that you've made me look this closely into the issue, I would say that the other Toronto Star quote probably needs to be verified as well with the actual imprint version because it is just as likely that the quote itself came from the forum reproduction--though this isn't clear and hence I would never remove it on those grounds. I hope this has been enlightening to you. I still think, pardon me for psychoanalyzing, that you assumed from the very beginning there was impropriety and never gave me any benefit of any doubt on any of these edits. That's just my opinion and you can disagree with it, but I think you should review them with a bit more contextual thoroughness if you really want to get to the bottom of this. Cheers.PelleSmith 00:17, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Addendum -- The reference may have been made originally to a link to www.thestar.com, which I presume would have been to the article in question. However, this link never provided any information as to what it was referencing, and existed only as a dead link when I came upon the entry. It was removed as a dead link. The first appearance of both the supposed text of this piece and of the citation came together in the above mentioned forum version. Just to be clear so there is no confusion here.PelleSmith 12:16, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Adam Gadahn

You claimed in your response on my talk page that I "removed his entry because [I] thought the reference didn't back up that he was associated with terrorism." Here I need you to understand, though I forgive the mistake, that your statement is in fact simply NOT TRUE. I did not remove his entry at all and please have a look at the edit history. I removed two references provided for his entry. 1) I removed this reference because it was cited after the statement: "Appeared in al Qaeda videos." As my edit summary states, the reference only ever backed up that he was "believed" to be the man in an al Qaeda video. Now you may ask why not then change the text to: "He is believed to have appeared in al Qaeda videos?" Had the entry been called "Religious converts and suspected terrorism" then I might have changed the sentence. As it is the statement the reference was meant to verify simply was not verified by the reference hence the removal. 2) I also removed this reference because it didn't establish Adam as a terrorist, but maybe as a spokesman for al Qaeda. Here is the first sentence of the story: "An American thought to be an al-Qaida activist appeared in a videotape with the terror group’s deputy leader Saturday and called on his countrymen to convert to Islam and for U.S. soldiers to switch sides in the Iraq and Afghan wars." The story was mostly about a video in which, again it is "believed" this man appeared. It also included this blunt statement: "The video included no direct threats of terror attacks." I concluded, after reading the source that it was bad because it didn't actually substantiate anything but "belief", and even at that this belief didn't make the man a terrorist, or someone making terrorist threats even, but someone speaking for a known terrorist group. Again I felt that the reference simply did not back the statement it was referencing, hence a bad reference. Not an unreliable reference ... but not appropriate for the statements it had been attached to. I want to leave you with this. Please be more careful with your statements. As I have pointed out to you it is clear in the edit history that I didn't remove any of the text about Adam in the entry but only the references. Please review the edit history.PelleSmith 04:16, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

General Concerns with Sources

I want to address a more general issue here that is related to both of the above, more so to the Adam Gadahn scenario. Very few of my removals of references had anything to do with the reliability of the sources themselves. There was the case of a spreadsheet that clearly did not meet our criteria and the case of the forum (and maybe one or two others). However, a vast majority were removed because they were sources that didn't actually attest to any of the information they were added to as references. I'm sure I mentioned this to you on your talk page and during the AfD. I'm not the lazy sort who sees a reference and says "oh looks good, this stuff is sourced." No I like to read the sources to make sure they have something to do with what they are sourcing. You'd be surprised at how often people get away with misquoting, fabricating material and otherwise simply throwing up ghost references. When the lack of good references has been made an issue, and all of a sudden a bunch of references appear to back statements then it is our job to look into them. Anybody can find articles in reliable media and create links to them, but if they don't source the statement they are linked to in the entry then they are useless ... even if they can be considered reliable as sources in the abstract. This is exactly what I was dealing with. Trust me I didn't enjoy reading these sources through but I did, and then I explained as well as I could in the edit summaries why exactly a specific source failed to prove any relevance. Again my feeling is still that you simply didn't want to give me the benefit of the doubt here.PelleSmith 04:31, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

So you're not moving forward with this?

