Talk:George McGovern

Section re-organisation needed?

I came to this article wanting to find out more about McGovern and in particular his 1972 presidential campaign, what policies he had beyond being dead set against the Vietnam war. The problem I found is that the section about his campaign and candidacy is buried within the Senate years section. For a while I actually couldn’t find it. Seriously. And if I have that problem, then you can bet that others will also have it. Wouldn’t it be better to give the 1972 campaign its own section, rather than have it as a subsection? Yes, that will necessitate subdividing his senate years, but although the campaign was not successful, surely, rightly or wrongly, he is far better remembered for being the democratic presidential candidate of 1972 than for his years in the senate. Any objections? Boscaswell talk 21:55, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

As the main contributor to this article, I am not in favor of moving that section. The section on the campaign is not buried: it is clearly visible in the table of contents, it occurs in chronological order as the article progresses, and it takes up some 1,600 words and is thus not hiding. And anyone doing a ctrl-F browser search for '1972' will find it on the fourth click. As for your experience, we all miss things sometimes for whatever reason, but I haven't heard of others having this difficulty.

And for what it's worth, the idea that McGovern should only be remembered for an initially successful but eventually disastrous presidential campaign is a notion that this article as a whole will hopefully dispel. Wasted Time R (talk) 16:19, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

"60 Minutes included him in a 1971 report about liberal politicians and journalists who advocated integrated schooling while avoiding it for their children.[nb 10]" This sentence should be removed from the paragraph about the economy and inserted in a related paragraph (sorry I don't know wiki formatting, but I think this kind of fits here) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:6C40:700:53A8:4055:AA17:A340:965C (talk) 18:35, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

[Paragraphing]

"60 Minutes included him in a 1971 report about liberal politicians and journalists who advocated integrated schooling while avoiding it for their children.[nb 10]" This sentence should be removed from the paragraph about the economy and inserted in a related paragraph (sorry I don't know wiki formatting, but I think this kind of fits here) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:6C40:700:53A8:4055:AA17:A340:965C (talk) 18:35, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

There isn't a better place to move it to, given the current contents of that section. But I have introduced a transition phrase to make that sentence seem less jarring from what came before it. Wasted Time R (talk) 12:42, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Portrait vote

User:HistorianL

Vote on the portrait used in the article. I believe that Photo 1, the current one, is better since it's in color, facing forwards, not an odd super-close crop of McGovern speaking; instead an actual portrait. I vote for Photo 1.

• 
  Photo 1
• 
  Photo 2

Mycranthebigman of Alaska ^_^ 16:06, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

• Photo 2. Looking at it, Photo 1 is a crop of a low-resolution crop of a cheesy campaign cut-and-paste – look at the visible outlines in the uncropped original. By contrast, Photo 2 is a good image from a professional photographer and captures more of what McGovern actually looked like. Neither is ideal for the top photo, but between the two, Photo 2 is the better choice. Wasted Time R (talk) 16:27, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Photo 2: Photo 1 is a hastily made crop that was took from a random piece of McGovern campiagn material, with one of the only reasons of it staying up on the article is that it is a colored image. Sometimes a B&W image is a better choice over an colored image as the B&W image looks like a image that was taken by a professional photographer. As @Wasted Time R has stated, neither image is ideal for the infobox, but between the two images, Photo 2 gives off a better image of Sen. George McGovern HistorianL (talk) 17:44, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Vote over. Photo 2 wins 2-1. Mycranthebigman of Alaska ^_^ 17:57, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

Political affiliations

On the right sidebar, it would be appropriate to add his affiliation with the Progressive Party, since later in the article it states that he was a delegate to their national convention in 1948.

Proposed text:

Political party Democratic Other political affiliations Progressive (1948) 199.79.170.209 (talk) 04:04, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

Y I'm in favor of this. Mycranthebigman of Alaska ^_^ 09:12, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

Added. Mycranthebigman of Alaska ^_^ 05:53, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 7 April 2023

Please fix the formatting of the infobox, specifically for the office of Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture. The ambassador_from1 and country1 parameters are used when really only the office1 parameter should be used (and would look better). Like so:

Demonstration of infobox with change

George McGovern Official portrait, 1972 United States Senator from South Dakota In office January 3, 1963 – January 3, 1981 Preceded by Joseph H. Bottum Succeeded by James Abdnor United States Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture In office March 10, 1998 – September 28, 2001 President Bill Clinton George W. Bush Preceded by Thomas A. Forbord Succeeded by Tony P. Hall Chair of the United States Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs In office July 1968 – December 1977 Preceded by Committee established Succeeded by Committee abolished

Using the ambassador_from parameter as it is currently used in the article makes the infobox look too fat with the name of the office unnecessarily stretched out. Using a simple office parameter would fix this issue. 195.99.8.32 (talk) 03:54, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

 Done Tollens (talk) 07:41, 7 April 2023 (UTC)