Talk:Milton Friedman/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

POV

I tag the article partly because of all the comments on this page. My own issues, however, can be seen here at the FAC mentioned at the top of this page. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:04, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Please create a short summary of main POV issues that led you to add POV tag and place it in this section. Otherwise it will not be clear what changes need to be done to the article. --Doopdoop (talk) 10:49, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

I second this request. -- Vision Thing -- 19:49, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

We should try removing the tag after one week if there is no reply. --Doopdoop (talk) 23:23, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Semi-automated Peer Review

The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question.

• Please make the spelling of English words consistent with either American or British spelling, depending upon the subject of the article. Examples include: honor (A) (British: honour), recognize (A) (British: recognise), criticize (A) (British: criticise), criticise (B) (American: criticize), ization (A) (British: isation), isation (B) (American: ization), signaling (A) (British: signalling), program (A) (British: programme), programme (B) (American: program ).
• Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that it exemplifies some of Wikipedia's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a.^[?]

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 01:19, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Looking for good photos

I'm currently looking for good photos to help illustrate this article. If you can provide generic, Fair Use photos of Milton Friedman, please do so by replying to this message. Thanks! Gary King (talk) 03:11, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Neutrality and Criticism

This article is one of the most biased heavily developed articles I've encountered on Wikipedia, and until its general tone changes and a stable criticism section is established, it will have to be tagged as a neutrality dispute. The establishment of a proper, and accepted criticism, the absense of which at this stage of the article's development is a disgrace and has been raised on numerous occasion, should be the first priority. However the general presentation of Friedman throughout the article also needs to change.Nwe (talk) 00:51, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Criticism will also need to be extensive, since criticism of Friedman, and even more so of his disciples, is very extensive, probably more extensive than that for any other modern economist.Nwe (talk) 00:56, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Criticism sections are discouraged in Wikipedia. Can you give a couple of refs so that notable criticism can be incorporated into text (most likely in the Economics and Public policy positions sections)? --Doopdoop (talk) 18:00, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Only as opposed to criticism properly and widely incorporated into articles, it is far better to have a criticism section than no criticism at allm which is the case in this article. Therefore removal criticism sections on that basis is utterly groundless. Since the establishment of any form of criticism in this article has proved difficult, a criticism is most likely the best, and most easily maintained, way to allow criticism at this point. Your idea that criticism should be "summarised" is also completely wrong. Nwe (talk) 02:18, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Please try to find some valid criticism and avoid excessive quoting. -- Vision Thing -- 08:30, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Simply because you disagree with the criticisms doesn't mean they aren't valid. If you have a problem with the level of quoting then you should try to rewrite the criticism, not remove it completely.Nwe (talk) 17:13, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

You're edits are utterly unacceptable in every way. The incorporation of some criticism that has broken down to the point of meaningless into the economics section violates policies on criticism and its integration into the article. You also changed "free-market economics" back to "economic freedom" without giving any reasons whatsoever.Nwe (talk) 17:19, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Nobody thinks that Milton Friedman was never criticised. Please help us understand which criticisms are most notable, so they can be included in the appropriate sections using WP:SUMMARY style. --Doopdoop (talk) 21:47, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Removal of criticism of him in the article implies such a belief. Summary style is intended for detail that has its own fork, its irrelevant here. I should also point out that these cavils are, even if they were relevant, absolutely no reason for removing all criticism of him.Nwe (talk) 23:07, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Since there are only two criticisms given in the entire piece, its kind of hard to say which criticisms are "notable". And since summary style is irrelevant here, there is no need anyway.Nwe (talk) 23:30, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE states "Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation among experts on the subject, or among the concerned parties." Please state which criticisms are most represented among experts. --Doopdoop (talk) 17:58, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Depends what type of "experts" and "people concerned with the subject" you're talking about? Sociologists, economists, political scientists, political writers and historians all have a say. People concerned would involve, in some way I suppose people affected by Friedman's policies would count, but also people involved in combating Friedman's ideology in the fields of politics and academia. Klein's a good example of this, though there's plenty of others.Nwe (talk) 23:46, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Criticism of Friedman regarding his links to Pinochet are fair game. But what else is there? Criticism of his scholarly work would seem more applicable in specific economic philosophy wiki articles. CavanaughPark 02:20, 22 April 2008 (UTC)CavanaughPark —Preceding unsigned comment added by CavanaughPark (talk • contribs)

income tax witholding

Didn't Friedman come up with withholdings on paychecks of income tax when he worked for the US Government? Pdbailey (talk) 21:09, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Don't know but it's something worth knowing, given that by the 1970s he was opposed to any withholding. His evolution from a Keynesian to a the monetarist was quite a turnabout. Unschool (talk) 23:38, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

No Nobel in Economics

(moved old unsigned comment from top of page)Cretog8 (talk) 21:13, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

This is an important point of order: Technically there is no such thing as a Nobel Prize in Economics. The correct English name is "The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel." Alfred Nobel did not create the prize nor does the Nobel Foundation supply the money for the award.

Klein

I still don't understand why some try to add the critic of Naomi Klein, which is probably the most inappropriate amongst all. Apart from people believing in conspiracies and plots, there isn't even the beginning of a rational argumentation in it. Therefore, may I remind everyone that this is not because she may have some editorial succes that her economic critics are adapted here. Let's focus on economics, which is the subject, and not some leftist lunacies. There is largely enough to see, with keynesian critcs for example. --Bombastus (talk) 08:04, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Why Klein's criticism isn't encyclopedia-worthy.

Putting Naomi Klein's book in the criticism section of an encyclopedia article on Milton Friedman is akin to putting Ayn Rand's or Deepak Chopra's thoughts on Quantum Mechanics in an encyclopedia article on that topic; Klein's polemic isn't even based on the thought of Friedman but rather on the out-of-context cherry-picking of a few quotations and a tremendous flight of fancy.

This is very well-documented. One place to start looking--if you don't want to bother picking up the book and seeing for yourself that it's dishonest, slanderous rubbish--is Johan Norberg's whitepaper [1].

I'm not convinced that "Criticism" sections as they currently appear on Wikipedia are encyclopedic, but we editors can and I dare say are obligated to make the distinction between bona fide criticism (a la Paul Krugman) and the patently ridiculous. Some writings do fall in between, but Klein's book is not one.

Bkalafut (talk) 02:59, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

You believe that a four paragraph collection of the cuff dismissals is adequate for you to dimiss Klein? Norberg's "refutation" is incredibly bad, a mixture of childish contradiction and plain inaccuracy. Thatcher's policies did not have support from the British public befor the Falklands; she was down in opinion polls and there were strong rumblings within her own party. His dismissive comments on China are just pathetic. Klein lays out why its wrong, he thinks he just refute that be reiterating the conventional. In fact its just occured to me that the entire tone of this guy's "critique" points to him only having actually read the first chapter. And there's several more problems and inaccuracies besides those. We're all aware that that's the conventional view, . Additionally, aying that a quotation is out of context without elaborating is just a completely inadequate way of trying to put the most comprehensive method of criticising someone, their own words. What's out of context, as just one example, about a direct quote from Friedman's autobiography that shows him explicitly lying about the chronology of Pinochet's coming to power and the economic policies he adopted.

But all that isn't really relevant here. Regardless of your disagreement with book, though, which are legitimate, your entire argument about the "worth" of Klein's policies or whatever is utterly baseless. There's nothing more unencyclopaedic than the inclusion or exclusion of material on the basis of subjective opinion. That you don't believe this to be the "right" sort of criticism is utterly irrelevant. It happens to be arguably the most famous and comprehensive contemporary criticism of Friedman in the world, and while you might not acknowledge it, millions of other people do. Needless to say supporters of Friedman aren't really the people who should judge the value of critiques of him.Nwe (talk) 23:33, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

I see you had to get that off your chest. Feel better now, after your rant?

Four paragraphs? I linked a whitepaper much longer than that. You accuse Norberg of basing his criticism on the first chapter, but it would appear as though you didn't even read the second page of what I linked. "Policies or whatever"? "Disagreement with book"? Get serious. Read the whitepaper I linked. Klein's criticisms are based on an imaginary Milton Friedman and not Milton Friedman the academic economist. They are beyond nonscholarly, they are dishonest, and do not merit inclusion here.

Encyclopedia editors must decide what is and is not worthy. We do not include here what a Tucson cab driver or the grocery clerk at Safeway has to say about Milton Friedman. Unless you understand why that is and admit that it is our inevitable duty as editors to judge content, you ought to reconsider your participation here. Moreover, the suggestion that admirers of Milton Friedman are not cut out to judge critiques of him is as insulting as it is stupid. We are not crazy people whose intellectual capabilities magically disappear when considering others' appraisals of individuals we believe to have made substantial contributions to human understanding.

