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Archive 1

First lawyer is space?

I believe Sen. Nelson is the first and only lawyer ever in space. Can anybody verify this and if so include this fact in applicable places? --Butnotthehippo (talk) 20:30, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Episcopalian?

Some sources claim he is presbyterian. http://www.votesmart.org/bio.php?can_id=MFL25165 Anyone care to fact check this before changing the article, or is votesmart proof enough? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.0.65.18 (talk) 23:09, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Protection

I'm protecting this until the troll goes away. john k 02:44, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

On second thought, unprotecting. Now we can revert instead of deleting, since it has a history. john k 03:03, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Suggest protecting it again, due to vandalism. Alvarolicea (talk) 15:41, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

NPOV edits

Hi! I removed some inferences from the ratings he has been given that the reader could draw for himself, and which were basically not cited original research. Also, I removed the POV term "Partial Birth Abortion" and replaced it with the medial term for that procedure, Intact Dilation and Extraction (D&X). --BenBurch 18:50, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

The term "Partial Birth Abortion" was the title of the legislation. It passed both houses of Congress and was signed into law. Using that term is therefore appropriate; even if the medical community doesn't use it, millions of others do. I would be willing to bet that if you pick 100 people at random off the street and ask 50 of them to explain "Partial Birth Abortion" and the other 50 to explain "Intact Dilation and Extraction," a lot more of the first 50 are going to know what you're talking about. Also, there are plenty of examples here at Wikipedia where information contained in the body of an article has been repeated in the lead, and you've defended at least one of them with remarkable resolution. Dino 01:43, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Political actions and positions

This section should be devoted primarily to Nelson's own descriptions of his views, not partisan groups' characterizations of them. When one characterizes a politician's views via partisan groups' assessment of them, it violates both WP:NPOV and WP:RS, and thus WP:BLP. Nelson's views and actions need to be accessed from the Senate website and reliable third party sources, not partisan groups. This all should clearly go without saying, but apparently not. CyberAnth 10:46, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Um, no it doesn't. If we make it clear that "X group says Y" about him and X is a notable political group, there's no issue. JoshuaZ 04:59, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
So, in your view, is it okay and responsible in a biography to sum up someone's views on an issue by exclusive reference to a partisan political organization? Yes or no? CyberAnth 05:05, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
CyberAnth, your above question to some extent shows why you've been running into so many problems. Not everything is a Yes or No question. In this case, noting what ratings someone has had from various partisan groups is relevant when attempting to summarize the individual's voting record. It is thus not unreasonable to mention how someone voted on some major bills and also indicate of the partisan groups which ones have favorable and which ones have unfavorable impressions. I do not know how much I can reiterate- the ratings are reliable sources for this purpose since all we are using them for is to discuss the ratings themselves. There is therefore no BLP issue, but at most an NPOV concern. JoshuaZ 05:14, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
The yes or no dichotomy began by your insertion of the material. The action demonstrated that, in your view, it is okay and responsible in a biography to sum up someone's views on an issue by exclusive reference to a partisan political organization. That is poorly sourced material and is completely subject to WP:BLP. CyberAnth 05:22, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
The way forward here is as I said above. Go to senate.gov and get his views in his own words and google news and get reports about his views. At that point, the partisan sources will not present an WP:Undue weight issue. CyberAnth 05:27, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
Um, excuse me? One of the sources given is partisan, the other two sources are non-partisan. This hardly constitues summing up "someone's views on an issue by exclusive reference to a partisan political organization" Now, if you think there is a problem with the sourcing, I suggest that you go to google news and senate.gov. JoshuaZ 05:29, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, excuse me. Project Vote Smart is a collator of partisan information. Project Vote Smart places this right on the page:

Project Vote Smart does not evaluate or edit these descriptions.

AND

Keep in mind that ratings done by special interest groups are biased. They do not represent a non-partisan stance. In addition, some groups select votes that tend to favor members of one political party over another, rather than choosing votes based solely on issues concerns.

http://www.ontheissues.org/Social/Bill_Nelson_Abortion.htm - yea, let's look at this. First, the text I keep removing says he voted YES when this "source" says he voted NO! Therefore the assertion is not verifiable - verifies as false. As for whether it is partisan, it clearly is, since it selected only NARAL to include in its evaluation of Nelson. Don't let neutral sounding URLs fool you. It is not just the prochoiceamerica.org type orgs that are partisan because they have a partisan name.

Removing it per WP:BLP.

Perhaps I will expand the article, but not tonight.

