User talk:John Broughton

Welcome

Hey there, John Broughton. Welcome to Wikipedia. Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! By the way, you should sign your name on Talk and vote pages using three tildes, like this: ~~~. Four tildes (~~~~) produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! --Lord Voldemort ^{(Dark Mark)} 20:10, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Help on the timeline

If you're willing, I'd love you to help hack around on the Jack Abramoff timeline -- right now it's mostly notes... --User At Work 22:29, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

RI Political Races

So should I just start leaving you messages about what I edit next, so you can wikipedia-ize them?

Dadip6 13:26, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

It was a joke. I noticed that several times (I believe Sheldon Whitehouse as well as Carl Sheeler and perhaps one or two other articles) I would flesh out an article and then you would make them look like actual Wikipedia articles, as opposed to what I had left. We were operating as an inadvertent tag-team, and I was amused. Sorry for confusing you. Dadip6

Thanks. I'm a Rhode Island resident, and have never seen him poll above 10 percent (besides in a campaign press release interpreting undecideds to be supporting him) so I was immediately concerned about that tidbit. I've been concerned because I've seen his people continually trying to edit the article and use it as campaign propaganda. That being said, thank you for saving it from deletion, I worked hard collecting some of that information. By the way, I am soon going to be adding an article on Patrick C. Lynch, Rhode Island attorney general, if you would like to edit it. --Dadip6 12:59, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

The Patrick C. Lynch page is up.--Dadip6 16:01, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Thought you might want to check out my comments at Talk:Stephen Laffey. Dadip6 17:13, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Marianas Islands

As you know, I've wanted to do an separate article on this for a while. Now this Legal Times article says that "Roger Stillwell, the desk officer for the Mariana Islands at the U.S. Department of the Interior who dealt closely with disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, is expected to plead guilty to a misdemeanor count of false certification, his attorney confirmed Wednesday." I think the time has come! (I'm also going to drop this note to User:Kwh) -- Sholom 19:49, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

You answered Regarding an article on the scandal in the Marianas Islands - I can help with editing in general and copyediting in particular, but don't expect to have much time to do anything else (i.e., finding sources). Please let me know when you put up a draft page.

Hmm, that sounds like how we started the previous joint effort -- sounds good to me. I will attempt to do a data dump (and report back here), before I leave. Please see Jack Abramoff/CNMI. I am going on vacation for a week and will have no access on-line until next Wednesday. -- Sholom 12:50, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Thought you'd be interested

... in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Patrick Murphy (politician), and Wikipedia:Candidates_and_elections. -- Sholom 19:26, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Thelma Drake

As per your suggestion, I created Virginia 2nd congressional district election, 2006, and moved the campaign stuff out of both of the challengers' pages (Thelma Drake and Phillip Kellam). I think this kind of thing (moving campaign material to separate articles) is a good idea -- I think <g> -- I'm still getting used to it. -- Sholom 19:17, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your sound advice. BTW, the entry's been moved to User:The Thadman/Advocacy Requests. -- Sholom 14:30, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Phyllis Busansky article deletion

John, I need your help and some understanding here for a moment. I now believe you guys deleted this article on Phyllis Busansky without an understanding of who she is or the importance of this race. Busansky is the ONLY Democrat in the race and she is FAR from a "lesser candidate." She is one of a very few candidates nationwide given "Red to Blue" status by the DCCC. The contest in FL9 is being watched nationwide. Additionally, her opponent's Wiki page is still up and running. His name is Gus Bilirakis. In the interest of fairness, in the interest of realizing that the article was cleaned up dramatically to conform to the NPOV guidelines and in the interest of doing the right thing, will you guys please stop all this heavy handed stuff and drop the restrictions? People deserve to know about the whole race, not just 1 candidate. If you won't do that, then would you please also delete the Bilirakis article, which also appears to fall under the same areas you guys shut this one down for? Thanks. 20:07, 9 July 2006 JohnTampa

• I note with interest your preparation of the article Florida 9th congressional district election, 2006, perhaps in response to the above?. This seems to duplicate United States House elections, 2006#Florida to which it seems not to be linked (unless I missed the link which is entirely possible!). It seems to me that the better course is to merge your content into the substantive article - what do you think? BlueValour 22:03, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

User:Edicius and Great Neck Village School

From User talk:Edicius.

