Talk:Larry Klayman/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Untitled

The user Escp99 continues to try to remove factually accurate and properly sourced material from the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BigDog2012 (talk • contribs) 18:05, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

I have removed a lot of unsourced material from this page. Please do not add material to this page without proper and reliable sources. Phil Sandifer 02:05, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

This looks like PR written by someone associated with Klayman. For example, he's sued his own mother, he's been sued by Judicial Watch, there is a warrant for his arrest in Ohio for non-support of his children (over $70,000), he's filed for bankruptcy and said all he has is $200 to his name, he's been disciplined in Florida, prohibited from practicing law in New Jersey and in a federal court in California. Where's that?

footnote #6 does not exist. Will Wiki remove the anti-conservative post? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.214.49.242 (talk) 21:21, 5 June 2012 (UTC)

Article locked

Because of the very long-running edit war over the content of the article, I locked it for 3 days. Normally, I would not choose which version of the article to retain during the lock. However, coincidentally, the lock includes the Legal Troubles section, which I consider to be largely a violation of WP:BLPPRIMARY. Therefore, based on policy issues, I am removing the section from the article. Editors are free to discuss the content of the article, including the removed section.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:56, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

bears a resemblance

Can someone please either tag the unsourced sentence containing the words "bears a resemblance" as OR, or remove it as such. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:39, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

 Done. Sentence removed.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:32, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

the incident at the rally

I've made a rewrite and fully identified the source, which is a CNN political blog. It may still be undue weight though. I won't be in the least hurt if someone reverts on those grounds and would be happy if someone who sees it as still non-neutral were to rewrite it still more mildly. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:09, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, Yngvadottir, I made a couple of small changes to the section, but that doesn't mean I endorse including it. I'll leave that to others to decide. I don't think the material should have its own section, but the structure of the short article makes it hard to move the material into another section.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:17, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I removed an entire new section that had just been pasted in. It needed refactoring and incorporation into the appropriate part of the article. However I see now that the job is done and no further material remains to be added. --TS 07:00, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

The UK's Channel 4 News included footage of tis incident in a report on today's bulletin, their correspondant characterising it as "deeply shocking" and "a racist rant". I think it'll be available online shortly. 84.203.45.99 (talk) 18:27, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

SEAL Team 6

This article is making the utterly false claim that the SEALs who carried out the raid to kill Osama bin Laden died in when a helicopter was shot down in Afghanistan. 75.76.213.161 (talk) 17:25, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for noting that; I've added links and tweaked the wording a little, I hope it's clearer now; if not, can you suggest a better way to put it that fits with what the source says? Yngvadottir (talk) 19:04, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

conwebwatch

This conwebwatch article may not be reliable itself, I haven't evaluated yet, but it has links to a cornucopia of useful sources that should be folded into Klayman's article. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 06:28, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

BLP

DrFleischman, after careful consideration I have removed the allegation that was included based on a court judgment. WP:Biographies of living persons#Avoid misuse of primary sources states: "Exercise extreme caution in using primary sources. Do not use trial transcripts and other court records, or other public documents, to support assertions about a living person." Given that this is an extremely serious accusation, it seems to me that one primary source, albeit as one as reliable as a court judgment, is not sufficient for us to include the information. I reach that conclusion with some regret, given that it seems to be true, but I think that is what the policy requires.

I have done a bit of searching for reliable secondary sources covering the matter, without finding any. (I found a number of non-reliable ones!) There may well be ones out there though, since my searches were far from exhaustive. I want to make clear that I don't criticise your revert, since you were correct that it was a good-faith edit not vandalism and I had to read the BLP policy to decide whether it was problematic. Regards, Neljack (talk) 07:31, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Very interesting indeed, and I'm not at all offended by your revert. A couple of notes. First, the source isn't a "trial transcript" but it does fall under the category of "other court records." Ironically this source is, IMO, even more reliable than typical secondary news reports, but I'll abide by WP:BLPPRIMARY. As for reliable secondary sources, I too looked and I was surprised by the lack of them, given the apparent noteworthiness of the subject. However, what are your thoughts on the reliability of this source? I'm not 100% certain of this but I think it should be citable with attribution. The author, Terry Krepel, has a declared political bias and suggests his stories are self-edited (see here), but he's a veteran professional journalist with strong creds, he's been cited a number of times elsewhere on WP (without attribution, no less), his website is independently funded, and his language in the article about molestation is arguably overcautious. Your thoughts please. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 16:46, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure it would be considered sufficiently reliable for such a serious matter, but I don't claim any expertise in BLP matters, so you might want to ask at the BLP Noticeboard. Neljack (talk) 05:51, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

