Talk:John Kerry/Archive 5: Difference between revisions

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Quotes

I'm not sure about having the "Quotes" section. There's been similar issues in George W. Bush and John Ashcroft, and honestly I feel like (given the large number of potential quotes), any selection we make will be accused of bias. I'm taking it out unless someone objects. Meelar 04:55, 1 Feb 2004 (UTC)

No objection to removal of the quotes on Iraq war. But it would be nice to mention something about Kerry's position on Iraq -- since (a) he's currently the leading Dem. candidate and (b) Iraq has been the key political issue between Dem. & Rep. for the last 6 to 9 months!

BTW, I added a pro-Kerry and anti-Kerry quote before I read this talk page or viewed the page history. --Uncle Ed 18:05, 3 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Birthdate

Most online sources report John Forbes Kerry's birth in Colorado 12/11/43. A source believed to be reputable which received children's birth information (in order) from Richard Kerry reports the entries of his children as such:

Margery A. Kerry, b. 11/11/1941
Diana Kerry, b. 04/16/1947
Cameron F. Kerry, b. 09/06/1950
John Forbes Kerry, b. 01/01/1943

Conclusion: this source is almost definitely incorrect, first w/regard to date, second w/regard to sequence of children's births. Still, it might be prudent for someone to double check.

Skull and Bones

I don't know enough about Kerry: is he publically admitting membership in Skull and Bones? If so, should it be here? I don't know....it feels a little like a smear to me, but I'll admit I don't know anything like enough about it. Just pondering...Jwrosenzweig 20:27, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

His membership is common knowledge. Why is it a smear? It's not a negative organization; elitist perhaps, but nothing that shouldn't be included here. Moncrief 9 Feb 2004

He has admitted it himself. I read an interview today in which a reporter asked him if the fact that he was in skull and bones would make a difference and Kerry said "very little" and smiles uneasily. Bush was a member too btw. Mrdice 20:55, 2004 Feb 9 (UTC)

Hmmm, well, I'll trust you. :) I can't say I really like "common knowledge" as an answer, but I know that's the basis for a lot of what we do here.

It's simple to verify these things. People unable to do so have no business editing enclopedias. "common knowledge" is indistinguishable from rumor. Any claim should be substantiable via authoritative sources.

Re: smear, I don't think you'd dispute with me that, for many Americans, the image of the S&B society is that they are up to no good....perhaps involved in some strange dark rituals.

So what? By the same argument, the fact that someone was a Nazi, Communist, or Jew should be suppressed because many people have negative views of those.

I personally doubt the veracity of these claims, but I would want to be fair to Kerry's reputation.

By suppressing facts about him?

If it was common knowledge that Abraham Lincoln was a Freemason, I still don't think I'd mention it

Then stay away from editing encyclopedias.

(except in a truly exhaustive article....which John Kerry has yet to become). But I'm over-sensitive, and I'm willing to accept your point. Thanks for responding. Jwrosenzweig 20:38, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Here are 57 articles that mention John Kerry's membership in Skull and Bones:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=John+Kerry+Skull+and+Bones&sa=N&tab=wn

Heh, sorry to make you go to the trouble! I believed you on the common knowledge thing. I do appreciate your taking the time though, and am sorry to have caused inconvenience. Jwrosenzweig 20:45, 9 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Negative Views of Kerry

[saving this until Positive Views of Kerry can be written]

On the other hand, the Associated Press reports that Kerry made efforts to keep loopholes for special interests. One allowed American International Group to profit from liability insurance coverage it provided for the "Big Dig" project in Boston. AIG later provided the funds for Kerry's trip to Vermont and donated $30,000 (or more) to a group used to set up Kerry's presidential campaign (Company executives also donated $18,000 to his campaigns). Charles Lewis, head of the Center for Public Integrity, stated that "the idea that Kerry has not helped or benefited from a specific special interest, which he has said, is utterly absurd". [1]

Coupled with this, Republican opponents such as Pat Buchanan criticize Kerry as:

...a Massachusetts liberal who voted against the Defense of Marriage Act, backs civil unions for homosexuals, voted to defend the infanticide known as partial-birth abortion and wants to raise the federal income taxes that George Bush lowered. [2]

Kerry has been criticized by some in the primary race (especially Howard Dean) for his position on the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Kerry voted for the resolution in the Senate that authorized President George W. Bush to go to war; however, he has since become a fierce critic of the war effort, attacking what he calls poor planning and poor diplomacy on Bush's part.

Positive Views

[reinserting into article] ... Jengod (1st pls sign), there is not a need for take out the info from the article. ALL views should be in the article ... ADD the positive (and the negative) as they come. JDR [PS. Why did you take out the position quote from his website? [I didn't put it in (nor the republican view) .... though I did input the Charles Lewis (Center for Public Integrity) and Associated Press part (which are BOTH neutral parties)].

National economy

Kerry has as a priority the status of the middle class and hard working families. He has pledged to bring back the millions of jobs that have been lost.

What is the "status" of middle class and working people, and what does it mean to make these a "priority"?
Which millions of jobs were lost, and when? (Is he blaming the post-Clinton recession on Bush?) Is he saying he'll get people working at their old companies, or get them new jobs, or what?

Please understand: I'm not trying to be a partisan here. I'm not trying to start a debate. I just want to know what the text is supposed to mean so we can copy-edit it and put it right back.

If we can't turn the above two sentences into plain English, maybe a quote from Kerry or his website would be better. Like:

Regarding the US economy, Kerry said, "My priority is the status of the middle class and hard working families. I pledeg to bring back the millions of jobs that have been lost." Then the text could stand as itself. --Uncle Ed 18:58, 11 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Here's a text markup of a replacement ...

Kerry wants to enforce trade laws for a level playing field in the global economy. Kerry believes in a more efficient and smaller government; he has pledged to control spending by the government. Kerry advocates research and development (R&D) and giving industrial upgrade tax breaks. Kerry has proposed a "State Tax Relief and Education Fund" to help states improve the workforce.

Kerry advocates manufacturer tax incentives to bolster goods production and create jobs in the United States. Kerry proposes strengthening the enforcement by the Securities and Exchange Commission for restoring investor confidence and stopping oversea banking by corporations (which is done to avoid taxes). Kerry plans to implement the McCain-Kerry commission on corporate welfare to undermine the special interest groups.

Regarding the US economy, Kerry has stated it is his priority to foster the status of the middle class and hard working families. Kerry supports increasing the minimum wage and indexing it to inflation. Kerry has pledged to bring back the millions of jobs that have been lost. Kerry believes in expanding opportunities for women and making "equal pay for equal work". Kerry has proposed more tax breaks to the middle class with new tax credits on health care and college tuition. Kerry desires protecting the increases in the child tax credit and keeping the reduced marriage penalty. Kerry has also proposed a "College Opportunity Tax Credit".

Sincerely, JDR 20:13, 11 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Kennedy vs. Kerry

Was his mother's name really Rosemary Forbes Kennedy or is this someone's freudian slip?

She was Rosemary Forbes. Her married name would be Rosemary Forbes Kerry. Somebody's Freudian slip (already corrected it)

Drudge

Should this article discuss a completely uncorroborated rumor, like this Drudge allegation? john 03:13, 13 Feb 2004 (UTC)

How about instead of repeating the rumor and innuendo we leave it to the simple, incontrovertible facts: "On February 12, Internet columnist Matt Drudge reported that media outlets may be investigating martial infidelity rumors dating to 2001." and then link to Drudge and let people read for themselves. jengod 06:22, Feb 13, 2004 (UTC)

This isn't an article about Matt Drudge. Drudge is just one (very partisan) person who can say anything he wants about anything. Without substantation, it's still no more than repeating his rumor and innuendo.

That'd be much better. It also should not be its own section, but probably part of the campaign section. I'm still dubious that we should have anything on it until we see if it turns out to be anything (at this point, I don't think we know enough about it for us to know whether it's important enough to be in the article or not), but that would certainly be an improvement. john 06:41, 13 Feb 2004 (UTC)

There's a good chance I'll be getting to meet him Saturday morning (Nevada caucuses), so I can just ask him then. :-) Stan 07:13, 13 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Well, that seems like a wise idea. Of course, if Drudge is right, Kerry will be responding to Drudge's allegations tomorrow (on Imus?). I imagine Imus will ask him about it, at any rate. john 08:16, 13 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It seems way to early to devote so much space to an unsubstantiated rumor. Wouldn't another approach be to wait and see what happens ?

I completely agree. As yet, there is no actual story here. john 22:05, 13 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I have to run, but if we're re-adding, could someone please add Wonkette's scoop? It's at least as legit as stupid drudge. jengod 02:15, Feb 14, 2004 (UTC)

I'm still not clear on why this rumor is being reported. No Guru 20:47, 14 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Look, I don't like it either, but I'm not going to get into an edit war over it. Maybe it should be moved off this page into it's own page? jengod 20:53, Feb 14, 2004 (UTC)

Kerry in Berlin?

Did Kerry live in Berlin? I have heart something like that. 82.83.0.240 00:11, 14 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Don't know, User:82.83.0.240, but it's quite possible--his father was a diplomat and he spent at least part of his time growing up overseas... jengod 00:32, Feb 14, 2004 (UTC)

yes, as a child he did. (in then still the western part) 62.134.92.74 00:36, 14 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Silly whitewashing

The material that exists seems to dwell on the insubstantial. While I like the fact that the article is getting some deserved attention, this "he said, she said" treatment is way out of hand. That "views of Kerry section was meaningless, and silly on top.

And instead of using a rather subtantial and meaningful quote, it was removed. No mention of that Senate hearing exists, and only this remains: "In 1978 he cofounded Vietnam Veterans of America. He maintains a lifetime membership in the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) organization."

Views

"views of Kerry"? I find it informative IMO (as o' now, both kinds o' views are there ...) YMMV on that though ... mabey crop it down on both sides (or, what I'd do, is leave it as is) .... " Vietnam Veterans of America"? I would be supportive in expanding his role in the Senate hearings. One part I do like is the "Encounters with President Kennedy".

Letter to his parents/Yale U.

What i think there needs is a copyedit of the "letter to his parents". Wikipedia is not a primary source ... send it to sourceberg. Also, a copyedit is needed on the "Yale University" portion. Way too much there ... wieghs the article down IMO, but YMMV. Sincerely, JDR 16:49, 14 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Copy edited the page and moved the letter to Wikisource. The letter, however, should NOT be copy edited. It is a primary source and should therefore be left exactly as it was written by Kerry. jengod 20:53, Feb 14, 2004 (UTC)

Cool, thanks ... and I agree on the primary source thing (it should be an exact copy of the original; my comment on "copyedit" was to remove it and send it over to SB ... not change it, but that may not have been clear). I liked reading it, but just not here ... ~~did you make a link to it? [i didn't check]~~ ... only other thing (right now) i'd suggest is renaming the military/homeland security/forgien policy to military/forgien policy (HS being a subdiv of those) ... but it's not that big of thing, the article is looking good IMO (but o' course YMMV on that) ... Sincerely, JDR 01:50, 15 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Pix & POV

Chris, sorry to undo your undo of my undo. :) But there have been PLENTY of battles of the POV-ness of pix. Anti-people use ugly pix, pro-people use pretty pix. The verdict on George W. Bush, for example, was to use his official Prez portrait. Warren Christopher has the background of his image blued out because some consider having the US flag in the background to be POV. jengod 02:42, Feb 16, 2004 (UTC)

Informal image vote

File:John kerry2.jpg

File:John Kerry 2.jpg

Use left:
- Evercat, Jengod, —Eloquence, Maximus Re x, Dori, Fuzheado, No Guru, JDR, Anthony DiPierro RickK

Use right:
- ChrisDJackson

Comments:

The right one is ugly. We should use reasonable looking pics for everyone. Evercat 02:50, 16 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The new right one is even uglier. I wouldn't wish being fotographed from a low angle on Idi Amin. jengod 03:01, Feb 16, 2004 (UTC)

At the very least, the first, most prominent photo should be the standard shot. You can debate the merits of the "patriotic" photo as a secondary photo, but to be consistent with G.W. Bush's portrait, we should go with the straight shot. Fuzheado

Nice tactic Chris, replace the photo just as you lose the vote. Quit it. Your behaviour is anti-social to say the least. Evercat 03:07, 16 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Organization

You're aware that you've both removed these passages, and they're now not present anywhere in the article? Evercat 02:59, 16 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I would love to restore them, but I figure Chris Jackson will revert, so we ought to talk about it first. jengod 03:02, Feb 16, 2004 (UTC)

Okay, family and personal stuff from adult life are in "personal life", youth and childhood are at top in "early life." jengod 03:09, Feb 16, 2004 (UTC)

Go team us!

John Kerry made the "In the News" section on the main page. Yay! jengod 04:15, Feb 16, 2004 (UTC)

Are we to believe that a Yale graduate would write this: "endless self-distruction." If that's a real mistake, then (sic) should be added, but if it's a typo, someone should edit it (it's a letter, so there's a possibility it's a genuine mistake...). ugen64 23:06, Feb 16, 2004 (UTC)

A good observation, Ugen. It's hard to say because indeed the Boston Globe's transcript of the handwritten letter reproduces the word as "self-distruction", but when you look at the letter at http://cache.boston.com/globe/nation/packages/kerry/images/day1/letter1.jpg you can see that Kerry's distinctive handwriting with its long, narrow letters, could easily make a small e look like a small i. The question is whether the e/i has a dot above it, a fact we cannot determine by viewing the letter online. I agree that Kerry would have known how to spend destruction correctly and that it probably should be (sic)'d. -- Damion

doctored photo

i don't have time to incorporate the info from this news item into this article. could someone please do so. Also, it would be nice maybe to have external links to the images. maybe it deserves its own article? Kingturtle 07:52, 17 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The information has been there for over a day already. -- Damion

The link I provided shows the original photos and the doctored photo. It would be nice to make links to them, or to see if we can have them here. Kingturtle 04:33, 19 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Other Skull & Boners

In re: the paragraph: "Other members of Skull and Bones that year were Alan W. Cross, George Clifford Brown, John Bockstoce, Michael Dalby, James Ernest Howard, Ronald Singer, Thomas Vargish, Forrest David Laidley and David Rumsey, who would go on to found the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection."