It is the same user as User:Kyla and User:Jessica Liao, among other accounts this user has/had. I recognize the user page format, and the subjects and pages that the user contributes to. I once saw that this user was born in January 1988 and a 12th grade student at Great Neck, which means she's 18, but shouldn't be a high school student still (as she states in her user page as of June 2006) unless she failed. --User:Carie 00:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

You asked the question, and I answered it. --User:Carie 00:25, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Political article question

A subject that's interested me: Congressional districts. There exists, sometimes, districts which are the same in number only, but that are radically different after a decennial re-drawing. The historical continuity is kinda weird -- not that I have any suggestions. However, an interesting solution to a location-specific situation exists in a past version of Tennessee's 9th congressional district. That is the current congressional district that emcompasses Memphis. Over the years, Memphis has been in the 8th, 9th, and 10th congressional districts. Where does one find the information if one wants to know who has represented Memphis in Congress? In a past version, somebody actually compiled that information. I thought it was pretty cool. Some time later, however, somebody removed it with the comment: "removing 'History of Memphis based distict'. This belongs in a Politics of Memphis article, not here." Clearly (imho) the info ought to be somewhere. But where? I'd be interested in your opinion on the matter. -- Sholom 12:48, 12 July 2006 (UTC) (PS, thanks for the clarification on 3RR).

Civility on AfD

I am in agreement that the following edit [1] violates WP:CIVIL and constitutes a personal attack. I think that the "Or do you think sarcasm suffices?" might have been edging very slightly toward a provocation, but Calton's response was wholly out of line. I have perceived a similar trend in nominations for deletion, but it would be good if you could demonstrate a good-faith effort to find Republican nominees that have been brought up for deletion. Captainktainer * Talk 14:19, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Tom Davis and United States House Committee on Government Reform

Might you check out Tom Davis and United States House Committee on Government Reform, and their associated talk pages. This guy User:Acham is determined to be a one-man hatchet job against Davis. Which is weird, because I live in Davis' district, and am voting for his opponent. Nevertheless, his edits are hopelessly POV and his responses to my comments are rarely on point. (As far as United States House Committee on Government Reform, I haven't even tried to edit that yet.) Thoughts? -- Sholom 13:07, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

FWIW, the issue is still raising its head. I finally vented a little bit. See Talk:Thomas M. Davis. -- Sholom 13:33, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

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deleting my stuff

hey man. you deleted some of my edits for no good reason. all of those senators voted against john mccains amendment that would prohibit torture of prisoners. i dont know what 'source' you want, if the United States congress is not good enough for you.

like i said before, wikipedia is being taken over by thought police who dont care about reality.

John E. Sweeney

Hey, nice catch on the deleted sections of John E. Sweeney. You see that article was hit pretty hard by a persistent vandal and I didn't even think to look for stuff that hadn't been caught when I modified the ref formatting. Good job!  :) —Wknight94 (talk) 17:12, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Other than the one section which was more like a news item, all I did was reformat how the references look. They were already there - it's just the new format groups them and presents them in a nicer way. But thanks anyway!  :) —Wknight94 (talk) 17:39, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Estate tax article, IRS cutback

Interesting article, I guess I should apply for work there. Bona Fides 19:22, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Re: social promotion

I have fixed what needed to be fixed. Newcomers mean well but they can mess things up heavily... and this user did this the second time :/ -- _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus  talk}  15:35, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Deleting articles on candidates

I just posted a comment about this on User talk:JChap2007, and then noticed you had as well. You might want to take a look at what I posted, in case you think it's relevant. John Broughton 14:09, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the heads up : )
It was informative. - Jc37 14:14, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Vowgs

No, I don't know him - I just stuck a {{blatantvandal}} tag on his talk page. If you want him to stop doing it, I suggest you report him somewhere - Wikipedia:AIAV or WP:RFI perhaps. Stephenb (Talk) 08:25, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Tobacco Advertising

Hi John. I seriously think that people working for Wikipedia and/or Wikipedia itself must be receiving funding by tobacco companies because the tobacco product pages seem to be getting defended a hell of alot. Why is this? It can't be because of "Wikipedia policy" because that is a load of garbage. The people defending the tobacco product pages are probably working for the tobacco companies (Eg: Moderators and other people that are freely allowed to edit these pages). It is not necessary at all to let tobacco products be advertised on Wikipedia-Not every single article on Wikipedia has an image, so why should tobacco products? Tobacco is an ADDICTIVE product. It causes a huge amount of morbidity and mortality each year, yet Wikipedia doesn't mind being associated with these drug dealers. You should not care about Wikipedia policy, and instead care about the potential saving of peoples lives by stopping the advertising of these products on this website. Gillies corner 01:24, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

If he doesn't care about Wikipedia policy, he gets blocked. Wikipedia is not a place for a moral crusade, even one that I agree with. Captainktainer * Talk 20:31, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