CyberAnth 06:06, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Ok, the particular website ontheissues may have issues (I'm not sure, although they use the NARAL ratings for abortion, they use the term "pro-life" to describe those with low ratings, and classically there are very high inverse correlations for ratings from groups who are on opposite ends of the political spectrum, making which one you use as your referrence actually not that relevant). As to the matter that our text doesn't reflect the source- that's easy to deal with, flip it. JoshuaZ 06:17, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
As to the matter of project votesmart, since votesmart correlates data from all sorts of groups, its descriptions can be presumed to be fairly non-partisan. JoshuaZ 06:18, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
Does the article cite such from all groups or select only one? Thus, all the source is doing is being used as an intermediary, one that "does not evaluate or edit these descriptions" - all one is doing is citing the partisan source through VoteSmart, a source that "does not evaluate or edit these descriptions". See?
And do you or do you not agree that it is true you added material in violation of WP:V (the no, not yes vote) and then threatened to "report" me in part for for removing it?
Also, recall it is the burden of the person adding material to ensure it is adequately sourced, not the person removing it. You know this yet seem to want to enforce a private rule you hold on the contrary.
As for why I have so much trouble removing blatantly violative information from BLPs, it is related to that private rule and and many others like it. I should have been able to place my initial post in this section and that should have ended the matter. Because what I said was and is right. But no, I instead have have to spend six hours removing a mere three sentences.
No, the reason I have so much trouble is not for the reasons you think. It is because tribes of influential (= have the most free time on their hands) admins and editors have decided that WP policies say something other than what they actually say. They want to have loose reigns to make WP their playground for their own particular agendas, and people who follow strict and standardized interpretations of policies threaten that. So people like me must be stalked and rebuffed.
And worse, otherwise potentially responsible editors and admins get sucked into it all by peer pressure - a desire for "inclusion" in tribal "in-groups". The problem on WP is not so much the obvious trolls but the ones who make editing painful for other editors by repetitive questions, tendentious editing, private agendas hidden beneath yet lord of all arguments; immature teenagers and college students who view BLPs as their private political platform rather than a task requiring the utmost responsibility and mature outlook, all in recognition that words can be like flames and real lives can and sometimes really are ruined or at least permanently altered; people who fill up talk pages with nonsense, who see the truth of contrary arguments but refuse from selfishness to acknowledge them; who endlessly Wikilawyer the most obvious points, and enforce not the policies but the policies as they privately interpret them through the grid of their own private agendas. Most people like me are at Missing Wikipedians, many gave up much sooner, and many such people are enjoying the heck out of Citizendium, while some are taking their jabs at Wikitruth. The price that has been paid and will continue to be paid until something changes is a Project in the guise of an encyclopedia that cannot even be cited by 1st graders, lest high schoolers. Welcome to your Wikipedia.
CyberAnth 06:27, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
What an incredible rant. Nevertheless, there was an element of truth somewhere in there and I have replaced the links to an obviously none-too-reliable partisan page with ones to the official voting records, and updated the text to reflect the latter. AvB ÷ talk 14:38, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Major rewrite of section

I've reconfigured the "Political actions and positions" section according to the following plan--

  • Summarize X's own description of his positions and priorities
  • Cite important measures or issues associated particularly with X, if not described in preceding paragraph
  • Characterize X's position as liberal, conservative, in-between, or otherwise. If X does not fit well onto the the left/right continuum (e.g. liberal on social issues, conservative on economic ones) illustrate with significant votes and/or interest-group ratings.
  • Characterize X's voting record in terms of agreement or differences with party
  • Cite examples of major votes against party and/or major deviations from position on left/right continuum.
  • --And throughout: footnote, footnote, footnote.

This isn't a rigid algorithm. However, I think that a per-genus-et-differentiam approach like this is a good way to convey X's political position to the reader. The alternatives seem much worse: either limiting ourselves to X's own bland waffling statements, which will leave us with 535 articles asserting that X cares about American families; or watching the section turn into an unreadable tangle of unrelated sentences, as editor after editor after editor inserts a sentence or a paragraph about his particular pet issue.

In keeping with this scheme, I've made a couple of excisions that I suspect will be controversial:

"He has also voted in favor of tighter bankruptcy restrictions"

I checked Vote Smart for a couple of votes on this. Although a majority of Democrats oposed the measure, it wasn't a terribly strong majority. Thus I don't think that Nelson's vote represents a significant deviation from what you'd expect a Democrat to do.