If you're going to make the case for inclusion of the Klein criticisms, you're going to have to do better than lying about the sources others give (four paragraphs?) and insinuating that they are incapable of judging scholarship. Bkalafut (talk) 08:52, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

If a senior fellow at the Cato institute writes a 15-page paper on a book, and that book is reviewed somewhat sympathetically by a Nobel laureate in a major newspaper, that's evidence the book is notable, regardless of its quality. (I haven't read the book myself.) Cretog8 (talk) 09:12, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but WP:UNDUE states the Wikipedia's policy quite clearly: Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation in reliable sources on the subject. We don't have to include anything anyone has ever said about Friedman. If President Bush has something to say about Friedman, we don't necessarily have to include it in the "criticism" section despite it being notable.

Even Stiglitz acknowledged that Klein's book was not a reliable work of scholarship, and the criticism he agrees with is already well summed up in the Krugman quotation. I'll agree that it's notable--as Norberg, Stiglitz, Tyler Cowen (who goes beyond Stiglitz to call the book "Dadaesque"), and quite a few others have all weighed in on it. Accordingly there's an article on it in Wikipedia. But it's not a reliable source on the thought of Milton Friedman. We'd be better off citing what Stiglitz--who has read Friedman and who is qualified to have a strong opinion on economics--had to say about Friedman in his review of Klein's book than giving several paragraphs worth of attention to the discredited Naomi Klein, who barely even pretends to base her criticism of Friedman on the words and actions of Friedman.Bkalafut (talk) 09:40, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not impressed with the way Klein's book is described in the article (off and on), though. I think it would make more sense to integrate a very brief bit on it into the "Chile" section, or something like that. Cretog8 (talk) 09:21, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Obviously, a large number of editors (those who restore the page after others delete the Klein reference) believe that Naomi Klein's book is relevant and scholarly (shocking, I know!!). To remove any trace of her from this article is going to be an exercise in futility, as it has been thus far. To all the people who disagree with Klein, I suggest you allow the mention, but link to something from a right-wing critic like [[2]] this that sums up your view. That way, we can have multiple viewpoints. This is what Wikipedia is about. Compromise. Not totalitarian revisions. Jcrav2k6 (talk) 13:40, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

A large section on Klein's criticisms and criticisms of those criticisms does cross the line into UNDUE. I really think the way to go is to integrate something like 2 sentences on Klein's criticisms into the main flow of the article--probably in the Chile section. Then the responses to the criticisms are already there, without adding anything new. I haven't read the book, so I'm not in a great position to make these changes, since I'd be working based on what others wrote about what she said. Cretog8 (talk) 18:02, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Inclusion of Klein's work at all crosses the line into UNDUE but if dropping her name in the Chile section and integrating a sentence or two into the Chile section can serve as "flypaper" and keep end the constant reversion to versions of this article containing a lengthy plug for her book, then I'll take it. Bkalafut (talk) 19:21, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Naomi Klein is a charismatic speaker and a nice lady but I don't agree with her views expressed in her lengthy book. Personal view aside, the following are Klein's views and I don't see any reason why they should stay in a Wikipedia entry that is not about her (note: the "Klein argues ..." and "Klein states ...".

"Klein argues that the human rights violations of these regimes cannot and should not be separated from the economic programs they adopted."

"Klein states that human rights abuses were the mechanism which allowed these regimes to adopt Friedman's economic orthodoxy."

And the following statement is what Klein claims and again, it seems inappropriate to me to include what she claims here in another person's entry.

"Without the repression of leftist opposition, the radical economic shifts which occurred in these countries could not have happened, since, in the cases she cites, she claims that they did not have popular support."

And then this big jump to conclusion.

"Therefore, authoritarianism was the only possible way to implement Friedman's ideals, Klein argues. A democratic regime could never implement Friedman's strict and in her view, repressive, economic ideals."

Finally, Klein may have written a really thick book (and a popular book amongst some circle of readers) but that doesn't automatically make her an expert (in Economics nor Friedman).

At this moment, I so much wish I were a millionth as insightful as the 93-years-young monetary economist Anna J. Schwartz (long time colleague of Friedman), I doubt she would have any trouble disposing the examples and arguments laid out by Klein cleanly and without much effort. Dr. Schwartz last "beat the crap out" of Paul Krugman in a 2007 NBER working paper. http://www.nber.org/papers/w13546 That was a beautiful read and ripped Krugman to pieces.

Sorry for my finally rant and aside. It is awful (and time wasting) to have ideological fight play out in Wikipedia entries. It suck. – Kempton "Ideas are the currency of the future." - a quote by Kevin Roberts 16:24, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Linking Norberg (who is not "right-wing") or Tyler Cowen is suitable in an article about The Shock Doctrine or Naomi Klein. This is an article about Milton Friedman.

Bkalafut (talk) 19:46, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to respond to Bkaflut's provocative posts and personal insults here and on my talk page if and when I get the time, since I believe the level of provocation involved entails a fairly detailed response and because I did make the mistake of failing to notice the whole of the linked article, which from what I have read of it so far necessitates some fairly straightforward but nonetheless longer refution. But neither of those are really at issue here. Simply on criticisms made by Bkaflut regarding Klein, they are utterly ludicrous. Klein's book has 60 pages of foot-notes, and the criticism of Friedman is based on his real quotes and actions.The fact of the matter is that the views of people who think Friedman is god or who think Klein is worthless cannot dictate the the criticism section this page. Klein is a well-respected, best-selling journalistic known for painstaking methods of research and "the Shock Doctrine" was fairly extensively praised. She is notable and well-respected, and simply cannot be barred from this article by any argument. The suggestion that her criticism should be restricted to the Chile section is also flawed, firstly since the continuation of a criticism section (which I support as a first step towards including proper criticism as a part of this article) provided it is balanced and comprehensive) for other other issues serves to marginalise Klein and secondly since Chile is only one part of Klein's criticism, which is far, far wider.Nwe (talk) 23:39, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Michael Bellesisles's book on gun control also had tens of pages of footnotes, and we all know what became of that. I don't know what a "best-selling journalistic" is but it's not a scholar. Anna Schwartz, Johan Norberg, and co. have very much trashed Klein's credibility. It doesn't matter if she's popular or notable, she's not a scholar and her attempt at economic history is considered "fringe". As per WP:UNDUE and WP:RS her book doesn't belong here at all. Dropping her name up in the Chile section is a "compromise" with her fans. But you say that she cannot be barred from this article by "any argument" which is your admission that it's your way or the highway. I challenge you to find a favorable review of Klein's book in a scholarly economics or economic history journal. When you do, I will change my mind.

Bkalafut (talk) 00:34, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

On a related note, if there are truly people who believe that "Friedman is God", it merits inclusion in the article and perhaps a page of its own. Can "Nwe" come up with a source on that one?

Or is this just more ranting from someone who's already made his intellectual immaturity clear?

Bkalafut (talk) 00:50, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Of course opularity is important, the value of someone's opinions can't just be measured on a poll of your "right kind of people", just because someone doesn't subscribe to or base their knowledge around the principles of "rationalist" economics doesn't mean they're not a scholar and can't comment on anything deemed related to economics, not least becauese the foundations of economics are arguably the most politically-skewed in all of academia, deems itself qualified to comment on everything and because it has effects far beyond its own parameters. Saying otherwise is the equivalent of saying that only qualified theologians have a right to make any comment on the existence of God. Klein is well respected not only as a journalist but in some respects as a historian, and a former visiting fellow of the London School of Economics. According to this site she is, according to prospect magazine, the highest ranked female intellectual in the world. Of course you'd probably dismiss that because it was "popular", I mean look at all the lefties on it, how about that "unscientific" lefty at the top! In any case, the book received widespread critical acclaim by top newspapers, including numerous conservative ones. Nwe (talk) 05:39, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I would not contend that only theologians have any right to comment on the existence of God, but would contend that we should not take seriously, as encyclopedia editors, a person's comment on a point of theology unless he demonstrates familiarity with the subject matter and the thoughtfulness of a theologian. Slandering the entirety of the economics profession by declaring their peculiar science "politically skewed" (a statement with no support in the literature, and which surveys of the political beliefs of economists contradict!) is a weak excuse for including any-old-criticism of Friedman beyond the bounds of WP:UNDUE. Suppose you, personally, object to "rationalist" physics and would prefer that the science came to different, irrational conclusions. Would that justify putting a criticism section with a lengthy reference to some popular crank in the Quantum Mechanics article? Bkalafut (talk) 08:35, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The WP:UNDUE page keeps getting linked. As per the rules found there: "Articles that compare views should not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views, and will generally not include tiny-minority views at all."

Whether her view is a "minority view" is debatable but not relevant. Assuming it is, though, I agree that there shouldn't be a lot of text at all devoted to her critique since this article isn't about her. However, since her entire book deals directly with Friedman, her views can be briefly summed up in the criticism section (not in the Chile section, since the book has a wider scope than that).

While it may be a minority, surely you will not disagree that those who subscribe to the viewpoints of Ms. Klein do not constitute a "tiny-minority." As was linked, she was ranked as one of the top intellectuals in the world, and her book has been recieved fairly well by most reviewers. These publications aren't fringe newsletters with small circulations, they are internationally recognized ones. Therefore, following the rules found on the WP:UNDUE, I don't think complete deletion of anything mentioning her name is warranted at all.

