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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 66.212.57.206 (talk) at 20:36, 4 May 2009. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Redundant discussions

In case anyone is wondering if they have an original comment about one of the frequently-discussed issues for this article, here is a list of discussions at length which have taken place just in the past couple of months.

Race

Religion

Citizenship

Full name

Give this some consideration before deciding to start another one. Bigbluefish (talk) 14:24, 17 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please skim this page first (and ideally the FAQ) before starting a new discussion about Obama's birthplace, citizenship, race/ethnicity, etc. You'll probably find there's already a section there where you can add your comments. Thanks, Wikidemon (talk) 00:09, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you want to read about where Obama was born and have concerns about it, read Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories#Citizenship facts, rumors and claims and in particular this source which is heavily utilized in the article.

Where is the archive on Ayers? 68.5.11.175 (talk) 19:42, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Should we select one from this list? ↜Just me, here, now … 19:56, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Any of those should do. I do wonder why the Ayers topic is not included in the "Discussions". Admins getting censor happy?Miker789 (talk) 02:18, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Did you miss the whole WND invasion? They spammed the page and we even got mentioned on Drudge and Fox News for having "whitewashed" the article. Soxwon (talk) 02:22, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Where did the discussion on Teleprompters go? I don't believe that was finalized.Miker789 (talk) 02:22, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Consensus and Tertiary Sources issue

Closing discussion. Please see the answer to Question 2 in the FAQ --Bobblehead (rants) 18:10, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

So if everyone were to still have a concensus that the world was flat, would that mean it was correct to put in wikipedia, as tertiary sources stated so? Furthermore, it should be people of directly mixed ancestry that should decide what terminology to label themselves, not the general public concensus.

We do not use this type of labelling for any other race than black, thanks to the slavery etc, and we already know that the concept of the on-drop rule, where everyone with a trace of black ancestry is labelled black was formed in the 1920s by white supremacists who wanted to keep the white race pure, hence labelled any in-between as black. It's an originally racist concept. Why wouldn't any 'african american' with a trace of one-drop of white ancestry, i.e (usually lighter than dark brown)be called white? It's precisely the same absurd principle. Mixed race people's opinions are continuously ignored in all sections of society. In fact there has been evidence shown from 'reliable sources' such as New Scientist to say that mixed race people are discriminated against mroe n the workplace than black people, and govermnet statitiscs form teh UK show that mixed race people are 50% more likely to be a victim of crime than ANY of the other main ethnic groups in the country, including those that are black. If the point in race labelling was to identify these issues, then surely mixed race people should be classified seprately , because statistics have shown these different trends. If they put 1st African American president, they should also include 44th European-American president of the United States. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.192.129.91 (talk) 18:07, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If you have concerns with how Americans label racial backgrounds, this isn't the venue for it. Grsz11 18:11, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So what determines whether a consensus is in fact factual information or popular opinion? There are probably numerous sources in other countries that say the American Government is planning on nuking Iran, it doesn't mean it's true. Could this be stated as factual information in Wikipedia? The race aspect is just an aspect of this discussion, involving reliability of tertiary media sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.192.129.91 (talk) 18:15, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]


I'm sorry but this issue has not been covered in the FAQ section 2 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.192.129.91 (talk) 18:18, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This talk page is for discussing how to improve the Barack Obama biography article. It is not for meta discussions about consensus and sourcing. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:21, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Unsuccessful health politics

Closing discussion. Brothejr (talk) 14:33, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

My proposal for the article: WHO raised the swine flu alert level 5. Currently US has the biggest number of proven swine flu cases 91, compared to Mexico's 26 cases. It is indicating that something is wrong in US, one reason can be that we had no health minister.Multiplyperfect (talk) 22:32, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

We don't do original research - and how many times do you need to be told that this is a high-level summary article and we wouldn't cover that level of detail here? --Cameron Scott (talk) 22:36, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
WHO fears swine flu pandemic imminent for the source. Multiplyperfect (talk) 22:38, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
"high-level summary article" Uff. Without critics, this is only a big tale about superman. Multiplyperfect (talk) 22:39, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