American Hunters and Shooters Association

As per the request for Mediation Cabal mediation, I've added my thoughts to the talk page Talk:American Hunters and Shooters Association. Since there are only two parties in this dispute, I think it's quite possible to resolve everything on the talk page. In any case, I have added what I think is a reasonable compromise position; please respond and let me know if you are happy with this compromise. -- Deville (Talk) 23:04, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Politicy/Strategy for reporting congressional races, etc

Hey John! First off, many thanks for that link. Very impressive! On another issue, I went to the Cynthia McKinney entry, in order to update from results last night. There's still a ton of info about the campaign. I was a bit reluctant to simply cut it all out. I was wondering your thoughts on the matter. I see three viable options: (a) just excise it; (b) stick the info in Georgia's 4th congressional district; or (c) create a 2006 Ga 4th Election article. (Note: a non-trivial amount will indeed be cut out if options (b) or (c) are chosen). So . . . your thoughts?

I actually have a much larger thought. I was wondering if all congressional election info ought to be in their respective congressional district articlces? FWIW, I have seen it that way for one state, although I can't for the life of me remember which one. -- Sholom 12:13, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I like your ideas. And I'd be happy to join in any wikiproject in this regard, as well as helping to implement all that you just suggested to me. Unfortunately, I'm swamped at work this week, because I'm going away for two weeks starting Sunday and I need to finish up a number of things. Not sure how much I'll get to before Aug 28. -- Sholom 15:04, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Two quick things: (a) I have a first draft of Georgia 4th congressional district election, 2006 up, and took out info from Cynthia McKinney and Hank Johnson; clean up for all three articles are probably needed; (b) that awesome website you pointed me to with all the congressional races disappeared (or, more likely, moved) -- do you know where it went? -- Sholom 15:45, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Weird. Now it works for me, too. This morning I was getting redirected somewhere else. Oh well. On another interesting election issue, this article describes an interesting case, although doesn't describe it well (which is rare for cqpolitics). I _think_ it's saying that: (a) Ciro Rodriguez lost to Henry Cuellar in the Dem primary for Texas's 28th congressional district but b/c of the recent court case, got redistricted into Texas's 23rd congressional district and is now going to challenge Henry Bonilla in a make-shift primary that'll be on Nov 7. -- Sholom 21:01, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Great job on cleaning up Georgia 4th congressional district election, 2006. It's been a pleasure, once again, collaberating with you. However, in a few hours, I'll be away for 2+ weeks on vacation with very limited 'net access. Hold the fort while I'm gone! ;) -- Sholom 16:33, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Texas' congressional races

Hi John, I'm back from vacation. And jumping right into writing more about elections. I was toying with the idea of creating an article for Texas' 22 race (Delay's former district). I'm asking for your opinion on where to put the information. If we follow our (very recent) past practice, we'd put the info in an article called Texas 22nd congressional district election, 2006. But I see that there is already articles and/or information in other places: (a) Texas 22nd congressional district special election, 2006 (which has nothing in it); (b) Texas United States House elections, 2006 which is designed to have information on all the races (and, if complete, would be unweildy, certainly in a few more years); and (c) Texas's 22nd congressional district which would also suffer from some unweildiness in the future. So, my initial thought it to create a new article called Texas 22nd congressional district election, 2006, and delete a lot of other info and/or have "see also", and/or do redirects. But, before I was that bold, I wanted your opinion on this. Thoughts? -- Sholom 17:21, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your thoughts. Yes we do agree. I went and did the move, and added the "see also" to the other articles (but had a hard time actually deleting any info -- perhaps my bad, feel free to go in and delete). Again -- thanks. BTW, on another topic, I see you've recently done some work on Jack Abramoff/CNMI, I look forward to it becoming ready for prime time some day! -- Sholom 19:17, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Minor note

One of wikipedia's tenants is to assume good faith. In your last edit summary at Georgia 4th congressional district election, 2006, you said "removed commentary of a Wikipedian". In fact, the text you removed - text that I put in - was taken directly from a politics1.com page. I don't feel strongly about the text, one way or another, but I do mind being accused of adding "commentary". I don't. (And yes, the text was not sourced - but "Removed commentary" would have sufficed as an edit summary.) John Broughton 17:15, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

First of all, I did assume good faith. Second, I did jump to a conclusion that it was your commentary, but that does not mean that I did not assume good faith, I merely attributed the commentary to you without checking with you directly (I had no other way of knowing because there was no citation given), that does not mean that I did not assume good faith. You are probably correct that she does run as a candidate quite often, but I did not see the relevance to the article. Also, there is no Wikipedia article about her, I don't think there should be, but unless we do an article about her then it is best not to comment on her. Third, I am well aware of politics1.com. I have been following its various incarnations over the years (shutting down, starting back up, changing format, etc.), but at the end of the day I would call it a blog, and as such, it is not a source that can cited in Wikipedia. Also, if not a blog then an Internet news compiler--similar in form and content as Lucianne.com. Under either scenario it is not appropriate for citation. In summary, I apologize for jumping to a conclusion that it was your commentary, but it would have been easier to spot that if a citation had been given. Best, --Getaway 18:44, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Re: 155.188.183.5 and 155.188.183.6