Jcrav2k6 (talk) 18:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

For quite some time I've had a little difficulty interpreting WP:UNDUE. "Minority" is context-dependent and it is not clear to me if the relevant context is economists/economic historians or everyone. We don't write hard-science articles on Wikipedia as though it's "everyone", why should economics/econ. history/biography of economists be different?

Bkalafut (talk) 23:37, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm interpreting WP:UNDUE in this context as not being about how minority Klein's views are. Fortunately, I don't think we need to figure that out for this article. I agree with Jcrav2k6 that the point for this article is that criticism from one book shouldn't be given large weight in an article on an economist who there's whole lot of other stuff to write about. I suggested putting it in the Chile section because that seemed most relevant to me. Putting it somewhere where Klein's arguments are supported (and criticized) by others in the natural context of the article would make the most sense. If there's a better place to put it, I'm all for that. What I don't think is appropriate is devoting a section to the book, full of pros and cons. If we get to the point that we need to balance things by quoting people responding specifically to the book by Klein, that indicates to me we've gone past WP:UNDUE.

More specifically, responding to Bkalafut, I'm sure it can be tricky sometimes to figure out the set from which one is deciding "minority" or "tiny minority", I don't think that's relevant for this article. Friedman was an economist, but was also a prominent public intellectual/philosopher and activist in encouraging certain economic policies. All that certainly opens his biography article up for non-economists to get into the mix. Cretog8 (talk) 18:27, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Krugman / Schwartz

Urg, criticism sections are a problem, aren't they? I don't think it makes sense to devote a great deal of space to criticizing a criticism. In this case, I don't think Krugman's criticism is of the kind that needs any rejoinder which isn't already in the text of the article.

If Schwartz's response is necessary (again, I don't think it is), it should be handled differently. The quote itself comes down to saying, "Krugman has no standing to comment on this matter and is mean." So, the quote isn't necessary. Also, Schwartz may be more prominent than her co-author Nelson, but it's inappropriate to leave him off. So, if necessary, how about just following Krugman's quote with, "Edward Nelson and longtime Friedman colleague Anna Schwartz contest Krugman's qualifications to make such comments." Cretog8 (talk) 06:40, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Agree, criticism sections are often problematic and tricky to deal with.

Thanks for the suggestion and I've added proper credit to Edward Nelson to the NBER paper.

I am always reluctant to remove a criticism in a Wikipedia entry just because I think it is wrong or has no ground. This is why I included the concluding paragraph in the Nelson Schwartz NBER paper. The problem of leaving Krugman's quoted text without a response is it will give Krugman unnecessary credit when none is due (as shown by the NBER paper).

Given what Nelson Schwartz concluded in their paper, does Krugman's criticism still merit such an extensive quote as if he is an expert in monetary economics or Milton Friedman? – Kempton "Ideas are the currency of the future." - a quote by Kevin Roberts 17:56, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I know less about monetary economics than Krugman on his worst day, so the substance any of those disagreements between Krugman & Friedman/Nelson/Schwartz is beyond me. I'm looking at Krugman's quote in the article, which isn't about monetary economics. It places Friedman in the history of economic thought. I think it's a good quote because it captures what I think is a common opinion (can't say how common) in the field. So, for this article, that quote from N&S is a non-sequitur.

Other quotes could be found more directly aimed at that Krugman quote, but I don't think anything's to be gained from doing so. The quote is clearly a matter of opinion, and so can stand on its own (given that it remains a small piece of a lrge-ish article).

At least, it can stand on its own unless (as would be better) it, or something like it, is integrated into the text of the article (possibly in the public policy positions section?) Cretog8 (talk) 18:22, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

The Nelson & Schwartz quote has lots of weight as Schwartz has worked with Friedman for years and is an expert in monetary economics. Note that in N&S, it was stated "In Section 6, we refute Krugman’s claims that a liquidity trap characterized monetary policy in the Great Depression in the United States in the 1930s and in Japan in the 1990s." So the talk of Great Depression in Krugman's article is related to monetary economics.

I personally see no merit in keeping Krugman quote, but out of respect of a fellow Wikipedia editor who took time to add it, my compromise is to add the N&S quote. A workable alternative is to remove both the Krugman quote and the N&S quote completely and reference both sources simply.

Ultimately, I hope there isn't a dispute of Schwartz (and possibly Nelson) as world-respected monetary economist and her NEBR paper speaks for itself in refuting Krugman's claims. After all, the N&S paper (31 pages of solid content and 10 pages of references) should be sufficient to convince someone of the problems with Krugman's claims, I doubt I have the ability to debate or explain the issues any better than N&S. – Kempton "Ideas are the currency of the future." - a quote by Kevin Roberts 05:07, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

There's a couple problems.

1. As I say above, the Krugman quote is an opinion, and is clearly so. It's obviously an opinion that Friedman would have disagreed with, and it's no surprise that Friedman's close colleague and many others would disagree with it. So there's no point that I can see in adding a response that, "X says Krugman is wrong."
2. If one did want to add such a quote, the N&S quote isn't the right one, because K's quote isn't about monetary policy.
3. Including a response to a criticism that is as long as the criticism itself is problematic. It also starts a possible chain-reaction. K responded to N&S's paper, and N&S replied to K's response, but we don't want to go there.
4. It's not up to us to decide who's right. You've decided who's right for yourself, but it doesn't matter in deciding what goes in the article. Cretog8 (talk) 09:15, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Krugman's critique and Nelson & Schwartz's response are now referenced instead of quoted. – Kempton "Ideas are the currency of the future." - a quote by Kevin Roberts 04:49, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

The new change clearly doesn't work, since it doesn't include any of the substance of the critique (or the defense). If it's really important to include the defense by N&S, then here's a possibility--we can expand the critique by K to include stuff about monetarism, and then the defense which says that K doesn't know enough about monetarism will have context.

I really want to revert this back and start fresh. While we work it out here, I'm just going to revert back a bit and edit the way N&S's response is presented, so the presentation is neutral. Cretog8 (talk) 06:42, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, the problems with the N&S quote itself remain, but the presentation of the quote is now neutral. What do you think about expanding K's quote to include more on monetarism? (I also switched the citation to the more canonical published version of their paper--the quote itself didn't change from the working paper.) Cretog8 (talk) 07:05, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

The neutral tone of N&S presentation is good.

Krugman wrote "In the aftermath of the Great Depression, there were many people saying that markets can never work."

Let me include two of Krugam's quotes from the article here for our discussion,

• Start of first quote

"Although A Monetary History is a vast work of extraordinary scholarship, covering a century of monetary developments, its most influential and controversial discussion concerned the Great Depression. Friedman and Schwartz claimed to have refuted Keynes's pessimism about the effectiveness of monetary policy in depression conditions. "The contraction" of the economy, they declared, "is in fact a tragic testimonial to the importance of monetary forces."

But what did they mean by that? From the beginning, the Friedman-Schwartz position seemed a bit slippery. And over time Friedman's presentation of the story grew cruder, not subtler, and eventually began to seem—there's no other way to say this—intellectually dishonest.

In interpreting the origins of the Depression, the distinction between the monetary base (currency plus bank reserves), which the Fed controls directly, and the money supply (currency plus bank deposits) is crucial."

• End of quote

• Start of second quote (This part appears right before Krugman wrote, "In the aftermath of the Great Depression, there were many people saying that markets can never work.")

In his 1965 review of Friedman and Schwartz's Monetary History, the late Yale economist and Nobel laureate James Tobin gently chided the authors for going too far. "Consider the following three propositions," he wrote. "Money does not matter. It does too matter. Money is all that matters. It is all too easy to slip from the second proposition to the third." And he added that "in their zeal and exuberance" Friedman and his followers had too often done just that.

A similar sequence seems to have happened in Milton Friedman's advocacy of laissez-faire.

• End of quote

Based on the above quotes and other parts in the Krugman article, I took Krugman's claims about the Great Depression and the market are partly based on his understanding of monetary economics, and those are makes the N&S quote relevant.

As I don't wish us to enter into a protracted and time-consuming debate here, I suggest we leave both quotes in. As an aside, I don't think Krugman (or other critics) or Nelson & Schwartz (or other defenders) should really have more quotes than what we have already. Ultimately, this is the Friedman entry, not the Krugman or Nelson & Schwartz entry.– Kempton "Ideas are the currency of the future." - a quote by Kevin Roberts 14:09, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Photo Quality

Is this the best photo we can find of Milton? It's aspect ratio is off and frankly it is unbecoming. There used to be a much nicer photo here, but I assume it wasn't allowed under the rules. But I'd prefer no photo to this one. JoelMichael (talk) 06:42, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Discussion to Resolve Neutrality Problems

I have again flagged this article for lack of neutrality since my earlier flag was deleted without discussion. Let's be clear: whatever your opinion of Friedman and his ideas, there is no doubt that he is a controversial figure, and people visiting Wikipedia should know that. Stating that critisicm is already presented or that you feel the article is balanced does not justify deleting others' tags or comments when dozens of contributers clearly feel that the issue is unresolved. Having said that, I hope that we can be mature and have a thoughtful discussion.

