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François Asselineau

François Asselineau (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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Nominating per this ANI thread. Apparently, the article was deleted at frwiki for lack of notability (though their notability standards are different from ours). Although the subject is mentioned in several reliable French newspapers, several French(?) editors have mentioned that the newspaper articles barely refer to the subject at all and that the article is mostly promotional. Referring to AFD for the community to examine. NW (Talk) 15:18, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]


  • Correctly deleted from the French Wikipedia by their criteria for a politician (no electoral mandate), but we have no such rule. This arguably does belong on en.wiki because of the coverage in reliable French newspapers (which is demonstrable from the links already in the article). This character is a minor, but colourful and controversial, political figure on the right wing in France. (By French standards he's fairly extreme right wing, although I suspect his views would be mainstream at a British UKIP conference or a US Tea Party). Some of the sources barely refer to the subject at all and may be removed. The article is mostly promotional. But I think this is fixable by normal editing. I'll go with weak keep, and I personally pledge to help with the fixing if it's kept.—S Marshall T/C 15:31, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - Per the general notability guideline. This is a seminotable politician who has had decent coverage in the French newspapers, thus also meeting WP:POLITICIAN #3. However, I would support removing the unreferenced content about his personal life. Reaper Eternal (talk) 15:44, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep Dear NW, thank you for your notification. I found 2 points in the claim:
    • The article is mostly promotional
      I referred to this Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not#Wikipedia_is_not_a_soapbox_or_means_of_promotion where 5 points of promotion are developed: 1. Advocacy, propaganda, or recruitment Since it is a biography, it will be difficult to make propaganda on it. 2. Opinion pieces All information come from the sources. They are just facts of his career. 3. Scandal mongering The biography does not mention any scandal. 4. Self-promotion I am not François Asselineau. 5. Advertising All sources are independent and from third-parties such as Les_Échos_(France), Libération, Le Monde, Le Parisien and Le Figaro.
    • the newspaper articles barely refer to the subject at all
      Without even reading French, you can see that the name "François Asselineau" is in the title of these articles: source 1, source 2, Source 3, Source 4...
    • S Marshall mentioned also that françois Asselineau had no electoral mandate which is untrue since he had been elected member of the council of Paris source. I wish these explanations will help you. Cordially, --Lawren00 (talk) 16:03, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • keep More than a million cumulate viewers on DailyMotion (French) and YouTube (Worldwide) .. Saying he has no notoriety is like saying that Agusta A.101 has a great notoriety and anyone in France knows about it .. This is a silly discussion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.231.15.101 (talk) 19:37, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Delete. This would be politician has no notoriety whatsoever in France. The article is skillfully misleading in the way it uses references. Their number suggests that F. Asselineau has some kind of notoriety. This is not all the case. In every reference his name is just mentioned in passing, as he is a civil servant who has worked for famous politicians on whom the articles are about. But he has no personal notoriety. Recently he has tried to launch a personal political career, but it's been a failure. It's not been mentioned in the news media. His "political party" is just him and a few friends. No one has ever heard of it in France. Wikipedia is just a way this person has found to revive his failed political career. Gede (talk) 16:30, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Delete. Idem Gede. Asselineau has absolutely no notoriety in France and its admissibility on WP:fr has been clearly denied. Regarding the cited sources, it doesn't directly refers to the person but are solely sometimes a vague mention to him. We faced on WP:fr a strong PoV pushing (now pages are protected to creation) to promote this person and its so-called political party which has absolutely no notoriety but wants to acquire one.--LPLT (talk) 18:33, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Shame! this gentleman is like Nigel Farage (NB : F. Asselineau is better) Be careful what you do, EVERYBODY IS WATCHING YOU. you discredit wikipedia !
  • Keep Although François Asselineau's notoriety is quite low compared to some other politicians, it is far bigger than some persons' biographies you can find on wikipedia. His conferences also generated from 750 000 to 1 million views on dailymotion and youtube which makes him pretty popular on the french internet scene.
    Another point is that he has in fact been elected counselor of Paris. Also, what makes you think it is necesseraly him or his friends that created this notice?
    Btw saying he is deinfitly extreme right is a total nonsense to everybody who knows the french political scene a little and has common sense. There is no xenophobia, racism, anti-semitism in his speeches so why saying he is extreme right wing?
