Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Joe Klein's 21st November 2007 Time magazine column

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Secret ^account 00:26, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Joe Klein's 21st November 2007 Time magazine column[edit]

This article does not meet WP:NOTE; it is little more than a collection of columns responding to the column that is the subject of the "article" Unschool (talk) 04:40, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete, "blogosphere" blowback, by the looks of it. There are a lot of things wrong with the article, but when it comes down to it, the column simply isn't notable. Make a mention of it on Joe Klein if absolutely necessary. Lankiveil (talk) 05:27, 6 January 2008 (UTC).[reply]
Delete per nom. TJ Spyke 06:38, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Time is a major magazine. All of its articles will receive close scrutiny and this one is no different. Article violates WP:N, WP:OR, and WP:NPOV. Ice Cold Beer (talk) 07:42, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to Joe Klein. While most of the article is a rambling brain dump of the issue at hand, there doesn't seem to be an actual article anywhere within all of the information provided. A very limited subsection of the contents here should be merged to the author article and addressed there in a more coherent fashion. Alansohn (talk) 08:47, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How can I boil all of it down to a sentence or two? Because that's all that the folks there will allow because of disproportionate weight issues. --NBahn (talk) 08:53, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- You can mention his article, summarize what he said, and mention the overall response, with a possible summary of what the common reaction was. Blogs are not reliable sources - WP:SPS - so please don't cite those. Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought - WP:NOT#OR - and politicized debates are not welcome, constructive, or even interesting to editors trying to write good encyclopedia articles. The article at present is largely original research - WP:OR - because you've provided your own analysis by stringing blogosphere comments together. This "new synthesis of existing information" is not allowed. Wikipedia does not provide new interpretations of events, we regurgitate existing information (from reputable sources) into an article in the manner of an encyclopedia, not a newspaper, or magazine, or blog, or personal webpage, or essay. Most of the content does not belong whatsoever, in any form. For example, "memorable quotes"? The whole section should be deleted entirely. Humorous responses? Definitely gone. "Analysis"? Without even reading it, it's obvious the whole section probably needs to go (again, original research. we don't provide our own analysis). A few snippets from the "analysis from the mainstream media" could probably be salvaged, but not in the form of a mere collection of opinions TheBilly (talk) 11:50, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. This is not an encyclopedia article, it's a collection of links, which we are emphatically not. This is like a technorati search so that someone has a handy reference page for all the big or semi-big bloggers who have at one time made a comment on the topic. It's definitely WP:NPOV#Undue weight for a subject which can be adequately covered in about a paragraph. Even if it's the worst boner Klein ever committed to public view, it's not deserving an article of its own. --Dhartung | Talk 09:54, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Wikipedia is not a soapbox. Colonel Warden (talk) 10:32, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Nbahn as per comments on the talk page of Joe Klein I greatly admire your effort on this but the level of detail here is both not suitable and not notable enough for an encyclopedia. The few sentances on the Joe Klien article are enough to learn about the controversy. This article belongs in a political blog and although you have referenced it, it is mainly a list of links to different blogs. I am sorry but delete. Perhaps if you can get this to a few neat paragraphs of prose, with correct reference styling - see WP:References then maybe you might be able to swing me. But for now this article shouldnt be on WP. Sorry. LordHarris 10:33, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge after significant pruning and cleanup. This has multiple substanital issues - It's almost all original research, it cites blogs, it's blatantly non-neutral (phrasings like "this train-wreck of a paragraph"), but then again this was a controversial article one of the oldest and most respected magazines, so it's certainly worth mentioning that it happened and that there was a media response to it. That should be done in a very small section in the article about Joe Klein TheBilly (talk) 11:54, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
User:Lankiveil-- I like the way you so blithely dismiss the fact that between 4 and 20 million people now -- thanks to Klein and his editors -- believe that Democrats are "terrorist-coddling national security losers." Shouldn't such prominently placed inaccuracies/misstatements like these be described as such? But never mind that, you must be very busy -- so busy that you can't even be bothered to identify the "lot of things [that are] wrong with the article...." I do recall asking for input on the article; I guess that I should have been more specific and asked for constructive criticism.
User:Unschool--About the piece being "little more than a collection of columns...": If it wasn't structured like that, then you would be accusing me of engaging in original research.
So please allow me to repeat -- but rephrase -- my request: I would greatly appreciate it if someone would be kind enough to precisely show what needs improvement. Potshots from the peanut gallery are neither welcome nor desired.
