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	Barack Obama is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Misplaced Pages community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.
	This article appeared on Misplaced Pages's Main Page as Today's featured article on November 4, 2008.
Article milestones Date Process Result August 12, 2004 Featured article candidate Promoted August 18, 2004 Today's featured article Main Page January 23, 2007 Featured article review Kept July 26, 2007 Featured article review Kept April 15, 2008 Featured article review Kept September 16, 2008 Featured article review Kept November 4, 2008 Today's featured article Main Page December 2, 2008 Featured article review Kept March 10, 2009 Featured article review Kept March 16, 2010 Featured article review Kept A news item involving this article was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the "In the news" column on November 5, 2008. Current status: Featured article

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faq page Frequently asked questions To view the response to a question, click the link to the right of the question. Family and religious background Q1: Why isn't Barack Obama's Muslim heritage or education included in this article? A1: Barack Obama was never a practitioner of Islam. His biological father having been "raised as a Muslim" but being a "confirmed atheist" by the time Obama was born is mentioned in the article. Please see this article on Snopes.com for a fairly in-depth debunking of the myth that Obama is Muslim. Barack Obama did not attend an Islamic or Muslim school while living in Indonesia age 6–10, but Roman Catholic and secular public schools. See , , The sub-articles Public image of Barack Obama and Barack Obama religion conspiracy theories address this issue. Q2: The article refers to him as African American, but his mother is white and his black father was not an American. Should he be called African American, or something else ("biracial", "mixed", "Kenyan-American", "mulatto", "quadroon", etc.)? A2: Obama himself and the media identify him, the vast majority of the time, as African American or black. African American is primarily defined as "citizens or residents of the United States who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa", a statement that accurately describes Obama and does not preclude or negate origins in the white populations of America as well. Thus we use the term African American in the introduction, and address the specifics of his parentage in the first headed section of the article. Many individuals who identify as black have varieties of ancestors from many countries who may identify with other racial or ethnic groups. See our article on race for more information on this concept. We could call him the first "biracial" candidate or the first "half black half white" candidate or the first candidate with a parent born in Africa, but Misplaced Pages is a tertiary source which reports what other reliable sources say, and most of those other sources say "first African American". Readers will learn more detail about his ethnic background in the article body. Q3: Why can't we use his full name outside of the lead? It's his name, isn't it? A3: The relevant part of the Manual of Style says that outside the lead of an article on a person, that person's conventional name is the only one that's appropriate. (Thus one use of "Richard Milhous Nixon" in the lead of Richard Nixon, "Richard Nixon" thereafter.) Talk page consensus has also established this. Q4: Why is Obama referred to as "Barack Hussein Obama II" in the lead sentence rather than "Barack Hussein Obama, Jr."? Isn't "Jr." more common? A4: Although "Jr." is typically used when a child shares the name of his or her parent, "II" is considered acceptable, as well. And in Obama's case, the usage on his birth certificate is indeed "II", and is thus the form used at the beginning of this article, per manual of style guidelines on names. Q5: Why don't we cover the claims that Obama is not a United States citizen, his birth certificate was forged, he was not born in Hawaii, he is ineligible to be President, etc? A5: The Barack Obama article consists of an overview of major issues in the life and times of the subject. The controversy over his eligibility, citizenship, birth certificate etc is currently a fairly minor issue in overall terms, and has had no significant legal or mainstream political impact. It is therefore not currently appropriate for inclusion in an overview article. These claims are covered separately in Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories. Controversies, praise, and criticism Q6: Why isn't there a criticisms/controversies section? A6: Because a section dedicated to criticisms and controversies is no more appropriate than a section dedicated solely to praise and is an indication of a poorly written article. Criticisms/controversies/praises should be worked into the existing prose of the article, per the Criticism essay. Q7: Why isn't a certain controversy/criticism/praise included in this article? A7: Misplaced Pages's Biography of living persons policy says that "riticism and praise of the subject should be represented if it is relevant to the subject's notability and can be sourced to reliable secondary sources, and so long as the material is written in a manner that does not overwhelm the article or appear to take sides; it needs to be presented responsibly, conservatively, and in a neutral, encyclopedic tone." Criticism or praise that cannot be reliably sourced cannot be placed in a biography. Also, including everything about Obama in a single article would exceed Misplaced Pages's article size restrictions. A number of sub-articles have been created and some controversies/criticisms/praises have been summarized here or been left out of this article altogether, but are covered in some detail in the sub-articles. Q8: But this controversy/criticism/praise is all over the news right now! It should be covered in detail in the main article, not buried in a sub-article! A8: Misplaced Pages articles should avoid giving undue weight to something just because it is in the news right now. If you feel that the criticism/controversy/praise is not being given enough weight in this article, you can try to start a discussion on the talk page about giving it more. See WP:BRD. Q9: This article needs much more (or much less) criticism/controversy. A9: Please try to assume good faith. Like all articles on Misplaced Pages, this article is a work in progress so it is possible for biases to exist at any point in time. If you see a bias that you wish to address, you are more than welcome to start a new discussion, or join in an existing discussion, but please be ready to provide sources to support your viewpoint and try to keep your comments civil. Starting off your discussion by accusing the editors of this article of having a bias is the quickest way to get your comment ignored. Talk and article mechanics Q10: This article is over 275kb long, and the article size guideline says that it should be broken up into sub-articles. Why hasn't this happened? A10: The restriction mentioned in WP:SIZE is 60kB of readable prose, not the byte count you see when you open the page for editing. As of May 11, 2016, this article had about 10,570 words of readable prose (65 kB according to prosesize tool), only slightly above the guideline. The rest is mainly citations and invisible comments, which do not count towards the limit. Q11: I notice this FAQ mentions starting discussions or joining in on existing discussions a lot. If Misplaced Pages is supposed to be the encyclopedia anyone can edit, shouldn't I just be bold and fix any biases that I see in the article? A11: It is true that Misplaced Pages is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit and no one needs the permission of other editors of this article to make changes to it. But Misplaced Pages policy is that, "While the consensus process does not require posting to the discussion page, it can be useful and is encouraged." This article attracts editors that have very strong opinions about Obama (positive and negative) and these editors have different opinions about what should and should not be in the article, including differences as to appropriate level of detail. As a result of this it may be helpful, as a way to avoid content disputes, to seek consensus before adding contentious material to or removing it from the article. Q12: The article/talk page has been vandalized! Why hasn't anyone fixed this? A12: Many editors watch this article, and it is unlikely that vandalism would remain unnoticed for long. It is possible that you are viewing a cached result of the article; If so, try bypassing your cache. Disruption Q13: Why are so many discussions closed so quickly? A13: Swift closure is common for topics that have already been discussed repeatedly, topics pushing fringe theories, and topics that would lead to violations of Misplaced Pages's policy concerning biographies of living persons, because of their disruptive nature and the unlikelihood that consensus to include the material will arise from the new discussion. In those cases, editors are encouraged to read this FAQ for examples of such common topics. Q14: I added new content to the article, but it was removed! A14: Double-check that your content addition is not sourced to an opinion blog, editorial, or non-mainstream news source. Misplaced Pages's policy on biographies of living persons states, in part, "Material about living persons must be sourced very carefully. Without reliable third-party sources, it may include original research and unverifiable statements, and could lead to libel claims." Sources of information must be of a very high quality for biographies. While this does not result in an outright ban of all blogs and opinion pieces, most of them are regarded as questionable. Inflammatory or potentially libelous content cited to a questionable source will be removed immediately without discussion. Q15: I disagree with the policies and content guidelines that prevent my proposed content from being added to the article. A15: That's understandable. Misplaced Pages is a work in progress. If you do not approve of a policy cited in the removal of content, it's possible to change it. Making cogent, logical arguments on the policy's talk page is likely to result in a positive alteration. This is highly encouraged. However, this talk page is not the appropriate place to dispute the wording used in policies and guidelines. If you disagree with the interpretation of a policy or guideline, there is also recourse: Dispute resolution. Using the dispute resolution process prevents edit wars, and is encouraged. Q16: I saw someone start a discussion on a topic raised by a blog/opinion piece, and it was reverted! A16: Unfortunately, due to its high profile, this talk page sees a lot of attempts to argue for policy- and guideline-violating content – sometimes the same violations many times a day. These are regarded as disruptive, as outlined above. Consensus can change; material previously determined to be unacceptable may become acceptable. But it becomes disruptive and exhausting when single-purpose accounts raise the same subject(s) repeatedly in the apparent hopes of overcoming significant objections by other editors. Editors have reached a consensus for dealing with this behavior: Efforts by established single-purpose accounts to introduce such poorly-sourced content will be summarily deleted. On the second such attempt, the source in question will be immediately reported to the reliable sources noticeboard for administrative assistance. New editors who wish to engage in discussions on previously rejected content are encouraged to ensure that their sources do not violate any of Misplaced Pages's policies and sourcing guidelines. Other Q17: Why aren't the 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns covered in more detail? A17: They are, in sub-articles called Barack Obama 2008 presidential campaign and Barack Obama 2012 presidential campaign. Things that are notable in the context of the presidential campaigns, but are of minimal notability to Barack Obama's overall biography, belong in the sub-articles. Campaign stops, the presidential debates, and the back-and-forth accusations and claims of the campaigns can all be found there.