    Basically all the points raised to delete are wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by La botte secrète (talkcontribs) 20:33, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I do not want to interfere in the decision process of this project, but seeing broad declarations about "articles not being relevant", I thought you might be interested in getting some detail about the content of the references of the article (as you may not be fluent in french) so that you can decide by yourselves.
A remarkable fact is that most of the references are not "press articles". They are mere mentions of appointments. Les Echos are an economical journal who regularly posts entries related to the appointment of civil servants or executives.
These entries are put in what they call "Le carnet". You can find the Carnet here. You will find therein brief announcements relating to deaths or appointments of civil servants or in corporates. Arguably, not all people mentionned therein are notable for WP.
Anyway, herebelow in the collapsed box, the detail of all the references.
So all in all, a civil servant with an average career, who at some point appears to have tried to start a political carreer. With the support of some one of his political sponsors (Pasqua), was elected at a local election in 2001. Since then, lost his support, jumped from party to party (from the biggest going down to the smallest, see RIF), did not even represent himself at the next elections and founded his own party. This party, founded in 2007, is completely unknown. I could not found one single article talking about it, except for the short reference hereabove, in 2008. Oddly enough, there is an article about a "Union populaire républicaine" party in Wikipedia in french and here, but...it is about a party who disappeared in 1946.
Hope this helps. 217.136.98.58 (talk) 21:42, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep See here and here. I don't see why a former inspector general of finance wouldn't be notable. There's plenty of sources about him out there. SilverserenC 04:42, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    My reading indicates that at best, that is analagous to an undersecretary in the federal government of the United States. I imagine that isn't terribly notable... NW (Talk) 05:18, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    Ah, it sounded more important than that. :P Well, regardless, there are more than enough sources about him out there. It makes me wonder if there is some political reason for its deletion over on French Wikipedia, but I wouldn't know. Maybe they are just that much more strict about Notability over there. SilverserenC 05:43, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    The french WP is indeed definitely particularly strict especially for french people perceived as creating their own entry in WP, and probably even more for unknown politicians trying to boost their carreer (which is, I understand, the reason for the deletion over there, but I did not really looked into it and did not participate in that deletion). Being strict has probably a lot to do with the fact that an entry on WP:fr for a french person may have an impact on his actual notability IRL (in any case, it is the reason why they create it). WP:en may have different criteria and may be less concerned by the impact a page may have, if any, in France, this is the reason why I just gave hereabove some factual information about the sources of the article, without giving my opinion on what WP:en should do with the article (but be patient with guys from WP:fr giving their opnion here, they fear -and it has already started- that an article staying here will serve to create pages on other wikis and will end up promoting the re-creation of the WP:fr article). Anyway, I just stopped by to give another information: an inspector general of finance is probably not even the equivalent of an undersecretary. An inspector general of finance is merely, as I understand it, one of the 260 members, all civil servants, of the General Inspection of Finances, an auditing body of the French administration. Hope this helps. 217.136.98.58 (talk) 06:58, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    Well it's not as if he was only a general inspector of finance. He's been "chef de cabinet" chief of staff of numerous ministers (Panafieu, Longuet for instance). Arguing is unotability over that simple argument isn't serious. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.198.158.245 (talk) 08:16, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    I am not sure if being a head of staff of a minister gives somebody sufficient notability. As a reminder, because I do not know what the equivalent can be elsewhere, a cabinet staff member in France has no position at all. He is personnally chosen by the relevant minister usually amongst civil servants, but he has no personal responsibility at all. He will leave when his minister leaves, or even earlier than that as he can be kicked out at any moment, whereupon he just returns to the public body where he was serving before. There are staff members who become notable because of the carreer they do after their cabinet's staff position, but the vast majority just return in their former position as civil servants, maybe with a little promotion if they get lucky. 217.136.77.95 (talk) 18:01, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Keep This deletion is intended for political reasons by french extremist politics. 57000 results on google.fr and about 70000 on google.com for "François Asselineau". French page of François Asselineau has already been censored for a long time with no serious reasons by wikipedias watchdogs (see LPLT). Yes you're facing strong PoV, what proves Gede is actually just telling lies about the so called political failure of M. Asselineau. The UPR is a growing movement in France (due to Internet acces to information) but all the major medias are trying to keep it under water. If WP is now doing the same exact job as mainstream broadcasted medias, what's it's purpose ? I thought we were on free information platform, not on manipulated garbage. Thanks not to spend so much energy on trying to delete M. Asselineau's pages and please give us free access on restoring WP:fr "François Asselineau" page. Best regards, 62.147.205.164 (talk) 09:28, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep [I don't know what the problem with this article about F.Asselineau, It's perfectly acceptable and u have absolutely nothing to oppose. Plus rien ne ralentira sa progression à l'exception du temps. Désolé for my poor English. By the way, I'm French so where is the Asselineau's French Page ?!] 83.198.38.58 (talk) 12:50, 9 March 2011 (UTC) Metra Inc. comment added by Metra Inc. (talk) 12:09, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Keep INFO : User/Deletionists Gede & LPLT are French. Attention ! here it's wikipedia not la fête des BBR...