Couldn't this para be deleted. As shown by the wikification, none of these people are well-known. I think the article is long enough without a laundry list of names.

Hey everyone, I just wanted to say I think you're doing a fantastic job with the Kerry page. This has got to be one of the most well-written and informative pages in the entire Wikipedia (which isn't saying much, but in this case I mean the article is very well-written and informative). Looks like people who track John Kerry actually know how to write. Thank God for that. -- 160.39.193.218 10:16, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Vietnam Split

Does anyone else disagree with the removal of the Vietnam War material from this page? jengod 23:25, Mar 3, 2004 (UTC)

I certainly do, but I have been swimming against the current with regards to spinoff articles like this. See discussion under Article Length here. Jgm 23:34, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Yes, Jgm, forks and splits are quite natural. In this case, it may be temporary - the real issue is that this section is a controversial one, separate from the rest of the bio material, and as such should be handled a bit differently - I noticed a few POV written sections that are easier to handle if the article is split. Of course, a split is warranted any time an article gets very large, as this one had. Forking articles happens naturally when enough material exists to warrant it - rather than just cutting it down to fit a length-limit, or making articles longer than is readable. -S 23:54, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Um, er, length-limit? To my knowledge, no length limits is one of the earliest and most basic tenets of Wikipedia. [3]. If there has been a discussion resulting in a new consensus about this issue please point me to it, and see about modifying the referenced page to reflect it. Some of the other reasons you posit (quarantining controversial sections while they are in flux) are reasonable, but I don't see length as an issue. That's what sectioning/TOCs and News Style are for. Jgm 03:03, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

My concern is the political implications. Kerry's Vietnam services is one of two poles of his bio--the other being his Senate service--and I feel that removing it basically takes it out of the spotlight which could be viewed as diminishing him and therefore enhancing the other guy. There's no reason in the world that the POV, has to be removed in some separate domain. It can be removed here. jengod 00:23, Mar 4, 2004 (UTC)

I think moving the Vietnam stuff makes sense because of the size of the article, but it is so central to Kerry's political career (which really began in earnest with the exposure the Senate testimony afforded him) that it should really be in the main article. Cecropia 00:32, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I have considered all of the above comments. One, I disagree that moving it to a separate article (especially one with a high level banner headline "John Kerry and the Vietnam War" - which matches the target article) is somehow too far removed from the original. Also, take a look at how much easier to read the TOC is! Two, I disagree that other political contexts on article one are bound to reflect a polarity between past and present - this would be a typical way to desparage Kerry, and that would be POV. Keeping things clear and distinct makes things more or less easier to deal with. So, those wanting malign Kerry by confusing reference to his anti-war and "tell the truth" (yesterday's speech) philosophy regarding the War, will no doubt be irked by Wikipedias ability to refactor articles to make them more clear. There are exceptions - certain highy-contentious articles suffer from "excess detail" in many cases.

Your arguments are confusing at best. I am reverting. I look forward to the inevitable revert war, but I believe that you are the only one advocating the split and that the encyclopedia article about John Kerry is much more encyclopedic with the Vietnam/antiwar material included. TOC clarity issues can be solved in the other ways. jengod 01:20, Mar 4, 2004 (UTC)

You "look forward to the inevitable revert war?" is that a civil way to approach the article? Maybe you are right, but your ill-mannered defense of your unfounded and ill-reasoned assertions only indicate that you are unwilling to admit you are not. -S 01:54, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Loosen up? jengod 01:57, Mar 4, 2004 (UTC)

Is your two-word nonsequitor supposed to mean something? -S 02:05, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Peace, man. jengod 02:09, Mar 4, 2004 (UTC)

Sure, I got no problem with peace - but dont start undoing my changes without getting at least some consensus. Two people a consensus doth not make... holler on the WP:VP if theres something needing attn. Peace is nice, sure, as long as you follow the rules of conduct. That said, the subheaders look better now -- the only really annoying format thing I see now is the one line paragraphs althroughout. Separate by bullets for lists or use real pghps. Since I would be inflaming "a revert war" if I did it, Ill let you do it. Pax. -S 02:18, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Okay, but by the same token, don't go ripping whole sections out of well-formed articles without talking to anybody about it first. Doing the bullet thing now. jengod 02:27, Mar 4, 2004 (UTC)

I also see no reason to split this material off. john 05:34, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)~

Well, when you say "well formed" I get the joke. Quite a sense of humor, you have there, god. S 07:50, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Is "nominee-elect" the right term to use? Kerry doesn't have 50% of the delegates yet. How about "nominee-apparent"? Molinari 21:40, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The use of the word "presumptive" in the article already takes care of the "apparent" part. There's no such term as "nominee-apparent" or, if someone finds a reference to such a term, I'll say it sounds really awkward. "Presumptive" is better, in my opinion. Moncrief, 4 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The new edits vis a vis vietnam vets against the war

There are a few things we should consider--while I will not argue with the substance of the edits (although some substantial POV evaluations are included--and BTW, Jane Fonda was a major contributor to VVAW, though Kerry knew to distance himself from her), the VVAW (if not Kerry himself) and its Winter Solider Investigation is substantially whitewashed. Subsequent investigation showed that a great deal of the claims (not under oath, as implied by "testified") made by participants ran from hyperbole to outright lies. Other charges at Winter Solider, especially involving use of minority soldiers, are outright fabrications as seen in everything from films of Vietnam action to troop strength statistics to casualty figures, which show African-American soldier deaths were in the same proportion as in the general population.

Having lived through the era, I will argue with the general assertion that VVAW or even most of the anti-war movement ended the war earlier. If that was the aim, they did a piss-poor job, since the major combat for Americans lasted from 1965 to 1973, many years after the biggest protests. In fact, the pictures of long-haired protestors hardened the opinions of many of the older generation, who had the real power to do something but saw evidence that the protestors were ungrateful brats who wouldn't fight for their country "like we did, in World War II." What brought the war down? Tactically, the Tet Offensive was a huge blow to the strategic assumptions of the war policy. But emotionally, it was when short-haired boys, not long-haired protestors, began coming home in body bags in even small towns in mid-America.

If Kerry committed one sin, knowingly or not, in his Senate testimony, it was that he did as much as anyone, and more than most, in improperly, inaccurately, and ignorantly portraying the typically US soldier as a war criminal and "baby killer," a charaterization that I, and almost every other veteran of the Viet Nam era, has been dealing with ever since. Cecropia 00:02, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Jane Fonda was a contributor to VVAW. We agree. So what? What am I, the average reader supposed to infer by a Kerry-Fonda connection? Am I, a post Gen-X'er supposed to automatically see "traitor" and "Commie-lover" when I see Fonda's name? Fonda's integral support is mentioned in the article. If you want to talk about debunking Winter Soldier, you should probably start with writing the Stolen Valor article.

I was not yet born when all of this is going on, so its all pretty new to me. I can only hope that more people have the courage to stand up and tell history as it was, so that the same mistakes are not repeated, and repeated... What mistakes? I dont know, really. I wasnt there. Maybe you do? If you want to argue that anti-War protests had no effect in ending the war... I dont know... It seems like a real no-brainer that they did. Maybe you know of some more complex and fancy math that calculates otherwise.

So little of popular American history seems to reflect the Winter Soldier testimony, for obvious reasons, so I have a hard time understand you when you claim to know persecution as result of it. Even now that I have read the documents, I am in no position to make personal judgements. I'm sure that the testimony is not 100 percent flawless, and likewise I'm sure that it doesnt reflect on the majority of soldiers put there. So I, in my easy youth am privelidged to say that: What remains clear is violence in the name of some ideal (under which is only a philosphy of selfishness and self-ism) is bound to come into a moral question. It is the moral questions, many of which in your lifetime were completely ignored and ignorable, that are what finally brought 'the War' to an end. Can we agree that regardless of what the facts were about Vietnam or the Cold War in general, that the War on Terror not be a similar one? (By "similar," I refer to the conduct and deception, not the "losing." Perhaps I need to do a little more reading... the whole Pentagon Papers text, maybe. Finally, your opinions are not NPOV either. Any corrections to the "POV" in the article should raise the NPOV bar. -V

To get rid of the most minor item first--my mention of Jane Fonda was to point out not that Kerry was buddy-buddy with her, not even that he liked or was sympathetic to her--just that the general trend is to try to go completely the other way and claim that they were like "two people who just happened to be in the same city at the same time." I'm just saying Fonda was a big bankroller of VVAW, which says something of the bent of the organization.

I appreciate your opinions and perspective, and I wasn't trying to say my opinions are NPOV--I just try for it in my writing. I'm just trying to clue people in to the fact that there are other perspectives than what you read in the press and I'm trying to let you ("royal you"--not only you personally) know that the Vietnam-era soldier is a social pariah among those who didn't serve, which includes most of the power structure of the country. Haven't you ever heard of "the crazed Vietnam Vet?" It's very hard to express to someone who wasn't at least alive at the time, because whether you were in the service or not, you kind of need the "hook" of being able to connect with he passions and personalities of the time.

If you really want to get a bit of a feel for what it was like in the Army at the time, get your hands on some copies of "The 'Nam" comic book--they're pretty cheap on eBay. Strange commentary about a strange era in American history that the most ralistic portrayal of the soldier's POV is in a comic.

I think Kerry was kind of duped with VVAW--he was the presenter for a POV that was not really his personally--he was a boat operator who engaged an enemy in a much different fashion than those on the ground. He didn't have the personal experience to tell whether the people who spoke at Winter Soldier were lying or telling the truth. There is more testimony, or oral history, of Vietnam, than what was at Winter Soldier. Cheers! Cecropia 03:42, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Addition addressed to Stevertigo (and anyone else interested) I appreciate your open mind in understanding there is more to know about Vietnam than what was (and is) in popular culture. Soldiers were very aware of the moral issues of Vietnam and the war, but there wasn't much to be done. People wanted to stay alive, you spent your time in the Army watching the calendar. You had at ETS--the day you would get out if you stayed alive--you didn't havethat in, say, WWII. If you went to 'Nam, you were there for a year tour. If you were a combat soldier in 'Nam (I wasn't) you were supposed to be in combat danger for six months of those twelve months, and you had R&R to look forward to. That's what kept people going. That's what kept Kerry going. He did his job as best he could--so did almost everyone else--and when he had a chance to get out, he did it! More power to him!

It is impressive that the people who "testified" claimed that they personally committed these atrocities. What was up with that? If they really did that, they, personally, were war criminals, not people who were entitled to point fingers at anyone else. Cecropia 07:15, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Sorry, I didnt see your other comments on the page. Ill be brief: 1. 'Photo' C'mon, your meaning was to insinuate something about Kerry, by associating him with Fonda - not an NPOV edit. 2. 'Passions' - I cant even imagine - maybe when the "War on Terror" becomes a full fledged war... wait a minute... You seem to be saying that you can associate more with the Jane Fondas than you can with those of us who born later - that at least seems interesting, if only natural. 3. I try not to confuse comix with history, but I think I had one of those, way back in the day... But I understand: SPOV. 4. "I think Kerry was kind of duped," Back then, who was'nt? 5. 'Ability to tell lie from truth' - I imagine it was hard for anyone, including the Prez, to tell the difference - everybody went 'on instinct,' I suppose. (BTW, You ever read anything about Vasily Arkipov? Talk about loyalty...) 6. 'There wasnt much to be done' - Canada or Vietnam. The choice is rather hard to imagine, I'll admit. 7. 'staying alive in 'Nam.' Seems like Canada would have been easier. 8. "What's up" Maybe some Hamlet would be quotable. Briefly,-S 22:25, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Guess you didn't get much out of my attempt to communicate something sincere to someone who wasn't, as you say, even alive yet. Cecropia

Article split needed

This article is twice the "should-be limit" - I suggest moving the Vietnam section, John Kerry and the Vietnam War or split it by biography/campaign. So, the John Kerry presidential campaign article would have all the current campaign stuff, with some tie-over to the history. -V

I oppose a split. If the consensus is for a split, I support splitting off the campaign-related materials. jengod 04:01, Mar 5, 2004 (UTC)

I support a split of 2004 Presidential campaign, Views of Kerry, and Issue stances. Especially 2004 Presidential campaign, since that will be irrelevant in a few years anyway. But of course these need to be summarized on the main page. Alternatively, maybe split off all the sections. Anthony DiPierro 04:06, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I'll cast my vote in opposition of a split. Rei

I also think it would be better to keep the article as one piece. A story needs flow. Cecropia

Flow at 65KB? Sorry, ain't going to happen. What is needed is for somebody to summarize some of the longer sections and split the detail off into daughter articles. Then the reader has a choice between reading the summary here or the detail on the daughter articles. --mav 06:34, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Well, in a truly just world, all the really relevant stuff would be the main article, then you would click links if you wanted to read the gossip and innuendo. :) Cecropia

I agree with mav. For an example of this, see the Malaysia article. There's a summary for several sections, and links to the full-fledged daughter articles under the summary header. I support this split, partially because on my slow connection, both the page and its edit page take ages to load. :-p --Johnleemk 08:02, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Splitting is different from refactoring, which is what Mav suggests. There isnt really enough to warrant "daughter articles," for multiple sections, but there is enough to simply split the bio from the possible political future, etc. Doesnt that make some sense? -S 21:30, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Sincere request: please tell me where the "should-be limit" is documented. Jgm 21:59, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I agree it should be split up. Especially with all the details and nuances in each section, the page as a whole is getting rather unwieldy, and it's only going to get worse in the coming months as the fight kicks into high gear and the edits get more frequent and heated.

May I propose a split along these lines? (1) Keep the biography and "Personal Life" sections in the current article. (2) Put "Presidential Campaign" into a separate article. Or maybe (1) and (2) should be reversed? Any other ideas?