There are clearly strong feelings about Naomi Klein's book (The Shock Doctrine). IMO, The CATO response to the book that is linked in an earlier discussion is not sufficiently persuasive to discredit Klien's work. First, the cato response is built almost entirely on straw-man arguments that refute ideas that Klein never even wrote. Second, the cato response relies on an index for measuring economic freedom that they developed at CATO (which is equivalent to saying that "we're right because these numbers that we made up say so") and which is far to broad to deal directly with the issue at hand (the index, for example, includes strength of currency and protection from aggression as measures of economic freedom--countries discussed in Klein's book would clearly do poorly on these measures even if they had no government regulation at all). Finally, while Klein's "Shock" premise may be highly debatable, her account of the consequences of the application of Friedman's freemarket principles are verifiable and well documented--much of the book tells the story exactly as I learned it in my International Development class in college. You cannot dismiss the criticisms of Friedman in this book becuase the supporters of Friedman disagree. History is history, and Wikipedia is not the place for Orwellian revisions.

Including Edward Nelson and Anna Schwartz's criticism of Krugman's criticism is a bit absurd. Should we also include Krugman's response to their criticism. Moreover, the response is insubstantial and juvenille. The quote from Krugman is primarily one of economic history, on which he is a highly qualified source. Paul Krugman is a very highly respected author Princeton economist, and including irrelevant criticisms of his criticisms in an effort to marginalize his very mainstream views is an intentionally deceptive manuever. Therefore, unless someone has a good reason to keep the Nelson/Schwartz comment, I will delete it.

Jdstany (talk) 00:26, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

As can be seen above, I'm with you on the Nelson&Schwartz response to Krugman. It should be removed as a non sequitur, if nothing else. The rest I find trickier, but I'll try to keep an eye on your changes and proposals. CRETOG8(t/c) 03:46, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

That sounds reasonable. It sounds like you're suggesting a partial rewrite of the "Chile" subsection to lay out Klein's position more substantially, with less emphasis on the CATO refutation. I think WP:NPOV would be advanced by such action. Let me know if you need help copyediting. -FrankTobia (talk) 04:56, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

And I took the liberty of removing the Nelson and Schwartz criticism per above discussion. -FrankTobia (talk) 04:58, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can see, there is no CATO refutation in the article. Further explanation of Klein's position would give undue weight to her opinion. -- Vision Thing -- 20:10, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

The POV tag is based on a misunderstanding. Friedman himself was a controversial figure with a very strong set of policy positions that many opponents disagree with (many intellectuals are like that). But the POV tag is used only is the text of the article is controversial, and no evidence has been presented that even one paragraph is POV--that is that it fails to represen t the debate. Rjensen (talk) 03:56, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah this article looks pretty neutral to me. From reading the above critique, I think the section on Naomi Klein's book is under dispute. Jdstany, is this the only remaining issue? If so, how can we move to rectify it? Thanks. -FrankTobia (talk) 04:25, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

It appears there is another issue concerning the lack of attention paid to the effects of Friedman's ideas in South America. Apparently, they didn't work. --Patrick (talk) 04:40, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I suspect the POV tag is based on honest disagreement, rather than misunderstanding. I think this article reads fairly neutral, in spite of some bits that skew. However, I'm not sure that the overall neutral reading makes for a neutral article. The thing is that Friedman was a controversial figure, and quite happy to embrace controversy. I don't think this article makes that clear, and that might be a POV problem. For instance, in the lead, it could say something like, "Although many of his policy proposals are still considered radical, he lived to see some of his laissez-faire ideas embraced by the mainstream." CRETOG8(t/c) 05:15, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, I think it's a good sentence but I'm just picturing debates in the future about the use of his ideas still being considered radical. The point would be moot if we could find a good source that said that his ideas are still radical, but after playing around searching, I couldn't find one. My suggested sentence is "Although many of his policy proposals have been considered radical, he lived to see some of his laissez-faire ideas embraced by the mainstream." --Patrick (talk) 05:47, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Hi everyone. My assertion is not that the current writting lacks neutrality, but that the article fails to provide adequate criticism for such a controversial figure with such controversial ideas and that the content is therefore biased. Unfortunately I am in the middle of moving so all of my books are in boxes, which is making it difficult to find the references that I want. While I do feel that there should be a sub-section within the criticism section on Klien's book, I think that it is even more important to present critisicm of his ideas in general. Many credible economists and historians believe that the widening income inequality, deregulation scandals, weakining labor/union movements, apparently growing corporate corruption, no-bid government contracts, environmenal abuses, and unprecedented corporate influence on policy (energy policy is a well known case) are directly attributable to the the application of Friedman's ideas. Also many (perhaps even most) economists think that Friedman's auto-pilot monetary ideas were a total faiure (even Reagan abandoned this approach after a few years). There is virtually no mention of any of these critisicms in the article. Jdstany (talk) 19:15, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Ok. What if we revisit this topic in a few weeks when you get unpacked? --Patrick (talk) 19:58, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Rather than pinning all evils of corporate malfeasance on Milton, why not discuss the merit of the idea he championed in the actual article of the idea itself? I think summary of general criticism specific to his own idea and how criticism specific to his idea does or does not contribute to overall criticism of Laissez-faire capitalism is sufficient. For an example using the same standard about neutrality criteria based on opposing views of the broader class of idea instead of presenting one specific to the article itself, Ludwig Von Mises should also have criticism section devoted regarding merits of the broader idea he may or may not have been attributed to but it does not. If it is the criticism of the broader idea that must be presented, present about the criticism of the broader idea in the article devoted to the idea itself, not in the article of the proponents or the opponents. If one must present the criticism of the person, let's present all facts. Milton Friedman was repeatedly interviewed saying that he is not an classical libertarian. He stated that he is against externalities that corporations may impart (e.g. pollution), and that the proper function of government was to adjudicate such cases where externalities existed. For both even a casual YouTube search shows his views on the two items. Blaming Milton Friedman's primary idea for the wave of corporate corruption lacks any basis on causality. Corporate corruption can occur under many circumstances under varied criteria of corruption. Same goes for corporate influence on policy. Income inequality is again under same category. In summation, you are making sweeping generalizations about Milton Friedman and his idea without considering any of the views of the man himself (interviews, articles, books: i.e. his own word). Be specific about the infractions of the man himself (and his primary idea, not of ones who implement) if you have verifiable source. After all this is the article about Milton Friedman, not of free-market capitalism.--Dchem (talk) 20:01, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

WP:LEAD

Recent improvements to the lead section look good, but per WP:LEAD it should be a max of four paragraphs. Needs some tightening up and slimming down; I'll see what I can do if I find the time. Probably better if someone else gets to it first, as I'm not familiar with the nuance of Friedman's controversy. -FrankTobia (talk) 02:46, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Rjensen :) -FrankTobia (talk) 13:25, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Agree, it's a bit too long. No need to go into details like "According to The Economist,". This is required in the article body, but the lead should be concise - a summary. And what's with the 13 word wikilink? Morphh ^(talk) 22:05, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

"""I trimmed about 1000 bytes of minor stuff. Rjensen (talk) 23:37, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

I tweaked it a little bit more, hopefully not removing anything too vital. Morphh ^(talk) 0:44, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

stagflation and accuracy

There's a line in the lead, "He rejected the Phillips Curve and accurately predicted that Keynesian policies would cause "stagflation" (high inflation and low growth)." The "accuracy" part of that statement has been repeatedly challenged, though it usually remains in. The line isn't ref'd, and doesn't directly mirror material in the main article.