//// Usr "UDUFRUDUHU" This user is also French... CQFD ////

  • COMMENT [So it's nothing but a political ploy ! Probably FN] 83.198.38.58 (talk) 14:49, 9 March 2011 (UTC) Metra Inc.duplicate vote struck out by me... Carrite (talk) 04:26, 10 March 2011 (UTC) ...Now it's a comment 83.198.47.26 (talk) 17:39, 10 March 2011 (UTC)Jean Josianne[reply]
  • Strong Keep This deletion is intended for political reasons by french extremist politics. 57000 results on google.fr and about 70000 on google.com for "François Asselineau" show his polpularity. French page of François Asselineau has already been censored for a long time with no serious reasons by wikipedias watchdogs (see LPLT). Yes you're facing strong PoV, what proves Gede is actually just telling lies about the so called political failure of M. Asselineau. The UPR is a growing movement in France (due to Internet acces to information) but all the major medias are trying to keep it under water. If WP is now doing the same exact job as mainstream broadcasted medias, what's it's purpose ? I thought we were on free information platform, not on manipulated garbage. Thanks not to spend so much energy on trying to delete M. Asselineau's pages and please give us free access on restoring WP:fr "François Asselineau" page. Best regards, Sperate (talk) 16:24, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete since, up to now, it has not been demonstrated that :
    • François Asselineau occupied any function in the French political system that would give him a sufficient notability. Inspector general of finance is nothing but a common function the French administration. There is not any notability that goes with this function.
    • None of the sources are focused on François Asselineau himself but mention him as linked to the main subject of the article. See the detailed analysis of the references in the hidden box above. Udufruduhu (talk) 16:31, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    I mention to the attention of the sysop that will conclude this talk page that both Sperate and La botte secrète are accounts created just to give positive opinion in this page, see [19], [20]. I wouldn't be surprised that some other contributors appear here in the same way. Udufruduhu (talk) 16:41, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Amusingly, the deletion of the page on French Wikipedia led to the creation of this. As for other sources, see this, this and this. SilverserenC 17:05, 9 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    Silverseren: you mention 3 sources. Amusingly, as you say, the 1st one is about Mr Asselineau complaining about the fact that this WP entry was deleted. I do not know this website, "Enquête & Débat", and knowing who they are is interesting, as they seem to be the only information media actually interested in Mr Asselineau. Enquête & Débat seems to be structured as a collective newsblog (see this), and the articles about Mr Asselineau are signed by "Jean", which leaves me uncertain whether we can use them as a source. But I reckon it is the 1st time we have something that looks like a real source actually saying something about the guy :-)
    Your other sources are a small article that is already in the sources of the article, and 2 economic intelligence related websites who mention the fact that Mr Asselineau was, in 2004, appointed as head of a directorate in charge of economic intelligence. It is not surprising that specialised website echoed the creation of the directorate and mentionned who was going to head it. As a reminder, the directorate was so important that it was dissolved 2 years later. Hope this helps. 217.136.77.95 (talk) 18:01, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - I favor the lowest of all possible barriers to notability for political parties and their youth sections, regardless of ideology. As there is no page for the political party established by this subject (Popular Republican Union), I am amenable to assuming per se notability on that basis alone. With 47,000 google hits on the name, it is clear that we are dealing with a significant public figure here. I don't speak French, but I will lay 5 American dollars that there are third party sources out there about this individual. The fact that a page on the subject got whacked on the French Wikipedia doesn't relate to the English article before us here. Carrite (talk) 04:35, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm french, and I consider the second "this" on the comment above your reply to be a reliable source; this is why I disagree with the french admins on this one. Regards, Comte0 (talk) 11:39, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

>>>>>>>> ATTENTION ! SOME VOTE WERE ERASED ! <<<<<<<<<<

    • BACKUP :
  • SPEEDY KEEP INVALID REASON / MALICIOUS ATTEMPT
  • Keep Il s'agirait de redescendre sur terre, M. François Asselineau est président de l'union populaire républicaine, l'U.P.R. compte plusieurs centaines d'adhérents à jour de cotisations ainsi que plus d'un millier de sympathisants, notamment sur Facebook. Outre son brillant parcours, M. François Asselineau est reconnu en France et à l'étranger pour la justesse de ses analyses. Si l'on fait une synthèse de l'ensemble des informations déjà longuement détaillées ici, force est d'admettre que M. François Asselineau est bien plus présidentiable que ne pourrait l'être Madame Cindy Lee (Présidente du sulfureux parti du plaisir et strip-teaseuse à ses heures perdues).