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Eyes needed at 2012 BO campaign article

Would be helpful to have more eyes on Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2012 regarding POV fringe nonsense regarding the campaign slogan. Tvoz/talk 07:12, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 9 May 2012

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Add the following to Obama's wikipedia page, under any relevant section:

On May 09, 2012, President Barack Obama announced his support for gay marriage, becoming the first sitting U.S. President to endorse equal status for same-sex couples.

Such002 (talk) 20:24, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

 Done by Cadiomals. There have been some edits that added it to the lede, but since it is his "personal opinion" rather than any policy change, that's really not appropriate. This is "no big deal" in Obama's life and not worthy of mention in the lede.  Frank  |  talk  21:49, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Not sure I agree, Frank, that this is not a big deal in his life - in fact I think the historic nature of this statement is a bigger deal to his life than it is to policy. I expect we'll be adding it to the lede, and I support that, but would wait for some analytic sourcing that goes beyond just the announcement. As for policy, it remains to be seen what effect it has. But as he himself has described this as his personal evolution, I think it is not correct to say it isn't worthy of mention in the lede of his biography - for whatever reason it took him a long time to get to today, and today's announcement was not casual or offhand - it is a major shift in how he has described his fundamental personal beliefs, and that is central to a biography. Tvoz/talk 22:17, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

You make a fair point. It's probably worth some discussion here; media attention to this blows it out of proportion, I think, but...that doesn't mean it's not worth mentioning somehow. Given that he has gone to some effort to say it's a personal opinion and not a call for federal legislative change (and not likely to be one), and further that he thinks states ought to make their own decisions on the matter...I don't know that it is really a big deal. (See this ref for the big caveat.)  Frank  |  talk  22:33, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

It's important to remember that this article is about Barack Obama, the very well known and internationally very highly respected person. It's not really about current politics in the USA. (That stuff is in the current election article.) Obama's announcement on gay marriage is major international news, because it comes from him, and from the President of the USA. It's highly notable, and really should be in the article. HiLo48 (talk) 03:15, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I propose mentioning President Obama's support of same sex marriage in the lead. As a major policy move, being the first President in history to support same sex marriage while in office, and the major coverage it is receiving, it seems like a small mention in the lead paragraph added to the other accomplishments mentioned seems merited. Naturally we should be selective of what we include in this section, as it shouldn't become clogged, but I think this is definitely worth a mention. Thoughts? --Politicsislife (talk) 03:32, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not especially convinced that wide coverage automatically equates to notability, and since this is a restatement of a previously-held position, one could say it is completely political rather than any real significance to the man himself. Nevertheless, I do see the point about him being the first sitting president to espouse this view and find the current entry in the lede appropriate.  Frank  |  talk  11:29, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

It was added to the lead again, and I don't disagree that there should be a small mention of it there, so I tried to "fit it in" where it seemed most appropriate (without undertaking a complete rewording of the paragraph). As others have pointed out, it may not be "a big deal" to some editors here, but I assure you there are millions of Americans who believe the history of civil rights in the United States is a very big deal. I'd suggest it's probably a good idea to take a look outside of ourselves before we decide what's "overblown" or "not a big deal" for other readers. I don't have all the sources at my fingertips, but all day yesterday it was touted by numerous news sources as "historical" and was equated to Lyndon Johnson's stand on civil rights in the 1960s. I think there are several quotes from Michael Bloomberg and several other high profile politicians and historians basically saying the same thing, and I dare say, it will most likely be one of the things he'll be most remembered for 20, 30, 40 years from now, long after most of his official "policies" have long been forgotten. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 11:45, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