-- 160.39.193.218 22:32, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Yes - the campaign stuff is really a subject onto itself and should have its own article. A 2-3 paragraph summary should be in this article and a prominent link to the daughter article should be given a la the "Main article" links on the country pages (see United States). This was done to the Gray Davis article once the recall stuff got too long. --mav

I think this article should primarily be biographical and agree with splitting off the current campaign stuff. (And, since, somebody's already done it we may as well go with it.) I think any of the current-issues should be moved to the campaign page -- things like the fonda photo hoax and the parts that say "Bush's campaign says this...". I would try to keep things that will be relevant years later in this article. Mdchachi 21:46, 19 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Vietnam war and the current campaign

This entire section is an editorial putting a spin on Kerry's actions and their current meaning. It is attempting to "refight the war" as part of a (hopefully factual) article. Many of the assertions are doubtful or wrong. Saying his past places him at odds with "conservative anti-Communist ideology" presupposes that noone else except this small groups has a negative opinion. Again, doubt on Kerry's record is acribed to "Bush allies or pro-war activities." There are some substantive problems with Kerry's actions besides "old bitterness." Anger against Kerry is not so much "aiding the enemy" (that was Fonda's thing) but defaming the bulk of troops in Vietnam. Where does the author get that there are no "credible" disproofs of Winter Soldier. There are many, including the fact that congress was so incensed at the charges that they investigated some of the "war crimes" and found some bogus, and others where the people who reported them refused to testify, when it would be under oath. Please cite a source for Kerry's popularity with veterans.

And finally, try to understand that it was commonplace for a Vietnam-era soldier to be anti-war, anti-US policy and still doubtful about Kerry's actions. The deleted section follows:

***

Vietnam and the current campaign
Kerry's Vietnam War past currently places him at odds with political conservative anti-Communist ideology, and some attempts have been made to tarnish Kerry by associating him with "radicalist" agenda of the Anti-war movement. Because of the political divisions surrounding the Vietnam War, some, either Bush allies or Pro-war advocates, have chosen to attack Kerry for his Vietnam stance. In February of 2004, after comments by Bush officials, Kerry accused Bush of trying to "reopen the wounds" of the Vietnam War and its history.

To a limited degree, the Vietnam War remains a controversial issue in the US —because "the War" is recent history, the acceptance and interpretation of the history and events remain somewhat in flux. In the US, there still remain some of the old bitterness—such as the accusation of "betraying his country," or "aiding the enemy," for opposing US policy. While many have criticized Kerry and the anti-War movement for "bringing dishonor" upon the Vietnam War Veteran, by protesting US policy, and for supporting the disclosure of controversial events, very few credible criticisms have surfaced to discredit the Anti-War movement in whole or in part, or the claims made at the Winter Soldier Investigation. (See Stolen Valor)

Veteran support for Kerry's presidential bid appears high, but some who oppose Kerry appear to do so for his Anti-war stand of over thirty years ago. Kerry's strong showing in polls against Bush appears noteworthy, in light of the 30-years of largely one-sided popular history regarding the Vietnam War, along with an deep-rooted cultural defensism for the anti-Communist Cold War policy. The Pentagon Papers were the keystone for the Anti-war movement, which substantiated it's claims that of US government deception, and would lead to Nixon's resignation. The documents showed that each US administration back to Truman was actively and deliberately decieving the American people about its involvement in Vietnam's conflicts. The philosophical debate continues regarding the merits of US Cold War policy. Candidate Kerry, who decades ago spoke in opposition to the then US war policy, recently compared the current Bush administration's Iraq War policy, to the "deceptive policies" of administrations during the Vietnam War.

***

Sr Cecropia,

While much in the above section indeed needs a rewrite, (rewrite, rather than remove - remove is lazy) it's not "editorializing" for Wikipedia to contain material which explains a debate of political ideology, if such a debate exists. Is there a debate? Yes - in fact, what else is there left of all that? Yes, removal of some of the minor POV ("old bitterness") is warranted, but then you go on to say "anger against Kerry is not so much 'aiding the enemy' (that was Fonda's thing) but defaming the bulk of troops in Vietnam." Is this POV "true"? You also say Fonda was "more" 'aiding the enemy,' than Kerry. Where's the beef? Both these claims may be correct from your POV - call it a POV. However asking the reader to swallow a pre-supposed definition of who "the enemy" was, and what side Kerry and Fonda 'should have been' playing for - it's an international wiki, sorry. That said, there is a legitimate place for your experience in the related articles - I or someone else will call you on it if its too partisan.

Do (certain) people still feel like they must defend a US state policy of two generations ago? Did'nt the Pentagon Papers make it clear that all involved adminstrations were truly flying blind, decieved, and deceiving - many thought all the things they were saying were true? "...try to understand that it was commonplace for a Vietnam-era soldier to be anti-war, anti-US policy and still doubtful about Kerry's actions." 'Against the war,' but 'doubful about Kerry' and 'despise Fonda?' Someday, for the record, these utterly paradoxical contradictions will need some clarification. It seems to me like just another 'blame famous girl and rich boy for breaking (fearful Cold War) social protocol...' Whether it's a case of rehash or the same old sentiment, I dont know. In any case, I sincerely appreciate your critique, and want to see some substance for your claims as well - like who exactly thinks negatively of Kerry and why. But there's plenty of time to write history, and I won't be working on this for a little while. Onto yet-uncovered country... Sincerely, S 21:06, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Friend Stevertigo,

I see your point, and will engage it. First, this is "Talk"--I would not write in the article what I write in talk, because a POV (which may or may not be accurate) needs explanation or moderation.

Yes, this is a debate, but the section I extracted was one side only. It was not a debate, it was, as I said, an editorial. Further (and maybe most important) as a debate it should really be in a separate section, since making it part of John Kerry unfairly (to him as well as to facts) connects the truth of the vietnam agrument to his actions, and they are not necessarily the same thing. IOW, if Vietnam was "right" for the U.S. to do, he could still have sincere objections which were well founded. OTOH, if Vietnam was "wrong" it doesn't mean that any assertion against the war is fair.

you go on to say "anger against Kerry is not so much 'aiding the enemy' (that was Fonda's thing) but defaming the bulk of troops in Vietnam." Is this POV "true"? Yes, in that Kerry relayed information, without nuance, claiming widespread atrocities that simply didn't occur. Those in service at the time had a good idea what did and didn't happen and how widespread. Kerry was not on the ground in the situations he desribed, so he took Winter Soldier as true coin, and was wrong.

You also say Fonda was "more" 'aiding the enemy,' than Kerry. Where's the beef? Both these claims may be correct from your POV - call it a POV. However asking the reader to swallow a pre-supposed definition of who "the enemy" was, and what side Kerry and Fonda 'should have been' playing for - it's an international wiki, sorry. That was an aside, but I'll answer it. The "enemy" is country-specific. Jane Fonda is an American citizen so the enemy is a country at war with the U.S. If I said that Rudolph Hess, the Nazi who parachuted into Britain in WWII, supposedly to make a peace treaty with "the enemy" everyone would understand that I meant that Britain was Germany's enemy, not the world's enemy. Except for the fact that Vietnam was not technically wartime in the United States, Fonda could have been tried for treason, as defined by the United States Constitution.

What I'm trying to convey, perhaps rather clumsily, is a little-appreciated truth—there was a large body of Americans (including many in the Army, including career soldiers) who were opposed to the Vietnam War, but were also opposed to the Viet Cong and North Vietnam. Their take was that the U.S. shouldn't be there and many blamed the soldiers (in effect) as part of the pro-war camp. This was the symbolism of Jane Fonda on the anti-aircraft gun. Not too long ago, a college acquaintance of my wife's started arguing about Vietnam with me (I was, and am opposed to that war) and told me I wasn't against the war because I wasn't for Ho Chi Minh. He said it is only logical you had to agree with one side or the other. I don't agree with that statement. Do you? Cecropia 22:04, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

"The enemy," contrary to all lesser belief, is not country-specific. S 22:35, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I agree. Unlike Cecropia, I refuse to define an entire race of people as my enemy due to the random happenstance that their birth was in a particular country. Categorizing everyone in a country as "enemy" is little more than racism. Rei

Yes, in that Kerry relayed information, without nuance, claiming widespread atrocities that simply didn't occur. Those in service at the time had a good idea what did and didn't happen and how widespread. Kerry was not on the ground in the situations he desribed, so he took Winter Soldier as true coin, and was wrong.

Care to back that up, or are you just going to assert it as fact? Rei

Kerry was in a specific spot in which we was not in contact with US ground troops while in-country. I think that is undisputed. My Lai is famous, but if you're going to claim widespread atrocities, sources other than Winter Soldier need to be cited by those that believe they happened. That soldiers in service at the time knew what did and didn't go on to the amazing extent that Kerry claimed, I was one of the soldiers with contact with the troops that Kerry did not. What more can I say? Remember that Kerry never said in testimony that he committed atrocities. He never said that he witnessed these things. Read his testimony. He only said that others asserted these things at Winter Soldier. He was an unknowing front for others.

From the Chicago Tribune: In a 2001 interview with NBC's Tim Russert, Kerry said: "I don't stand by the genocide. I think those were the words of an angry young man. We did not try to do that. . . . But I stand by the rest of what [I said] happened over there."

Nothing seen firsthand

In a recent Tribune interview, Kerry said he and the men with whom he served had no firsthand experience with atrocities.[4]

From the Washington Post: Although many of the alleged atrocities have never been verified -- and some have been disproved -- Kerry told the Senate that such stories were not isolated occurrences but had happened "on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command." [...] "[What] Kerry did after leaving the Navy constituted a breach of trust with his fellow veterans, because, to protest the war, he cast aspersions upon their conduct," Mackubin Thomas Owens, a former Marine in Vietnam and a professor at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I., wrote in a recent issue of National Review. Kerry's actions "went a long way toward cementing in the public mind the image of Vietnam as one big atrocity." [5] Cecropia 22:40, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Hello, have you ever heard of Operation Phoenix? Seen the pictures of *our* tiger cages? Are you aware of the scale of it? Have you ever heard of the bombing of Cambodia? Haven't you ever bothered to look at the prolific pictures? Are you even aware of the rates of rape against *our own servicewomen*? It's usually around 30% - no kidding [6] [7]. You think somehow we'd treat the Vietnamese better, seing as we killed about 2 million of them? Ever heard of Tiger Force? Remember their habit of stringing ears on necklaces? I personally have met enough Vietnam veterans who left that place f'ed up from what they saw that it's almost laughable that you'd try to pretend that atrocities weren't widespread. It happened. Deal with it.

By the way, in case you didn't *read* the quote, Kerry never said that he or his crewmates saw it firsthand. He stated that the members of the winter soldier group did. Please read better next time. Rei

Please don't use "Hello" like that; you'll sound like Dennis Kucinich. Next thing you know you'll be forgetting to bathe. -- 160.39.193.218 23:28, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Naturally, we get a response which doesn't actually address the post, and instead resorts to petty childish insults over styles of writing. Rei

Hey, I'm just pointing out that your snide attitude isn't doing much to help your cause.

By the way, I agree with Cecropia that who the word "enemy" refers to is clear in context. If you want to start debating "enemy," I think you might as well go about rewriting the entire document, since so much of the article demands a basic understanding of social and literary convention (such as the meaning of particular words).

-- 160.39.193.218 23:37, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

There you go again. This is your third time in three posts to avoid debating substance and instead focus only on insults; will you please stop? The closest thing that you've said to substance so far is your line, By the way, I agree with Cecropia that who the word "enemy" refers to is clear in context., which is really just an assertion. For your information, not a single of Merriam-Webster's four definitions of "enemy" involve an entire country vs an entire country. The primary definition is "one that is antagonistic to another; especially: one seeking to injure, overthrow, or confound an opponent." The Vietnamese were not trying to harm Fonda, and she was not trying harm them. Consequently, they weren't enemies. Rei

Dude, I had no idea what you were debating--something about Vietnam?--and to be honest I didn't, and don't, really care. But your sarcastic "Hello?" caught my eye as I was scrolling down the page and I thought I'd offer some constructive criticism regarding your attitude. Whatever. It's cool. -- 160.39.193.218 00:16, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Are we in the habit of putting double quotes around text that's already block quoted? I don't think that conforms to any traditional style guide, but I don't know... -- 160.39.193.218 22:15, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

coup de grace?

A agree with the edit that substitutes "killed" for "coup de grace" but the term was used in a major newspaper profile, and simply means that he fired the shot which killed someone already wounded.

But ... as I said, I prefer the simple "killed" to the phrase "coup de grace," which was usually used to describe the shot fired by an officer at an execution to make sure the person was dead. Cecropia 05:46, 7 Mar 2004 (UTC)

My main issue with that paragraph was the ambiguity; as mentioned, there's a mail doing the rounds that suggests that Kerry "finished-off" a fatally wounded Viet Cong, which is not the case. We need to watch this stuff at election time. The "coup de grace" stuff was just the icing, with hints of taking pleasure in the killing. Expect more of this stuff, from both sides. Tarka 06:35, 7 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Excommunication?

Excommunication? I can't find anything on an explicit excommunication on the web. Kerry would be eligible for excommunication based on his pro-choice stance, and there's a 1998 vatican decree regarding automatic excommunication of anybody engaging in abortion, up to an including some forms of birth control. This bit strikes me as partisan, unless anybody can come up with something concrete I'm removing this. Tarka

Concentrate on the phrase "latæ sententiæ" which means "self-inflicted"--i.e., no "bell, book and candle" but could not receive communion because of sins in opposition to church teaching. A commonly understood phrase (if true) such as "does not attend church," "considers himself Catholic, but non-practicing," "not eligible to receive communion by action of some bishops," etc. would be less mystifying. There was a church ruling at least in some places a few years back that the church should deny communion to politicians who openly advocate abortion. Cecropia

Sorry I should have brought this up here first: the Catechism of the Catholic Church states in canon 2270nn that Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life In case you don't have a copy here's a link in english [8]

I also recall reading in local press about several bishops stating Kerry will not recive communion. I can't find any good links about this [9], but I'm sure someone has a good link. NN 20:57 7 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I think it is inflammatory to state as a fact that Kerry is in a state of excommunication (self-inflicted or otherwise) if that is not in any way officially documented. I mean, until he is actually excommunicated, it is just a matter of opinion as to whether he is or is not. I am deleting the statement again. Bkonrad 20:16, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I don't think his negative status with the Church is relevant unless he, for example, makes a big positive issue of his Catholic faith. Cecropia 20:54, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Neither is the fact that his maternal grandfather traded opium or that he saw the ruins of Hitlers bunker and camped in Sherwood. I think we should include this, if You find it out of place in the early life section we can move it his stance on abortion or views of Kerry, as for Bkonrad: the closest you'll get to an official statment are the news stories, canonical law does not document such cases. N.N. 21:34, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The indents are getting to hard to read, so I'd going back to left margin. My main objection is that stating as a fact that Kerry is excommunicated is simply wrong. Until he is actually excommunicated by an act of the church, then he is not in fact excommunicated. With one sentence, you are actually presenting the conclusion of a somewhat questionable chain of logic. Something like:

A) All Catholics (who are politicians) who do not oppose abortion are (or should be) excommunicated
B) Kerry is a Catholic (politician) who does not oppose abortion.
C) Therefore, Kerry is (or should be) excommunicated.