While there should be reference in any case, I think the point of contention is the combination of "Keynesian policies" and "accurately". I think most folks accept that he successfully predicted the possibility of stagflation, which was important. It's not clear to me without some good refs that most people accept that Keynesian policies caused stagflation. If it's not very widely accepted that Keynesian policies cause/caused/could cause stagflation, then that line needs to be qualified. CRETOG8(t/c) 17:05, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I added a suitable quote from Krugman in a footnote: "In 1968 in one of the decisive intellectual achievements of postwar economics, Friedman not only showed why the apparent tradeoff embodied in the idea of the Phillips curve was wrong; he also predicted the emergence of combined inflation and high unemployment...dubbed 'stagflation.'" Paul Krugman, ‘’Peddling Prosperity: Economic Sense and Nonsense in an Age of Diminished Expectations (1995)p 43 Rjensen (talk) 20:52, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the ref. I'm still not quite comfortable with the sentence. Later on )pp.46-47), Krugman says, "On average the economy should more or less achieve the natural rate, but it may oscillate wildly around it; one may still advocate Keynesian policies to try to stabilize the economy." I'd suggest instead of the sentence that's there currently, we use, "He rejected the Phillips Curve and accurately predicted "stagflation" (high inflation and low growth)." That leaves in the accurate, but takes out the cause. If we want the cause, I think the wording will have to be much more careful, and possibly come out of the lead. CRETOG8(t/c) 06:46, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

The new version, "He rejected the Phillips Curve and accurately predicted that Keynesian policies then in place would cause "stagflation" (high inflation and low growth)." is still not careful enough. I've just skimmed Friedman's AEA address (should be freely downloadable), and it reinforces the impression I have--Friedman's recognized accurate prediction was that stagflation was a possible thing. This is very different from being given credit for predicting the cause and onset of a specific period of stagflation. He might have done so, but I haven't seen the source yet which recognizes it. So, again, I recommend saying he accurately predicted stagflation--or perhaps better he "accurately predicted the possibility of stagflation". If he predicted that specific Keynesian policies at a specific time would cause stagflation then we'd need strong evidence (a) of the prediction, (b) of the prediction being recognized as occurring and being accurate, and (c) the specifics of which Keynesian policies were to blame--and then we could put in something like, "accurately predicted the Fed's loose money standards of the early 1970's would..." CRETOG8(t/c) 03:59, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

I think in the world of prediction "predicted the possibility of stagflation" is the same as "predicted stagflation." He gave every indication he expected staglfation to start happening, not as a theoretical eventual possibility but as a reality in the near future. Rjensen (talk) 04:47, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Afroghost (talk) 02:49, 19 February 2009 (UTC)== Discourse on Friedman regarding his policies and the current global financial crisis. ==

Hi,

I believe it is time to start off a discourse, and ultimately a section under this article head about the connection between Friedman's theory and the present crisis in the markets.

Orpus (talk) 09:30, 4 January 2009 (UTC) Orpus

No. Afroghost (talk) 02:49, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Infobox

Economics is not science; despite his own opinion, Friedman's infobox shouldn't give the impression it is.

Lapsed Pacifist (talk) 21:40, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Jewish ethnicity

What is this bullshit? I'm Italian, he's russian, he's puerto rican, he's jewish? You've got to be kidding me. There's no jewish ethnicity just as there's no catholic or christian ethnicity. You can't be a little pregnant and you can't mark the ethnicity box with 'jewish' for the same reason you can't mark 'muslim' or 'catholic'. Fix this nonsense.

From Jew: A Jew is a member of the Jewish people, an ethnoreligious group. According to this article, then, you are mistaken. Unschool 07:43, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

"Jewish" has always been an ethnic designation regardless of the person's religion. See Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups p 151 Rjensen (talk) 08:44, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Abortion?

In Capitalism and Freedom, Friedman writes "The children are responsible individuals in embryo and a believer in freedom believes in protecting their ultimate rights." Is this an anti-abortion stance? Should mention of Friedman's abortion views be included in this article or are they irrelevant given that he was an economist and not a politician? Slepsta (talk) 22:12, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

No. I think you are confused due to his choice of words. He isn't saying 'children = embryos', he is saying "children are responsible individuals [i.e. adults] in embryo", meaning that children (i.e. born children, not embryos or fetuses) are responsible adults at a not yet developed stage. He is using this to explain why no rationale person would say children are deserving of full liberty, but that they must be protected, because they will be adults and therefore deserving of such one day in the future. In this usage, wikt:embryo means "the beginning; the first stage of anything."

Having said that, I have no idea his stance on abortion, and I assume it could be either way. But there shouldn't be anything added on the matter based on this excerpt. Strikehold (talk) 11:14, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Criticism concerns

I reverted Nwe's lengthy addition to the criticism section because (1) it was copied and pasted directly from C.B. Macpherson, and (2) it is seriously out of proportion to its importance to the subject, at 672 words long. The information may warrant being re-added, but it should be written in a summary style, and kept within reasonable length in comparison to the rest of the article, and other critics commentaries (why is Macpherson's more important, for example?).

I should also point out that I think the criticism section is getting out of hand: criticism sections are generally frowned upon as they create inherent POV issues. It is preferable that the information be worked into the appropriate sections of the article itself. Secondly, given Friedman's wide-reaching impact on the field of economics, he is, of course, going to have a large amount of critics. Many of them are going to essentially criticize him for the same, or similar, reasons. They don't all need their own individual sections for this, the reasons themselves should be emphasized. Strikehold (talk) 15:45, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Okay, I added subsections to the criticism section by economic philosophy. This I think, is a lot better than having sections by the critic (as it was a little while back), or having no subsections at all in such a long section (as it was before I made my latest edit). Strikehold (talk) 13:02, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

undue weight?

can you explain removal of criticism section? one of the richest people in the world and doctor of philosophy in economics as well as few nobel leaurates criticized his work and you think it is undue? 94.189.153.237 (talk) 15:47, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

This article isn't a coat rack where every single criticism ever made by somebody somewhere needs to be included. Krugman and Rothbard are well recognized by economists and the broader public. Klein wrote (a pretty dumb) book lots of people read so she marginally makes it in. Macpherson and Letelier should also probably be taken out. Basically, a single article, by a single person is not notable enough.radek (talk) 18:14, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Letelier was one of the most prominent critics of Friedman for much of his career. MacPherson was a world-respected political scientist, more highly placed, i'd conjecture, in his field than Rothbard is in his, and about on the same level as Krugman.--Nwe (talk) 02:13, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

I guess Lakatos is not just 'somebody somewhere'. People do seem to quote him once in a while. I think we could say the same for Spiro Latsis 77.46.222.197 (talk) 13:30, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with radek, Macpherson and Letelier are not notable enough to be included. Also, criticism section is too large. -- Vision Thing -- 20:29, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

How can say that without any basis. Letelier was a well-renowned higly-regarded public critic of Pinochet and Friedman. Removing MacPherson, one of the most highly regarded political theorists of the 20th century, is even more baseless.--Nwe (talk) 10:28, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Can you confirm their prominence with some reliable source? Also, bear in mind that some person can be notable but that doesn't automatically make its criticism notable. In any case, it doesn't make sense to give every somewhat notable person who criticized Friedman a separate section. -- Vision Thing -- 12:47, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely, but MacPherson is not "somewhat notable", he was, in his day, one of the most well-respected political theorists in the world. He's certainly more notable and broadly recognised than someone like Rothbard. I don't know what kind of source for prominnece your looking for, however the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics has a fairly extensive section on Macpherson, in between Machiavelli and Madison (and his inclusion in longer than Madison's). In contrast figures as prominent as John Rawls and Robert Nozick, not to mention countless widely-reknowned political theorists and political scientists, are excluded from it. You can see various commentaries on him here.Regarding MacPherson's criticism of Friedman, it is both part of a broader conception of freedom which helped make Macpherson famous and secondly of an example of a general critique of Friedman's simplistic conception of freedom. You can see a number articles which use or reference the specific article in question here.

Letelier was arguably the most prominent critic of Pinochet in the world when he was alive. His notability you can see yourself even by the number of positions he held in his life; Chilean ambassador to the United States, senior fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and previously a senior figure in the Inter-American Development Bank. You can see articles which refer to Letelier's criticism of Friedman here.--Nwe (talk) 09:19, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I can't see anything since I don't have an access to JSTOR. I think that prominence of criticism is best established by secondary sources. Are there any secondary sources on Firedman's work that mention MacPherson's and Letelier's criticisms? -- Vision Thing -- 20:27, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the articles shown on the JSTOR link, as I said, include secondary information that does exactly that. Since you can't access the links I can give you details on the on some of the specific articles they list:

MacPherson:

• "Ideology and Utopia in the Political Economy of Milton Friedman"

Rick Tilman Polity, 1976

• "A Comment of Professor Macpherson's Interpretation of Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom"

Robert Crowley Canadian Journal of Political Science, 1969

• "The Welfare State: An Affront to Freedom?"