Taken care of, thanks for noticing that. Let me know if the vandlism continues, it looks like switching IP addresses isn't too hard for this fellow. Also post it at WP:AIV, for I may not be on for too much longer. -- Natalya 17:00, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

George Allen

Sorry, hope I didn't offend. I think the Prospect is right that this could turn out to be yet another blot on Allen's record. In my opinion it seems more likely than not that it will. Perhaps, if other editors agree with my initial assessment of the text you added, you could keep it in a safe place and repost if Allen is implicated in the big mess in the future? I betcha you'll get to :) · j·e·r·s·y·k·o talk · 19:58, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for rewording the Senate part and making it more appropriate 72.130.182.2BoltsFan

Gil Gutknecht

Did the strib contacting you over the Gil Gutknecht edits? I did a revert on the 14th to Gutknecht then went on my merry way, today I see your edit and read the artcle. Crazy! -Ravedave 18:01, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

I realized about the govt site after I did the revert but it was propaganda anyways. The revert Jonathunder did was becuase I posted to the admin notice board. I knew WP has had libel issues before so I did't want to get involved since the edits said "On the authority of Gutekentchs office". I may contact the strib writer of this article. I am amazed how journos always manage to mangle articles about WP in one way or another. -Ravedave 19:33, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Feel free though I have a feeling he won't know anythign about this. -Ravedave 19:50, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

8th district

Those are some good ideas. Next time I have time, I will look those up and add the text. I live at college now, and free time is limited. ЯyanGerbil10(The people rejoice!) 21:57, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Jack Abramoff Indian lobbying scandal

Would you take a look at the latest edits in Jack Abramoff Indian lobbying scandal? The Byron Dorgan addition seems silly but I don't want to get into an edit war. Maybe there should be a more prominent link to to Monetary influence of Jack Abramoff ? --User At Work 20:36, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Council for National Policy

Since you removed the link to Stephen Harper, would you suggest another way to show this information? His speech to the group was highly controversial in Canada, and this is well discussed in the article on him. There is no need to rehash it on the CNP article, but a link I think would helpful and appropriate. After all how many other current world government leaders have spoken to that group (and acknowledged it publicly)? Kevlar67 01:48, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I added a better link, and altered the wording. But generally, I think it works well. Thanks. Kevlar67 12:39, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Hal Rogers

Hal Rogers, the Founder of Kin Canada was not known as Harold Rogers. Your attempt to claim the name Hal Rogers as the exclusive name for Harold Dallas Rogers cannot be justified. Harold A. Rogers, the Founder of Kin Canada, was always known as Hal Rogers. The page titled Hal Rogers should be a disambiguation page. Thanks for referring me to these other pages but nothing on those pages gives you exclusive right to the name Hal Rogers. I believe my change was appropriate. Please contact me so that we can attempt to resolve this matter without going throught the arbitration process Doug 16:55, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

You might like to review the Membership page to see that the requirement for three articles is not a strict limit. Doug 19:50, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

First, you should know that I am happy with how you have resolved the issue. Please see my edit to Harold Rogers.

Your "rule" about needing three terms for a disambiguation page is non-existent. And, even if there were such a rule, the disambiguation guideline makes it clear that the rules are flexible. 74.119.199.226 23:11, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Brown-Henderson

Is she the daughter of the plantiff or the plaintiff? I have not lived in Kansas in 15 years, but I seem to remember that she is the plaintiff, she was the little girl. Her mother worked with the attorneys on the case, but she was the little girl denied access. I believe that I have that correct. The girl would be the only person who would have standing in a court of law to sue. That's why I fairly sure that she was the plaintiff, not the daughter of the plaintiff.--Getaway 16:18, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Hey, I'm just quoting from the article. And I'm not a lawyer. But generally (a) a minor cannot sue, and (b) a minor's mother clearly would have standing since she has a significant interest in getting a good education for her child. Unless you have another source, I think you should leave the article's wording as is. John Broughton 16:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I simply asked a simple, civilized question. No need for the hysterics.--Getaway 16:26, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

No need to suggest hysterics where there are none, either. Just sayin'. Nortelrye 06:40, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks

Dear John: Thanks for the advice re my editing and categorizing. I will try to improve to meet accepted Wiki standards. Littlemo 19:30, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