To reiterate: I may not be entirely convinced, but I'm not angling for removal either. Note my previous strikethrough above; my position has evolved. :-)  Frank  |  talk  13:42, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Ah, Frank, good one. Ain't evolution grand? Tvoz/talk 05:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with all of this and like how you included it. Good job!--Politicsislife (talk) 20:15, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I'd again like to highlight, especially in response to Crakkerjakk's comment about "millions of Americans", that millions of non-Americans have been influenced by this too. I heard it mentioned twice by our national (government) broadcaster's radio news service here in Australia 16 hours apart yesterday. (It's Friday here now.) When any US president speaks, much of the world listens. When Obama speaks, it's even more likely. Those who hate his party in the US may find that hard to swallow, but it's true. HiLo48 (talk) 20:52, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Unemployment graph not consistent with NPOV

I believe that showing the job gains and losses in the unemployment graph gives undue weight to that statistic. I looked at the Misplaced Pages articles on "unemployment" and "Great Depression". In both cases, there were a large number of graphs of the unemployment rate, but I did not notice any graphs showing job gains and losses.

Making matters worse, the scale on that graph is chosen in a way that makes the job gain and loss bars appear larger than the unemployment rate graph. In other words, the more notable statistic gets less emphasis than the less notable statistic does. William Jockusch (talk) 20:13, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I brought this up a few months back, when there was a different chart, but it didn't get anywhere. I think any graph is a NPOV problem for a biography, when there exist an infinite number of factors complicating any economic data point. Public or private sector? Compared to which other presidency? At the expense of the debt? At the expense of GDP? At higher or lower wages? etc. Also note that this exact data is ubiquitous in White House promotional materials. It's just not good practice for a biography to have such a sunny use of data. —Designate (talk) 17:07, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

The chart has already been changed earlier. I didn't agree with the change and thought it was more appropriate for the Obama presidency article, but others disagreed and the consensus was to keep the current chart in the article. Dave Dial (talk) 13:43, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

The explanation accompanying the proposed removal makes no sense. The graph is a clear indication of the unemployment rate during the specific period of Obama's presidency. The numbers are the numbers, and there's nothing inherently POV about that. I do tend to think that focusing on unemployment and economics, which is a matter of the national and world economics more than one of than presidential actions, is more than a little removed from a person's biography and so is WP:UNDUE in the first place. That is how the game of politics and public perception are played, and could be mentioned in that context. I wouldn't necessarily add economic charts to this article but that's the stable version so it has consensus, any removal would require a clear consensus here to do so, not apparent lack of response to one among several simultaneous hard to fathom proposals. - Wikidemon (talk) 13:47, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Exactly. Also, the edits from the OP have almost all had the same reasoning of POV and seem to indicate a want to lay a preliminary strike for a future battle. Dave Dial (talk) 13:54, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't know what the NPOV aspect would be, but there are two problems with the graph. 1, the scale for unemployment should include the maximum value. The maximum rate was 10.1% in October 2009, so the right side should go up to the next integer, or up to 12 to remain consistant with the number scheme. 2, the origin should be the same on both sides. Granted a value of less than 0% interest rate is meaningless, but not having the origin on the same point makes the graph a little confusing, there is a perception that the unemployment rate has changed much more than it really has because the natural assumption is that the origin line for job losses/gains is the same as for the unemployment rate. It should be fixed purely for proper graphing reasons, and as someone that has had several publications regarding statistical results and reviews journal publications from time to time, I would make the author change that graph for readability before publication. Arzel (talk) 14:02, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

According to the source(Bureau of Labor statistics), the rate was adjusted to 10.0 in October of 2009. The only POV issue I see with the chart is that it should include the data available since the start of the recession(Dec-2007), to show the trend. As the old chart did. This one does give more information, and including both is overkill. So probably best to keep it in the article and explain the economic situation in the body(which I believe is there). Adding more to this BLP, and not the presidency article, seems too much. Dave Dial (talk) 14:16, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

(ec) I was mistakenly commenting on the main unemployment graph, not the change in employment graph. Indeed a far from perfect graph. It's a classic problem, showing a change and its accumulated value over time. I'm not entirely sure I agree that the unemployment rate should be made more explicit here, as there's already a separate graph for that and here it functions as more of a sparkline. It is a little confusing to put a bar chart below a line graph, though, and I'm not too keen on having so much about employment in this article in the first place. - Wikidemon (talk) 14:22, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Demon, are you now saying you support removal of the graph? Just to be clear, I would be fine with that solution.William Jockusch (talk) 18:21, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit war of first sitting vs. first African American president in gay issue

We can read in the first page on this article that "In May 2012, he became the first sitting U.S. president to announce his support for the legalization of same-sex marriage."

On the other hand when I inserted this text: "First African-American President of the United States supporting the legalization of same-sex marriage: Barack Obama" on List of African-American firsts they have deleted this text twice. Why can we see this double standard? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.186.102.17 (talk) 01:03, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

• I quote: "He's the first African American president anyway, you can't put everything he did "first" that doesnt have to do with him being black". For instance, he's the first African-American to be a president and use the facilities in the White House. Drmies (talk) 01:06, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I agree, his support of same sex marriage is not associated to the issue of race to anywhere near the same level as him becoming President so it is not necessary to mention his race in this context. As mentioned the article does not bring up his race for other first either. For example, the article does not say that he is the first African American to sign a bill into law or give the State of the Union address.--174.93.169.157 (talk) 02:42, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 11 May 2012

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Under the sub-heading "Family and Personal Life" there's a photo of the Obama family. The description says it's in 2012 but if you click on the picture it takes you to the source link and there it says it's from the 1st of September, 2009. A little bit confusing, if you ask me. Which is correct? It seems like the 2009 date is the correct one.

Thanks!

173.29.222.186 (talk) 03:35, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

 Done:The devil is a lie. But you're right, the source states it's from 2009. Dave Dial (talk) 04:04, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

General lack of criticism in the article not consistent with NPOV

The level of criticism in the article seems extraordinarily muted. I looked through it. Here are the references to criticism I could find. In each case, the reference to the criticism is brief and indirect. The actual criticism of Obama is typically not even stated.

