Talk:Tulsi Gabbard 2020 presidential campaign

"silence debate and dissent"

@Nblund, next one — re this edit. The full quote this comes from is:

“Our freedoms and democracy are being threatened by media giants ruled by corporate interests who are in the pocket of the establishment war machine,” she said. “When journalism is deployed as a weapon against those who call for peace, it threatens our democracy as it seeks to silence debate and dissent, creates an atmosphere of fear and paranoia, and stokes the rhetoric that could lead to nuclear war.”[1]

I'm ok w most of your edits, but think her point re "to silence debate and dissent" should be included along with the "stokes the rhetoric that could lead to nuclear war". Humanengr (talk) 04:37, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

@Nblund: Are you ok w that? Humanengr (talk) 14:43, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed the earlier ping. I'm not strongly opposed here, but I think the "silencing debate and dissent" stuff has more to do with her views on the media rather than her views on foreign policy issues. I won't object if you really think that's essential, but I liked your previous suggestion (related to other content) of including a full quote in a footnote while paraphrasing in the text. Nblund ^talk 15:45, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

To explain — this is another aspect of the foreign-domestic coupling; it is silencing debate and dissent -about- foreign intervention per the boldface:

“Our freedoms and democracy are being threatened by media giants ruled by corporate interests who are in the pocket of the establishment war machine,” she said. “When journalism is deployed as a weapon against those who call for peace, it threatens our democracy as it seeks to silence debate and dissent, creates an atmosphere of fear and paranoia, and stokes the rhetoric that could lead to nuclear war.”[2]

Edited and also put quote in fn. Humanengr (talk) 20:45, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

to add (after condensation) from her PR

published by Politico:

“… only four of the DNC’s list of sixteen qualifying polling organizations - Monmouth, Fox, Quinnipiac and CNN/SRSS - have released any new polls following the second July 30-31 Democratic presidential debate in Detroit.

 In the two weeks after the first Democratic primary debate in Miami, the period between June 28 and July 13, six DNC-certified polls were released.
 After the second debate in Detroit, when Rep. Gabbard had one of the strongest performances on the stage, only two certified polls were released in the two weeks following her break-out appearance in the second debate.

	# polls released in first week	# polls released in second week	# polls released in third week	Total to date
Debate One	4	2	5	14
Debate Two	1	1	2	4

 No major news source released a national poll in the two week period following the second debate, compared to five polls released by seven major news organizations after the first debate. For example, CNN released DNC-certified polls on a regular monthly basis since March until after the Detroit debate (which CNN co-hosted) when they inexplicably stopped releasing polls. 
 Following the first debate in Miami, eleven of the DNC’s qualified polling organizations released numbers, and four of these organizations released multiple polls. This contrasts starkly with the almost dormant activity of these same polling organizations following the second debate.  
 The delayed release of polls so long after the debates is particularly harmful to candidates with lower name-recognition. Delayed poll releases are an advantage for high-name recognition candidates such as Vice President Joe Biden and Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris.”

Humanengr (talk) 23:12, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

I definitely don't think we can include stuff directly based on her press releases. Nblund ^talk 01:52, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

It's not presented for the truth of the matter. So, yes, it can be included as Politico is a professional organization that published it as a claim made by the Gabbard campaign. Humanengr (talk) 02:23, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

But Politico just repeated the press release. It's not a matter of the number of links in the chain. A press release from the Gabbard campaign is still just a press release from the Gabbard campaign no matter who decided to reprint it. It's a question of WP:DUE weight. Nblund ^talk 02:29, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

It’s not links in a chain for the truth of the matter — which I would agree with you on — but only for validation that the campaign made the statement. Humanengr (talk) 03:51, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

But its a question of WP:DUE weight. This poses the same problem that is posed by taking stuff from her website. If secondary sources aren't covering it, then it probably isn't worthy of inclusion. Nblund ^talk 12:00, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