More thanks

Thanks for reverting the deletions to tom feeney's page. http://reddit.com/info/itoo/comments 10:50, 17 September 2006 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tuber eater (talk • contribs)

Moving an article

• I did not realize that at all, but figured it out when I saw your comment at WP:RM. I'm glad to have learned something new. Thanks for your help. Skeezix1000 21:28, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Webb edits

I do not understand why the Women contoversey about Webb was removed and considered Vandalism? I dont see this as vandalism at all but a valid sourced fact. Doug rosenberg 20:59, 28 September 2006 (UTC) I will use the summary box in the future. I was not aware of it. Doug rosenberg 21:03, 28 September 2006 (UTC) You moved the contoversey to the campaign page. Now,I look at the George Allen page and over 1/2 the page consists of controversey associated with the 2006 election campaign. Why don't you apply your same diligence to the George Allen page to clean it up?--Doug rosenberg 20:13, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

'nother election article

I just added Colorado 5th congressional district election, 2006, and also editing out some material from the candidates themselves. There are a number of races I wanted to do, I'm not sure this was the most competitive one, but, whatever. I thought I could whip it off quickly, but, darn, these things, take so long. Oh well, I'm sure there's a ton that can be improved if you want to give it the once over. -- Sholom 15:23, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

...and another one: California 11th congressional district election, 2006. -- Sholom 15:16, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

...two more for today: Nevada 2nd congressional district election, 2006, and Pennsylvania 10th congressional district election, 2006 -- Sholom

...another: Ohio 13th congressional district election, 2006. For this, I was trying something new (back-research into an interesting primary). It took way too long, and I had to stop, and the result looks pretty ugly (including the ref's). -- Sholom 17:12, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

In re Category:Fundraisers

It seemed like a good idea to create a category for fundraisers, given their particular notoriety. I understand your point that every politician raises funds, but that does not necessarily make every politician a professional "fund raiser", I don't think. (Should we add "Professional" to the category name?)

In any event you are free to do what you like, and if you want to recommend it for deletion, I can't stop you.

HOT L Baltimore 13:07, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Candidates for election - wikiproject

In this edit summary you ask that editors "wait until after the early November election". Wikipedia is not a soapbox for hosting blurbs for election candidates. We don't keep articles about candidates during elections and then delete the losers when the elections are over. Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, and people warrant biographical articles only if they already satisfy our Wikipedia:Criteria for inclusion of biographies. Gus Bilirakis does, for having already won an election to a state legislature, and that is the correct grounds on which to dispute the proposed deletion (which in fact you beat me to doing). Uncle G 22:20, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I have to review some of the AfDs from today, but merely being nominated for Congress does not make one notable. A state legislator supposedly is notable so I believe I nominated some articles in error. WatchingYouLikeAHawk 04:48, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Hey! Lemme know when you see candidates for House being nominated for AfD! I was stunned to come back for the weekend and see that Jerry McNerney had been nominated, and had already been decided. Yikes! They wanted to merge it in with California 11th congressional district election, 2006 -- an article I would not have written had I known it'd be used as leverage to remove Jerry McNerney's article! In any event, perhaps we need to start a push to change Wikipedia:Criteria for inclusion of biographies to be much more inclusive of US House candidates. Thoughts? (BTW, also see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Diane Farrell (Second nomination).) -- Sholom 14:33, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. In the meantime, let's make a plan for my suggestion above (we need to start a push to change Wikipedia:Criteria for inclusion of biographies to be much more inclusive of US House candidates.). Perhaps we ought to start after the elections, and we can notify all those who have been voting "keep" on folks like Diane Farrell that the issue is being raised. Wouldn't it be great for there to be an official policy along the lines of "A major party nominee in any US Senate race, or in any House race where the race is considered competitive or notable is considered notable for inclusion of biographies"? (Yeah, yeah, we'd still have to define "competitive and notable", but you get the idea). Thoughts? (BTW, you wrote "did a bunch of prods to candidates" -- what's "prod"?) -- Sholom 13:26, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

.. also Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Van Taylor, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Russell (Florida politician), Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/J. Richard Chema, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jim Henley. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Joe Ross (politician). Man, those guys are relentless. Wouldn't it be awesome if they devoted just half that time into improving/writing articles, instead of calling for deletions? -- Sholom 17:38, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

answering various parts of your last message:

• I understand not putting energy into supporting congressional Candidates who are sacrificial lambs. It's hard for me to do, too, although I do tend to be an inclusionist and since "WP is not paper" see no harm in including them.
• As for your five step plan I have a few comments:
  • It is possible that perhaps I can whip up a little program that would create code -- from a template -- for individual house races in 2008
  • Are you thinking along the lines of an article for each race? Or just those potentially competitive or significant? The former seems like a lot of work, but the latter is completely unpredictable. Even races thought to be blow-outs can suddenly turn competitive (as we have certainly seen this year). I'd like to hear your thoughts on this
  • In parallel with this, I'd like to see a bit of time developing a really top-notch template, which will be useful (obviously) no matter which direction we go. We can cruise the current articles, and pick the best of the best from them.