    Si Madame Cindy Lee dispose de sa page Wiki, je ne vois pas quelle raison sérieuse pourrait s'opposer à la publication de la page de M. François Asselineau. (à l'exception, bien entendu, d'un acte de malveillance). C'est une question de bon sens. En conséquence je demande à la fondation Wikipedia de bien vouloir réactiver toutes les pages ayant trait à M. François Asselineau. CDT 83.198.41.24 (talk) 04:49, 10 March 2011 (UTC)Cirrus&Pigs[reply]
      • Translated Version : Mr François Asselineau is president of the Union Populaire Républicaine, UPR has several hundred members ... updated contributions as well as more than a thousand supporters, including Facebook. Besides his brilliant career, Mr. François Asselineau is recognized in France and abroad for the accuracy of his analysis. If we make a synthesis of all the information already detailed at length here, we must admit that Mr. Asselineau Francis is much more presidential than could be Ms. Cindy Lee (President of Parti du plaisir and "bimbo girl" in his spare time).* SEE THIS: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parti_du_plaisir.If Ms. Cindy Lee has his Wiki page, I don't see any serious reason could oppose to the publication of Asselineau's wiki page.(except, of course, a malicious act). It is a matter of common sense. Therefore I ask the Wikipedia Foundation kindly reactivate all pages relating to F. Asselineau. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.198.47.26 (talk) 18:21, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

NO NO NO... Hey, Dude, I see nothing ! it's certainly a PoV. You know, a persistence of vision.

- Yeah bro, he confused "PoV" and "PoV Pushing". This guy is hallucinating ! God save the Asselineau's Page 83.198.47.26 (talk) 15:12, 11 March 2011 (UTC) MIRAGE[reply]

  • (weak) delete + comment Though most of the comments above are probably coming from the same person, others coming from :fr Wikipedia sysops undestandably fed up by a similar circus on this other wiki, a few ones are structured and come from good faith long-time editors from this wiki. (Some cleaning on this page might be useful, but I don't know pretty well what can commonly be done here). I think I should take time to answer a few of these comments :
    • for User:S Marshall, Mr Asselineau is "a minor, but colourful and controversial, political figure on the right wing in France." I am sorry to disagree, at least on the word controversial : as the sources show, nobody outside Mr Asselineau himself do care about him - he is not famous enough to receive unpleasant comments from political adversaries, he is simply unknown ;
    • many thanks to 217.136.98.58 for his careful and balanced analysis of the sources given in the article. Very few are newspaper full articles (more often they are only short news agencies reports), and they don't contain more than one sentence about Mr Asselineau ;
    • I am sorry to disagree with the conclusion of Carrite. I understand very well his position ("I favor the lowest of all possible barriers to notability for political parties"), but Mr Asselineau's party is for my taste under this lowest of all possible barriers : we have until now only found one source, a short news agency report of the Agence France-Presse ([21]) with a slight hint of this party (Mr Asselineau is cited as "président de l'Union populaire républicaine") in this report, which relies on a communiqué by Mr Asselineau, and which probably simply reproduced the mentions given in this communiqué. Note that the "Union populaire républicaine" must not be confused with the "Union républicaine populaire", another very small right-wing party, under leadership of Christian Jeanjean, mayor of Palavas-les-Flots. I personally think this URP is probably notable enough for inclusion, at least if one is inclusionist, but Mr Asselineau's party has no notoriety at all.