If you want to make this argument, fine -- just spell out all of the premises and don't just give the conclusion. And I'd prefer to see such an argument not in the introductory section.

About self-inflicted or voluntary, well, I am not up on canonical law (heck, I'm not even a Christian, let alone a Roman Catholic) so I don't know about the finer points of "latæ sententiæ" or whatever Latin jargon you want to throw around. I'd be willing to bet that most people (including a lot of rank and file Catholics) don't know much about it either. So if you do want to include anything about it, you'll need to explain exactly what it means in lay language.

Even given all that, I'd still say that the notion of self-inflicted or voluntary excommunication is a pretty subjective thing. So I'd expect any such statements to be qualified as such.

Now, if you want to simply say something to the effect that Bishop X and Bishop Y have said that they would refuse to give communion to Kerry because of his position on abortion -- well that would be a factual statement which could easily relatively uncontroversial to report here. But to conclude that Kerry is excommunicated because of his actions requires a lot more explanation and justification. Bkonrad 22:23, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Recent Changes

I removed a lot of (IMO) garbage added by an anonymous user, essentially reverting page to previous version. Some of the changesd were vague, unsubstantiated claims, such as "VVAW was founded by several Hollywood personalities, including Jane Fonda. A number of the members and leaders of VVAW were subsequently found to have fabricated their claimed service. Some had never served in Vietnam at all." -- This may or may not be true -- I can't tell. It needs to be more specific about who founded it and provide verifiable citations. Same goes for "Subsequent investigations by military authorities and a reporter were unable to substantiate ..."

The stuff about Jane Fonda and comments by NV general strike me as irrelevent, since there is no close link between Kerry and Fonda. And I very much doubt that the books that were added to Further Reading mention Kerry at all. Bkonrad 14:25, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Being new to Wikipedia, I didn't realize I should create a usership. I am the Anonymous User who added the "garbage." I am not sure what citations you want. I added two books, one of which specifically discusses Kerry and VVAW, the Jane Fonda relationship, the information about the unreliability of the Winter Soldier investigation personnel. I am curious what your assertion that there is no close link between Kerry and Fonda is based on, because the first book describes the link. You removed that well known reference called "Stolen Valor" because you "doubt" that it contains relevant information, but Kerry is the subject of two entries in the book. The second book discusses internal COSVN/PRG/NLF/NVA strategy and how it related to the US anti-war movement, and hence provided source for some of the other information. It was written by the Justice Minister of the NLF, who was also a founder of that organization. The Kerry story is incomplete without a fair description of both his honorable service in Vietnam and his activities just after he returned, including the impact on the treatment of veterans and the subsequent conduct of the war. The current version implies that the Winter Soldier investigation was authoritative, which is incorrect.

Please advise how I can provide references for the material you didn't like and deleted? What is the criteria? Gustnado 23:49, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Sometimes deletions are justified, sometimes they are removed by someone who simply doesn't agree with or like what someone says. If you feel your material is factual and well-documented, just restore it (and the citations). In the summary briefly explain why your material is valid. You might even say something like "this is valid and relevant information (see talk)" and then in the talk, explain why you think its "valid and relevant" :) OK? Good luck. Cecropia 00:09, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I looked at your revisions and think they are reasonable if they can be backed up. Cite specifics: not just "a reporter", name him/her. If military officials reviewed the claims, cite a source given in the book "the Department of the Army in 1972 examined the names of soldiers who partipated in the investigation. "Out of about 150 who claimed to be Army veterans, the names of 30 can't be matched to any Army record. [Stolen Valor, p.242]" (Not a real quote, just an example).

Of course, some people may complain that you're putting in too much detail. You can revert and maybe put excess material in talk. Cecropia 00:18, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

My apologies if I offended you Gustnado. I was a little cranky this morning when I came across what you wrote. It is certainly not necessay to have a Username to contribute to Wikipedia, but sometimes it is hard to distinguish "hit-and-run" anonymous contributions from serious ones. Like I wrote above, what you said may well be true--I can't tell. I think Crecopia has given good suggestions about how to revise. (Even though we probably come at this from diametrically opposed positions, I respect Cecropia's contributions and it is helpful to have different perspectives involved to keep things from tilting too far in any one direction.) I'll admit I'm not familiar with either of the books you mentioned. There was nothing in either title to suggest any direct connection with Kerry. Perhaps you could include a very short statement about how the book pertains to Kerry along with the title. One other thing I would suggest keeping in mind is that this is an article about John Kerry. It is not about Jane Fonda, or about the Viet Cong, or the Vietnam War, or the VVAW. Each of those have their own articles to which you can contribute if you have information pertinent to them. Anything in this article should have some direct relevance to Kerry -- and not simply try to discredit him by association. Again, I'm sorry if I offended you and hope you enjoy contributing to Wikipedia. Bkonrad | Talk 01:15, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Nice response, Bkonrad :) Cecropia 02:47, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Balance between Bush and Kerry articles

We have a problem here which, IMO, threatens the integrity of the Wikipedia. Editors (especially anonymous editors) are letting no positive comment on Bush pass unchallenged; no explanation or modification is allowed to stand without deletion and/or complaint, sometimes even when links are provided, and the entire tone of the article reads more like an indictment than an encyclopedia article. Editors are even removing fully documented information refuting specific charges on the basis that it is too wordy.

On the other hand, the Kerry article reads like a campaign biography put out by the DNC, at least until you get well into his war service, and even any factual negative assertion ends with a stronger positive spin. We learn about how he liked to play "kick the can", how competitive he was riding his bicycle, how he cycled into Berlin to look at Hitler's Bunker, and how Scaramouche is his favorite movie. We hear about his rock band and how he sailed with President Kennedy. What an idyllic life! We move right along to his accomplishments (many) and his relationships (admiring). All in all, we get 13 paragraphs mostly of unabashed praise and admiration.

Bush gets four short paragraphs for his personal ife. At this writing, the first one is simply "who was born when". I'm surprised there is no assertion that his little sister was "supposed to have died of leukemia" and that Bush didn't murder her.

In the second paragraph we learn that he earned a BA from Harvard and an MBA from Yale, but it doesn't matter because Daddy got him in college and he's a moron. The information I placed to point out that his SAT score of 1206 put him at the 79th percentile was removed because the statistics for 2003 might not be the same as when he went in, but the combined SAT is scored on a 1200 point scale of 400 to 1600 which makes 1206 about the 67th percentile (still not moron quality) if SAT were a flat scale, but its not, it's a bell curve.

We had material removed that Bush was successful in business because it is alleged to be arguable, but later he's attacked as being successful in business but only because he's crooked.

OK, so now we move on to the third paragraph. where we find out that he has daughters (no charge of incest, how generous) but that he's a war criminal, though he can't be tried because he's making sure the US doesn't ratify the international criminal court.

Pargraph four is just the mini-fact that he and his father are only the second father-son presidential pair in U.S. history.

Come on, people. Are we so partisan that we have no shame as to allow such obvious bias toward the candidates? If someone posted information that Bush has always loved dogs, someone else would post a statistic on how many dogs were killed in the Iraq War.

I don't hate Kerry, and as a veteran who served at just about the same time, I honor his service. I suspect I respect it a lot more than many of his supporters, who have generally not characterized Vietnam-era veterans were well, until just now when it is useful to hail him as a "war hero." I can't remember the last time I heard a Vietnam Vet characterized by the left as a war hero. Take the case of another very liberal (now former) Senator named Kerry (or to be exact Kerrey). Bob Kerrey was (among other things) chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee for the 104th Congress. Like our Kerry, he was in the Navy in 'Nam, and was an aggressive commander as a Navy Seal. He lost part of a leg in action. He was involved in similar operations as Kerry (but more of them, since he was in-country way longer) and came out with the Congressional Medal of Honor, I think the highest award possible. Did this save this liberal senator from anti-Vietnam Vet hatred? Not nearly. Check out this article from the liberal website FAIR. Note the date. As part of this storm, The Vietnamese Government accused Kerrey of war crimes. The liberal attack then targeted his being the President of the Progressive New School for Social Research in New York and demanded his removal. [10]. I live in New York and I remember that some of the leftist elements in the City and the University wanted to mount of a mock trial of him as a "war criminal" with the result being his removal. Inconveniently for them, this was still going on on September 11, 2001 and suddenly no one was nearly as interested.

What if Kerrey had been the candidate instead of Kerry? Both Democrats, both war heroes. Would Kerrey then be the war hero and Kerry the "baby-killer"? Or does one judge the quality of Vietnam service by whether or not he can beat Bush?

I shouldn't give up, but I'm almost inclined to let the Bush-haters have their way and let the article stand as an embarassment to Wikipedia. Cecropia 17:41, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Kerrey was probably involved in war atrocities. There is no evidence that Kerry was involved in anything similar. Don't want to comment on the other stuff. john 19:00, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Make that "possibly" rather than "probably". There is indication that John Kerry was involved in things that *I* would argue against being considered a war crime or atrocity (beaching his boat against orders and procedure to pursue and kill a fleeing Viet Cong teenager, the incident of the old Man and the water buffalo, firing on positions from which fire was issuing when he knew there were civilians in the area) that those who wanted to try Bob Kerrey for could easly try John Kerry for, but are silent or support Kerry as a "war hero with a chestful of medals" because he can beat Bush.

Consider also that, AFAIK, Bob Kerrey is not accused of personally doing any of the doubtful actions in that village incident, but being in command of those who allegedly did. If they're using that standard, John Kerry is responsible for anything his crewmen did when he was their commander. To reiterate, I'm not accusing John of anything. But there is a significant hypocrisy problem for liberal and leftist critics of Bob and all those who consider Vietnam Vets baby killers but John Kerry a war hero. Cecropia 19:24, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Keep up the good fight Crecopia. IMO, the GWB article should be able to present all the factual info about dubya, both good and bad. (I'm tempted to make a snide remark about how perhaps the articles merely reflect the relative good and bad qualities of the two men, but that would be uncalled for as well as unfair.) Comparing the two, I agree that the Kerry article has a more soft-pitch presentation of his early life. I would support that approach for the GWB article as well, and leave the criticisms and controversies for later in the article. I've stayed away from the Bush article (largely because I have no interest in him, but also because I know that I would have a hard time remaining unbiased). I suspect that part of the relative imbalance at this point is due to the fact that Bush has been under close scrutiny for many years already and the close scrutiny of Kerry has only just begun. Just as I don't like to see the (IMO) unjustified talking points served up by the RNC included in the Kerry article without rebuttal, I think the same standards should apply to the Bush article. Bkonrad | Talk 19:10, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Bkonrad - a more soft pitch Bush article is fine with me. For instance, I don't think there needs to be any mention that his SAT score was below Yale average, and that he got in because he was a legacy. As to the other points, I will admit I'm not completely familiar with all the details of Kerry and Kerreys' war records. However, I would note that there is surely a difference between saying that some American soldiers committed atrocities in Vietnam and saying that all Vietnam veterans are baby killers. john 19:29, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I don't see the problem with the SAT score. It's factual information. And it's relevant. Some people are going to identify with it and say Bush's my kind of guy, he's got common sense not book smarts and others will, of course, feel the opposite. Write it NPOV as much as possible and let the people decide. But don't omit facts. Mdchachi 20:05, 19 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Nonsense, we omit facts all the time. There is a question of the relevance of any particular fact. And I'm not sure why somebody's SAT score is relevant to anything. john 02:25, 21 Mar 2004 (UTC)

As I've contributed much of the information that Cercopia feels is worthy of a DNC press release, I guess I should respond. First of all, I'd point out that the information does not come from the DNC or the Kerry campaign, it was compiled from numerous sources. Is all of it relevant or not? But it depends on your philosophy of what wikipedia is for. I think it should all be put in because you and I simply don't know what's going to be relevant to the reader, who could be anyone in the world. Don't assume the article is just being written for some child doing a report for school. SAT score? Favorite color? Astrological sign? Bring it on! It can be relevant in ways you and I simply would never know. As for the Kerry article having much more detail about his youth than the Bush article, there's at least one answer for that: I haven't written much for the Bush article. But here's another reason, and a more important one-- Kerry had a very interesting childhood and did a lot of interesting things in his youth. You may not think it's interesting that he visited Hitler's bunker as a child, but if Kerry becomes President I am certain it will be an important point in his biography, due to the fact that his grandfather's family died in concentration camps. -- Damion

Damion, I have no complaint whatever about the material you've included about Kerry. "Warm and fuzzy" personal stuff is fine with me--still it reads like a campaign biography. My point is not that the Kerry article is too positive, it is that any similarly positive information about Bush is either taken out with someone's ingeuous complaint that "we need to stick to the basics," "this belongs someplace else," and so on, or has to have something negative attached to it, even if its irrelvant. His eight years as governor of Texas (first ever to win two terms) where he earned high marks for bipartisanship from both sides of the aisle gets one sentence. All that is left in about his early life is that he drank. Do you really think Kerry is so squeaky clean? A lot is made of Bush's being helped into Yale as a "legacy" (frankly implying he's stupid), but he not only graduated but went on to become a Harvard MBA. Do you really think that Kerry, who was born rich has never benefited from privilege? But I don't go trying to stuff that into his biography. Obviously (I hope) I'm not implying that you personally are trying to pump up Kerry and bash Bush--as I said, put anything you like into Kerry's bio--if you found out he spent a month when he was nine years old helping hungry puppies, put that in too! I'm complaining about balance, not whether to include individual specifics. Cecropia 03:54, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Well then, the solution would seem to be finding someone who can soften up Bush's bio. I agree, this would be a good step. The Kerry article is, I'd say, quite good and pretty thorough--the solution to this is to add some soft-focus to the Bush bio. Know anybody who can? 'Cause I have no idea. Meelar 04:01, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I posted this in the Kerry talk in the first place because I hoped that POV but fair-minded Kerry supporters might be interested in seeing some balance, or at least be aware that what has been going on with the Bush article is an embarassment. If anyone paid money for an encyclopedia and compared the two articles, they might assume that the editing was so biased that the rest of the encyclopedia is too. I don't see how to "soften" the Bush article, because we have a virtual vigilence committee (often anonymous IPs) continually reediting to suit themselves. A small example is a paragraph which places the positive information that Bush was nominated for a nobel prize for getting rid of Saddam with a comment that he won't get the prize because "law experts" want to try him for war crimes. Now that may seem like "balance" to some people, but none of the three citations appended to the paragraph connects the two. I've tried several times not to excise the war crimes business, but separate the two items. Each time they get stuck back together. Others (including some non-Bush fans) have tried to make the article less of a polemic, and they get reverted too. Cecropia 04:18, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The Nobel Prize thing is nonsense. Anyone in the Norwegian parliament can nominate whoever they like, and there's some crazy right wing Norwegian MP who keeps nominating Bush. I don't a "Nobel Prize nomination" is a fact particularly worth mentioning, unless you feel that, say, the stuff that Congressmen submit in proposals for resolutions ("Our country has always been made great by the contributions of lighthouse keepers. This resolution expresses the House's support for the grand tradition of American lighthouse keepers) is worthy of mention in an encyclopedia. That said, it's stupid to say he won't win because "law experts" (what kind of English is that) want to try him for war crimes. The whole "nomination" thing is silly (and implies a formal process like for the Academy Awards, which is not the case), and should just not be discussed in any way. I've removed the whole bit. john 04:40, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Vote!