Good idea, will do. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 06:08, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

Partial shutdown

I removed "partial" [1] and was reverted on that, so I´ll comment here. My reasoning is that this event is generally called shutdown/government shutdown (I base that on the title of the Wikipedia-article) without the "partial" (seems all US government shutdowns can reasonably be called "partial"), so this article should not be an exeption. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:53, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

The source [2]says "partial" shutdown once (first), but after that it´s only "shutdown", several times. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:56, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree wholeheartedly. "Partial" is unsupported by the overwhelming majority of reliable sources and is non-neutral given the political context. The related term "government slimdown" has also been discussed at Talk:United States federal government shutdown of 2013, with a consensus for "government shutdown" instead of "government slimdown." --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:09, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm not wedded to "partial" but thought teh opposite, that it was more neutral, hence the revert. Yngvadottir (talk) 18:20, 25 October 2013 (UTC) ... and actually, since the source uses that term at the outset, I don't think it's compelling to argue that since it only uses it that one time, the term is invalidated - the subsequent mentions are referring back to the same event. What did other non-opinion articles in the press use after the first few days? Yngvadottir (talk) 19:00, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

I´m not sure. I´m looking at United States federal government shutdown of 2013. It has 257 references, and none of those have "partial" in the title. Not all have "shutdown" of course, but many do [3]. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:14, 25 October 2013 (UTC) Also, some of the CNN-article´s subsequent mentions are quotes and links to other articles. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:54, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

So, is this consensus or no consensus? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:24, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Let's give it 48 hours and if Yngvadottir doesn't object, I'd say we have consensus. He/she is "not wedding to 'partial'" and seems receptive to adhering to what the reliable sources are saying (which is generally to exclude "partial"; a Google News search for "partial government shutdown" shows a majority of the hits are from FoxNews, which is evidence that most other sources aren't using "partial"). --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:58, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, although I don't think it's much of a consensus since only 3 of us are talking about it, my own brief review of the press coverage (looking at the actual articles rather than just the headlines, but I didn't make a big Google search) shows "partial government shutdown" being used at the start and then "government shutdown" after the first few days. That seems to me to be defining the situation at the outset and then referring back to what is already defined - much like in the one source that kicked this off - but that's technically original research, and no, it doesn't seem like a big deal. So I'll step back on that. Yngvadottir (talk) 20:13, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, the pattern I see is that, aside from FoxNews, the articles specifically about which agencies are open and which ones are closed sometimes used "partial government shutdown" whereas the articles about the article about the shutdown in general almost always omit "partial." --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 20:26, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Not quite that simple - the BBC on October 3 was also using "partial". But yes, after a while it was just "the government shutdown". Yngvadottir (talk) 21:31, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

It´s been a pleasure to discuss with you. Thanks! Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:35, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Is Judicial Watch nonpartisan?