-- Sholom 20:44, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the copyedits on the three election articles. BTW, would you mind checking out Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ellen Simon -- Sholom 14:30, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Nice plan you outlined on my page. Thorough and comprehensive. I only have two slight tweak-ideas.

• You wrote: Then slap redirects on the articles on challengers (if of questionable notability) so that there is no need for AfDs for these. (Such AfDs are bad precedent, in general a waste of time regardless of outcome, and successful AfDs could kill off source info.) I tend towards inclusionism, so, while I generally agree with your statement, I would also like to see if we could get a specific proposal in WP:C&E to cut off those AfD's.
• As I wrote above, I would slightly expand your definition of notable races. I wrote earlier (cut if from above and put it here, to reduce redundancy): the list of competitive and/or notable races ought to (imho) include races for which the primary was the main race. There have been races where all the action was in the competitive primaries (e.g., in Harold Ford's old seat (where Ford's cousin, or nephew, lost and is running as an independent; Major Owens's old seat in NYC, etc.).

Again -- nice job! -- Sholom 17:00, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Are you...

... John Broughton? ---J.S (t|c) 22:29, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm actually referring to the subject of the article "John Broughton"... Just wondering if your the same person. ---J.S (t|c) 22:43, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Jim Gerlach, Lois Murphy and the PA-6 campaign

I just created a PA-6 election page (partly to deal with an edit-war with an anon-IP user ('Dan') who's deleted the ARMPAC info from the Gerlach page 6 times now).

Perhaps I could impose on you (as at least a somewhat uninvolved 3rd party) to put an appropriate summary paragraph in the Gerlach and Murphy pages for the '06 campaign. If I re-add anything at all to the Gerlach page I'm sure 'Dan' will delete it again; he's ignored a Third Opinion.

Thanks! jesup 06:19, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks John; excellent edits on the Gerlach page (it's more informative now) (and also PA-6 and Murphy edits). I'm trying to take the ball and run with it to continue the improvements. jesup 14:34, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

re: Michele Bachmann

Very well said, thank you. I was about to post, but I realized that nothing more need be said. Impressively diplomatic and patient. --Aguerriero (talk) 22:42, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Thank You

For offering your opinion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lori Klausutis (third nomination). The article was deleted. "The quality of mercy is not strain'd . . . It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God's, When mercy seasons justice." ~ Wm. Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act IV Scene 1. Morton devonshire 22:42, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Very impressive

User talk:John Broughton/United States House elections, 2006. Wow! Super impressive! 207.69.136.204 06:27, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

3R whatever thing

Ok, I messed up, I'm new to wikipedia, and I didn't know. I did however add a talk page. It also appears that I only reverted twice, and I added talk pages and referenced why in each one. You really don't have to make such a big deal over it, we're all just trying to get the facts straight here please don't be so rude in the future. As for the content, I will be adding Glenda Parker to the lead in to serve neutrality. These are pages about a person and not just the race. In this case, since there are only three candidates (as opposed to 7 or 8 in others), I guess that neutrality is served, but not as well as removing the candidates. Anyways, further dicussion can be on the talk page.

I saw the Gail Parker objection in talk, so I didn't do it. Thanks for the direction to signing posts.

Scarborough article

In your vote to redirect in the Klausutis article AfD, you suggested a paragraph in the Joe Scarborough article would suffice. Now there is an edit war in that article over whether her name can be mentioned, or if she must be an anonymous staffer. Just wondered what your views were on that. Thanks. Edison 14:03, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Your comments on my talk page

Thanks for the tips, they make sense. I have lately been lurking on pages with enough controversy that any edits are immediately reverted if not accompanied with a :talk explanation, thus my extended comments. Anyway, I take your tips into account, and thanks for the heads up. 01:07, 31 October 2006 — Preceding unsigned comment added by SuperJerms (talk • contribs)

Clint Curtis

John,

Do you have time to look at the Clint Curtis page over the next week or so? I've been working with an anonymous user to try to balance the page, but we're kind of going at it hammer and tongs, so a fresh viewpoint might be helpful. Thanks, TheronJ 14:57, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Wiki Administrator abuses (aka Clint Curtis redux)

John,

TheronJ has repeatedly been vandalizing the Clint Curtis page, including the deletion of well cited sentences, paragraphs, the insertion of obvious bias (including the summary of a Wired news article that was completly skewed to slander Curtis's biography). Today he deleted quotes and citations from the Orlando Sentinel.