What we have is a 2ary source which has, in fact, covered publication of and therefore validated the original source. That validation is not contested and is all it is being cited for. That suffices to include a statement that "the campaign said x". As for the claims themselves, they are verifiable — which I have now accomplished. Humanengr (talk) 20:28, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I would remove the paragraph beginning "Realclearpolitics columnist Michael Tracey argued...." It's not specific to Gabbard and belongs in the Debates article. TFD (talk) 20:05, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm open to that idea, but Tracey is mostly framing his complaints in terms of the perceived unfairness to Gabbard. Nblund ^talk 20:24, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Thx, @Nblund — I hadn't seen the updated coverage of the press release. All seems resolved. Humanengr (talk) 20:21, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

All of these changes seem to be mostly one sided. It's understandable that we would give a bit more coverage of Gabbard's response here than we might at a general page on the DNC debates, but we're heading toward a one-sided WP:QUOTEFARM. Nblund ^talk 22:11, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

What you call "quote" is in the first part of my edit the explanation of the DNC's polling ruleset as written by Vox. I could not find a better, more concise way to describe these rules as Vox did. Please feel free to rephrase (maybe reorder sentences?) it if you worry about copyright. The second part is a link to the list of Gabbard's 24 non-qualifying polls above 2%. If you can find another link to that list of polls, please replace it. I have not found another list except combing through Wikipedia's own poll list. Xenagoras (talk) 23:55, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I think I was a little vague there. I linked a series of diffs, and most of it wasn't stuff you added. That said, there was some copy pasting here. We need to restate stuff in our own words. It can be a fine line, but there were several passages where there are more that 10 words in a row that are identical to the source. Nblund ^talk 00:13, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Regarding this edit: the problem is that the placement of the quote gives the impression that Wikipedia is taking sides. The implication is that DNC should have changed their polling criteria in the run-up to the third debate. Tracey and Gabbard make that argument, but Wikipedia doesn't need to make it for them. Nblund ^talk 00:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm unclear how the placement of the quotes creates a problem. Do you imply that not having the statement in full quote is making it unclear that it is an exact DNC quote? I began the sentence with as much attribution as appropriate to indicate that the following statement is a DNC quote. Please make a proposal on how to change the quotes for that DNC statement. Would you prefer a full quote? I avoided a full quote because firstly it's easier to find the begin and end of shorter quotes, secondly I use quotes only for judgmental phrases (like newspapers do), and thirdly because you seem to be keen on the copyright issue (although I don't know if the DNC's ruleset may be copied freely from their website). The DNC's 2018 announcement is important to know because it invalidates the claim of several others (e.g. Vox) who say that changing the polling rules during the debate cycle would be inappropriate because of "interference". The DNC foresaw a possibly upcoming requirement to change the rules during the process and stated this publicly. We are not arguing on behalf on Gabbard or Tracey, but stating the facts / quoting the DNC. If a full quote makes it better, so be it. Xenagoras (talk) 01:17, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The DNC's 2018 announcement is important to know because it invalidates the claim of several others (e.g. Vox) who say that changing the polling rules during the debate cycle would be inappropriate because of "interference". This is the problem. The length of the quote doesn't really matter, the problem is that you're trying to arrange things in a way that advances your own interpretation of the situation. WP:NPOV doesn't allow this. Nblund ^talk 01:23, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Prefacing it with “The Gabbard campaign reminded the DNC that …” or some such should resolve this. Humanengr (talk) 02:18, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Did the Gabbard campaign do that? The source was the RCP op-ed. The goal is to document the dispute, not persuade readers of who is right. We can say "the Gabbard campaign complained" and provide some specifics, but we don't need to transcribe their views onto this page. Nblund ^talk 14:21, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The DNC “Given the fluid nature…” text from their framework was quoted in both the RCP commentary and the Gabbard campaign press release (para 7). RCP followed the quote with “Now would likely be an ‘appropriate’ time for such a reassessment.”; the press release followed with “The Gabbard campaign is calling on the DNC to hold true to their promise and make adjustments to the process now to ensure transparency and fairness.“ Humanengr (talk) 15:15, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Okay, but the other problem still remains. We're dedicating an excessive amount of space to the Gabbard campaign's characterization of the issue. Surely we can get the main idea across without beating readers over the head with every argument the campaign made. Nblund ^talk 15:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Will try to look at later today.Humanengr (talk) 15:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Nblund, the Gabbard campaign did quote the DNC in their press release (also quoted by Politico): "In a 2018 memo laying out their proposed framework for the debates, the DNC wrote, “Given the fluid nature of the presidential nominating process, the DNC will continuously assess the state of the race and make adjustments to this process as appropriate.” The Gabbard campaign is calling on the DNC to hold true to their promise and make adjustments to the process now to ensure transparency and fairness."