After these answers, a few personal comments :

    • An "inspecteur général des Finances" is not similar to an undersecretary in the US meaning, see General Inspection of Finances (France) to have a (sadly unsourced) flavour of what it is. The "inspecteurs généraux des Finances" are civil servants who, in their twenties, graduated with a high rank from the prestigious École Nationale d'Administration. While in France brilliant studies are a key to success, they are not completely sufficient : while _some_ of these "inspecteurs généraux" go for world-class recognition (Jean-Claude Trichet) and others for very high situations in French administration, others stay in obscure auditing missions and there would be nothing to say about them in a Wikipedia article ;
    • The most interesting point in Mr Asselineau's carreer (and the explanation of the "weak" before my deletion opinion) is its short spell as a member on the Conseil de Paris, which is the deliberative assembly (163 members) for this town. It would not be unreasonable to think _every_ member ever of this assembly can have an article on Wikipedia (and it would of course include Mr Asselineau) ; this is not my position though, since only a few dozens of these members are reasonably active and well-known, those who are in the executive team of the Mayor and a handful of leaders or the opposition. It might seem reasonable to include every maverick member of this council, and I am myself hesitant to sustain this position : as the council of Paris is reasonably followed by the media, an atypical member leaving the group in which he was elected might be considered as interesting - it might be noteworthy that a colleague of Mr Asselineau among the five "non inscrits" of the 2001-2008 term, Alexandre Galdin got his five minutes of celebrity this week. However, I don't think this should be automatic ; I do approve of the inclusion of some of the mavericks, even perhaps most of them, but only those who manage to get a reasonably significant coverage by the media. Which is not the case of Mr Asselineau. French Tourist (talk) 12:15, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • I'm sorry to contradict you, but I'm afraid this AfD is itself evidence that M. Asselineau is controversial. The matter is exactly as I said, save that he does seem to have an "electoral mandate" for a minor post in one small part of France—which is not relevant to en.wiki's notability criteria because nobody believes he passes WP:POLITICIAN. The position is that he meets our general notability guideline because he has received coverage in multiple reliable sources. Certainly, if the sources were in English, this debate would have been snow closed by now.—S Marshall T/C 13:42, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        • I think this AfD only proves that M. Asselineau is controversial in the very limited circle of :fr-wikipedia sysops, that he has a (local) importance on the fr-wikipedia sysop's bulletin - not that he has got "coverage in multiple reliable sources". As concerns the mandate, as far as I understand he has none now, but had a non neglible one before 2008 (member of the Council of Paris). French Tourist (talk) 14:33, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep this page please because this statesman is the future of France, it's abuse to see him at the extreme right wing and this is not a serious argument. How many extremist man have a page on wikipedia ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.163.184.79 (talk) 15:27, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I am the one who originated the article of François Asselineau. I would like to answer to the main points of French Wiki admins, such as Udufruduhu, who came here to expose their point of view. It was said that references are just mentioning briefly François Asselineau. But it is untrue and I wrote it in my first message. There are at least 4 references that use François Asselineau in the title of their articles. Therefore it would be awkward that those references are just "mentioning briefly about him". source 1, source 2, source 3, source 4... Moreover, the article is using 19 references from most recognized French Newspaper such as Les_Échos_(France), Libération, Le Monde, Le Parisien and Le Figaro. I could have use more since I found almost 30 references from those newspapers but it was just meaningless. Finally, even if the references were giving only few information about François Asselineau which was proven untrue above, it allowed to build a decent article in term of information and length. In conclusion, I would like to say sorry to English wikipedians that are "victims" of an undesired French war on this page. On the one hand, you see all these "spam" comments, expressing the passion of people who appreciate François Asselineau and can not understand that almost any politician can have his page on Wikipedia but not François Asselineau. On the other hand, there are those that spend days fighting against vandals that have nothing to do but to destroy Wikipedia. I can understand them becoming extra-sensitive with those people by over-moderating any of their movement in the way that it even brings them to the English Wikipedia for justice. I understand all of this but I do not justify any of them. Maybe we should just keep it simple. Wikipedia has rules and recommendations. And this article seems perfectly valid in this frame. The consensus of third party that are represented by English wikipedians seems to confirm it. --Lawren00 (talk) 15:41, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This article may well be kept, and maybe it is OK for it to be kept under the criteria that are used here, but we both know that in fact it will be kept for the wrong reasons: because some very clever and active people created a fog with sources that are accepted at face value as relevant while they are not.