Again, I made it less than halfway through the article, and there are a large number of direct criticisms of his actions as President. William Jockusch (talk) 15:24, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, thank you for fixing the formatting, but you still haven't presented a coherent case. We don't define balance as having an equivalent amount of criticism in every presidential candidate's article. I'm sorry, but that's just nonsensical. Any events leading to criticism of Obama need to considered individually, not according to some mystical view of equality of numbers of critical comments.. If you want a particular event mentioned, suggest it in a new section. Your approach in this section will never succeed. HiLo48 (talk) 00:31, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Lol. I was the one who fixed the formatting. William Jockusch posted this about 12 hours ago and it was almost immediately closed, then reopened, and I was just fixing a glitch in the re-opening which made the section appear to be part of the "Edit request" section above it. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 03:02, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Whoops. Sorry. Well, thank YOU for fixing the formatting. HiLo48 (talk) 03:07, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

At the moment, it's not a question of an "equivalent amount of criticism." It's more a question of having any direct criticism at all. None of the four "critical" sentences in the Obama article actually states the criticism of Obama. This is in stark contrast to the Bush and Reagan articles. William Jockusch (talk) 04:50, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Oh, for fuck's sake. I repeat....

Any events leading to criticism of Obama need to considered individually... If you want a particular event mentioned, suggest it in a new section. Your approach in this section will never succeed. HiLo48 (talk) 05:09, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Immediate hatting/closure of criticism

I do not believe this hatting/closure was appropriate. See the text above. The issue is worthy of debate. I ask all users to take actions which promote debate, not actions which inhibit it. Thank you. William Jockusch (talk) 19:42, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

That will likely continue to happen if you stick to your current manner of bringing up criticism. In your hatted case, for example, you state a number of perceived issues but do not present any actual solutions or edit suggestions. You say the actual criticism of Obama is often unstated, but you fail to suggest what that missing actual criticism is in any of your examples. You also make the mistake of "other stuff exists" or "look at this article about someone else, it has more criticism." That is not a valid argument. Obama is not Bush. Obama is not Reagan. Obama has not done the same things as either of these two individuals. While I haven't looked, I'd guess that our article on Gorbachev may have less criticism than that of Stalin, as the two people took different actions while in office. Furthermore, your comparisons to Bush and Reagan also fall afoul of time. Barack Obama has not even completed one term in office. Both Bush and Reagan had two terms in office. Simply by time, it is entirely possible for them to have more criticism.

The goal is not to make every article for every president have the same amount of criticism as anyone else, therefore these comparisons by volume are not very relevant. Instead, make concrete suggestions of criticism you feel relevant to this article that is currently absent. Besides, until concrete suggestions are made, what exactly do you expect to happen? Even if listened to, you only listing grievances results in nothing changing as no one has actually suggested a change. --OuroborosCobra (talk) 20:34, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

I made several mildly critical edits. Most were reverted within the hour. I also removed the non-NPOV employment graph. Again it was quickly reverted. So I did make constructive edits, and they were reverted, with a request to bring up the issues in talk. So I made a lengthy and constructive post about it in talk, and that was hatted with an inappropriate sarcastic comment from the administrator. Though I see that someone wisely has wisely reversed the hatting. As for specific criticisms, the following are recurring themes among Obama critics. Inclusion of several of the following would be consistent with NPOV:

• Failure with the economy. His economic team predicted that if the stimulus was enacted, unemployment would never exceed 8%. Yet it quickly rose above that level and remains there today.
• Excessive class warfare rhetoric.
• Disastrous attempt at rapprochement with Iran and Syria. Outcome: both have slaughtered thousands of their own people.
• Obstructionist attitude towards some businesses. See Keystone Pipeline, lawsuit against Boeing for building a factory in South Carolina, and raids at Gibson Guitar based on flimsy justification.
• New Black Panther Case -- refusal to enforce civil rights laws against its allies.
• But above all -- failure to grow the economy. The number of employed Americans today is still lower than it was when O. took office. When was the last time that happened -- after 3+ years of a President, the number of employed Americans has dropped.

But the main point is that the article currently contains extremely little criticism. I could accept the ratio argument if the Obama article had a similar percentage of criticism in proportion to its length. However, it does not. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 00:46, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

What is this? The military approach of attacking on several fronts? I responded to your points in the thread above, and then you post here, as well as on my Talk page. This scattegun approach will get you nowhere. My advice is in the thread above. Follow it! (Oh, and my repsonse to what you posted on my Talk page is "No".) Join the conversation and discussion. If you can't do that, perhaps this isn't the place for you. HiLo48 (talk) 01:13, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not taking sides (I haven't looked at your talk page), but in defense of William Jockusch, he only started this thread after his first thread was closed (before many of us even saw it). Ok now. Full disclosure: I'm personally a fan of Barack Obama, but I can see where, in some instances, the article might need to provide a broader scope of a given subject. The difference between this article and the Reagan article (for example) is that with former presidencies we have the benefit of historical hindsight. Well respected, impartial historians have had a chance to evaluate the Reagan administration without the effects of "recentism" to cloud their perspective regarding every single thing he said and/or did. Nowadays, If Barack Obama makes a speech declaring the sky is blue, we have pundits at FOX News, and numerous other "critics" who will immediately dispute it. With the political climate the way it is today (which is very different than it was even just 20 years ago), including every single "criticism" of president Obama would make the article extremely tedious for the reader. This would mean that we would need to list Obama's position; "The sky is blue", then list criticism from the right; "the sky isn't blue at all", then list criticism from the left; "he didn't declare the sky was blue enough", on and on and on and on. I'm not saying that this is what you're suggesting, but the point is that we need to be extremely selective with which "criticisms" we begin to include. Given this, I'm more on the side of stating which positions he's taken (without characterizing whether this side or that side thinks it's "good" or "bad") and then be extremely careful when deciding which criticisms need to be included. One example was what is now known as "Obamacare". Even reputable news outlets repeatedly reported for months that something like 60% of Americans polled were "unhappy" with his health care plan while 40% supported it. Once the numbers were broken down, it was revealed that 20% of those that "disapproved" thought his health care plan didn't go far enough, which meant 60% either approved or thought it needed to go farther, leaving only 40% who genuinely thought health care was better before he was elected to office. Again, I'm not saying that you're trying to distort the issues, but I'm just using this as one example as to how easily (even reputable news sources) can distort "criticisms" just to fill today's 24-hour news cycle. I think this might be one of the reasons why there is resistance to going too far down this road in this article. Once we include one "criticism", then we need to include the counter "viewpoint", etc, etc.. I'm not saying that there should be no mentions of any criticisms whatsoever, but I'm just saying that once we begin to add detailed criticisms, the article instantly becomes three times as long (and tedious), so, in many cases, many editors would rather not go there. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 03:02, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