What's wrong with saying that Judicial Watch is nonpartisan and the supporting CNN source? It appears reliable (per WP:NEWSBLOG) and it's not contradicted by any other sources. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 21:36, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

I suspect that may be a partisan definition of nonpartisan, but I agree, the source is a blog sponsored by a major news organization and therefore not just some blog. So I'll revert those 2 edits. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:43, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

CNN says that because they are just reporting what this partisan group says. If the KKK called itself a civil rights group, organizations like CNN would call it that too. 96.25.248.210 (talk) 19:56, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

What is the basis for your assertion? --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 06:33, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Judicial watch is a partisan group founded by highly partisan right-wing activist and birther Larry Klayman. It claims to be a nonpartisan watchdog group, but although it does not exclusively target Democrats (because that would threaten its tax status), it clearly spends most of its energy attacking Democrats. This is widely recognized, as a web search quickly reveals. But when a CNN reporter describes the organization, it will typically turn to the organization's self-description. That's all that happened in the given source. At some point common sense and ordinary language must dominate a legalistic debate over whether JW is nonpartisan. It is certainly often accused of being partisan. At the very least, the description of JW as nonpartisan is controversial. In my judgment, JW highly partisan. It's founder is a highly partisan promoter of birther stories, attacks on Obama's religion, and now promotion of Donald Trump. There is every common-sense reason to accept that this group is in fact highly partisan, as it is perceived to be by many. But there is no request by myself or others to call it partisan. The request is simply that the article not mislead readers by calling JW nonpartisan. That is a reasonable request. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cerberus0 (talk • contribs) 20:19, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

This article currently does not describe Judicial Watch as "nonpartisan"; there currently is a discussion regarding Judicial Watch's nonpartisanship on its talk page. Weazie (talk) 20:06, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Sources

I don't have time to incorporate it at the moment, but here's a very informative new source about Klayman:

• Shear, Michael D. (December 17, 2013). "Score One for the Legal Thorn in Government's Side". The New York Times. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |newspaper= (help)

--Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:16, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Divorce

The entire section on Klayman's messy divorce has been removed with an edit summary stating that "moderators" decided this material should stay out. Can anyone link to the relevant discussion? Yngvadottir (talk) 16:21, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

I suspect this is what Escp99 was referring to. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:27, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Would this New Times article be a sufficiently reliable source as to avoid BLP problems? --Weazie (talk) 01:25, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Conservative - and other changes

While I appreciate the motive of protecting a BLP, the recent edit that has now been reverted to removes two paragraphs whose sourcing does not appear to me to be bad enough to outweigh the need for full coverage. Is Slate, for example, to be dismissed? It seems like a bit of a whitewash, especially since we already have many things sourced to his own organization(s) and the edit added more. Also, we should not leave the reader to infer that he is conservative, especially since we have an article on only one of the two organizations he founded. The lede as rewritten essentially states that he is a founder of two organizations and is known for suing people. This is not informative and trivializes his political concerns. There is nothing biased about the word "conservative". Yngvadottir (talk) 05:24, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Agree. Escp99, if there are reliable sources that contradict those currently cited, please present them here for discussion. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 22:22, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

The current disagreement seems to focus on the sourced information about how many people actually attended the rally mentioned in the last paragraph. Mention is made in an edit summary of sources that contradict what the article says; please can we have those sources? Yngvadottir (talk) 20:58, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

The end of the paragraph has now again been removed, with an edit summary referring to "the sources cited". This leaves in place only a source referring to the calling of the rally, and sources variously describing attendance at the rally as "about 200" and "less than 100". The removed source states that the rally had "about 130 people" in attendance at its peak; the removed sentence should therefore be modified - I suggest to "between 100 and 200" - and the "about 200" reference reused. But we certainly should not leave the impression that it was a large rally by omitting the sentence just because sources disagree about how small it was. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:25, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

With the current wording, there's nothing to suggest it was a large rally. Regarding the sentence at issue, the source given was a leftist blogger, who is obviously antagonistic and would downplay the numbers. That's the problem with the Slate article and others. If the sources were objective, I'd feel better about the citations. Harmful or contentious material, as the disclaimer says, needs to be adequately sourced, held to a higher standard than other material. Escp99 (talk) 22:12, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Calling a rally to prepare for revolution implies a mass movement was desired. The Time source is the most dismissive - "less than 100", and even the Washington Times, a conservative newspaper, has "about 200 ... milled around". Oliver Willis' piece has the important note that it was hoped there would be millions - quoting Klayman - and has a more careful assessment of the total in attendance. So to complete the story, I do think we need that last sentence, but I agree, given the spread in the numbers, probably we should change "less than 100" to "between 100 and 200" and add a second use of the Washington Times. (Seems fair to me: a liberal political columnist and a conservative-leaning newspaper, both presenting it as not highly attended.) Similarly, it's important to make clear his political stance at the outset - remember, not all readers of the article will have a political scorecard and be able to infer that "Clinton opponent" means "conservative" - and the Slate piece is useful for that. Whereas the state he resides in strikes me as truly immaterial. Yngvadottir (talk) 23:01, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