And, the hot one:

"Nelson has received a 75-percent rating from the National Abortion Rights Action League. He voted against the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act,[1] on the grounds that it failed to provide for cases in which the mother's life was in danger.[2] He has also voted against a bill providing for criminal penalties for anyone harming an unborn child during the commission of a crime.[3]"

I don't think that abortion is a trivial issue, or that a politician's position on it isn't important. However, Nelson's position seems to be no surprise, given his left-right ratings by various groups. If he were strongly in favor of abortion restrictions despite being liberal in most other matters, it would be worthy of note in the article; or if abortion were considered one of his signature issues, it would be worth including under the second point in my outline. As it is, I think that this paragraph is only an illustration of one aspect of a point that's already been established.

Let the discussion begin...

References

  1. ^ Roll call vote on S. 2, the Partial-Birth Abortion Act of 2003
  2. ^ Stratton, Jim; quoted by Tammy Lytle. "Harris questions Nelson’s faith". Central Florida Political Pulse (Orlando Sentinel blog). 2006-10-05. Retrieved 2009-12-16.
  3. ^ Roll call vote on H.R. 1997, the Unborn Victims of Violence Act of 2004
--Ammodramus (talk) 23:51, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Gitmo

I'm surprised there's nothing here about his support for the Guantanamo detentions, given the ongoing controversy surrounding them. Koyaanis Qatsi 16:44, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Son Charles Nelson

Various news outlets are reporting on the recent sentencing/probation of Nelson's son Charles. I don't know that we need anything about this in the article, but right now the article only mentions a son named "Bill Nelson Jr." I'm guessing this is the name that Charles usually goes by, but since he is all over the news now as "Charles Nelson" we might want to clarify his name in the article (giving the full name but also the nickname is probably the way to go). Thoughts?--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 20:38, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

"bumped from Challenger"

I'm removing this passage:

Nelson was originally scheduled to be on the Challenger flight that resulted in the destruction of the Challenger and the loss of the entire crew, but a scheduling conflict bumped him to an earlier launch.[citation needed]

From what I read, it looks like Nelson's trip on Columbia was the cause, not the effect, of the "bump," bumping Gregory Jarvis to ''Columbia. See , e.g., http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,960601,00.html ("Rescheduled to fly on Columbia last month, Jarvis was again disappointed when he was bumped in favor of Florida Democratic Congressman Bill Nelson.") and the book "Space Shuttle Challenger" By Ben Evans, http://books.google.com/books?id=MQjCF8Cc7HoC at page 240 ("The more likely reason for reassigning Jarvis, wrote Mike Mullane, was that Congressman Bill Nelson had requested a Shuttled flight and the space agency had hurriedly complied. 'NASA bumped the oft-abused Jarvis one mission to the right,' Mullane recalled in his 2006 memoir. 'The next time he would pose for a crew photo would be for STS-51L, the mission that would kill him.'"). TJRC (talk) 23:02, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Membership in The Family

I removed the addition on this point from the lede. As his membership does not seem to have become newsworthy, I'm not sure this belongs in the article. It almost looks like an attempt to tar Nelson with association with a recently controversial group. If there is a consensus that this factoid should be added to the article, it most certainly does not belong in the lede. -- Donald Albury 11:50, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

primary

who's running against him in the primary? I can't vote for this moron again! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.62.8.253 (talk) 06:38, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Nelson, Obama, and the public option

I've excised the following two sentences:

"Nelson must run for reelection in November of 2012, on the same ballot on which Barrack Obama is expected to run. As a supporter of the Obama health care plan, along with the "public option," he is expected to receive substantial opposition."

The first sentence should be rewritten-- after all, Nelson might opt not to run for re-election in 2012. The second sentence needs a citation and a rewrite: expected by whom?

This material also doesn't belong in the section "2006 re-election campaign", since it has nothing to do with the 2006 election.

--Ammodramus (talk) 05:14, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

We can always hope he decides not to run again in 2012. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.150.94.194 (talk) 16:16, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

2006 election

I've excised the following:

"In an interview with Sean Hannity on March 15, 2006, Harris claimed that Nelson was a member of the ideological far-left and had taken bribes. She did not state from whom, nor did she give any other specifics as to these allegations, nor has anyone else mentioned these charges. It is probable that this was merely propoganda to try to discredit Nelson. Nelson is generally regarded as a moderate in Florida.[1]"

This strikes me as a violation of BLP standards: it makes an unsourced claim about a living person (Harris) that might tend to damage her reputation.