(to original poster) If you have any specific content you wish to propose for the article that's relevant, sourced, and of due weight, it's worth a shot. A generalized claim that the article doesn't have enough negative stuff about Obama isn't really worth serious consideration. Even if you could prove it, it's an irrelevant point. It's not actionable, and the exercise in making an article more negative towards its biographic subject, or loading criticism for the sake of criticism, is storybook POV. It's not the job of a biography to present criticism of the subject. It's to tell the story of the person, their life, career, legacy. - Wikidemon (talk) 05:25, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Believe me, I will be proposing plenty. I want to take strong issue with the claim that my point is "irrelevant." Recent polls have shown that approximately 45% of respondents disapprove of Obama's job performance. So about 45% of the US population holds a primarily negative view of the President. In a balanced article, their views would be described. Right now, all the article does is note their existence. It does not describe their criticisms of the President. 45% is a large enough number that their point of view is a major one within the population. Yet their point of view is not represented. That is why the article does not conform to NPOV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 12:49, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Careful - you seem to miss a point made above. If 45% are unhappy with Obama, that does not imply that those 45% have even one notable criticism. There could be 90 groups of 0.5% each, members of which are unhappy for different and even contradictory reasons. Some may dislike that Guantanamo hasn't been closed, some that it hasn't been expanded. Some think the stimulus is a waste of money, others think there was not enough. Some wonder why the US hasn't nuked Iran, others why they muck with the Near East to begin with. And so on. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:31, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That doesn't bode well. While individual proposals will get a hearing if well supported and accompanied by reasonable discussion, I think the community's patience level is wearing thin here, and taking a combative or rapid-fire approach doesn't work. People are not going to be swayed by any argument that we should bias a biography to be more negative or that the story of the President's life should be filtered through the lens of political campaign stories. Those arguments, in the past, created nothing but trouble and interfered with the orderly upkeep and progress of the article. - Wikidemon (talk) 13:54, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

But here is the problem, Wikidemon. I started off by doing exactly that in the case of the unemployment graph/job creation graph. The only responder supported my point of view that the graph was POV and should be removed. So I removed it. My removal was promptly reverted. In light of this, how can I believe that I am getting a "fair hearing?" — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 15:34, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I will add that very recently, the discussion on the graph issue has picked up, and that's a good thing. However, at the time I made the posts above, the situation on the graph was creating a rather strong perception of a lack of a fair hearing at my end. William Jockusch (talk) 15:38, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

There's lesson one of several, don't mistake people ignoring your suggestion for approval. The reason people ignored it is probably that it was recently discussed, that you accompanied it by unnecessary accusations of POV bias, and perhaps (without checking the history here) that people were already beginning to overload on your multiple proposals and tuning out. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:25, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

It was my first proposal in talk here. William Jockusch (talk) 05:24, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:OR in source 1, source 2, source 3 -> "frequent"_"frequent"-General_lack_of_criticism_in_the_article_not_consistent_with_NPOV-2012-05-13T15:00:00.000Z">

Listing a small number of sources for claim X does not support that "X is a frequent theme". There are many thousands of editorials published daily. To show "frequent", you need a high-quality source that says "frequent". --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:00, 13 May 2012 (UTC)_"frequent""> _"frequent"">

OK, then why not leave the new paragraph in place, but remove the word "frequent." If you had simply removed the word "frequent" without disturbing the rest of my addition, I would have had no issue with your action, and would in fact have thanked you for improving my post. That would have been a useful and positive course of action. It would have build trust rather than destroying it. William Jockusch (talk) 15:27, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Because there is no evidence that the criticism is notable or significant. Your approach would open the opportunity to insert each and every comment ever made in a letter to the editor of the Backwater Enquirer. Of course political opponents criticise actions of an administration. But not all such criticism is significant enough to include in a biography. For that you must be able to positively answer the question if this criticism has had a significant influence on Obama or his administration. This is, of course, easier in historical hindsight. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:35, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Fox News is by far the most watched TV news source. It is therefore a notable and significant source. Sure, it has bias against Obama. But the Bush and Reagan articles quote the NYT all the time, and the NYT also has bias against those Presidents. William Jockusch (talk) 15:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Just found this, from the host of the most-watched cable news program in the USA. That ought to qualify it as a high-quality source. It does not include the word "frequent", so I would have no problem leaving that out. But it is a high quality source for the class warfare criticism. http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/oreilly/2011/09/29/bill-oreilly-pushback-class-warfare William Jockusch (talk) 15:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

There were more problems with that section than one can easily list. Predominantly using Fox News attack pieces to source a biography of Obama is just strange. Use of primary sources. Messing up the citation format. Using bizarre Republican talking points, mistaking political attacks for actual criticism, and on and on. A low quality proposal in a new or out of the way article is only reasonable, you can start from there and improve it collaboratively. But aggressively inserting bad material into one of the most trafficked featured articles here? There seem to be some WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT and, frankly, WP:COMPETENCE issues. This is not a good place to learn basic editing stuff. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:19, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

If the New York Times were banished from the articles about Republicans, I could agree with you. But it is patently unfair to say that the NYT is a valid source for its Republican opponents and simultaneously say that Fox is not a valid source for its Democratic opponents. The policy should be consistent. William Jockusch (talk) 16:24, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but sources do not enjoy affirmative action. The New York Times is a widely recognised quality newspaper - somewhat on the left of the US spectrum, fairy centrist from a world-wide point of view, but in either case well-regarded for quality journalism and a separation of facts and opinions. Fox, on the other hand, is off the scale, and is famous for mixing a very small amount of fact with a very large dose of "opinion" (if it is even that, and not just rabble-rousing). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:43, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

(ec - addressing WJ) We're talking about the Obama article here, not about other articles. Be that as it may, opinion pieces on the New York Times are also primary sources that do not establish in and of themselves that there is noteworthy criticism of a subject. Comparing Fox News to the New York Times is absurd. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:45, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