It's been quite a while now since you had the entry resurrected from its resting place. Are you going to move on with this or what? It's also been over a week since you have edited any of the relevant pages or discussed anything related to this. I don't mean to sound like a pain but I really think that if you intend on dredging this up and ask to have pages brought back from the dead then you ought to do something or else gracefully let them go back to where they lay. Thanks and best.PelleSmith 00:07, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with you working on the a new version of the entry, but I do have a problem with the idea that the restored version should housed on Wiki indefinitely for you to work on. It would seem that unless you are going to initiate a deletion review you will have to be BOLD and recreate the entry or a similar one on your own. If an admin restores deleted materials so that you can do this at your discretion 4 months down the road (or again so that you can initiate a review whenever you want) I think that you do damage to the integrity of the deletion process, and as the nominator of the AfD I think I'll feel like my efforts (thus far deemed completely within policy and procedure) were for naught. So yes, unless you plan on doing something now you should ask the admin who restored it for you to put back to rest. Thanks.PelleSmith 11:45, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Category:Alleged Osama bin Laden bodyguard

Category:Alleged Osama bin Laden bodyguard, which you created, has been nominated for merging into Category:Bodyguards. You are invited to participate in the discussion located here. – Black Falcon ^(Talk) 17:30, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Sada Jan

I don't have the page watched, so I wasn't aware of your lengthy explanation. On a quick read, it appears to be a position statement against US policy. I think the section on the tribunal in the article is completely unnecessary and violates WP:SOAP. When I read an article and can ascertain the political view of the author with regard to the subject, it has POV problems. It's as simple as that. Obviously, you oppose US policy on this subject, and your personal feelings have spilled over into the article. Take a look at this article, for example. There's no detailed explanation of the Nuremberg Trials, just a link to that article. I think it does these people a disservice to use their individual articles to debate US policy. IMHO, their articles should be limited to the details of their own situation. Link to the tribunals from each. Then, the individual articles might be free of POV, although there will be a holy war at the tribunal articles (if there's not already). Of course, it's harder to oppose WP:SOAPING if it's going on at 100 different articles, but these sections really don't belong. Cheers! -- But|seriously|folks  18:13, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

All articles related to the GWOT are controversial. I am going to ask you to consider that your test -- I am not trying to be sarcastic, but I am going to call it a "I know it when I see it" test -- is simply not reliable. This test could only be reliable if you, yourself could guarantee you were 110% free of any POV yourself. Of course that isn't true. No one is free of POV. We all have to make a conscious effort to be aware our POV, so we can do our best to keep it from our contributions to article space. Geo Swan 02:39, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. I'm not saying the test is whether I agree or disagree with the content. The test is whether I can discern your POV by reading what you have written. And it's obvious. And it shouldn't be. On the other template, the POV is just as obvious. Whether or not it's factual, it reads like propaganda, and it's not particularly relevant to the subject of the article. It's simply not appropriate to take a POV position against the "GWOT" in each detainee's article. -- But|seriously|folks  16:19, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

I fixed the caption on the second template and removed the POV tag. I don't know why I didn't just do that in the first place. I still don't think the TalibanBounty template belongs, but I'm satisfied with the second one now. -- But|seriously|folks  16:24, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, your perception that my contributions are tainted by my POV could just as easily be explained by your reading of my contribution being filtered through your POV.

I am going to repeat this. My contribution could completely comply with WP:NPOV, and yet be perceived to be biased by someone laboring under common misconceptions, or who have biases that they are simply unaware of.

This is why it is extremely important that you and I and every other wikipedia contributor makde sure we extend the benefit of the doubt to other contributors when we perceive a POV problem. It is absolutely essential we continue to discuss our concern with them while being prepared to accept that we might be wrong, and they might be right.

Maybe you are right? But you won't convine me by simply stating that you can perceive my contributions are biased, when that perception could just as easily be explained by your bias.