I didn't see this discussion until after my change to the article. I just focused on the one sentence and the number of people who showed up and the one source in support. If there are other sources that conflict, feel free to change my edit to whatever the consensus is.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:47, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

We've now had a change to 130-200, but the Media Matters source has twice been removed. I'd appreciate some more eyes on the latest changes. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:06, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Regarding Escp99's most recent edit to replace "predicted" with "encouraged," I support "encouraged" as it's substantively closer in meaning to the source, which uses "called for." As for the reliability of Media Matters for America, I've always considered them to be biased but fairly accurate, but I'm surprised to see they don't publish their editorial policy or staff. Without evidence of editorial oversight I would consider MMA a self-published source and therefore unreliable, especially in light of their overt bias. I understand many editors have disagreed with this position in the WP:RSN archives and I'm open to changing my mind. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:14, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

I did some research a year and a half ago on RSN discussions regarding the reliability of MMfA, available here. To say there's a consensus in either direction at this point in time would be false, which is an indicator that we should likely refrain on using it whenever possible. Thargor Orlando (talk) 18:47, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for that great research! If it makes a difference, I noticed that MMfA used to list their staff and editor bios on their website. Here's what it said in 2009. While there were some professional journalists on their staff, most of the editors came from politics (on the left, of course) and appear to have had no professional experience in journalism. This (weakly) supports my view that MMfA is more of an advocacy organization than a reliable news gathering organization. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 19:11, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Judicial Watch section removed as POV

Escp99 removed the section about Klayman winning a lawsuit against Judicial Watch, stating in their edit summary that it violated NPOV. I reverted, seeing no bias, and the same editor has re-removed it, citing the word "falsely" as an example of taking sides. This derives from "false claim" in the source - which is the Washington Post. I believe the section should be reinstated as a fair summary of what happened according to the source. (The removal also puzzles me a bit since the claim was found to be false in a court of law that was ruling for Klayman, not against him.) Yngvadottir (talk) 01:31, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Concur; I made the original edit, and I also reverted. Defamation is -- by definition -- a false statement. A jury found the statement to be false, and the Washington Post (a reliable source) reported that fact. It would violate WP:POV and WP:BLP to suggest that Klayman might have been convicted when he wasn't. --Weazie (talk) 01:41, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm not following - are you agreeing that stating there was a false statement made violates NPOV, or are you agreeing that there is no violation of NPOV in including the paragraph, with its statement that it was a false statement? Yngvadottir (talk) 01:55, 18 June 2014 (UTC) - I see you also reverted Escp99, so it looks as if you mean you concur with my view, that the paragraph does not violate NPOV. But I'd like to be sure, because it is a BLP. Yngvadottir (talk) 02:08, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I agree with you: It does not violate WP:POV (or WP:BLP) to cite a reliable source that reported a jury found the statement to be false (and the statement is, in fact, false). --Weazie (talk) 03:16, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I agree with both of you. "Falsely" is required to avoid a BLP violation. There's nothing POV about "falsely." It's properly sourced and does not connote any bias. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 03:56, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I still think it needs some kind of clarifying language, such as "according to a jury" or "a jury determined...." The current wording struck me as accusatory and POV, even if it's sourced. Escp99 (talk) 06:55, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Good to see you on the talk page. Try adding that language, instead of edit warring. Collaborate. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 15:49, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I think clarifying language is unnecessary, but its inclusion certainly wouldn't violate any wikipedia policy. --Weazie (talk) 17:59, 18 June 2014 (UTC)