Christopher John Nock Canadian Journal of Political Science, 1988

• "A "Mixed"-Property Economy: Equality and Liberty in a Market Economy"

Robert Krouse and Michael McPherson Ethics, 1971

• "Coercive Wage Offers"

David Zimmerman Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1981

• "Democratic Ontology and Technology: A Critique of C.B Macpherson"

Hwa Yol Jung Polity, 1978

• "Humanist Democracy: The Political Thought of C.B Macpherson"

K.R. Minogue Canadian Journal of Political Science, 1976

Letelier:

• ""Factual Politics" and "Terror Economics""

Economic and Political Weekly, 1977

• "The Chilean Model: Fact and Fiction"

Jorge Nef Latin American Perspectives, 2003

• "The Reality of Power and the Poverty of Economic Doctrine"

James Street Journal of Economic Issues, 1983

• "Capital Accumulation in Chile and Latin America"

Michel Chossudovsky Economic and Political Weekly, 1978

• "Review: Chile Past Present and Future; The Long Road to National Reconciliation"

Eduardo Silva Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs, 1991

• "The Failure of Repressive Monetarism: Chile 1973-83"

Carlos Fortin Third World Quarterly, 1984

• "Armed Forces, Market Forces: Intellectuals and Higher Education in Chile, 1973-78"

Robert Austin Latin American Perspectives, 1997

• I reverted the criticism section, although that isn't an endorsement of the current version. There is no way in hell that Naomi Klein should get more than a single line or two. She is a crank, plain and simple, and as a fringe viewpoint, it does not warrant equal representation. This is quite clear in WP:WEIGHT. The version that Nwe keeps trying to restore is 1,235 words long – that makes the criticism section a full 22% of the main body of this article, which is ridiculous. There's no reason that there should be individual sections under the criticism section – the viewpoints, not individuals who espouse them, should be the focus. The criticism section needs to be balanced and written in summary style, and the version Nwe keeps restoring is far from either. Strikehold (talk) 22:42, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Klein is probably the most prominent critic of Friedman in the world, she is a best-selling and widely respected journalist. It is the notion that she should not get a significant section that is absurd. Regarding your reversion, 22% of the main body strikes me as quite reasonable, considering the controversy that Friedman's views have aroused, and compares quite favourably with other bio's like Noam Chomsky's where criticism gets an entire article of its own. But if you have a problem with the new section you must make constructive changes, not just simply remove valuable information. The previous inclusions contribute as least as much to the size of the article; the size of the section on Rothbard for example. I agree that there should not be individual sections, but for the sake of easiness for readers the criticism section does need to be subdivided in some way, I repeat that if you have specific problems with the broader criticism version, then make constructive changes to it, don't simply revert to an inferior version.--Nwe (talk) 10:55, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't make any difference how many books someone sells—crank theorists do not get equal representation here. Read WP:UNDUE, that is what that whole policy is about. Velikovsky and Von Daniken sold massive amounts of books, but that doesn't mean they get inclusion on gravitational or Egyptian chronology, and for good reason. John Kenneth Galbraith, while spectacularly misguided, was not a crank. He was actually respected in the field of economics, and I'm guessing he might have said something about Friedman at some point. If you want a mainstream anti-consumerist critic, he would be the one, in my mind.

And I'm sorry you disagree, but reverting and discussing is the standard process here and how we reach consensus. Strikehold (talk) 11:05, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

As I have said previously, of course it makes a difference how many books are sold. You seem to show real misunderstanding of what WP:UNDUE is about. For a start, UNDUE is primarily used to guard against views held by an extremist minority, it guards against "crank theorists" to the extent that the vast majority of respectable opinion will not take any notice of it. Klein writes for respected newspaper such as The Nation and The Guardian and is a former visiting fellow at the London School of Economics. She is an award-winning journalist. Her books have been widely praised, including by such respected figures as John N. Gray,John Berger, Arundhati Roy, Seymour Hersh, Peter Carey and Joseph Stiglitz. Additionally, while her work, being highly polemical, has been criticised, I have not found many people who have dismissed her in terms you would use.

And reverting and discussing is not the standard process, especially not reverting back to a new version that has already been reverted. Additionally reverting is especially to be discouraged when the information you remove by the reversion, while you may consider it imperfect, is of value. You should instead act constructively and make new changes.

But what is most interesting is that despite advocating "reverting and discussing" you have stopped saying anything about the actual content you have reverted.--Nwe (talk) 12:49, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

This article talks about Friedman's view on freedom in only one sentence: "Friedman argued for stronger basic legal (constitutional) protection of economic rights and freedoms in order to further promote industrial-commercial growth and prosperity and buttress democracy and freedom and the rule of law generally in society." To have four paragraphs of criticisms on that is indeed undue weight. As for Letelier, his quote is not an attack on Friedman's economic theories but on his character. -- Vision Thing -- 19:29, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Giving Naomi Klein that much space in the article would be a good example for Recentism. Only because she is prominent now, in the late 2000's, does not mean that her criticism has the same prominence and signifance on a historical scale. The section is already quite unbalanced, with contemporary critics of Friedman getting less space than extremely recent criticism by Paul Krugman and Namoi Klein. Stepopen (talk) 15:50, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

No Mention of current crash in Iceland?

Funny, no one has updated the entry on Iceland to mention the complete collapse of its economy... I wonder why?

Iceland's Economic Meltdown Is a Big Flashing Warning Sign http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/19205

Funny how a Friedmanite "economic miracle" so quickly becomes "economic meltdown"... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.40.192.31 (talk) 14:07, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it's just waiting for a good source to reference. I'd accept Z magazine as a source of left-wing opinion/analysis, but I'm not sure that the link you have above is really from Z magazine, and it would be better if the source was more mainstream. CRETOG8(t/c) 15:48, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Z Magazine is not considered a reliable source. Additionally, this crash in Iceland has come some 24 years after Friedman's visit and 17 years after "Friedmanite" policies were first put in place. Maybe the crisis should be blamed on Egill Skallagrímsson instead?radek (talk)

If it comes down to it, we can take Z Magazine to a reliable sources discussion. Note my qualification above, however. It's a reliable source of left-wing opinion/analysis, just as Reason is a reliable source of libertarian opinion/analysis. For the moment, it's moot since I'm not sure about the provenance of the source above. As to the timing, the current framing of the Iceland section highlights recent history by drawing distinct attention to "economic freedom" indices in 2004 and 2008. The implication is that Friedman's influence is at least partially responsible, even after 17 years. CRETOG8(t/c) 23:34, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I think Z was already discussed on reliable sources and the answer was that it's not. I might be wrong - maybe I'm confusing it with the discussion on some other talk pages. Part of it is that's not just left wing, but very left wing (to the left of the Nation, Mother Jones, etc.). I guess we could use it with some qualifications like "in extreme left-wing opinion it is argued that..." or something. But that raises questions of undue weight, due to the 'extreme' qualifier. The issue with the timing is not just about the more recent 2004 and 2008 indices. If there was some influence, then why did it take 17 years for it to have this adverse effect? And the crisis is occurring in many different economies, which have had very different policies. In all honesty I don't see how Friedman and the present situation in Iceland are at all relevant to each other. It's really just a common instance of 'hang bad economic outcomes on your least favorite economist, whether they deserve it or not' (and it's not just Friedman. People try to do it to Keynes all the time too).radek (talk) 00:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Ah, now I understand -- Friedman's ideas get the credit when Iceland is doing well, but not when Iceland crashes. I'm impressed with the intellectual dishonesty. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.40.192.31 (talk) 16:15, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

128.40.192.31, can you come up with other references? CRETOG8(t/c) 18:29, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Erm,

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12415730&CFID=36468871&CFTOKEN=23056596

and

http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11900731&CFID=36468871&CFTOKEN=23056596

Thanks, do we find The Economist to be sufficiently mainstream?

114.31.155.185 (talk) 17:04, 4 January 2009 (UTC) Orpus

Neither of those articles mentions Iceland, so I don't think they work in this specific context. (I also have some issues with The Economist as a source, but fortunately that's irrelevant for this.) CRETOG8(t/c) 21:11, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

I recently offered two sources for this, both of my edits were reverted, I suppose on the grounds that the sources did not explicitly connect Friedman to the specific policies. This makes no sense at all. The articles mentioned how 1) Davíð Oddsson and his fellow party members were inspired by Friedman's ideas, 2) how they then proceeded to implement definitely Friedmanesque policies when they came to power, and 3) how these policies resulted in the current financial crisis. What more can you ask?

The section on Iceland currently has a whole paragraph on the Independence Party policies which also have no direct connection to Friedman. If you want to keep these policy descriptions, you should also make a mention of their results. Smite-Meister (talk) 01:12, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Your edits were rightly reverted. The explanations given for the reversions were satisfactory. Especially the second one. Simply providing a source that mentions the collapse and mentions Friedman's name doesn't make it a sufficient citation. The point of a citation is to cite where the specific information shared in the encyclopedia article came from. The information you added to the article was not at all supported by the article you cited. Nowhere in that article is the implication made that the policies themselves (like deregulation) had negative impacts or that they "were the chief cause behind the collapse and financial crisis" as you wrote in the wikipedia article. In fact, the source seemed to point the blame more strongly than anything else on "the crooked system" in which "the political and economic decision makers on the island are so closely intertwined, by blood and money" and "institutional boundaries [were] blurred by cronyism."