I seek your input at Wikipedia:WikiProject POTUS Campaigns. Please come weigh in. jengod 23:05, Mar 19, 2004 (UTC)

Kerry's sequence number

Normally, we count George Washington as the first President, and John Kerry will be the 44th. However, according to a rectangular box at the bottom of George Washington's article, I now see 8 Presidents of Continential Congress, making George Washington the ninth President and John Kerry the 52nd. User 66.32.68.243

First of all, John Kerry will have to be elected before he becomes any number president. Second, we do not count Presidents of the Continental Congress in the sequencing, since they were presidents of that Congress, and not the executive of the United States. Cecropia 21:16, 20 Mar 2004 (UTC)

You saw a box that told you that Kerry, if elected, will be the 44^th President of the United States and that George Washington was the 1^st President of the United States. - Woodrow 01:09, 21 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Was Kerry justified in killing the fleeing soldier?

Relative to the sentence added (I put in bold) to the "Combat wounds" subhead:

Kerry chased down and killed a wounded Viet Cong, who had been shot in the leg by a crew-mate and was fleeing with another B-40 rocket. Kerry came back to the boat with the rocket and launcher. He was awarded the Silver Star medal for his actions. There is some controversy about this, as the Geneva Convention is clear about the treatment of wounded enemy soldiers not engaging in combat (and Kerry was himself the commanding officer, recommending the award).

In general, the question would be whether the fleeing soldier was "not engaging in combat." He was still a fair target, especially if he was fleeing with his weapon. The soldiers option at that point would be to surrender or risk death. This is not like a criminal fleeing from the police. The further question (in determining whether Kerry was right or wrong) would be whether Kerry might have stopped him in an disarmed state in which the VC could have unresistingly been taken as a POW, but Kerry shot him anyway. AFAIK, there is no evidence of this. Cecropia

None of us was there and therefore none of us can answer that question. RickK | Talk 15:59, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Understood. That's why I wonder whether the added sentence needs modification. Cecropia 16:15, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Some clarification would be helpful, though I don'd feel qualified to parse the situation. I'm actually more interested in the implication that Kerry as CO recommended himself for the medal. Is this really possible? I know military beauracracy can be strange at times, but I'd think there would be some sort of check on this type of self-promotional action. Bkonrad | Talk 16:24, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I also find the medal thing curious. My own memory (Army not Navy) is that, if someone was comfortable with the commander above them, they could "hint" that a recommendation for a medal would be nice, but I didn't know you could recommend yourself, if that's the way it happened. OTOH, the assertion made elsewhere in the article that Kerry's superior prepared the paperwork for Kerry's early out from 'Nam on the superior's own initiative (not Kerry's) would also be unusual, in that you ordinarily put in your own request for a personnel action. Actually, the latter would be easy to check, if they could find the original paperwork (as with the Bush ANG thing) Cecropia 16:39, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I say we take the medal thing out until a reference can be provided; that just seems way too suspicious. Also, I suggest that the Geneva Conventions part be removed since the enemy was still armed. If he had been unarmed, there would be a Geneva Conventions case, but not if he was carrying a rocket as he fled. --Rei

The whole thing is "curious" if not fishy. [11] Mdchachi 18:28, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Family Background

Vidiviniwiki claims that it's "Silly to put in '6th cousins' and '8th cousins' and descent from Charlemagne, as if any European is not his descendant; not unbelievable, simply pitifully innocuous)" in the "family background portion. I tend to disagree, but ask for opinions. First, Kerry isn't European. Second, not everyone can trace ancestry to Charlemagne. To some people it's interesting and useful to know the family background at this level, and isn't silly at all. Kerry dopesn't come from just some ordinary American family, his maternal ancestors have played an important role in both American and European history, and I think that as a candidate for the most powerful political office in the world, that's certainly worthy of attention.

Here are portions which were deleted:

" In the 19th century, members of the Forbes family played an important part in building the railroad system of America's Middle West, in helping get Grover Cleveland elected President, and in building Alexander Graham Bell's telephone company. Ralph Waldo Emerson's daughter, Edith, married into the Forbes family."

And

"This branch of Kerry's family tree also shows a common ancestry with Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jane Addams, Calvin Coolidge, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush. Because Margaret is one of the "gateway ancestors" of Charlemagne, according to the International Society of the Descendants of Charlemagne, Kerry's lineage can be drawn back to the great emperor as well."

-- Damion

Well, I agree. I earlier reinserted some of the same material that Vidiviniwiki had deleted. I agree that it is interesting and should stay. Bkonrad | Talk 05:02, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

"Kerry dopesn't come from just some ordinary American family, his maternal ancestors have played an important role in both American and European history, and I think that as a candidate for the most powerful political office in the world, that's certainly worthy of attention."

I actually find that a bit offensive. The USA is a republic and a democracy which rejected royalty and the divine right of kings, implicit in that the rejection of the concept of inherited nobility. To make the kind of fuss which requires us to think back to Charlemagne presupposes the doubtful genetic basis of greatness, especially when you are going to distant cousins. Why is it that when we trace ancestry we find kings and princes and emppresses, but somehow nobody is ever related to Adolf Hitler, Attila the Hun, Ivan the Terrible, Jack the Ripper and Vlad the Impaler. I suppose all these gentlemen died childless. :) Cecropia 05:08, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

It's offensive if someone is making that particular argument, which the deleted statement does not. Another interpretation could be that royal families have preserved their power and wealth over the centuries through sending their children to prep schools, marrying into other wealthy family lines, and joining exclusive organizations-- all of which the Forbes family has done (and I speak not as a detractor but as a supporter and fan of Kerry's). Whatever the interpretation is, I think the point here is to present the genealogical fact and let people make up their own minds.--Damion

Yes, the U.S. did reject royalty and ironically, if there is a candidate in the current election who is vulnerable to the charge of "inheriting" the office, it is not Kerry. I could be quite happy without including the Charlemange detail, but the somewhat nearer relations are interesting. Bkonrad | Talk 05:28, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Yes, and Mr. Shrub has most of the exact same bluebloodedness as Mr. Kerry. Cowboy hat or no, daddy is a New England wasp and you would never have been embarassed invitin' ol' Prescott to the best hoe-downs! :) But, you see, I'm a thoroughgoing republican, suh! (small "r" please) By all means, keep Charlemagne and everyone else in there, but like your horoscope: "For Entertainment Value Only." ;-) Cecropia 06:13, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Vidiviniwiki responds on March 31: Regarding my concise but perhaps slightly too assertive original commentary, I will step back and try to argue out my points more diplomatically, and offer to abide by any extended vote during April/May (whoever wishes to organize).

First, regarding Charlemagne reference, I agree that a legitimate, proven descent from this ruler could be interesting. However, to genealogists, it is in fact less powerful than a closer relationship to say Edward III, considered a 'font of English blood royale', which has 'been proven' for many Presidents, including each Bush and probably Kerry. For most people of European descent, it is not a question of if someone is a descendent of Charlegmagne, but rather how many times, 50 generations later. For genealogists, the prominent early Colonial ancestors of Kerry (Winthrop and Bowdoin) would be more telling, and of course, his immediate Forbes family (of China and Boston) descent and Kerry family descent are most important, with the relationships with his parents and grandparents deeply formative. More relevant to our article's 'family background' section is the genealogical impact on Kerry's biography; is Kerry confident or ashamed because of his varied ancestry?; was Kerry helped or hindered because of this ancestry; is he an 'outsider' or 'insider' or both with his family background? Clearly the 'Irish Catholic' illusions of early Boston press and political campaigns, his (and his mother's) trusts' origins in the Forbes family wealth and opium dealing in China especially when he self-financed his primary fight against Dean, his father's and maternal ancestors patriotric service - these are important genealogical references. Non-genealogists, though, might see a Charlemagne reference and either ignore it (as these get common and cause 'ancestor inflation' for every notable) or put too much emphasis on it (as if Kerry was born with a tiara on his head). Yes, Kerry is partly an aristocrat and considers himself a kind of one, which is clearly is part of his biography now (his youthful idol was Scaramouche). But he is an aristocratic Senator not because of 'blood royale' a thousand years ago but because of his family's 19th century commercial and local ties - mainly because the Boston elite like the Winthrops in the 19th century married into and 'adopted' an immigrant Scots Forbes family grown rich while living in China, and these ancient Boston connections were helped with Forbes trusts and (French estates), prep schools in Switzerland and the Northeast, the Ivy League, etc. A royal descent is fun and all, but a descent from King Louis XI or Charlemagne probably belongs on a different page (the Forbes or Winthop or whichever 'family' page). (Now if you said Kerry was the natural son of the Queen mum, that would be different).

Regarding proposed standards for an individual's genealogy (and secondly, a family), in an article:

For an individual's article: list parents, if known, in any case, with careers; list grandparents, if sufficiently interesting; list uncles and aunts, and 1st cousins, if powerful or accomplished people affecting the individual (for example, Kerry's uncle and aunt were expatriates, I believe, and his childhood pal and 1st cousin is a French citizen and was a (Green? party) candidate for President or Prime Minister of France; that seems relevant to an individual running for President of the U.S.); list any (American/nationally connected) ancestors within 10 generations, if they were clearly famous and accomplished leaders, etc., like a top stateman or 'first governor' (not simply historical footnotes);

For a family article: confine article to prominent family only, like 'Forbes family of China and Boston', but not necessarily a 'Forbes of Scotland' genealogical compilation out of Burke's into genealogical antiquity - that could be a different article; list main family line from 'patriarch/matriarch', with birthdates/places to identify them easily; list some spouses if of notable families (for example, Emerson's daughter married so and so); comment on interesting cousins/relationships to the 2nd cousin or 3rd cousin, or perhaps to a very distant degree if major like a '7th cousin' relationship between Kerry and Bush, descendants of same Governor (under Winthrop family article) comment on the accomplishments of members on this 'family' page (for example, keep the Forbes 'railroad' investments on the Forbes family page, since this Forbes appears to be a second cousin of Kerry's great grandfather, a pretty distant connection).

Sorry for longwinded proposal - the end! -------------------------------

May I mention that Charlemagne was crowned in 800 (sic!), 1204 years ago? Any white person who is not somehow a relative of him must belong to a family of untouchables or islanders. Furthermore, no serious encyclopedia would list far cousins, especially not if there exists an extra entry about the family and there is no indication that they had a personal influence on the life of the person the entry is about. Get-back-world-respect 14:02, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

As far as I know, Kerry and George W. Bush are cousins of NINTH degree. I see no reason to include this here, nor the connection to e Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jane Addams, or Calvin Coolidge. If one is interested in the family there are extra articles. Get-back-world-respect 23:08, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I honestly don't know what degree of cousins they are. If it is incorrect, let's fix it. But I definitely think this is appropriate to include. It is precisely the sort of background information I would expect to find in an encyclopedia article. As of now, I do not think there are any "other articles" which decribe these in any detail. If there are, then sure link to them and we can trim the verbage a bit. But until there is an actual article, I'd like to see it stay. It is actually not such a bad idea for an article: something like the Family tree of John Kerry. Course we'd probably need one for Bush, and then the completists will want one for every other president. Bkonrad | Talk 23:51, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Is this a novel or an encyclopedia entry?

Not that I think this was not interesting, but why is there SO MUCH information about details of his life? The story of him getting someone with a rocket in Vietnam even shows up twice, as well as Lacrosse and a girl he once dated. Is it important he met Kennedy at a sailing race? Get-back-world-respect 14:46, 1 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Hey that's a funny point get back the world respect... Anyway, if peeps are going to put in Austrian origins and distant Bowdoins and Winthrops, then they should put in grandfather Forbes (born in Shanghai for G-d's sakes) and opium dealing (which bot Naushon Island and offshore estate in France and trusts), ironic since Kerry has gone after Noriega/Bush for political credit... and also include Brice Lalonde first cousin - since obviously he was a May 68 student leader in demonstration/confrontations and green activist that clearly motivated Kerry to launch his own youth demonstrations in '69 and environmental policies in 70s. ERGO: Brice in, opium/Forbes connections in, JFK-JFK-oswald rifle tie in, but Winthrop/Bowdoin 'Brahmin' out.