If you do an intestigation, he is a political activist that vandalizes negativly the profiles of Democrats by deleting information that can be considered positive and adds negative content and does exactly the opposite to Republican profiles. TheronJ insists that this is "balance." If you look on the Curtis page, you will see that Tom Feeney's response to Curtis's allegations has been twice as long as the section that describes the allegations. Under a campaign issues section, he adds Feeney's response to Curtis. It is wrong because the issues do not mention Feeney at all. Not only do these NOT reflect balance, it is a serious violation of Wikipedia's standards that requires action.

TheronJ is abusing his power as a Wiki manager and has had repeated warnings in the discussion page of Clint Curtis and now his user talk page. These flagerant abuses deligitimize Wikipedia and places it in a difficult position of dealing with slander against a living person.

Please take whatever action you can to take see that these abuses no longer continue.

Thank you.

131.94.253.123 22:26, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, I'm just another editor here, not an administrator. But for starters, I would suggest that you register for an account (that is, get a user name). It's hard to respond on your user page when you apparently use a dial-up (based on the above being your one and only posting with that IP address). More importantly, you will have more credibility as a named user than as an anonymous IP. Also, to quibble, it's libel, not slander (slander is spoken, libel is written).

I've already promised (unenthusiastically) to look at the page, and I will do so. I'll start with WP:BLP, since there are strong policies against posting negative information that does not comply with WP:RS, and I'll look at compliance with other procedures such as WP:V and WP:NPOV. You might want to read up on WP:CIVIL and keep the point of your discussions to the article's content, as aggravating as you might find the behavior of others.

Finally, one or both of you might want to consider the processes described at Wikipedia:Resolving disputes, if you've not already done so. John Broughton | Talk 22:38, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Jerry Weller

Thanks for your message. I find your deletion of the external links to be a clear violation of NPOV and will continue to replace them accordingly. — goethean ॐ 23:26, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Jerry McNerney Quit West Point in Protest of Vietnam War

John, in your McNerney article, you state that McNerney quit West Point in protest of Vietnam War. I spoke with McNerney and he says he did not quit in protest. What background material can you share regarding this point? I am a graduate of West Point and spent 21 years on active duty. I am also a prior President of the West Point Society of Silicon Valley. This background information would help in determining if McNerney is another protester of Vietnam similar to John Kerry. Appreciate any info. 19:47, 4 November 2006 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.169.159.50 (talk • contribs)

Note: I'm copying this comment/question to Talk:Jerry McNerney and posting my response there. John Broughton | Talk 21:34, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Senate Page

Hi! Just wanted to say thanks for helping to keep the United States Senate Page article up to date. eric 22:01, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

That works great then, as I will be off-line for a few days starting friday eric 01:56, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Democratic Deluge of 2006

Way to be pro-active! Nice job.

A few quick random thoughts on the subject:

• The media may end up coining a different phrase regarding what happened, we'll have to see.
• Part of the GOP problem is that the right wing is going too far to the right. I can think of two districts (C0-? and AZ-08) off-hand where the retiring GOP Congressman left a bruising GOP primary, and ended up not not endorsing the winner, because he was so RW and/or the campaign was so nasty. In Kansas, the extremists have such strength in the state party that the chair of the state GOP switched party affiliation and is running as Lt Gov with the popular Dem incumbent gov. (Similarly, I think the Attny general candidate for the Dem party was a major GOP party big-wig). In ID-01 the Club for Growth backed a guy (is his name Sali?) who is so abrasive that his worst criticisms come from GOP state senators.
• A note about gerrymandering "Gerrymandering has a flip side, too. To carve out the largest number of partisan districts, officials run the risk of spreading their loyal voters too thin. G. Terry Madonna, who runs the Keystone Poll at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, said that Pennsylvania Republicans who controlled the last round of redistricting “got greedy” — creating some districts with favorable balances too small to survive a wave of discontent....“It’s never exactly static,” said Mr. Cain. “People shift from being independent to moderate or back to independent. Redistricting is good only as long as preferences are stable.”" [2] I read somewhere else that this, apparently is part of the GOP problem in TX-22 (DeLay gave up some "GOP territory" to other districts in order to stengthen the others.