I think acknowledging mistakes , lapses, is important, if we are going to preserve a collegial, cooperative community here. If you convince me I made a lapse I will openly acknowledge this. I look for this kind of intellectual honesty in my correspondents.

Ah. I see you edited Template:Combatant Status Review Tribunal trailer image and caption down to just a single sentence.

But you didn't go to Template talk:Combatant Status Review Tribunal trailer image and caption and leave a civil explanation for your edit.

You realize that this could be seen as a highly confrontational invitation to an edit war? I don't respond to invitations to edit wars. I really think an edit where you remove 80+% of the text obliges you to give a meaningful explanation.

Among your choices were to try to work towards a compromise wording. You could have done this, instead of your big excision. Geo Swan 17:51, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Ayman Saeed Batarfi

I just created Ayman Saeed Batarfi seeing his name mentioned as being a doctor who was present in Tora Bora - would appreciate if you can dig around for his ARB transcripts or anything else to help bring his article in line with the other Gitmos. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 00:24, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

TfD nomination of Template:TalibanBounty

Template:TalibanBounty has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. —- But|seriously|folks  08:08, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

POV

OK. Let's take it apart:

Combatant Status Review Tribunals were held in a small trailer, the same width, but shorter, than a mobile home.

I don't see a POV issue here, but if I'm reading an article about an individual detainee, why do I care how long the room is? It may arguably be appropriate to describe the room in an article about the CSRT's, but not the individual detainees, which is where this template is being used.

The Tribunal's President sat in the big chair.

Same comment. We're discussing detainees, and the caption is telling me where the "judge" sits.

The detainee sat with his hands and feet shackled to a bolt in the floor in the white, plastic garden chair.

Finally we get to the detainee. But unfortunately, it's just telling us where he sat during a hearing. And all of the detainees are sitting in the same place. So why is it worth mentioning? The answer is that it's not, unless one is trying to make a point by contrasting the judge in the "big chair" against the shackled detainee in the "white, plastic garden chair". But setting up such a contrast, i.e., selecting these particular facts and presenting them in this particular way, would be editorializing by trying to engender sympathy for the detainee. So whether because of unimportance or POV concerns, this fact does not belong here.

A one way mirror behind the Tribunal President allowed observers to observe clandestinely.

Again, even if this fact is relevant to the tribunals, it is not relevant to individual detainees. Of course, "clandestine" itself carries a negative connotation. It means more than "without being seen". It suggests that specific measures are being taken to remain unseen. This is irrelevant to individual detainees, but relevant to someone who is looking for aspects of the tribunals to criticize.

In theory the open sessions of the Tribunals were open to the press. Three chairs were reserved for them.

Also not relevant to the detainees. And "in theory" is a weasel term. Either they were open, or they were not. And who cares about their chairs.

In practice the Tribunal only intermittently told the press that Tribunals were being held.

Another editorial contrast. Again not relevant to individual detainees, unless the press was not informed of a specific detainee's tribunal, and unless that fact is significant to the article. In reality, this amounts to a POV criticism of the tribunals.

And when they did they kept the detainee's identities secret.

The fact that this is irrelevant to the individual detainees' articles makes this more POV criticism.

In practice almost all Tribunals went unobserved.

A third editorial contrast. How is it relevant to the detainee's article that his tribunal was unobserved? Almost all of them were unobserved, so it is nothing particular to that detainee. Bringing this up in an individual detainee's article is an unnecessary criticism of the tribunals in general and therefore a POV statement.

I hope you understand my position better now. -- But|seriously|folks  01:10, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

USA v. Barhoumi

This is an automated message from CorenSearchBot. I have performed a web search with the contents of USA v. Barhoumi, and it appears to include a substantial copy of http://www.territorioscuola.com/wiki/en.wikipedia.php?title=Sufyian_Barhoumi. For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions will be deleted. You may use external websites as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences.