I agree that the grandmother's grandfather is not needed, nor 9th grade cousins like GWB. But Oswald's rifle is only there because someone does not like Kerry, and the word "opium" occurs SEVEN times in an entry about someone whose only personal connection with opium is that some ancestors traded with it. The Forbes family has its own entry. Brice Lalonde is mentioned FOUR times. If 205.188.116.204 thinks it can decide who is a troll it may first open an account. 205.188.117.11 created the Brice Lalonde entry, and 205.188.116.65 changed it three times. 205.188.117.14 changed Forbes family 5 times, adding such neutral information as "For a while, the Scottish and Chinese opium trading background of the early Forbes family members who settled in Massachusetts did not wear well on Boston society, but because of the family's enormous wealth and aping (sic!) of local customs, the Forbes family became known, through friends like Oliver Holmes, as a true 'Brahmin' family." Get-back-world-respect 15:29, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Do we need what President Nixon said about Kerry? Just imagine there was a section about what Bill Clinton said about George W. Bush. To me that is not appropriate for an encyclopedia entry. Get-back-world-respect 15:05, 1 Apr 2004 (UTC)

News reports last week said that Nixon had the FBI trailing Kerry in the late '60s, so I don't think Nixon's opinions or statements about him are uninteresting. It probably wouldn't appear in the Encylcopedia Britannica, but this is a different kind of encyclopedia. Bias is more likely to appear in the withholding of information than in providing information. I maintain, the more the better. Damion

"Bias is more likely to appear in the withholding of information than in providing information." Direct counterexample: Cecropia included a lengthy paragraph about French and Russian financial interests in Iraq in the entry about George W. Bush. Get-back-world-respect 21:18, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

As long as there's context and accuracy, what's the problem? There really are no space constraints, you know, and so there is no reason not to be exhaustively detailed. For short and breazy, read the mainstream media. Damion

The inoffensive paragraph is as follows:

John Kerry's maternal grandfather, James Grant Forbes, was born in Shanghai, China, where the Forbes family of China and Boston accumulated a fortune in the opium and China trade, and became an international businessman and attorney living in France. Kerry's interesting Forbes family cousins and ancestors include: John Murray Forbes and his cousins, leading opium dealers in China during the Opium War; Cameron Forbes, the Governor General of the Philippines during the U.S. occupation; his niece, Ruth Forbes Paine, who started the International Peace Academy and who married Arthur Young, the inventor of Bell Helicopter; her son, Michael R. Paine and his wife Ruth Paine, benefactors and friends of Maria and Lee Harvey Oswald (and in whose garage Oswald's rifle is said to have been stored the day of the Kennedy assassination); Brice Lelonde, the Mayor of the Forbes family seat of Saint-Brieuc and a French politican (and ecologist) who ran for President of France as a Green party member in 1981; see Forbes family.

Get-back-world-respect continues to engage in edit war and deleting previous work by others. Further, he claims Brice is mere in law, but my authorities say that 1) Brice and John are sons of Rosemary and Fiona Forbes, expatriate heiresses of Forbes family and 2) Brice directly influenced John's activities in leading student demonstrations. So that must remain in. Put up authority on any claims otherwise. Others - either vote or replace Forbes family paragraph when he deletes it. Further, it's his middle name! People have remarked on Kennedy bootlegging and Bush CIA conections; Forbes 1st cousins and grandpa remain IN.

Regarding opium - well, he DID inherit the Forbes family trusts in 2002 when his mother died; he DID visit Forbes French estates and DID visit Naushon Island estates of Forbes family; he DID get tuition from a Winthrop family member (whose family was enriched with Forbes marriage connections); he DID go after Noriega and as prosecutors, several local drug dealers and supports strong drug sentencing; he DID prolongue his election fight against Dean with Forbes family inheritance (his interest in house/paintings/trusts); he did join Skull & Bones in part on Russell/Forbes family relationship; he IS a sailer and boat captain echoing Capt. Forbes opium smuggling adventures; he IS a New Englander with tremendous intellectual and moral ego built on opium profits lecturing to the rest of the country; he IS a Forbes first cousin with Brice, an active green party socialist and European activist; he IS a cousin with Forbes family members who have subsidized International Peace Academy and other UN functions, marrying into military, diplomatic, and wealthy families; this is a riff on the Forbes family connection to Senator J. Forbes K., a made man in a Forbes dynasty by the Captains Forbes as certainly as Samuel Bush and Joe Kennedy made their dynasties.

Regarding JFK-JFK connection with Oswald's rifle in cousin's garage, well, I agree that is coincidental and a Forbes family secret - but also, because of JFK-JFK connections (and his own modelling after President) and Bell Helicopter wealth/cousin (given Vietnam service and protests), and fantastic wealth all around (Kerry was not poor; if he was not a born trust fund beneficiary that's because he was a generation-skipping level away in offshore estate ownership, and trusts through his mother who herself 'waited' to get rich).

Anonymous tries to pretend that I deleted more than just the paragraph following "Kerry's interesting Forbes family cousins and ancestors include:" Already "interesting" is a judgment, and mentioning opium SEVEN times and including the Oswald rifle is an obvious attempt to throw mud on Kerry. I never wrote anything about Brice being "mere in law", and the relevant information on him is given at THREE different positions of the Kerry article. Get-back-world-respect 17:45, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Terrorism

Someone has inserted a paragraph toward the end of the entry on the subject of Terrorism that doesn't seem to have any context to it. I'm not opposed to the item being there as long as it's true, but at the moment it doesn't seem to tie in with anything else in the article. Any idea on how this shoudl be handled? Damion

That paragraph was obviously partisan and is about as important to Kerry as it would be to include a paragraph "Bush and trouble with names" stating that George W. Bush once called the Spanish Prime Minister Aznar "Anzar". Get-back-world-respect 00:32, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Second Tour of Duty

Reddi, your changes are A) poorly worded, and B) remove attribution. This content is quotes from a Boston Globe article. As a consequence, we need to credit the Boston Clobe, or we're committing plagiarism. Furthermore, the attribution indicates who is making the claim, and allows the user to cross reference it. You've had several people now revert your changes; when it's you vs. several other people, you should probably accept that your changes (on this particular issue) are not wanted. --Rei

Reddi, You can't just slap an disputed POV notice on a section without explaining on the talk page what it is that you are disputing. If you do not respond, the notice will be removed. Bkonrad | Talk 17:31, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Second that motion. With the combination of this extremely politically contentious time (election-year 'opinioneering'), war, and this biography that both schoolchildren and regular adults will read, we need to be very, very careful to cite (hopefully trusted, independent, and authoritative) sources. It's not enough to quote a campaign website, methinks, nor hearsay. Rather, the standard should be (IMHO) either a major newspaper or news service source that is being regularly fact-checked by other parties (like their competitors). Justanyone Talk 14:40 13 Apr 2004 (CDT)

Senate Career

He "decided" to replace Tsongas? Come on, we can do better than that. Some mention of the democratic process would be in order, like:

campaign for the senate seat
date of victory
date he took office.

Or was he simply appointed by the governor, after Paul Tsongas died? --Uncle Ed 19:26, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)

According to [[12]], in his bio there, it says John Kerry was Liuntenant governor first. Then, when Tsongas died/left office, he ran for the office against a well financed Reagan-coattails GOP candidate. I would like to see some corroboration besides JohnKerry.com. I believe the facts (was Lt.Gov, ran for Tsongas' seat) but would like corroboration on who challenger was, how traditionally democratic the seat was, etc. before writing this bit. Justanyone Talk 10 pm 13 April 2004 CDT.

Fingernail Scrape

It's just plain dumb to qualify the "fingernail scrape" comment by casting ulterior motives on the source (e.g. who is a registered republican and commented on the incident 36 years after it happened). It only verifies what we already knew -- that the injury was minor. We already knew that because (a) Kerry didn't have take any time off to get it treated and (b) Kerry and nobody on his crew has claimed that it was otherwise. Certainly if there were any stitch marks & scar tissue left behind, we'd have seen them by now. What's the big deal? Facts are facts. Mdchachi 18:31, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I don't see much point in characterizing the wound as a fingernail scrape in the first place, but if you want to include a detail like that, some context is appropriate -- I think a 36-year old memory of a minor incident is just little dubious. I'd actually like to see additional qualifications (from the same source that you cite) stating that it was very common for Purple Hearts to be handed out for minor wounds. Bottom line--even if it was only a "fingernail scrape", so what? And what about the detail that he recieved the wound on what was considered a dangerous covert mission? I say it is either an insignificant detail that is not worth mentioning at all or if it is mentioned it needs to be placed in context. Bkonrad | Talk 18:49, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Feel free to fill out the context further if you like. I think it's pertinent because people are trying to pass Kerry off as a bonafide war hero or something. When in reality, he tried to get a deferment, he pushed to get three purple hearts and then used that to get out of his tour early. I personally don't fault him for it. I wouldn't have wanted to be there either. But the spin-doctoring looks bad and it will cost Kerry the election if he lets it go too far. As to the "risky and covert" characterization. This is in the article but there is no attribution. It sounds like spin to me. What kinds of incursions in enemy territory were not risky and covert? Mdchachi 19:35, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Do we really have to discuss that someone said one of the wounds was just a fingerscrape but on the other hand it is so long ago and he was republican? IS it not sufficient to comment that the Purple Hearts at the time were given for whatever wound? Get-back-world-respect 22:52, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

At the time the "three-purple-hearts" issue was well known as a way to get out of 'Nam fast. Some guys were even said to be having a buddy give them a minor wound and claiming it as a war wound to get that third heart. And (as I've said before) I don't fault Kerry one bit for using it for minor wounds; but it is an entry in the question of running as a "war hero." When the brass realized that there were too many three-hearters for minor wounds, they changed the policy.

But anyway, it is a supreme irony to me to see Democrats and U.S. liberals hailing Kerry as a war hero—has to be the first time any of them hailed any Viet Nam vet as a war hero, especially one who admitted he personally killed a Viet Cong. Cecropia 23:02, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I'd prefer not including the "fingernail scrape" characterization or the admitedly awkward qualification of it. But it is a factual report that has been going around. If the CO's characterization stays in, I think some sort of qualification of the remark and circumstances of the wound is appropriate. Feel free to rewrite though. It is definitely not my best writing. Bkonrad | Talk 23:43, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The Toledo Blade recently won a Pulitzer Prize for revealing that the Tiger Force even did body count contests about "who will kill Viet Cong No. 327", cover-ups endured until last year's revelations. The fact that Kerry fought for his country bravely in the war but came to the conclusion that the war was wrong in my eyes is evidence for the fact that he knows more about warfare than many others, currently a helpful qualification. Are you Cecropia as a freeper as well? Get-back-world-respect 21:10, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

There are six sentences given on how bad Kerry's wounds were. Do you think any encyclopedia with the honest will to give valuable information would cover this so excessively? <<He was treated for a small piece of shrapnel in his arm and he immediately returned to duty. The wound was described by his former commanding officer as resembling a "scrape" when asked about it in 2004, though Kerry disputes this. At the time Purple Hearts were often granted for even minor injuries incurred on the battlefield. (...) One of his three injuries cost him "about two days" of active service and the other two did not interrupt his duty. Faced with criticism, Kerry has pledged to release his Vietnam medical records; his presidential campaign spokesman Michael Meehan stated: "We have a military record we are glad to run on, not run from.>> I delete the scrape stuff, relevant is only that he had got medals and that they were given out for minor injuries as well. Get-back-world-respect 20:33, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It's relevant because this is a campaign issue that we probably won't see the end of. Anti-Kerry pundits are bleating crap about his minor wounds which led to his early escape from the war. So rather than hide the facts we should include them. The sentence you put -- that medals were given for minor injuries -- is not relevant unless you first mention that his injury was minor. Personally I didn't think that sentence looked very good there but I was courteous to you and left it in. I've been reasonable about this (left out the "fingernail" in my last version and tried to take peoples opinions into account). But if you want to have an edit war over it, I will. I've never been part of an edit war before so maybe it's time. Mdchachi|Talk 21:15, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Can anyone actually back up the claim that purple hearts were granted for minor wounds, or that Kerry pushed to get the purple hearts? If not, well, this kind of smells like smear. And we don't want that. --Rei

Rei, I'll back up that purple hearts were issued for minor wounds. Did Kerry push? I don't know. Many did, if for no other reason than to get another medal or to work toward the magic three. Smear? Two (maybe all) of the three would probably have been awarded on the later policy, but only the last would probably have counted toward an early out. It is as good or bad a campaign issue as many others being thrown around by both sides. After November, nobody will care where Bush was for a year, or if Kerry had a "fingernail scratch". Also see my two paragraphs below, which I wrote before I saw your comment above.

I haven't been active in editing the main article recently, but having been in service the same time as Kerry, I know the culture and what was going down. This is my short take on what Kerry's service was like: He entered service according to a tradition that was common in his social class (as did the elder Bush in WWII and many others) and before Vietnam had fully geared up to what we know today. During his first tour he was in no realistic danger. In his second tour he was able to get what he thought was a safe assignment, but (the vagaries of war being what they are) turned out to be very dangerous indeed. In that assignment he performed both admirably and bravely, exceeding the norm. But he also took advantage of the "three-purple-heart" trick to get out as soon as could (four months of a year tour, IIRC). He was perfectly entitled to use; many others did, and I would have done the same. The 3PH issue was so often used, that they subsequently changed the policy (not because of Kerry obviously) to mean three purple hearts based on more significant wounds than he apparently suffered in two of the three incidents.

In short, he went in voluntarily, didn't like it much and got out when he could, but when he was in the thick of it, performed with merit. That description is typical of a lot of 'Nam experience. Hey, I knew lifers who left service with 17-18 years to avoid returning to Nam. I have been loathe to criticize him because he did so much more than most of the time, including National Guarders such as GW Bush and Dan Quayle and, outstandingly, Bill Clinton. OTOH, if we're talking "war hero," he did much much less than his fellow Vietnam Ver and liberal Democrat Bob Kerrey. Take this FWIW. Cecropia 21:41, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Actually, I was asking for more than just "I'll back up..." I was wanting a reference. Do you have one? I've seen a number of people claim it, but never seen a single reference. I would appreciate it. By the way, I agree with your assessment of Kerry's service. I just want to get insinuation out of the article. --Rei

Regarding PHs for minor wounds, check out the Boston Globe article that broke the story about the fingernail scrape. That is where I recall seeing it. 'Course, some might not consider that an unbiased source. Bkonrad | Talk 22:20, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

A link? Or at least an article name so I can track it down? --Rei

I cannot believe you want to keep such minor information in the article. All I see that is relevant is that he got three hearts for injuries and that a heart did not mean you had lost a foot or so. <<He was treated for a small piece of shrapnel in his arm and he immediately returned to duty. The wound was described by his former commanding officer as resembling a "scrape" when asked about it in 2004, though Kerry disputes this. At the time Purple Hearts were often granted for even minor injuries incurred on the battlefield. (...) One of his three injuries cost him "about two days" of active service and the other two did not interrupt his duty. Faced with criticism, Kerry has pledged to release his Vietnam medical records; his presidential campaign spokesman Michael Meehan stated: "We have a military record we are glad to run on, not run from.". is just not encyclopedia text but election campaign stuff. Get-back-world-respect 22:45, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I'll second this. We might as well start shoving in the glowing remarks about Kerry's behavior by his comrades, and those of his officers in his recently-released records, if we're going to put stuff like that. --Rei

Was there a vote?