If it is so "off the scale", why does it have more viewers than anyone else? Surely the total number of viewers and readers is a good way of measuring how mainstream a source is. By that measure, Fox is more mainstream than the NYT, and is the most mainstream news network. Additionally, if you look at the controversies that have engulfed the two over the years, it is clear that the editorial failures that have happened at the NYT have been much more serious, and it's not even close. That is a factual statement, which you can easily verify by looking at the articles for the two. As for respect, what you say is true among liberals, but it is absolutely false among conservatives. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 17:06, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Ergo: Eat shit; billions of flys can't be wrong?TMCk (talk) 21:27, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That faulty logic based on assumptions that many "Fox" watchers make that just aren't true. Fox is the most watched CABLE news network, mainly because they parrot what some people believe and those same people believe there is a inherit bias in mainstream media. But Fox doesn't compare to regular news viewers, where Fox receives about a third of viewers of NBC evening news. Much less the combined viewership of CBS, ABC and NBC news. And let's not even get into the total readership of the NYT. It's not even close. Dave Dial (talk) 17:37, 13 May 2012 (UTC)_"frequent""> _"frequent"">

I admit I have my own differences with President Obama's positions on a whole host of issues, but objectively, I can recognize that nobody coming to Misplaced Pages gives a flying f#@k what I think, so I'm not going to waste my valuable time looking to dig up obviously biased sources to substantiate my "criticisms", just so I can stick them into his Misplaced Pages bio. As others have pointed out, this is one of Misplaced Pages's relatively few Featured articles, so you have to understand that editors watching the page are going to be extremely vigilant with regards to the edits made to it. Comparing Fox News to the New York Times is honestly just laughable. List of Pulitzer Prizes awarded to The New York Times. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 17:55, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

OK, then how about this. Name some prominent right-leaning sources that you would consider high quality. Preferably more than one. Then I'll find the class warfare there. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 18:05, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Looking for left or right-leaning publications to source material is a POV exercise. And sourced or unsourced, this kind of partisan talking point hyperbole isn't biographic. He's also called a fascist, communist, socialist, Muslim, and so on. We can source all of that, it's not even criticism. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:22, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Demon, here is the problem -- if Misplaced Pages is unbiased, then the number of sources that Misplaced Pages considers high quality should contain roughly similar proportions of left- and right- leaning sources. Otherwise, it merely shows that what Misplaced Pages considers "high quality" is itself biased. Unless you think that right-leaning sources are somehow inherently worse than left-leaning ones. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 19:51, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

It's important to make a clear distinction between what a given news source presents as "fact" versus what they present as "opinion". In my personal view, a "reliable" source won't slant their reporting of the "facts" of a topic by injecting "opinions" or broad generalizations into it. The same news source may also provide "opinion" pieces, but in order to be deemed "reliable", they should make every attempt to make a clear distinction between the two. This again leads to my previous point - before we open the door to present one "opinion" regarding one of President Obama's policies, we'd need to source criticism from all sides of the issue. As far as I'm concerned, in the vast majority of instances this isn't really the article for hashing all of this out. You'll notice there are backlinks to articles about practically all of Obama's policies which present a wider scope of "reactions", "criticisms", "praises", etc. - In my opinion, that's the appropriate place for them. Yes, there are criticisms mentioned on other Presidential bios, but (as I've stated before), with the passage of time comes the benefit of highly reputable and well respected biographers and historians to view an administration from the 20,000 foot level. Adding daily updates of broad general criticisms to this page would largely amount to a lot of clutter and would almost certainly get the page downgraded from it's "featured" rating.--- Crakkerjakk (talk) 20:16, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed Crakker. Fox does make precisely that distinction. O'Reilly, Hannity, and Greta van S. are opinion. The earlier programming is fact. I don't know if they do it every day, but I've heard them say this shortly before O'Reilly comes on. At any rate, opinion pieces appear to be valid sources of criticism for the other Presidential articles. For example, the Ronald Reagan article notes that critics labelled his policies "trickle down economics." It is factual that that label was applied, but the label itself would have to be considered opinion. If a label like that is fair game for the Reagan article, it seems entirely consistent to include the "class warfare" label in the Obama article. As for your assertion that passage of time is the determining factor, I would suggest taking a look at the George W. Bush article as it existed at various times while he was still President. I actually just did this. I'll spare you the details, but there was plenty of criticism in there. William Jockusch (talk) 02:08, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not an expert on the policies of the Reagan administration 30-something years ago, but "trickle-down economics" appears to have been the "opinion" of Reagan's own budget director David Stockman. This is in no way the same thing as routine mud-slinging by political opponent's spin-doctors (some may feel the term "trickle down" is a pejorative, but a rose by any other name...) It's important to keep in mind that Fox News cannot verify their own credibility. When taking a "news" source seriously, Misplaced Pages is likely to ask: How many Peabody Awards does Fox News have? How any Emmy Awards for journalism? How any Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Awards? How many Pulitzer Prizes? Of course there are much lighter-weight sources that haven't won Pulitzers which are used for Misplaced Pages, but that's usually acceptable when we're talking about "celebrity" articles (actors, singers, athletes, etc). However, this is a featured bio article about the President of the United States, not the newest starlet on American Idol. No offense intended, but Fox News is basically considered to be the ugly stepchild of the world of legitimate journalism (and that's honestly being generous). If we're looking to add "criticisms" to this bio such as Obama declaring "class warfare" because Fox News "says so" then I can already tell you that we're wasting our time. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 03:28, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Fine, name some American right-leaning sources you consider first rate sources. I'll find it there. Unless you believe that American right-leaning sources can't be first rate sources, in which case I'll take strong issue with that contention. William Jockusch (talk) 05:26, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Hm. No. Finding acceptable sources is your responsibility since you're the one who wants to write something. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 05:42, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

But here is the problem. It looks like there is a double standard on what constitutes a "first class source". Fox is by far the most popular right-leaning news source, and the argument here appears to be that it does not fit the bill. It is true that Fox has had a lot of hate directed at it from the left. But if that were the standard, the NYT would not fit the bill either, as it has been the target of plenty of hate from the right. And if you look at the actual lapses at Fox (e.e. using the wrong video of Sarah Palin, making her appear more popular than she actually is) and compare those with the actual lapses at the NYT (e.g. failure to cover two separate instances of genocide, with millions of dead each time), it is clear that the NYT's are far worse. If people on the left are refusing to even name right-leaning sources they consider to be first class sources, that underlines my point. How can NPOV be achieved if the only sources allowable for certain kinds of statements are left-leaning and centrist sources? William Jockusch (talk) 14:35, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