Insider trading, shady deals, and unfair governmental powers granted to friends and family have nothing to do with Friedman's economic policies, and to be even more specific, are not at all what Friedman promoted. They are in fact some of the very things he labeled as the biggest problems in the economy and were the very things he spoke the loudest against.1

I do, however, not have much of an objection to your second point here, in that the section on Iceland may very well be too detailed. Of course the reference to Friedman's time there and what he specifically did are relevant to the Friedman article, but I personally don't see much support for the paragraph about Davíð Oddsson. It does appear to be more or less a stretch made by Friedman fans who would perhaps like to give him credit in places where it may not be wholly appropriate. I don't have any reason to doubt Friedman influenced Davíð Oddsson and the party, but to draw a direct correlation between them might be a bit much...and it certainly is poor practice to do such a thing in the way it's done there and without any provided support. I will add some tags to that section and we can see if anyone can improve it with sources. I would encourage more discussion on this topic, because I do feel almost that entire second paragraph is unnecessary, or at least needs to be reworded. --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 05:11, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Im going to remove the current edit with regards to Iceland and will detail the reasons here. The Huffington post article here does not support the claims made in the article here, specifically, it makes no mention at all of Friedman or his recommendations. The Guardian article also makes no mention of Friedman and, as such, has no place in an article about Friedman. This Huffington post article also makes no mention of Friedman.

This leaves only the Alternet story. I personally dont consider Alternet to be a reliable source on its face, but setting that aside, I note that this article is an editorial and, as such, is expressly forbidden by wp:RS: "Some sources may be considered reliable for statements as to their author's opinion, but not for statements of fact without attribution. A prime example of this are Op-ed columns in mainstream newspapers." For this reason I am going to remove the section in question. Bonewah (talk) 15:01, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

See, I'm not so sure I completely agree with the removal though, Bonewah. The section was only speaking to the fact that some people have tried to link Friedman-esc policies to the crash by saying he influenced the leaders who made those decisions...and that those economic policy decisions were the cause of the collapse. It didn't say anything to the notion of the validity of those claims...just the fact that people (basically anti-Friedman people) were making them. I understand the averseness to including such information—as it can be misleading to people who are not aware or do not understand the truth about the circumstances, and how it was not Friedman-type policies that led to the crash, but rather the government "cronyism" that was instituted along with them. And personally I haven't seen much evidence that Friedman had that much influence there in the first place. Perhaps those leaders studied his work and decided to implement versions of some of his recommended policies or philosophies, but a lot of these comments in articles like that Alternet one make it sound like some of these leaders were students of his, or even that he was some sort of advisor to the government..which of course is completely not the case.

So again, I understand your intent to protect the integrity of the article, so as not to mislead the reader—however I do think the fact that people have tried to blame the crash on Friedman policies is relevant information to the article...whether it's a correct assessment or not. When I have some time I'll take a shot at writing that piece of the section and we can see how it turns out. --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 15:42, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I get your point, but I think it is a mistake to traffic in popular falsehoods simply because they are popular. To me, that is the underlying logic to the section of RS that i quoted above, avoid opinions except in articles about the opinion holder (generally). Think about it this way, if I dig hard enough, I can find people who believe that Joe DiMaggio played a part in the assassination of John F Kennedy, but that opinion has no place in either biography (although it could find a place in John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories). The same is true here, the fact that some have tried to implicate Friedman in the Iceland economic crash has no value here because it is a fringe theory, rather than verifiable biographic material. Bonewah (talk) 16:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I actually hadn't thought of it that way. Would you really consider it a fringe theory? I mean it's entirely possible that none of the sources which promote it qualify as RS, but at the same time I wouldn't discount the possibility of actual reputable, reliable sources making the same claim. I mean, hell, Paul Krugman won a Nobel Prize. And with the popularity of Keynesianism, I don't think it's too far of a stretch of the imagination to suppose enough reliable sources say the same thing...whether it's nonsense or not. I'll do some digging and see if I can find anything. --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 17:53, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Based on what ive seen thus far, I would call it fringe, but I cant discount the possibility of a reliable source being found. Bonewah (talk) 18:07, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Criticism again

this edit and this edit both highlight criticisms of Milton Friedman and are problematic and should be removed. First of all, these are simply opinions, as acknowledged by the editor who placed them there, from his edit summary: " this is a "criticism" section, comprised of nothing but opinions; therefore, logically, opinions pertaining to Friedman belong here" This is wrong. Everyone in the world has an opinion, and, if we followed the logic of the editor here, Wikipedia articles would be overwhelmed with opinion after opinion after opinion. In order to justify the inclusion of an opinion, we have to demonstrate that it is important to the subject of the article, and not just random criticism. Consider the other criticisms in this article; Keynesian criticism is relevant because Keynesian economics is a major (perhaps the most dominant) school of thought, and the criticisms more or less represent a consensus of what Keynesians think of Friedman's views as represented by a widely known expert in Keynesian economics. The Austrian school criticisms follows the same pattern, a prominent school of economic thought, a major thinker in that school of thought, expressing the views of that school. This is the way opinions and criticisms should be done, by limiting them to only what is relevant to the subject at hand and not just the opinion of any old person.

Now lets consider the edits in question: "Economist Toby Sanger has argued that Iceland's complete economic collapse of 2008 was the direct result of that small nation's adoption of Milton Friedman's neo-liberal economic policies.[58]" this is backed up by a citation to The Progressive Economics Forum. As mentioned before, who is Toby Sanger and why should we care about his opinion? To the best of my knowledge, he is not a major player in economics nor an icon for a major school of thought. Why is this person's opinion relevant enough to include in this article? The only thing I can say about Mr Sanger's opinion is that he holds it, which is not nearly enough reason to include it. For at least this reason (there are other problems here too) i am going to remove the section in question. Bonewah (talk) 17:06, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Sanger is the senior economist with the Canadian Union of Public Employees. He is a professional economist who has published academic papers and his piece on Milton Friedman is as valid as any other cited piece included in the criticism section. If you delete the link again, your editing will be brought to the highest possible level of Wikipedia for scrutiny. J.R. Hercules (talk) 18:47, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Merely being an economist is not nearly enough for inclusion, again, the other critics in this section are quite prominent and represent (at least to some extent) the views of their respective schools whereas Sanger is just a garden variety economist representing his own views. If he has published an academic paper on Friedman lets see it, otherwise, you've only changed some random guy for some random economist, but still havent established why this person's view is important to our understanding of Friedman.

If you feel like subjecting me to "the highest possible level of Wikipedia" sctutiny, (whatever that means) go for it, but may i recommend we try an wp:RFC or some other dispute resolution technique? Bonewah (talk) 19:17, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Sanger has a great deal of prase for Friedman's im;pact on Iceland. To quote Sanger: Friedman "inspired a generation of young conservative intellectuals in Iceland who came to power in 1991 through the Independence party and have run the government through different coalitions since then." "At first, the policies seemed to be very successful. The economy grew at a strong pace, rising until Iceland achieved one of the highest per capita GDPs in the world. In 2007 it also topped the score for the UN’s Human Development Index. Iceland rocketed up to the top ten rank in the indexes of economic freedom designed by the Fraser Instittue and the Heritage Foundation." What went wrong, says Sanger, was Iceland's government's role. Sanger says "Icelandic banks and businesses, with the support of their government, expanded aggressively overseas." At no point does Sanger say that Friedman supported those government polciies---indeed, Friedman always warned against an active government. Rjensen (talk) 00:54, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

we now have J.R. Hercules repeatedly stripping away and rejecting the text by Sanger--does he want Sanger here or not?? Rjensen (talk) 00:57, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Sanger has some praise for Friedman and he has some criticism, but the important question is why should the reader care. J.R. Hercules is, in my opinion, selectively quoting Sanger not because doing so helps the reader understand Friedman, but because it advances J.R. Hercules' point of view. As I mentioned above, Sanger is not a particularly noteworthy economist, nor is he representative of a larger, important school of economic thought. J.R. Hercules is also doing this in 2008–2012 Icelandic financial crisis, where he finds some editorial that supports his POV then adds it in as fact, see here. I am reverting and strongly recommend that J.R. Hercules resolves this via talk rather than edit warring. Bonewah (talk) 13:08, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

A child's reading of Sanger's article would conclude that Sanger has no "praise" for Friedman: "Iceland's economic collapse wasn't caused by the subprime crisis or by the Wall Street shenanigans in the biggest economic powerhouse in the world. Instead, it was caused by the same Friedman-inspired economic policies being independently applied in one of the smallest countries in the world." "It turns out that Iceland, despite its coalition governments and Nordic social values, became a poster child for neoconservative economic policies inspired by Milton Friedman during the past decade." "At first, the policies appeared to be very successful...Then it all came crashing down." The line that Sanger was somehow "praising" Friedman was entirely missing from your earlier mendacious reasoning for deleting the material, but you've apparently now adopted and added it to your specious excuses for deletion after getting the idea from a similarly mendacious editor. You also are blatantly abusing WP editing policy by 1) deleting material; 2) saying that the matter should be discussed on the Talk Page; 3) after it has already been discussed on the Talk Page, deleting the material again -- and then again saying that it should be discussed on the Talk Page. J.R. Hercules (talk) 16:43, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

This hasent been discussed in any meaningful sense of the word. You have completely ignored my arguments and simply reinserted contentious material over the objection of 2 different editors. You gravely misunderstand WP policy, 1) deleting material is not a violation of any rule 2) all contentious edits should be discussed on talk rather than simply forcing your point of view via editing. Bold Revert Discuss means just that, you boldly added material, fine. I reverted said material, fine. Now we discuss the changes made. You dont simply re-add the material over the objection of other editors. The point is to develop consensus which I have asked you over and over to try and do, only to be ignored. Editing policy states that discussion is called for if someone indicates a disagreement, which I have and so has Rjensen. 3) You have not discussed this edit in any meaningful way, other than to declare that it should remain. As I have made clear, the problem here is that Sanger is not a noteworthy critic, and, as such, should not be included. Further, you have shown that your objective here is pushing a wp:POV rather than good faith editing. Bonewah (talk) 17:47, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Bonewah is correct in his assertions, J.R. You have not done anything to further any discussion on these matters. In fact as he said, you have more or less completely ignored any points brought up and just added the questionable material back. This is certainly not in good faith of the Wikipedia project.