To 205.188.116.204, I don't believe there was ever an actual vote on this -- simply a protracted discussion with no apparent consensus. I'm not removing the info right, mostly because I just don't care strongly enough to get into an edit war over it. I find it a bit much to include every remote relation here. This would be more appropriate in an article about the entire family, not about one member of the family. Some portion of the paragraph might work in this article, but no one is attempting to compromise by editing the material, only cutting or pasting it in total. Bkonrad | Talk 13:00, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The paragraph in question was discussed twice, at "Family Background" and "Is this a novel or an encyclopedia entry?". In none of the discussions the anonymous abuser could get much support, both discussions ended with unanswered statements by me. The family ties to other US presidents were deleted as well as a similar paragraph in the George W. Bush article. The only reason why the anonymous abuser wants to keep the paragraph is in order to include the word opium even more often in the article than it shows up already. Pretending I tried to act against a vote is just a disgusting way to show how poorly this abuser can defend his propaganda.

Besides his 11 edits in the Kerry article, 205.188.116.204 has only engaged in a ridiculous edit war about April 20. The page he edited first, Michael Johns, was also visited by a user with a very similar IP address, 205.188.117.11 who tried to include the word "handsome" in the article about Josef Mengele and who created the article about Brice Lalonde, where user 205.188.116.65 made 3 changes regarding opium dealing. Get-back-world-respect 14:17, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Don't be suckered by Get-back-world-respect who is an obvious partisan, editing George Bush, Vietnam, Iraq War sites, - look at his contributions. He deletes cousins.

Regarding Bkonrad - you were the one above I see when people were taking a vote on 'ancestors' and cousins that wanted all interesting cousins to be kept IN, including very distant ones I believe. Pick one or the other.

Please don't attribute things to me that I did not write. I objected to cutting out everything about the family tree. I wrote " I could be quite happy without including the Charlemange detail, but the somewhat nearer relations are interesting." That leaves me comfortably on the fence about exactly which relations are interesting. The "interesting" material I reinserted that Vidiviniwiki had deleted was this: This branch of Kerry's family tree also shows a common ancestry with Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jane Addams, Calvin Coolidge, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush. Nothing about cousins in there.

Second point, there was no vote. Simply discussion, which as I read it, was inconclusive but tending to support trimming the more extraneous relations. So I do not see any justification for you in using that discussion to support your repeatedly reinserting tangential information. Bkonrad | Talk 23:39, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

In sum:

include Forbes opium drug dealers, of course - source of Forbes family money; include Cameron, a Governor General (but for now I'll delete as compromise) include Paines, because of Vietnam/helicopter/JFK interesting tidbit (this could be compromise if 3 people agree to delete); include Brice Lalonde here because 1st cousins, French opium derived estate, student protest leader in 60's (giving JFKerry ideas), and ran for President - very important family connection and precedent - must include here, no compromise.

Deleted sentences were: Kerry's Forbes family cousins and ancestors include: John Murray Forbes and his cousins, leading opium dealers in China during the Opium War; Cameron Forbes, the Governor General of the Philippines during the U.S. occupation; his niece, Ruth Forbes Paine, who started the International Peace Academy and who married Arthur Young, the inventor of Bell Helicopter; her son, Michael R. Paine and his wife Ruth Paine, benefactors and friends of Maria and Lee Harvey Oswald (and in whose garage Oswald's rifle is said to have been stored the day of the Kennedy assassination); Brice Lalonde, the Mayor of the Forbes family seat of Saint-Brieuc and a French politican (and ecologist) who ran for President of France as a Green party member in 1981.

Paragraph after compromise: Kerry's Forbes family cousins and ancestors include: John Murray Forbes and his cousins, leading opium dealers in China during the Opium War; Ruth Forbes Paine, who started the International Peace Academy and who married Arthur Young, the inventor of Bell Helicopter; her son, Michael R. Paine and his wife Ruth Paine, benefactors and friends of Maria and Lee Harvey Oswald (and in whose garage Oswald's rifle is said to have been stored the day of the Kennedy assassination); Brice Lalonde, the Mayor of the Forbes family seat of Saint-Brieuc and a French politican (and ecologist) who ran for President of France as a Green party member in 1981. -Anonymous!

Here is the ENTIRE paragraph, not just the addition (so we can see redundancy)

John Kerry's maternal grandfather, James Grant Forbes, was born in Shanghai, China, where the Forbes family of China and Boston accumulated a fortune in the opium and China trade, and became an international businessman and attorney living in France. Kerry's Forbes family cousins and ancestors include: ~~John Murray Forbes and his cousins, leading opium dealers in China during the Opium War;~~ [it's already established that fhe Forbes family fortune came in part from opium trade] Ruth Forbes Paine, who started the International Peace Academy I've never heard of the IPA, but don't really care if this stays in or not and who married Arthur Young, the inventor of Bell Helicopter; again, I've never heard of either the man or his invention and this doesn't do anything to whet my interest--either keep or delete, makes no difference to me her son, Michael R. Paine and his wife Ruth Paine, benefactors and friends of Maria and Lee Harvey Oswald (and in whose garage Oswald's rifle is said to have been stored the day of the Kennedy assassination); right, now let me get this straight--the son of a cousin (neither of whom have clear connection to Kerry aside from extended family) had something to do with a notorious figure--ah yes, this really is such a telling detail about Kerry (not)--there is absolutely no need for that to be here Brice Lalonde, the Mayor of the Forbes family seat of Saint-Brieuc and a French politican (and ecologist) who ran for President of France as a Green party member in 1981. perhaps somewhat informative, I think another version established a closer personal relationship with John, if so, this may be relevent.

How about this for a compromise:

John Kerry's maternal grandfather, James Grant Forbes, was born in Shanghai, China, where the Forbes family of China and Boston accumulated a fortune in the opium and China trade, and became an international businessman and attorney living in France. Kerry's Forbes family cousins and ancestors include: Ruth Forbes Paine, who started the International Peace Academy and who married Arthur Young, the inventor of Bell Helicopter; Brice Lalonde, the Mayor of the Forbes family seat of Saint-Brieuc and a French politican (and ecologist) who ran for President of France as a Green party member in 1981.

Bkonrad | Talk 23:39, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Upon further reflection, I realize that the compromise I offered above was really just a straw man. I really see no reason at all for Ruth Forbes Paine or Arthur Young to be included (I was ambivalent about them, but including them tells us nothing about Kerry. I might be persuaded that it's worth mentioning Brice Lalonde if it can be clearly established that Kerry was close to him. Bkonrad | Talk 00:09, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

As I already explained, Brice Lalonde is mentioned at THREE different positions in the article, as well as the opium dealing of the Forbes family. Similar extensive relatice information was already deleted from this article as well as the one about George W. Bush. I see no reason why the sentences "Frederick committed suicide on November 23, 1921 by gunshot to the head at the Copley Plaza Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts. His second son, Richard was only six at the time." or "They (Kerry's partents) married in Montgomery, Alabama in January, 1941.) should be kept. They tell nothing about Kerry. Get-back-world-respect 02:13, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It's been a while since I read the entire article closely. Maybe I should take a look again. Maybe tomorrow. The more stuff I see from this anon obsessed with the Forbes opium fortune makes me very doubtful about any of hir contributions. S/he had inserted it into nearly every article there is about every member of the family making it sound as if every one of them was an opium dealer (and the descendents still responsible for whatever sins their forebears may have done). I don't want to cover up that background, but it doesn't need to be plastered everywhere (and usually in very poorly written prose at that). Bkonrad | Talk 02:42, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Bkonrad - since you're plausibly receptive to improving the site with a compromise, I'll address you. (Get-back-world-respect is a notorious partison adding and deleting on dozens of articles with far-leftist tripe). Regarding opium, well, the family is drenched in opium profits and profits on profits, so no deals to delete. It's like describing the Bush's without 'Northeastern Banking' (even though they've been in Ohio and Texas/Florida the last 150 years far more than the 'Northeast'), the Rockefellers without describing oil, or the Kennedy's without describing their wealth and region. The Forbes/Kerry's are a China/UN/Boston family of opium wealth, international dealings, and national service: period. That's where the trips to France (met Forbes wife) to Rio (met Heinz wife) to Switzerland (prep school), etc., came from. Regarding Brice Lalonde, again - he's 1st cousin (share grandparents), playmate on Forbes estate in Saint-Brieuc, and led his cousin in France with student protests and politics. Pretty amazing that James Grant Forbes (born Shanghai) is grandfather to a nominee for President of France and a nominee for President of U.S.! Regarding grandfather Kerry's suicide - well, that's not my entry, but it seems reasonable to put it in if describing grandparents, especially since suicide is probably dependent upon depression, and that is probably a genetic-associated infliction. Wouldn't you really like to know that the grandfather (1/4 of genes) of a nominee for President (with his finger on the button, or not, or on again?) was a suicide? Regarding Paines, well, perhaps they can go, but not until a vote. Regarding proposed compromise - well, again, don't delete until we come to a conclusion. Pervading ethos: keep in until voted out.

Anon.

No, Sorry. You're a smear artist. The opium connection is there, it is not necessary to repeat it in every other paragraph. Same with the French connection. The other stuff is irrelevant. A grandfather committed suicide has bearing on Kerry's qualifications? You've got to be kidding. You are misreading the discussion here if you think it supports keeping all of that in the article. Bkonrad | Talk 12:31, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I may have overreacted a bit. Calling you a smear artist is not helpful. I apologize. At the very least, you appear to be going through the motions of discussing things here on the talk page. There is hope in that (although I reserve the right to remain highly skeptical until you demonstrate a more responsible attitude towards editing NPOV encyclodedic articles). I stand by my other statements however. Most of what you are attempting to reinsert is either redundant or irrelevant. Bkonrad | Talk 13:45, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I am gettting SO sick of the debate over this issue. Now Bkonrad has deleted almost everything relating to the Forbes family in Kerry's entry. Surely it's not the most important infortmation, but my god, the Forbes family is one of the most prominent families in New England's history! Kerry's genealogical connections to and through the Forbes has been written about in major newspapers around the world.

Well, that is quite to the point. There is more than enough info about the Forbes family for a extended article (there already is a skeleton of sorts). Much more than is really relevant in an article specifically about John Forbes Kerry. I think it is enough to mention the highlights here and direct the interested reader to more complete coverage elsewhere. Bkonrad | Talk

This week, the director of Burke's-Peerage spoke to a reporter about Kerry's confirmed genealogical connections as a Forbes to several world leaders throughout history, and stated that he is exceptional in that he has more connections than even President Bush.

I'm not opposed to including a few additional highlights here. What I have been deleting the last few times is just some (IMO) inappropriate materials from anon. I did not feel sufficiently motivated to try and re-write the mess and simply restored back to the last version before anon's edits.Bkonrad | Talk

Don't tell us this is irrelevant and then unilateraly decide to delete it!

I have not been acting unilaterally. (Although I'm a little reluctant to claim him as an ally) GWBR has also been actively removing the inappropriate additions. And as I read the discussion on this page, the majority seemed to be tilting toward less detail rather than more. And I don't say all of it is irrelevant--I say irrelevant or redundant. There is a difference. I do not want to hide the connection of the family fortune with the opium trade but it is not necessary to repeat it ad naseum. Bkonrad | Talk

True, I think the connection to some guy who knew the daughter of a cousin or whatever is quite beyond the boundary, but Winthrop, Forbes and the rest, are all quite relevant.
I quite agree. I'm not sure why you seem to be attacking me. Bkonrad | Talk

And by the way, if Bkonrad wants to talk about bias, then let him explain why the Jewish side of his family line (which I mostly authored) has remained untouched for weeks! Presumably, it's fine to know that his grandfather's sisters were killed in Germany, but who his other grandfather's family was and what they were doing at the same time, is not relevant? -- Damion

Are you serious? You're accusing me of bias for not removing factual and fairly concise material about the father's side while also removing redundant extraneous information about the mother's side? If you read closely, the information about the mother's side IS still there--I only removed the repetitous insertions. Bkonrad | Talk 22:15, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with including some information about the family. But mentioning opium SEVEN times, Lalonde FOUR times and including what some relatives allegedly once stored in their garage for someone else is clearly over the top, and the anonymous was the only one who kept making these edits. What's wrong with claiming me as an ally? I clearly indicate on my page and even with my handle which opinion I stand for, but I try not to make biased edits in the articles and always support what I do with arguments on talk. Get-back-world-respect 23:56, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I'm not defending the opium, Lalonde and Oswald comments; but as it is now, the reader would have no idea about the significance of the Winthrop and Forbes families. When the Lalonde/opium/Oswald stuff was taken out, so was entirely factual and relevant Winthrop and Forbes material. -- Damion

I feel like I'm beating a dead horse, but if you look at the diffs carefully you'll see that the bio section was dramatically shortened some time ago during one of the earlier discussions above (the one where I wanted to see more details). The recent spate of edits almost entirely centered on Anon trying insert redundant and irrelevant info, I haven't seen anyone in the last few days trying to insert Winthrop connections. Bkonrad | Talk 12:28, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Damion, BTW I like your edits and additions of the last several hours. Bkonrad | Talk 12:32, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Kerry Poor or Rich?

This was added to the Kerry page:

Kerry may have had a moneyed pedigree, but he didn't have money. By the time the Forbes family fortune reached his mother, it had been subdivided into an extremely modest sum. (Kerry's mother, Rosemary, who trained to be a nurse, was one of eleven children.)