-- Sholom 03:09, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Wikiproject: House Races 2006

OK, boss, what's next? I was up way too late last night to think straight or in an organized fashion today. (On the other hand, if you say "do x y and z", I can do some of x, y, or z today.) May I suggest that you announce a place to start here? Also, FYI, the site I am currently using to get results is http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006//pages/results/states/XX/index.html, where "XX" is the two-digit postal code of the state. (Also, should a Project Page get started?) -- Sholom 13:51, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Things are, unfortunately, happening too fast for me. I just redid Arizona 1st congressional district election, 2006 to make it look like a real article, but then, it occurred to me: which race should be a template as an example of a great election article? I also updated Arizona 8th congressional district election, 2006 slightly. (I also discovered that it _seems_ like, but I can't tell for sure, that the Arizona primaries are open primaries. If that's the case, how should we report primary results? I reported them two different ways in the 1st and 8th. Please advise on that one). (Also, take a look at Rick Renzi's article, and tell me what you think: (i) should be moved to the election article; (ii) cut completely; or (iii) left as is). Lots of questions, I know: (a) what do you think of Ariz 1st, or 8th, and of all the election articles, which one makes a good template? (b) Was AZ an open primary and if so how to report primary results? (c) How much of Renzi's article to cut/move, etc.? -- Sholom 20:38, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

• Actually, I think we're ahead of the power curve, so whatever you do is fine. -- Good point. Thanks.
• In fact, one of the things that I wanted to do is work with you and perhaps a couple of other editors on what a good article looks like, and a set of instructions and other aids to editors to help them get there. So let's start with Arizona. -- I will try and look at the other House race articles I wrote, and tell you which I like the best.
• For the Rick Renzi article, I'm not sure what you're looking at -- me neither. Ignore the comment I guess.
• As for "open primary", I'm not sure what you mean. No, not Louisana style. But I take that comment back, too. See here where all the primary candidates are lumped together. Very weird. But, never mind.
• Finally, please let me know if you see any AfDs on candidates where I've not added my comment already -- yes, and vice versa, too.
• My understanding is that the page that was deleted is easily retrievable as a copy in one's user space -- I'll take your word for it!

Thanks! -- Sholom 21:52, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I created a strawman template at User talk:Sholom/Congressional race template. Check it out and hack away at it? -- Sholom 16:20, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I added a bunch of edits to the template, BTW, based on the Pennsylvania 6th congressional district election, 2006 article. jesup 20:15, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

As far as 2008 goes -- somebody has already started a wiki for it! See http://www.2008racetracker.com/ (fwiw, they apparently don't have a "we're not a crystal ball" rule <g>)

Neil Bush mediation

Here's a heads up that you may wish to comment here. --67.101.67.107 13:57, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Regarding Talk:Neil Bush/Cabal Mediation, thank you for the heads up. I was an early participant in the debate, but decided that I cared way less than other editors did about how the matter was resolved, and that all viewpoints would be represented even if I wasn't participating. So I've moved on to other things. John Broughton | Talk 14:22, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

That's what I thought, but just figured I'd make sure you didn't miss notification of an opportunity to add stress to your life. =) --67.101.67.107 18:10, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Perfectwave Technologies, LLC

I am new to Wikipedia; I therefore do not understand the protocol for making edits. I apologize for the unauthorized edits. Having said that; I would hope that Wikipedia would be committed to publishing facts. To that end, I changed the ownersip reference of Perfectwave to represent the facts. There is no articles of incorporation or formation that support the statement that Brent Wilkes owns my company. The fact is that he was a partner in the company until 12/01/2005; at which time I bought out his interest (due to his issues related to Cunningham.) The other fact that was not published its that Perfectwave has and continues to do valuable work for our military in the areas of voice clarity in noisey enviroments, speech recognition, as well as radar and sonar signal processing enhancement.

--Mgelwix 00:28, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Mr. Broughton; Thank you for your guidance. I will follow your suggestions. --Mgelwix 15:33, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

John Morrison (Montana politician)

The beginning of a content dispute (and ((WP:3RR]]) at John Morrison (Montana politician) -- see the history, then the talk page. Might need your help. -- Sholom 18:42, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Orphaned fair use image (Image:Vernparade.jpg)

Thanks for uploading Image:Vernparade.jpg. I notice the 'image' page currently specifies that the image is unlicensed for use on Wikipedia and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable under fair use (see our fair use policy).

If you have uploaded other unlicensed media, please check whether they're used in any articles or not. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that any fair use images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. Chowbok ☠ 20:12, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tangled bank hypothesis

John: I closed this one as redirect to Evolution of sex as I don't consider myself competent to pick and choose the pertinent passages that should go into either article you mentioned. Since Evolution of sex mentions the hypothesis it seems the more apt target, but if you believe there is usefull material to be merged, feel free to do so. ~ trialsanderrors 05:14, 18 November 2006 (UTC)