That's a lot of words, and irrelevant points, in defense of an untenable proposition, that Fox News is equivalent as a source to the New York Times. There is one standard, that's WP:RS and the real-world equivalent for reliable journalism. Where you get off track is seeing everything as liberal versus conservative (or the contemporary American partisan politics approximation of the same). You're looking under stones for something that is not there, a respectable source that parrots an absurd election-year talking point. You know what class warfare is, don't you? It involves violence, strikes, revolt, take-over of factories by the workers. It's not a term that any serious historian, academic, or journalist would use to describe modern American politics. That's one reason why the vast predominance of mentions are in marginal and fringe sources, it's part of the demonization of Obama as a communist, socialist, fascist, foreigner, etc. Fox News sometimes veers into that territory in articles it promotes as news coverage, and when it does that, it is not reliable. Misplaced Pages isn't a ratings contest, if it were we would source everything to Howard Stern and Good Morning America. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

You've said it better than I have. And I honestly feel like we're beginning to talk in circles on this. As I've stated before - Even if we did find a "reliable" source reporting on the broad accusations which are constantly being thrown around by his opponents, I would still object to adding them to the article. If we're going to add these types of "editorial" characterizations (and I use the term "editorial" loosely), then we'd need to add all viewpoints on the issue (and this article simply isn't the place for all of this). We're not trying to be snobs about sources. To be clear, not every source needs a Pulitzer Prize or a Peabody Award to be "reliable". I use "fluff" sources all the time – such as Variety, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, etc, – for actor/entertainer bios. The difference is that I use them as sources for a date of birth or the announcement of an upcoming film, or album, etc, not for including partisan "opinions" into politician bios. Highly contentious criticisms (opinions) alleging "class warfare", etc, are in a completely different category than innocuous biography info such as date of birth or where someone went to high school, etc. --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 19:38, 14 May 2012 (UTC)_"frequent""> _"frequent"">

Lack of criticism in the section on economic policy

The economic policy section needs to contain criticisms related to class warfare and over-regulation. These are common and notable criticisms of Obama's economic policy. Therefore, they should be included. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 15:22, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

No, for reasons already discussed. Drop it. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:04, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Let me get this straight. I post a change to the article. I am told to take it to talk. I do so. And the response is "drop it." This is trying my assumption of good faith. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 16:26, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That wasn't helpful either. You came to the talk page, where your proposal doesn't seem to be gaining support based on initial comments. At that point you should let the discussion take its course, instead of continuing to edit war on the article page while making many new sections to accuse the community of things and propose the same thing again (and a bunch of other semi to nonconstructive proposals). Yes, you should drop that approach. Please listen to the community's cautions and requests here because this is heading nowhere very fast. - 16:41, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, the Reagan and Bush articles both include prominent left-wing criticisms, including how their policies were "labeled" by the left. I am proposing that the Obama article get the same treatment. I am pointing out a double standard. The double standard and its existence are important. They go to the very core of Misplaced Pages. That's why I'm not going to drop it. If Misplaced Pages is serious about NPOV, it needs to either (1) allow both prominent left-wing labels applied to policies of Republican Presidents and prominent right-wing labels applied to policies of Democratic Presidents, or (2) allow neither.William Jockusch (talk) 17:40, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Why would you choose a predecessor and try to make them look equally bad or good? If looking for parallels, why not his father? His wife? The leader of Russia, or China, or Iran? His rival for the law review at Harvard? Eventually, we'd be adding praise and criticism to every article on the encyclopedia to achieve some arbitrary level of positiveness from Charlie Manson to Mother Teresa, like a baker adding more flour, or water, to make a batter. The proposal to add criticism to achieve parity with the Bush (or McCain) articles has been discussed and thoroughly rejected many times. You can take a look in the article archives, but a caution, many of the editors making that proposal are doing so from now-banned fake accounts. It's not going to gain traction this time, and not really worth extended discussion. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:36, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

William Jockusch, quite frankly, I agree that the current version of this and several other articles on Obama, such as the article on his presidency and the article on his political positions, paint entirely too rosy a picture. A Martian who had previously known nothing about Obama or American politics would have no idea of just how difficult Obama's tenure in office has been and how widespread the dissatisfaction with Obama's policies has been among a certain group of Americans if the Martian were to get its information on Obama from WP.

However, you are going about trying to improve the article the wrong way. Creating and maintaining WP is a collective process that is based on consensus. If you want certain changes to be made to an article, you have to be able to persuade others that your way of looking at things is more consistent with their own views than is the current version of the article. Telling your collaborators that they are all biased and they are wrong, which is effectively what happens when you criticize an article in the way you have been going about it, is unlikely to win you very many supporters for your point of view. Instead of listing dozens of instances of bias, why not target just a few high-priority sections of the article and begin offering suggestions for specific changes to those sections. If it is likely that a change you want to propose will be particularly contentious, make the suggestion here on the Talk page first, rather than directly on the article page, and develop a consensus before posting the change to the main article page. With an article of such prominence as this, it's unlikely that your suggestion will be completely ignored (something that could happen on a Talk page that has far fewer watchers). Point out what's wrong with the current version of the article, explaining specifically why the material needs to be modified, and then propose the language you believe would be an improvement. For less-contentious changes, making the modifications directly to the article might be better accepted. Then, by taking the article section by section over time, you will probably stand a far better chance of having some of the changes you would like to see be incorporated. Make an effort to show that you view the rest of us as your collaborators rather than as foes. Dezastru (talk) 19:07, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

And be patient. There's no reason that all of the changes have to be made at once. If you are making reasonable suggestions, there's a good chance other editors who agree with you will eventually join in if you give the discussion process a chance to play out over a few days. Dezastru (talk) 19:10, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

To be fair. I thought William was met with a certain degree of "dismissal" when he originally tried to post here. From watching other (far less contentious) articles, I completely understand that even experienced editors/admins can get tired and "cranky", particularly when it comes to topics that have been previously discussed in depth (I fully admit my own guilt on this front, particularly late at night when it's past my bedtime. lol.) But I'm just pointing out that I personally didn't think he was being fully respected either when the discussion began (yes, less experienced editors may not understand all of the intricacies of editing a high profile article such as this one, but we were all new editors once.) I'm not taking sides or blaming anybody - I'm just pointing out that it's important for everyone to keep the above admonitions in mind, or else we can expect that people are naturally going to feel insulted and frustrated (even if they may be wrong on the technical aspects of an issue). --- Crakkerjakk (talk) 19:40, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Lack of a section on Egypt