What the WHO says + your take that something is wrong with US response = Synthesis and original research. it's not going in. --Cameron Scott (talk) 22:40, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If you can't solve a puzzle then don't edit! I'm a thinking man, not a copy paste machine like you. Multiplyperfect (talk) 22:43, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've asked that you are topic banned from those articles, you may wish to comment here before that happens. --Cameron Scott (talk) 22:50, 29 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Good riddance. We're better off banning him; his only purpose on Wikipedia is to demonize Obama, using the most spurious of 'logic' and the mast fanciful of 'what ifs'. ThuranX (talk) 00:00, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
As discussed before, it is too early in the evolution of this event to know what will happen, whether Obama's role in it is significant enough to mention here, and exactly what that role is. If you're worried about an epidemic, there is a lot to worry about and a lot of places one can go to worry. There is no hurry here - editing the Obama article is not the biggest priority. Wikipedia, as they say, has no deadline. Wikidemon (talk) 01:56, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
What are you talking about? Obama is the president, responsible for solving the crisis. Multiplyperfect (talk) 05:31, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It's not going into the article at this time because the sources have not established it as a signifigant biographical or career event in the life of the president. We will keep an eye on it as news stories emerge. I'm not interested in a debate on the subject - at this point we've all explained it. Your disagreement is noted.Wikidemon (talk) 05:44, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

U.S. GDP sees worst drop in five decades

Discussion has moved to Presidency of Barack Obama. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 19:28, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

I think it would be good for Obama's article: U.S. GDP sees worst drop in five decades The source can't be better. Multiplyperfect (talk) 15:09, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Actually the source is worthless, we don't use wikis as sources in articles. --Cameron Scott (talk) 15:12, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In this case see the sources on wikinews. I'm a little surprised, never thought that wiki is blacklisting wiki. This is weird. Multiplyperfect (talk) 15:14, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wikis are not considered reliable sources because anyone can edit them and they lack strong editoral oversight - this is why wikipedia itself is not considered a reliable source. I see you learnt nothing from your recent block and it's like the next one is going to be for good. Either you are trolling (and thus shouldn't be here) or are incapable of grasping our policies and/or the purpose of this article (and thus shouldn't be here). --Cameron Scott (talk) 15:17, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This material isn't relevant to this article. Multiplyperfect has been warned. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 15:18, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It is time to stop feeding the troll. Future posts that are not inline with WP:TPG will be removed. BigDuncTalk 21:01, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Resolved - Troll indef blocked. Mfield (Oi!) 21:04, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hospital of birth cited is hearsay, not fact

This is the same troll, back again. Same minor syntax errors, same paranoia flavor, same insistence that smear campaign material be integrated. ThuranX (talk) 17:50, 3 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Academics

Obama is loosely referred to as a 'professor', when he was teaching; however, as the article points out, he was a 'Lecturer' and a 'Senior Lecturer'. He should be referred to as a 'lecturer'. KenmanLF (talk) 13:18, 3 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

We have discussed this before, and it seems like the solution was to keep professor.But as seen in the article, it only mentions Obama as professor at one point and the sentence goes into saying that he was a lecturer and senior lecturer, the reference especially the second one , is titled "Was Barack Obama really a constitutional law professor?" and explains why he is considered as a professor,Now professor also apears in the info box ( i think that is what it is called ) also says he was a professor, even though he never had that title, what is in the info box I could agree might need change, but I will look through archives before that.Durga Dido (talk) 13:38, 3 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
This article in the New York Times offers an additional reliable source that clearly describes Obama as a professor, in case anyone thinks we need it. -- Scjessey (talk) 02:16, 4 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I saw that too. I don't think an en passant mention of his (effective) title is particularly strong evidence. The reporter probably didn't ask his precise title. But we have the letter from the law school, which looks like plenty to me. PhGustaf (talk) 02:48, 4 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. What matters is what the university says. And what it says is clear.

But let's put that aside for a moment and see what the WP article says. It's that:

For twelve years, Obama served as a professor at the University of Chicago Law School teaching constitutional law. He was first classified as a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996 and then as a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004.

Any moderately alert reader is likely to think "Huh?" The period is divided into two; for each of these Obama was something other than "Professor", yet the two add up to the period he is said to have been a "professor". [Here and elsewhere in this message, I am using the Shift key carefully.]

What the "professor" bit means here is that -- to me, most uninterestingly -- Lecturers and Senior Lecturers are loosely termed professors at U Chi. This tells us nothing about what he actually did. Use of the word "classified" is wordy too. So, my suggestion:

For twelve years, Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, as a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996 and then as a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004.

This neither can be misread as saying he was a Professor (he wasn't) nor implies that he wasn't a professor (he was). Nit-pickers, axe-grinders and miscellaneous fanatics would be served up with the existing, informative and excellent footnote. -- Hoary (talk) 05:27, 4 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

As you say, "professor" was his function and "Lecturer" his job title. When my function was "software engineer" my title was "Member of the Technical Staff". Which of those terms is the more descriptive? Everybody knows what a professor does, which is what Obama did. "Lecturer" is far less clear. PhGustaf (talk) 13:26, 4 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
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