We already went through this very situation not long ago with another user. The discussion took place above, in the No Mention of current crash in Iceland? section.

I must admit it does seem that you are much less interested in improving the encyclopedia and more so interested in just making sure your personal views are accounted for. If this is not the case, then respond to the points Bonewah has raised and explain (and of course provide evidence supporting) why additions like the ones you made are not only important to the article, but also worthy of addition to the encyclopedia under its current standards. --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 10:14, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Before typing strange assertions like "you more or less completely ignored any points brought up" you might actually want to read the entire talk section, especially the part where I wrote, Sanger is the senior economist with the Canadian Union of Public Employees. He is a professional economist who has published academic papers and his piece on Milton Friedman is as valid as any other cited piece included in the criticism section.. That was a direct response to boneweh's earlier comment; it can't get any more direct than that. So, I repeat: you might want to actually read the entire talk section before putting finger to keyboard. Also, you might also want to elaborate on why you consider the the material "questionable". Can you provide any evidence that the material is questionable? J.R. Hercules (talk) 20:48, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

J.R. Hercules's misreading of Sanger is faulty--he removes Sanger's [praise for Friedman's impact on Iceland, as well as Sanger's point that he Iceland government played a key role in getting the banks to expand in ways that Friedman had always warned against. Rjensen (talk) 21:13, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

"Strange assertions?" I have read through the entire discussion. I noticed where you brought up Sanger's resume. That's great. You directly responded. From there, the conversation continued, as Bonewah directly replied back to you:

"Merely being an economist is not nearly enough for inclusion, again, the other critics in this section are quite prominent and represent (at least to some extent) the views of their respective schools whereas Sanger is just a garden variety economist representing his own views. If he has published an academic paper on Friedman lets see it, otherwise, you've only changed some random guy for some random economist, but still havent established why this person's view is important to our understanding of Friedman."

...Which you have completely ignored. --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 13:56, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

So J.R. Hercules is back at it again, this time it is Michael Hennigan and his book, 'Meltdown Iceland'. Ill start by saying that my earlier objection applies here, that merely being an economist or having an opinion does not necessarily establish why that person's view is relevant. Additionally, the linked citation has only this to say about Friedman "In the 1990's Icelandic Prime Minister David Oddsson, said to have been an admirer of former British pruime minister Baroness Thatcher and the late US adocate of free markets, economist Milton Friedman, privatised the banks which then funded big overseas acquisitions by a small number of people." which does not support the edits in question. Now, I havent read the whole book, so maybe it has more to say, but, again, per above, prove that this person's opinion is important enough to add here.

Further, J.R. Hercules was blocked twice for adding and re-adding material that he knew other editors would object to, and right after coming off his second block, he adds more or less the same material again without any discussion here. Bonewah (talk) 13:06, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

The stated source is Roger Boyes, not Michael Hennigan. You do actually read what you reflexively delete/revert before performing these reverts, don't you?

Here is a general litany of the ever-shifting, arbitrary rationales Bonewah in particular has employed while desperately reverting every one of my edits:

1) "Revert. This is from Huffington Post and Alternet, two sources which I unctiously don't consider to be proper sources of matters economic."

2) "Revert. Ok, so maybe Huffington Post and Alternet are merely the webpages which hosted the articles, and my earlier rationale is therefore meaningless. Nevertheless, I, uh, um, personally have never heard of such-and-such source. And what qualifies this person as an expert as far as what *I* consider to be an expert, anyway? Therefore, it doesn't belong here."

3)" Revert. Ok, so maybe he is a professional economist, after all. But merely having an opinion doesn't qualify just *any*body being mentioned here."

4) "Revert. Take it to the Talk Page. It must be talked about on the Talk Page before it can included in the article."

5) "Revert. Ok, so now that it *was* taken to the Talk Page, here are some more, brand-new reasons for me to keep making my reverts..."

6) "Revert. Merely being a professional economist isn't enough."

7) "Revert. These are all editorials."

8) "Revert. Ok, so maybe I don't actually know the definition of "editorial", because an editorial is actually an anonymous opinion written by the editorial staff of a newspapers or magazine. Nevertheless, I will continue to use the word "editorial" and I will continue to revert your edits while invoking the word "editorial", anyway."

9) "Revert. Ok, so maybe some of the sources you cited are actually news articles -- I will still reflexively revert the entirety of the edit.

10) "Revert. Yawn, this is simply the same type of thing as you did last time. Oh, it's in a different section of the article and uses an entirely different source? I've revert anyway."

11) "Revert. Maybe, if perhaps the source had actually written something on the topic."

12) "Revert. Merely writing a book on the topic isn't good enough in my opinion." J.R. Hercules (talk) 18:51, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Not only do I read what you continually re-add, I actually went to the library and looked through 'Meltdown Iceland'. You know what I found? Almost no mention of Friedman at all, which is exactly the complaint I have had from the beginning. The only places the book does mention Friedman it does so in passing, such as to say that the prime minister of Iceland was a fan of his. So what? As stunning as it apparently is to you, I expect a source to actually back up what is claimed in this article, not merely make a passing mention of the subject.

As for the rest of your personal attacks, I do know the definition of an editorial, more importantly, I know what wp:RS has to say about editorials "Some sources may be considered reliable for statements as to their author's opinion, but not for statements of fact without attribution. A prime example of this are Op-ed columns in mainstream newspapers." As I have said over and over again, I have no doubt that such and such a person is of X opinion, but so what? Lots and lots of people have opinions about Friedman, that doesnt make those opinions noteworthy. Again, as I have said over and over, Paul Krugman is notable, he is a nobel prize winner, a widely respected economist, and generally considered the standard bearer of Keynesian economic thought, and as such, his opinion is rightfully included. Toby Sanger, on the other hand, is just another economist, an unremarkable commentator who happens to share the same views as you. Same is true for Roger Boyes, who not only is an unremarkable commentator, but his work doesnt even support your claims.

And I havent even discussed how unbelievably vague your edits are. Biographies are supposed to deliver facts about the subject, and you write "debate swirled around the extent of Friedman's influence over the Icelandic economic policy" Talk about non-informative, you cant even say that he actually influenced Icelandic economic policy because the only contact Friedman had with Iceland was giving a talk there once. And what of the 'debate' that 'swirled', what sort of debate? Again, vague, non-descriptive verbage.

I could go on, your POV pushing, the fact that most of your citations dont even mention Friedman, your continuous edit warring, but your past history has shown that no matter what I say, you will not respond in good faith. Bonewah (talk) 19:44, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Friedman a Fascist Economist?

I can't think of a better example of fascist economics or of a fascist economist than Milton Friedman. Too spineless to admit it or take resopnsibility for the barbarism enacted based on his teachings. Broadly speaking, fascism is a breakdown of Capitalism's normal operating dynamics, and the need for a dismantling of civil society to allow a barbaric kick start - profit at any cost. Dressed up as something else, this is all Friedman's teachings amoount to. Strip away the wasteful, annoying trappings of a civil society which isn't profiting anyone, bleed it until you squeeze the very life out of it. How far do you have to look for a dozen examples of this? BadCop666 (talk) 22:20, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Stop the polemics and give citable examples. Examples that are non-partisan (as much as possible). Comments like this detract from legitimate criticisms or any earnest discussions. --Dchem (talk) 15:51, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

The supporting of the fascists in South America is obvious. The critics section is too short. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.121.41.181 (talk) 21:30, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

let me guess, Ms Naomi Klein has just sold another book? Bonewah (talk) 21:37, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

This is not a place for discussion of the article's topic. If a source isn't provided, it's probably worthwhile just deleting this part of the discussion thread, which is likely to derail and distract from actual use of the discussion thread for article discussion. 188.74.111.222 (talk) 04:10, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

The last comment in this section was over 2 months old when you added yours. And that comment was only there because someone added a response almost a full year after the one that began this section. No one is continuing this discussion but you. There wasn't any reason to try to revive it, especially if you didn't think it was appropriate for the page. Regardless, there is never any reason to delete content from a discussion page. In the future, please pay attention to the dates of posts and refrain from removing content from talk pages that are not your own user page. --JohnDoe0007 (talk) 18:51, 4 May 2010 (UTC)