The source cited in the final sentence doesn't support the sentence itself: it has nothing to do with whether Floridians regard Nelson as a moderate or not.

--Ammodramus (talk) 05:35, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ SurveyUSA - 100 US Senator Approval Ratings 02/06 Sort By State

political positions section

We need to separate the political positions section into separate subfields. This will make it easier to read. Mosesman76 (talk) 22:23, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

There is no way...

On a global basis, that this man is searched for more than Bill Nelson the musician. Why is he the first one that comes up? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.104.195.40 (talk) 13:23, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

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Gorsuch

PLEASE - Confirm Gorsuch. Enough Political posturing. Babs Simmons (talk) 13:06, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

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Controversies - Council on American-Islamic Relations

I made some edits to this segment, adding some internal links, tagging a dead link, and tagging an uncited claim (that Ahmed Bedier is linked the the Muslim Brotherhood). But these edits may not be enough, the segment seems somewhat slanderous towards Bedier. Case in point, I can't find evidence that Bedier called Israel a "terrorist state", as is supposedly claimed in a newspaper article (the one that is the dead link). Moismyname (talk) 10:20, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Possible error in lead

It says in the lead that Bill Nelson is the only statewide official in Florida that is a Democrat, but aren't there Democratic congressmen?— Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.52.119.87 (talk)

Members of the U.S. House of Representatives are not elected state-wide. Only qualified residents of each districts may vote in elections for representatives. Also, please sign your comments on talk pages by typing four tildes, like this, ~~~~, after your comment. - Donald Albury 17:27, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 7 November 2018

2018 Election Nelson ran for re-election in 2018. He ran unopposed in the Democratic Party primary, which took place on August 28, 2018.[43][44] He faced Republican challenger, incumbent Florida Governor Rick Scott, in the general election on November 6, 2018, and as of 1030am on November 7, 2018, the margin of votes between Governor Scott and Nelson came within the 0.5% points of the electorate vote needed to trigger an automatic recount, according to Florida state law... As of Wednesday morning, Rick Scott is leading with 50.2% of the vote, or 4,073,835, over Bill Nelson, at 49.8%, or 4,039,298. Neither canidate has conceded, and most likely there will be an automatic machine recount. Zihgem (talk) 15:55, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. DannyS712 (talk) 17:47, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Complaint by the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust

The section on the complaint by Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust probably should be removed/contextualised if found no wrong doing. The Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust has already shown to be partisen and vexatious recently being labeled as a 'a Chop Shop of Fake Ethics Complaints' while under Matthew Whitaker. Also:

Skinnytony1 (talk) 04:43, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Bill Nelson was not defeated by the incumbent

This article should not state Bill Nelson was defeated by the incumbent Rick Scott. Merriam Webster defines incumbent as "In the American political system, incumbent generally refers to someone who is the current holder of a position during an election to fill that position."

In the 2016 Senatorial race in Florida, Bill Nelson was the incumbent, it is not possible to have two incumbents in the same election race. The article should state "Bill Nelson was defeated by the former governor of the State of Florida." 2602:306:8B8C:29A0:84AD:F2B3:47C3:601D (talk) 02:46, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

Replacing the lead photo

Hello all! The current lead photo is from of Bill Nelson as a senator c. 2001–05. That is at a minimum 16 years ago, or nearly a fifth of the time Nelson has been alive. I would propose swapping the photo with this photo from 2017 (or a crop). Unfortunately, I've been reverted, so I'm bringing it here for discussion. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:49, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

See my comments on the reversion. The 2017 photo is a poor rendition of the subject. He will soon enough have a spanking new and official NASA photo as the agency's new administrator, so wait until then. There is no deadline. General Ization Talk 05:02, 19 March 2021 (UTC)
First, you should read the deadline essay—specifically, point three. :-p Second, while the 2017 photo could be cropped, I fail to see why it's so poor as to be unsuited for the lead photo slot. Third, I saw your edit summary; notably, Nelson is not a sitting member of Congress, so whatever norm we have around official portraits doesn't apply. Fourth, we should be striving for the best possible articles at any given time, not waiting for whenever a portrait might be released in the future. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 20:07, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

Not a NASA astronaut

I removed text in the lead describing Nelson as an astronaut. He was never a full-time NASA astronaut; Nelson was a payload specialist, and describing him as such as the text already did is accurate and sufficient. Ylee (talk) 17:08, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Ylee, This change is correct. Curbon7 (talk) 20:46, 9 July 2021 (UTC)
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