But the article indicates that Kerry had quite a privileged childhood and young adulthood; and he is now what almost anyone would describe as wealthy in his own right; even without having married into the Heinz food fortune. I believe this paragraph needs either to be deleted or explained: If "he didn't have money" where did he get it? Cecropia 04:21, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

You must have been online at the exact moment I was because that section was accidentally put into the piece while I was writing something else, and wasn't intended for final edit, and indeed is not there now. On the other hand, it appears to be true that the earlier characterization of Rosemary Forbes as just "an heiress" implies that his mother and father had more money than they did. For instance, his fees for St. Paul's School were paid not by his parents, but by an aunt. He is not described as poor in this piece, but I think it is accurate to say that he was poor in comparison to his classmates-- a point which is made by people who attended the school with him. His father, afterall, was the son of Jewish immigrants, and did work for a living as foreign services officer; it's not liek his parents were wealthy industrialists or executives or politicians. -- Damion Damion

Ah, I see your point. But to the average reader I think it sort of emphasizes his non-humble upbringing. Poor people don't spend their summers on estates on exclusive islands, have doting aunties who pay their private school tuitions, and they usually don't travel in the circles that allow them to marry two consecutive heiresses. One site, listing wealthiest U.S. presidents estimated that, if elected, Kerry will be the third or fourth wealthiest man ever to be President. Also up there, IIRC, are George Washington, JFK, LBJ and Herbert Hoover. Cecropia 12:55, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Erm ... I just noticed something in Damion's post: "His father, afterall, was the son of Jewish immigrants". IIRC, even Kerry was not supposed to have known that. I recall the Boston Globe "revealing" this. I can't find the original article, but I did find this reference to it:

"Now it's Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry whose Jewish roots are being reported.

"Kerry? The Massachusetts senator, the quintessential WASP-y looking politician with an Irish-sounding name?

"Yup.

"Two of Kerry's grandparents were Jewish, it turns out.

"Kerry, who is a practicing Catholic, said he has known for 15 years that his paternal grandmother was Jewish, but had unsuccessfully searched for news of his paternal grandfather's roots.

"However, a genealogist hired by the Boston Globe found that Kerry's grandfather was born to a Jewish family in a small town in the Czech Republic.

"This is incredible stuff," Kerry told the Globe. "I think it is more than interesting. It is a revelation." [13]

So it would seem that Kerry didn't know he was half-Jewish when he was in private school and would he have communicated that to his classmates if he did know? Cecropia 13:24, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It doesn't matter if he knew his grandparents were Jewish when he was kid. My point was that as the son of a Jewish immigrant, his father most likely was not an inheritor of wealth. Damion

by Anon: The facts are:

1. Kerry's Forbes mother was 1 of 11 children.
2. Kerry's Forbes mother (later in life) was beneficiary of Forbes family trusts
3. Kerry's father was public servant, but son of a wealthy/bankrupt suicide and cousin to very rich European merchants (cousins built modernist mansion in Italy), and thus father got plenty of education and connections
4. Kerry's parents were young, without cash in their own name, and accepted a gift of prep school tuition for their son John from great aunt (childless, who indubitably was going to give them money/inheritance anyway for estate planning)
5. Kerry's parents spent a lot of money traveling around the world to Forbes family estates, overseas postings, boarding school trips, books, clothes, etc.
6. Kerry's mother inherited (in today's money, approximately $40) millions, leaving son John in 2002 multimillion Forbes family trusts. (Kerry inherited about $5 MM himself; 4 siblings = approximately $20 MM; estimated spending by mother = 50%; mother 1 of 11 children > estimated grandfather's fortune in today's money (before spending, donations, etc.) = $800 MM U.S.).
7. All generations (generations skipping) beneficiaries knew they would be 'eventual' Forbes family heirs even if they were 'shabbily' dressed during prep school.
8. Forbes family wealth originated in opium trade, illegal under Chinese law, during 2 Opium Wars (wars for Oil? how about wars for Opium!)
9. Kerry's Forbes grandfather had equivalent today hundreds of millions of dollars
10. Great grandfather Forbes and his Forbes cousins had equivalent of billion dollars: an immense, early, ill-gotten American fortune started in opium
11. Kerry's million dollar 2002 Forbes trusts and inheritances (and offshore Forbes estates and Forbes family donors) absolutely helped him continue his campaign against Dean in Iowa when regular donations dried up
12. Kerry's wife's fortune (and unreleased tax returns) are interesting as well, as well as first wife's fortune. Seems like Kerry men only marry millionaires with foreign estates.
13. The idea that Kerry was born poor, was raised poor, remains poor, is the poor husband, or otherwise represents the poor is ABSURD on its face. - Anon1453.

Pershing photo

I am against including portraits of other people in an article about a person. If he is so important he should get his own article. Get-back-world-respect 23:11, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It doesn't bother me, but at the same time it is not essential to the article either. So no arguments from me if you want to remove it. Bkonrad | Talk 23:54, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Forbes family wealth

Suggestion to anyone - suggest someone works to publish/research Forbes family wealth (wills, estate tax, published trusts, etc.). Publish excerpts here on talk page. -Anon1453

I second that. I have been unable to locate the source for the claim that Kerry's mother inherited so many millions of dollars. I also find it biased and inaccurate to say what the amount would mean in 2003's dollars. If the reader is looking at the entry in 2010, it will be useless to know what the amount meant in 2003. This has clearly been put in the entry to make it seem like a lot more than it was.

Yeah, I kinda thought so as well, but I was catching so much flak for other thinks at the time I didn't want to comment. I'd be very interested in seeing some documentation for these claims. Bkonrad | Talk 00:23, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Brice Lalonde

Dear Bkonrad. My compliments on partly-thoughtful rewrite. I want Forbes cousins IN Forbes section. But as sop, in your language, I will include Brice only, leaving other for Forbes page. But if this compromise is not acceptable, then 1 2 3 4 I declare an edit war. Thank you and regards, Anon1453

Your recent edits are quite reasonable. Perhaps not exactly how I would have phrased things, but I guess that's how we reach NPOV. Re: Lalonde, he is also specifically mentioned in the Childhood Years section. I don't see it neccessary to include him in the Family History section as well. But I'm not going touch it for now. Peace out. Bkonrad | Talk 13:52, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I hope GBWR's recent deletion doesn't upset the compromise that seemed to satisfy anon. I'll gladly trade a redundant sentence about Lalonde for endless edit wars. Bkonrad | Talk 22:06, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

You do not love your country, appeaser 8^p Get-back-world-respect 23:10, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I want Bush and Coolidge out

"Other notable figures in this branch of Kerry's family tree are Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jane Addams, Calvin Coolidge, and ironically, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush." is unnecessary here. Bush and Kerry are only ninth (sic!) degree cousins, and a similar sentence was deleted in the article about George W. Bush. If one is interested in genealogy one can take a look at the Forbes family article. Get-back-world-respect 21:24, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Except that the relation to Bush would not be in the Forbes family article since it is on the Winthrop side. I think this is very appropriate to keep. Exactly the sort of information I would expect to find in a good encyclopedia. Bkonrad | Talk 21:57, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

PS Although I'd prefer to keep this info in, I don't feel that strongly about it; however, as someone (I can't see who right now) pointed out above, we have several paragraphs about the Forbes family and about Kerry's Jewish-Catholic heritage, but only one short line about the Winthrop family, which is quite arguably the more important connection politically and historically speaking. Bkonrad | Talk 22:39, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Indeed, if it weren't for a Winthrop -- his wealthy great-aunt -- he probably would have never gone to prep school and then eventually Yale, in which case we most likely would not be discussing him at all. About the Bush and Coolidge connection -- I'm not wedded to it either, but it has been in the news, so I don't think it's altogether irrelevant-- Damion

I know that Kerry and Bush are only ninth degree cousins, what are the family relations with Coolidge, Roosevelt and Addams? Get-back-world-respect 23:14, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

If they're really ninth cousins, it's a meaninglessly distant relationship. I bet I'm a ninth or lower degree cousin of at least one other person who's posted on this talk page. I don't object to it strongly, but we should understand that it doesn't mean anything when making the decision to keep or remove. Isomorphic 23:41, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I wouldn't assume that the genealogical connections are as common as you think. There are millions of African Americans, Mexican Americans, Italian Americans, etc.. who very likely don't share a single ancestor with Kerry or Bush until you're dozens of generations back, in which case it's probably impossible to prove anyway due to the fact that genealogies are kept more thoroughly among certain ethnic, social or religious groups than in others. The mere fact that Kerry's genealogy can be traced and so thoroughly is itself a certain indicator of his background. -- Damion

I agree that it is an inconsequential detail. But I still think that it is precisely the sort of detail I'd want to have in an encyclopedia article. I mean, there is some inherent interest and irony that Bush and Kerry are related. It's a fact, it's topical, and why should we make users have to look elsewhere to confirm or deny it. And besides, what harm is there in including it? As for Coolidge, Roosevelt, and Adams, while it may be a little less topical, I think there is still inherent interest in such trivia, perhaps even more so when Kerry gets elected. Bkonrad | Talk 23:57, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I personally have about twenty cousins. First degree. To ninth degree it increases nearly exponentially. Maybe 500? Maybe 5000? If one of them was George W. Bush, would anyone bother? Would I qualify for an encyclopedia article? You know what I just found when I searched google for "ninth degree cousin"? "You do not know your danger, Theoden," interrupted Gandalf, "These hobbits will sit on the edge of ruin and discuss the pleasures of the table, or the small doings of their fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers, and remoter cousins to the ninth degree, if you encourage them with undue patience." The Lord of the Rings (Book 3, Chapter 8). (This could be said of many genealogist I know).Get-back-world-respect 01:17, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Like I said, there is inherent interest in such trivia. Not that it amounts to much of anything, but some people do seem to be interested in such things. Hard to say why exactly, but then I guess there are worse ways to pass the time. Rather than the hard-core geneologist, I was thinking more of people sitting around, having a few brews and someone says, "Hey, you know I heard that Bush and Kerry are actually cousins or something" "What?, you're crazy." "No, I'm serious, let's check the web." Whereupon they come upon the Wikipeda article which settles the question. Bkonrad | Talk 02:20, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Remaining question: what is a ninth degree cousin? How many do they have? Get-back-world-respect 03:14, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Bkonrad. If it's true, it belongs in the article. Even if it doesn't have any great deep meaning, it's interesting and the kind of thing Joe Public would want to know. Mdchachi|Talk 13:48, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

By my math, if we assume (very conservatively) 3 children per generation, someone would have about 13,121 9th cousins plus 4,374 8th cousins (etc.). It comes out to nearly n^9. The actual formula for kin(k): k.sub(n)=n^9-k.sub(n-1). To help this out, let's just say its n^9, since that answer is only off by 30%-ish. With n=2.5=3814, n=3=19683, n=4=262,144, n=5=1,953,125. Family sizes going back 2 generations averaged much larger (some up to 13 kids, it was common to have 8 kids). I believe it's fair to say that there is a year Y where: if we pick 2 random people now living in the U.S., the chance that they are related through someone who lived anywhere on the planet in the year Y is 95%. I would guess that year to be 1800, but it's just my guess. Anyone have hard facts?

Basically, it seems like a lark that they're related, it's funny but not useful. The article may want to mention this somehow. Further, someone familiar with demographics and the specific way that they are related should determine the odds of this happening, which I believe are close to 1 in 1. True, the fact that they know who is related to whom is interesting, but with famous families and occassionally famous ancestors to help out, this seems like a math problem not a political debate. MY VOTE: This info belongs on a separate page and a link should be put here; the separate page should talk about the numerical analysis part, and include other famous examples (how many of us are ACTUALLY RELATED to KEVIN BACON??). User:Justanyone Talk 15:54 CDT 20 April 2004

That information is useful, but also well known and well understood by anyone who's studied genealogy. I maintain, though, that the relevance of Kerry's genealogical connections is less in the connections themselves than in the fact that the genealogy can be traced so clearly. The reason WHY we can trace Kerry to Charlemagne and other distance figures is because history saw fit to keep track of wealthy, powerful figures, and not keep track of most others. I may or may not share a common ancestry with Kerry -- but I'll never know because the line is lost once once looks past the late 19th century. Had Kerry's father not married into a wealthy family, no one would know from whence he came, as evidenced by the fact that Kerry himself didn't know of his Jewish heritage for a long time. We KNOW of his genealogy for a very specific reason, because his is a wealthy family, and for that reason it is highly relevant. -- Damion

If anyone is interested, [14] has a good graphical representation of one of the Bush-Kerry connections. This site [15] has a more complete listing of several different relationships between them. I don't see any way to concisely express any of it any more clearly than to simply say they are distant cousins. It might be worth trying to summarize in a separate article or perhaps just add these links at the end of this one. Bkonrad | Talk 00:30, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Family twice?

I do not like the splitting of "family background" in the beginning and then "family" in the ending part. That should be together at the top. Get-back-world-respect 23:30, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

@@ Line 656: / Line 656: @@
 :::::: Actually, I was asking for more than just "I'll back up..."  I was wanting a reference.  Do you have one?  I've seen a number of people claim it, but never seen a single reference.  I would appreciate it.  By the way, I agree with your assessment of Kerry's service.  I just want to get insinuation out of the article.  --[[User:Rei|Rei]]
 ::::::* Regarding PHs for minor wounds, check out the Boston Globe article that broke the story about the fingernail scrape. That is where I recall seeing it. 'Course, some might not consider that an unbiased source. [[User:Bkonrad|Bkonrad]] | [[User talk:Bkonrad|Talk]] 22:20, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)
+:::::::A link?  Or at least an article name so I can track it down?  --[[User:Rei|Rei]]
 ::::I cannot believe you want to keep such minor information in the article. All I see that is relevant is that he got three hearts for injuries and that a heart did not mean you had lost a foot or so. <<He was treated for a small piece of shrapnel in his arm and he immediately returned to duty. The wound was described by his former commanding officer as resembling a "scrape" when asked about it in 2004, though Kerry disputes this. At the time Purple Hearts were often granted for even minor injuries incurred on the battlefield. (...) One of his three injuries cost him "about two days" of active service and the other two did not interrupt his duty. Faced with criticism, Kerry has pledged to release his Vietnam medical records; his presidential campaign spokesman [[Michael Meehan]] stated: "We have a military record we are glad to run on, not run from.". is just not encyclopedia text but election campaign stuff. [[User:Get-back-world-respect|Get-back-world-respect]] 22:45, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)
+:::::I'll second this.  We might as well start shoving in the glowing remarks about Kerry's behavior by his comrades, and those of his officers in his recently-released records, if we're going to put stuff like that. --[[User:Rei|Rei]]
 == Was there a vote? ==