--NBahn (talk) 06:53, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- You are claiming that every one of Time's readers agree with him (because in bold print the article says this is how many people read the magazine)? TJ Spyke 07:01, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - How will they know that the principle paragraph in Klein's column is not just false but flagrantly false? (Or, put another way, how many of them will see on the internet the sources that I cited?) --NBahn (talk) 07:08, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - Wikipedia isn't the place for saying if someone is lying or telling the truth. TJ Spyke 07:11, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Another comment. Since this is a US based topic (and the original column appeared in the main US-based Time Magazine), the article title should use US date format(i.e. it should be Joe Klein's November 21, 2007 Time magazine column) and the internal dates should also use US dating. None of this will matter though if the article gets deleted. TJ Spyke 07:11, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- So wikipedia does not sort fact from fiction? I must have missed that particular memo. I don't suppose that you would be kind enough to provide a source for that now, would you? --NBahn (talk) 07:22, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nbahn, to the best of my knowledge, you and I have never met up on any issue in the past. Accordingly, I find it somewhat presumptuous of you to tell me how I would react to a situation that I never had to confront. Even I don't know for sure how I would act in the situation you describe.
Having said that, what constructive criticism can I offer? Frankly, I have some serious issues with the layout. Unless an article is actually a "list", and titled as such, then it should be compiled in a prose format. An article written appropriately is something that I can read to someone else, and they will be able to follow the article's flow. But this article has no flow, because it does not have one sentence which follows another. It's just not stylistically correct.
But that really is a moot point, and one that I shouldn't belabor, because, most importantly, I think that the article fails to meet the standards of notability. Even if you wrote this in the most flowing prose, I'd still've probably nominated it for deletion. Klein is a columnist. His job is to provoke thought and even controversy within the political dialogue in America. And other columnists often respond to and rebut their fellow columnists' articles. I started regularly reading political columns over thirty years ago, and this just seems perfectly ordinary to me, Nbahn. I just don't see any notability.
I admire the huge amount of work you put into this. I know that it hurts to have others denigrate your efforts. But don't mistake that for denigrating you. Anyone willing to put that much work into an attempt at an article will surely have good things to bring to this encyclopedia. With more time and experience, you'll someday probably look back at this discussion and better understand what is being said here. Good luck. Unschool (talk) 07:28, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And Nbahn, I also realize that I may sound a bit patronizing. I don't mean to be. It's just that I realize that I'm still relatively inexperienced as a Wikipedian, with only a little over 5000 edits, compared to many of these people that have tens of thousands of edits. I'm still learning. And you—you have less than 100 main space edits. You still have a lot to pick up; I hope that that fact makes you eager to learn, not angry and resentful. Unschool (talk) 07:47, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- So if I understand you correctly -- and I'm far from certain that I do -- then what you're saying is that it's perfectly acceptable for a noted columnist at one of the country's most infuential news magazines to promote flagrant falsehoods &/or lie through his teeth. I thought that yellow journalism was supposed to have died out generations ago. The truth is supposed to be identified as the truth, and a lie is supposed to be identified as a lie. Has political discourse in this country so deteriorated that journalists are expected to lie based upon their respective publication's political leanings? That is as vile as it is corrupt. --NBahn (talk) 08:30, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - No, I'm not saying that at all. However I must say that this encyclopedia is not the place to hash out such a partisan issue. One of the core principles of Wikipedia is to maintain a Neutral Point of View. And you don't really want a "neutral" article, do you? You're upset about this. Hard to write neutrally in such a state. Unschool (talk) 09:35, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Nbahn, Please calm down, and please do not use tortured logic. The fact that an article on a topic is not notable for Wikipedia has nothing to do with whether it's "acceptable" in society at large. You are trying to shame us into becoming a fact-checking service, but that's not what an encyclopedia does (Media Matters and Think Progress perform that function). If you have a beef with TIME, I suggest that you contact the editorial staff there. This has nothing to do with our policies. --Dhartung | Talk 22:06, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. All this boils down to is "a columnist wrote a column the premise of which was incorrect". That happens all the time and so is inherently non-notable. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 23:31, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete -- article has zero claim of notablity, maybe mention a line or two elsewhere but that is all --T-rex 00:42, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete mention elsewhere, but not in its own separate article. Fails notability. — BQZip01 — ^talk 04:56, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete POV fork of Joe Klein. --Samiharris (talk) 16:28, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Lankiveil and others, above. Would the article have been notable if it were not written in TIME or by Joe Klein? Would it have received the same scrutiny? I submit that, since notability is not inherited, that the column itself is not notable. However, the fact that TIME published the column, or the fact that Klein wrote it, may be worth a mention in one of those articles, provided that independent, reliable sources are provided to discuss the article. We cannot judge truth or fabrication in the article itself, because that is synthesis and Original Research, which is not permitted. We can note that Klein was criticised due to the article, and note the source and nature of the criticism, but we must then also note that other media sources defended Klein, saying thus and so. We must have balanced coverage, or no coverage at all. UltraExactZZ ^Claims~ Evidence 13:19, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete or possibly Merge per theBilly and others, above. It's good work, but belongs somewhere other than Wikipedia. Petershank (talk) 22:50, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.