Adding facts to an article is never a WP:NPOV problem, because WP:NPOV applies only to views = opinions, but not to facts. The source is not an op-ed, but the DNC's statement on their debate qualification process. Do you really want to suggest that readers cannot recognize the quotation marks encapsulating the DNC's text in Tracey's op-ed? You once threw the WP:LINKSINACHAIN at me to justify your removal of sources from an article, and now I hand it back at you: WP:LINKSINACHAIN defines that the text you dispute is sourced by the DNC, stating a fact about the DNC's rules and intentions because it is exactly and completely quoting the relevant text from the DNC.

WP:WIKIVOICE requests to avoid stating facts as opinions. Uncontested ... factual assertions made by reliable sources should normally be directly stated in Wikipedia's voice. (It is uncontested that the article text you dispute is a written statement by the DNC about the qualification rules and intent of the DNC.) WP:BESTSOURCES states, good and unbiased research, based upon the best and most reputable authoritative sources available, helps prevent NPOV disagreements. WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD states that sometimes, a primary source is even the best possible source, such as when you are supporting a direct quotation. In such cases, the original document is the best source because the original document will be free of any errors or misquotations introduced by subsequent sources.

Since Rupar disagrees with Tracey and Gabbard on whether changing the DNC's qualification rules is good (promised by DNC) or bad (interference), the best source is the original text of the DNC about their own intent for changing their qualification rules. Therefore, a full quote of the relevant text in the DNC source is a correct edit to make, but it can also be said in WP:WIKIVOICE since it is undisputed fact.

Besides that, Rupar writes, "the true “interference” would have been changing the rules late in the process." The DNC refutes that by stating, "Given the fluid nature of the presidential nominating process, the DNC will continuously assess the state of the race and make adjustments to this process as appropriate, and always transparently." This DNC statement does not imply that the DNC wants to or should make exactly the adjustments that Gabbard or Tracey propose. This DNC statement only refutes Rupar's claim that "changing the rules late in the process would be interference." This is exactly what I wrote previously. I am not "trying to arrange things in a way that advances" my "own interpretation of the situation", but I am adding important facts. If you prefer, we can explicitly or implicitly state that this DNC statement does not imply or endorse the explicit wishes of Tracey or Gabbard. We could alternatively include the Gabbard campaign statement quoting and reminding the DNC to stay true to their written promise given in 2018.