Let's have a look at what you pretend.
As already explained, the Les Echos sources (what you call the articles that have Asselineau as a title ^_^) are mere carnet entries. You can find the Carnet of Les Echos here. You will find therein brief announcements relating to deaths or appointments of civil servants or in corporates. Arguably, not all people mentionned therein are notable for WP.
You say there are other articles in other newspapers and you mention
  • Libération: there are 2 entries in that one. The first one is not an article, just the raw post election results of a ballot where Asselineau got elected as member of the council of Paris. The second one refers to the creation of a directorate in a Ministry and mentions Mr Asselineau as being head of the directorate (it is interesting to know 2 facts about this directorate that was supposed to be active on economic intellligence: the directorate was supposed to be a 15 people team and apart from this small article, no one ever heard anything about this directorate. Which is not surprising, as it was dissolved in May 2006).
  • Le Monde: one entry. Not an article, again a mere Carnet type entry about the fact that Asselineau will be chief of staff of a the president (Pasqua) of a general council.
  • Le Parisien: as Mr Asselineau was member of the council of Paris, his sole elected position ever, the surprise is that Le Parisien mentions him only 2 times, both related to the renewal of the council. The first one is about the upcoming elections and refers to a group of non registered members who grouped themselves under a "Free Paris" banner to be candidates vs majority candidates. Mr A is listed as a member of the Free Paris group and it is noted that he will run against his former boss. The second one mention the fact that Asselineau gives up being a candidate.
  • Le Figaro: one short article referring to Asselineau giving up for the Paris' council election.
So to cut a long story short:
  • a couple of Carnet entries about the various positions this civil servant took in various cabinets (as a reminder, a cabinet staff member has no position at all. He is personnally chosen by the relevant minister usually amongst civil servants, has no responsibility at all, leaves when his minister leaves, and he can be kicked out at any moment, whereupon he just returns to his civil servant position, sometimes with a promotion)
  • one short article and one carnet entry mentionning Mr Asselineau becoming head of a 15 people directorate that was dissolved 2 years later
  • a couple of short article about his political carreer in Paris: one, a list published in 2001, to mention his election. The 2 others in 2007, when the council was to be renewed and Mr Asselineau first tries to run against his former friends then gives up. Between 2001, his election in the council, and 2007, nobody hears anything about him.
Again, I do not want to interfere in the decision process here, and I will not give my own opinion (even if it may transpire from my comments ;-)), I just hope my comments may be of any use to the WP:en users. 217.136.77.95 (talk) 18:01, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your comment. But the point is that there are enough pieces of information in well known French Newspapers to build a decent article. It proves the Wikipedia:Notability and Wikipedia:Verifiability of the article. --Lawren00 (talk) 23:28, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the feedback.
Again, I perfectly understand that WP:en may have its own criteria, but what you say here is a bit strange. I am pretty sure that the simple fact that somebody was mentionned in a couple of newspaper articles cannot be a criteria to establish somebody's notability. David Becker, former General Counsel of the SEC has 116,000 Google hist, but no article here. Same thing for Sulaimon Brown, 48,000 hits or Irving Nathan, 9,430 hist. And I just picked a couple of names I could find in a few minutes in the Washington Post. Maybe some of these guys would pass the notability test, but the plain and simple truth is that a lot of people are mentionned in newspapers but do not pass the notability test.
I found some other examples in the announcements published in The Hill (these announcements are similar to the Carnet of Les Echos that has been used extensively as a "source" for the article). Mr Paul Arcangali is staff director of the House Armed Services Committee. 3 entries in The Hill, 3,000 Google hits, no article. Dr. Stephen Flynn, 7 hits in The Hill, over 200,000 Google hits (but probably not all about the same person), no article. Interestingly, Dr. Flynn is president of the Center for National Policy, a position that is a bit reminiscent of the position Mr Asselineau held in the economic intellligence directorate for 2 years (between 2004 and 2006 when the directorate was dissolve). Dr. Flynn had 7 entries over a 5 years period in the announcements of The Hill, while it took Mr Asselineau 12 years to have 8 entries in Les Echos (6 of which form the backbone of the sources for the article).
Any person holding various staff member position over a 10 year period and then gets elected at a local election will certainly gather some news coverage, but WP:POLITICIAN tells us that "Just being an elected local official (...) does not guarantee notability, although such people can still be notable if they meet the primary notability criterion of significant coverage in reliable sources".