This message was placed automatically, and it is possible that the bot is confused and found similarity where none actually exists. If that is the case, you can remove the tag from the article and it would be appreciated if you could drop a note on the maintainer's talk page. CorenSearchBot 17:17, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Lol. This page the bot thinks I plagiarized is a mirror of the wikipedia's Sufyian Barhoumi article. The single sentence from the Sufyian Barhoumi article that I recycled in the USA v. Barhoumi article is not only released under the GFDL by the original author, but I was the original author.

Try again bot! Geo Swan 17:29, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I already apologized on the talk page. My bad. GlassCobra (talk • contribs) 17:42, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Gaillard Hunt

I don't think I agree that notification has the status of a recommended courtesy, but I do think in this circumstance, you should have been notified. I'm trying to remember how I came upon the Hunt article at this point, but I dont' recall. I know I mostly use the CSD templates when patrolling new articles. In that context, I don't think notification is required and generally choose not to notify the article creators because I think it makes no sense in that situation. It's a different thing to use the templates on an article that has been around for 6 months. I apparently just didn't consider it at the time and neither did the deleting admin. Erechtheus 21:50, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Nice work on Gaillard T. Hunt. You have certainly cemented his notability with the cite not only to his Gitmo work but his Vietnam-era work. It's far superior to the version that essentially just said he happened to have a notable client at Gitmo. Erechtheus 01:28, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Why I deleted your template

It's just not suitable material for a template. This doesn't come from any policy in particular. It comes from the fact that I have closed over 2000 TfDs in my time as an administrator and a wanted poster is not proper for the template namespace. I have no problem whatsoever with the content being hard-coded into the pages the template was contained on. It is true that this didn't strictly meet the criteria for TfD nominations. That is not relevant. Just because something does not meet the requirements for what can be nominated does not mean that it cannot be deleted. It was not appropriate material for the template namespace, which I draw solely from my extensive work in closing TfDs, and not on any policy, as is allowed per WP:IAR. I am sorry if I have not been helpful, but there is little else I can say to clarify my actions. If you feel further action is needed, please take the excessive post you left on my talk page and use it as evidence in a DRV. I am sorry if I sound antagonistic in dismissing your lengthy, passionate, and well-researched post on my talk, but I feel it is germane to inform you that many other admins would have simply reverted such a long post or not have responded at all. Although the first step in deletion review is to contact the closing admin, a lengthy questionnaire is not likely to be warmly received. I am sorry if I sound mean or unhelpful.

As for closing malformed nominations as speedy keep, which you devote a lot of time to in your argument, this is not policy at all. At WP:AFD, we have bots which correctly format and post malformed AfDs. The correct thing to have done was fix the nomination, as it represents the real concerns of someone in our community, and then allow it to be discussed. In the case of this template, such discussion was in my opinion unneeded.

I didn't misinterpret facts either, I didn't even consider them. Facts have no bearing in TfD, which is one of the main differences between it and AfD. Templates which provide factual, correct, sourced information are deleted constantly for a variety of reasons. When it comes down to it, it just wasn't what templates are for. Feel free to add the information, as wiki-text, back into the articles, and I would be happy to provide both the deleted template content and the list of articles I removed it from upon request. RyanGerbil10(C-Town) 20:12, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Up until a few hours ago I had never read the template namespace policies, I just knew that must be what they are because I have heard other users paraphrase them as such. WP:AGF a bit in that I knew the policies as they are enforced, even if I couldn't quote them to you upon request. Be careful what you say, too. "I am going to admonish you" sounds more than a bit patronizing. Also, archive your talk page, my browser almost crashes while loading it. RyanGerbil10(C-Town) 19:27, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

merge notice

answer to your message at my talk page. 1. I don't feel like I know in which direction pages should be merged. I'm sure they should be - they guy is not notable at all outside of the affair, and affair is totally about this one guy and nothing else. 2. I don't see any necessity to start a discussion there; discussion should be started if someone is really against the merge. and if everyone is ok with the tag for a while, they should be merged.

Thanks for your notice! --Monk 08:22, 21 September 2007 (UTC)