Hiding the facts about the situation between Tracey/Gabbard and Rupar so that the WP:POV of Rupar seems to be balanced to the WP:POV of Tracey/Gabbard is not the purpose of Wikipedia. Facts always have priority over opinions. The DNC's "side" - the "side" of the facts - has not been mentioned yet. You are trying to delete facts from articles via spurious usage of Wikipedia policy like WP:NPOV and WP:LINKSINACHAIN (and others) which you apply only when it furthers your WP:POV but don't apply when it goes against your WP:POV. Your POV is visible where you write, "The problem is that the placement of the quote gives the impression that Wikipedia is taking sides. The implication is that DNC should have changed their polling criteria in the run-up to the third debate. Tracey and Gabbard make that argument, but Wikipedia doesn't need to make it for them." You recognize that the DNC statement refutes Rupar's view but you insist on hiding this but pushing the POV that Wikipedia must not present facts that refute Rupar's view. Xenagoras (talk) 20:07, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Xenagoras: please stop posting walls of text. We've already established that WP:DUE applies to facts, and editing Wikipedia with the goal of trying to "refute" one side and advance another is obviously not neutral. Nblund ^talk 20:48, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Nblund, abide the Wiki policies and we don't have to discuss at all. Read the policies before you lean on them. I do not want to quote Wiki policies, but this is unfortunately necessary, because you always keep cyclically coming back at me with another non sequitur Wiki policy. Therefore I have here pre-emptively refuted all comebacks you might possibly have brought in all these cycles. But you again brought another unexpected non sequitur. WP:DUE does not apply to facts as we established there (search text in project page: "21:44, 29 August 2019"). WP:NOTEVERYTHING applies to facts. I am not editing Wikipedia with the goal of "refuting one side". I add facts, prioritized by importance. You want to suppress facts, therefore I explained why these facts are important to include in the article. This whole discussion was easily avoidable if you had abode the Wiki policies and not deleted perfectly appropriate content. Stop using non sequiturs and I don't have to refute you by quoting the policy text. And stop attempting to justify your deletions by naming non applicable policies. Xenagoras (talk) 22:45, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Again: cite whatever policy you'd like, but its abundantly clear that saying "this information is factual" is not a justification for inclusion. You justified the edit by saying that "This DNC statement only refutes Rupar's claim...". That's not what we do here. Nblund ^talk 22:56, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I rearranged a shortened a bit in the first part; and added for context in the latter (forgot to note the last of that in the edit summary). Humanengr (talk) 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Nblund, I only cite the policy that applies best in the given context. You are right that stating "this information is factual" alone is not a justification for inclusion of a fact. Inclusion is warranted if the fact has enough enduring importance. The debates segment currently contains the opinions on the "changeability" of the DNC's rules from Rupar, Tracey and Gabbard, but zero facts from the DNC itself about this issue. Therefore the importance threshold for adding facts is currently very low because facts always have priority over opinions. Xenagoras (talk) 01:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Media coverage: NPOV and DUE weight

I've pared this back again. The previous version cited six different people all claiming that Gabbard has received unfair press coverage. It doesn't look like we're even attempting to appear neutral here. We can't use Wikipedia's voice to argue about whether or not Gabbard deserves better press. We need to cover her the way that mainstream reliable sources cover her. Its true that she has received negative press coverage and that some of her supporters have criticized that fact, but we can express that debate without taking sides.

The criticism of NPR's coverage here seems particularly unwarranted, because we're not discussing anything related to the actual substance of NPR's interview with Gabbard: she was asked about her ties to Chris Butler and the accusations of cult ties. I think that discussion might be undue for this page, but its absolutely undue to accuse NPR of bigotry without discussing what they said. Nblund ^talk 14:13, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

@Nblund: I just edited related material before I saw this post. Please let me know if you disagree with the information I restored about the substance of the NBC story. I also removed some campaign cruft. The wording I restored was settled in July.- MrX 🖋 22:32, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Defamation suit

SashiRolls, the citation lists one lawyer who argued that Gabbard's lawsuit was legitimate. Experts are not divided; there is just one with a fringe view. Please either revert or edit. --WMSR (talk) 21:31, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

fact-check says this is false (quotations from the Time article by Madeleine Carlisle WMSR didn't link):

1. Rodney Smolla, the Dean of the Delaware Law School of Widener University and a defamation expert, [...] added that Gabard's suit has "a solid fighting chance of succeeding."
2. Joseph Cammarata, an attorney [...] described Gabbard's case as strong.

-- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 23:23, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

A "solid fighting chance" implies that he believes Gabbard to be the underdog here. --WMSR (talk) 00:31, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

And so when she says that opinions are "split" on her chances of winning the case? Weird how you object to saying what the Time journalist herself says: feel free to add her name in wikitext if you feel her statement paraphrased from the quote tag in the reference (source) needs attribution. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 00:38, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

This is about undue weight. There are three sources cited, yet Time gets all the weight. --WMSR (talk) 01:02, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

13/53 words at the moment (not counting the expository topic sentence: 13/81 if you do). That's not all the weight, WSMR, it's a bit more than 25% or 15% depending if you count the topic sentence or not. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 01:18, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

No, because the way the text is written, it sounds like experts are divided except the two people from the other articles. The point of WP articles is not listing each individual notable person's opinion on things. One sentence noting that most experts dismiss the basis of the suit, with sources, will suffice. --WMSR (talk) 01:35, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

fine, find something saying noting that and trump Time, then. Go ahead! I'm pretty sure the science of stoppering Time has moved forward since Hotspur's days. You can do it. :) -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 01:53, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm sorry, what? --WMSR (talk) 01:57, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Aw sorry wm, just trying to say in a nice way that you need a reference noting what you want to note, and neither Merica nor the Intelligencer article with the grammatical mistake in the first paragraph (petty, petty, i know) do that. This latter, unless I'm mistaken is an op-ed? (vision 2020) -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 02:25, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

This entire debate is about what people's opinions are. Time did not survey every lawyer. --WMSR (talk) 05:27, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Should not cover any of this beyond lawsuit filed. No lawyers or pundits opinion is worth anything. Only a Judge and/or Jury will have an opinion worthy of inclusion. Slywriter (talk) 18:23, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Unwarranted deletions of content by MrX and WMSR

MrX deleted several blocks on content. He claimed [3], the text Gabbard receiving little news coverage relative to her polling position were a "poorly sourced and blatantly false claim. Her polling is around 1% so one would expect her media coverage to reflect that." I added several sources. MrX unfortunately did not consider the meaning of the important word "relative" in the original text. The "prosaic" text sources as well as the tabular sources [4] [5] show that the claim is obviously correct. MrX also claimed [6], the sub section "Campaign advertisement defacing" were undue for inclusion. I added several sources to prove that it indeed is due for inclusion and also note that political vandalism is unusual and has not been reported for any other candidate's campaign in the 2020 primary, thereby supporting due weight of this topic. MrX also claimed [7], Who cares who commented in Gabbard's defense [against Hillary Clinton's "Russian asset" accusations]? This is another instance of MrX's several violations of the neutral point of view pillar of Wikipedia. The defense against Clinton's accusations by journalists and Democratic and Republican politicians was very widely reported and so strong that it caused Clinton to ask the corporate media to "correct" their reports one week later. [8]

WMSR deleted [9] the same content that MrX had deleted and more. He claimed, The content MrX deleted did not belong in the article per WP:DUE. This article is not about other candidates. Above I already showed that the content is indeed due for inclusion. Thank's to SashiRolls for replacing mentions of names of every Democratic candidate who defended Gabbard against Hillary Clinton's accusations by summarizing text. I believe this is sufficient coverage of them in this context. WMSR additionally deleted a report of CNN's exclusion of Gabbard from their town halls leading up to the New Hampshire primary. I added several sources for this to show it is indeed due for inclusion. WMSR also deleted a report on Clinton refusing to accept delivery of Gabbard's lawsuit. I shortened the text and moved it to the lawsuit article. WMSR also deleted [10] an op-ed from the Boston Globe about low number of qualifying polls preventing Gabbard from qualifying for the December debate. WMSR claimed, this were NPOV, not notable, unproven allegation. Notability does not apply to article content. I wrote the text stricly follwing WP:NPOV policy (attribution to author, neutral tone, etc), therefore the objection "unproven allegation" becomes irrelevant. I added several sources and additional voices and reasonings and also added the DNC's response to remove any doubt that the text is neutral. The very low number of qualifying polls between the November and December debate was widely reported and caused upheaval among candidates, including a request to change the qualification rules. Of course this topic is due for inclusion. Xenagoras (talk) 03:33, 6 February 2020 (UTC)