Is there a significant coverage here? A couple of Carnet entries in Les Echos (I hope it is clear that these entries are not "articles" but mere announcements of appointments, similar to what you can read in The Hill), and a total of 3 articles covering the 6 years period when he was a member of the Paris council, and in 2 of these, Mr Asselineau is mentionned incidentally.
Regarding the other "important position" of Mr Asselineau, when he headed a directorate in the Ministry of Finance for 2 years, we have 1.5 article (one article about the creation of the directorate, and one announcement of the appointment of Mr Asselineau). And that directorate was so famous, that it never received any other coverage for the next 2 years, not even to announce the fact that it was dissolved 2 years later.
But if that is a significant coverage, then OK  :-) 217.136.76.230 (talk) 11:45, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The coverage in the most famous French Newspapers allows to build a decent article. So his notability is verified by these multiple reliable sources. Also, it seems that you are really fast at searching things in Google and you like to write long text. Thus, I would like to suggest you to write those articles, David Becker, Sulaimon Brown and Irving Nathan, if you really believe they are notable enough. I don't think Wikipedia is yet a complete encyclopaedia and it needs talent like you to enrich it. --Lawren00 (talk) 14:55, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It seems you have decided, instead of argumenting, to repeat your previous argument. You know, and I know, that the "coverage by the most famous French Newspapers" is a joke. You just decide to ignore it, that's OK for me. I think I have made clear all the points I wanted to make clear. 217.136.76.230 (talk) 16:29, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Keep. Mr Asselineau has been deleted in the French version of wikipedia for political reasons.He is mentioned on Médiapart at the following link : http://blogs.mediapart.fr/blog/daniele-lefebvre/190410/francois-asselineau-upr-qui-peut-me-dire ; by the way, if you type his name on google you'lle find out more than 50 000 entries for such a political name. That's the proof he is known. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.200.162.132 (talk) 20:17, 10 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • KEEP François Asselineau is the new president and founder of the Popular Union Republican who is a French political party created in 2007, Union Populaire Républicaine (UPR) in french. The UPR is the only political party that clearly said that France must emerge out of the European Union under Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty and unilaterally. UPR is more than a political party, it is a national liberation movement 77.192.31.33 (talk) 22:11, 10 March 2011 (UTC)article50[reply]
  • KEEP Francois Asselineau is the only hope of Free France, many abstainers might vote for him in the next presidential election in 2012188.62.251.203 (talk) 13:52, 11 March 2011 (UTC) Uprising[reply]
  • KEEP All the porn stars have a Wikipedia article and a bunch of FRENCH web activists want to deny to Mr Asselineau the right to have one... Is this a (bad) joke ? 193.251.54.118 (talk) 16:17, 11 March 2011 (UTC) Marc Lebeau[reply]
  • This whole "Article for deletion" debate is becoming a huge mess, as could be expected, when one knows the hysterical spaming that this person has been doing on :fr Wikipedia. So we've got lots of IP and recently created user accounts saying pure non senses, hoping I guess that English speaking users won't be able to check them. FA is supposed to be a famous but controversial politicians that's been banned on French Wikipedia for political reasons, etc. That is pure nonsense. This person is a complete unknown in France. The sources quoted don't deal directly with him, and when they do so, they are not real news articles but only notifications of his appointment to not very important civil servant jobs. One when one does a proper search on Google, using the exact wording function, one finds only 392 "real" hits : [22]. What more can be said ? Gede (talk) 16:20, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • This guy and his friends are big liars and fucking tall tale tellers. Asselineau is a leader in France ! http://votez2012.fr.gd/
  • STRONG KEEP François Asselineau offers democratic views for a country that desperately needs true honnest politicians dedicating themselves to the service of the country's destiny and not their own. François Asselineau probably sacrificed the future of his public servant's career in the name of integrity. Trying to implement some censorship upon him, so he cannot have a political one, is unfair and strongly unneeded. He is in no way affiliated to extreme right wing movements and offers a criticism of the institutions in the very interest of the citizens he's trying to reach. Having faith in your country and being deeply attached to it is not a sign of hatred towards anyone. Loving their countries doesn't make American people fascists, so don't corner M. Asselineau in such a way. 77.203.103.120 (talk) 17:57, 11 March 2011 (UTC) T.P.[reply]