Obama's role in Mubarak's overthrow should be included in the "foreign policy" section. Obama's attitude towards Mubarak played a significant role in his overthrow. This also had implications for Israel and Libya, both of which are covered. In addition, Egypt is a much more populous country than either Israel or Libya. It's role in the world is certainly far more significant than that of Libya. This is a further reason for the inclusion. William Jockusch (talk) 15:48, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Not sure whether this merits inclusion. If so, it would be a few words within a sentence about the Arab Spring. Do you have any specific language to propose? - Wikidemon (talk) 16:24, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I did propose some a few days back. It was reverted several times, with a different justification each time. Rather than attempting to improve the section, other editors resorted to wholesale reversion, with a different reason each time. But if the language can be improved, I would welcome an attempt to do that. It would have reinforced my assumption of good faith, rather than destroying it. The main thing that I think needs to be included is that Obama wanted Mubarak gone. Plenty of sources say that.William Jockusch (talk) 16:37, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I do not see a proposal here, but in checking I see we don't even mention the Arab Spring. We would start from there, as otherwise an entire section on egypt would be undue weight. The article's editing history isn't convenient for purposes of a discussion. Please see WP:BRD, it is a preferred editing practice. Do not accuse other editors of bad faith. That only antagonizes people. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:49, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

I could certainly support inclusion of the Arab Spring. I believe Tunisia should get only brief mention. Then Egypt, Libya, and Syria should be covered more extensively.William Jockusch (talk) 16:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Health Care Reform section should include the subsequent legal cases alleging unconstitutionality.

The Supreme Court has taken this up, and allotted several times the usual amount of oral argument. This is a major and notable development. It should therefore be included. William Jockusch (talk) 16:13, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

The fact that the law was challenged in the SCt is worth a sentence at the end. If the challenge fails it's not worth noting more than that, because the case history and arguments in a failed case aren't terribly germane to a biography. If the challenge succeeds that would be noted, and why, and the section would be rewritten to concentrate on the provisions that survived, if any. - Wikidemon (talk) 18:06, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Lack of a budget should be covered in the article

The Government's failure to pass a budget for three years in a row is a historically unprecedented development that should be covered. I understand that Congress shares the blame here. But it is remarkable that the Obama Administration has failed to push hard for the passage of a budget. William Jockusch (talk) 16:19, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

No, this is a fact of contemporary politics that is not biographically related to Obama. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:30, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Reagan, Clinton, and both Bushes managed to get budgets through a sometimes-hostile Congress. So stating that the lack of a budget is "a fact of contemporary politics" is bizarre. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 16:53, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

This is getting into WP:NOTAFORUM territory. The talk page isn't the place to discuss your opinion of Obama, it's for discussing specific changes to the article. Simply starting a thread by saying "This article should discuss " is not an acceptable way to get around this. --Loonymonkey (talk) 17:26, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

This section started off with a proposal for an addition to the article. I didn't start the diversion; I merely responded to it. I am happy to return to the original subject.William Jockusch (talk) 17:43, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Furthermore, the lack of a budget is not an opinion. It is a fact. William Jockusch (talk) 17:44, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

That is exists is fact; that it is important, opinion. Tarc (talk) 12:39, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

William, this is the BLP of Obama. Your initial post highlights "The Government's failure to pass a budget". Can you see the problem? HiLo48 (talk) 12:44, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

If that's the standard, then how about including the votes against Obama's proposed budgets? This would be consistent with the Bush article, which includes Congressional defeat of his immigration bill, and the Clinton article, which includes the defeat of his health care proposal. — Preceding unsigned comment added by William Jockusch (talk • contribs) 14:51, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

How about this: "Republicans, focused on ensuring Obama will only be a one-term President and beholden to a pledge they have made to Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform never to raise taxes, have succeeded in blocking the passage of all of the President's budget proposals." That about covers it. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:06, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

The vote in the House against Obama's last budget was 0:414. The makeup of the House is 242 Republicans and 193 Democrats.William Jockusch (talk) 16:48, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

LOL. I assume you're being intentionally disingenuous to get a laugh, so there's mine. Says this conservatively-biased newspaper, "President Obama's budget was defeated 414-0 in the House late Wednesday, in a vote Republicans arranged to try to embarrass him and shelve his plan for the rest of the year." It's because of tactics like this one it makes zero sense to bang on about defeated budget votes. It's just political bullshit that's essentially meaningless. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:17, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

The number of visits Adm. Mullen made to Israel is not worthy of inclusion in the article

This is simply not important enough for the article. It has nothing to do with my NPOV issues. William Jockusch (talk) 19:01, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. To keep the article at a reasonable length we'll have to pare down some of the less important and less relevant old stuff and make way for ongoing things. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:54, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Bribery of Jeremiah Wright

In the ‘The Amateur’, American author Edward Klein’s book, it claims Barack Obama or a high ranking official in his campaign offered Jeremiah Wright 150,000 to stop giving speeches during the 2008 presidential campaign. If this accusation is true it would constitute bribery on the part of either Barack Obama or someone close to Barack Obama. As this is an impeachable act as outlined in Article II Section 4, this seems noteworthy enough to include in on the Barack Obama page. It could be something like. When Obama was Campaigning for president in 2008, many sources claim he offered a $150,000 bribe Jeremiah Wright because he believed Jeremiah Wright’s speeches would hurt his chance to become president. While still unconfirmed, if true, this is one of the few acts specifically outlined in the US Constitution as an impeachable act. --192.195.66.3 (talk) 11:20, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm getting sick of this bullshit. I'll copy across something I just posted on the Romney Talk page....

Why not? Because the only people contributing to such a section would be his political opponents, guaranteeing non-neutral POV. I'm not American. I cannot vote for your President. Maybe it makes me more objective. The behaviour of the opponents of Romney AND Obama here at the moment is heading down the path of destroying any encyclopaedic value these BLPs have. Grow up and treat this place as an encyclopaedia, not a campaign opportunity. HiLo48 (talk) 12:07, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

If you read elsewhere on this page, you will see that I am certainly no friend of Obama, and am arguing strongly for more criticism of him. But this simply does not fit the bill. For one thing, even if true, this would not constitute "bribery." One might argue about whether or not it is ethical. But even if not, it would not be illegal. People pay for confidentiality agreements all the time. Addionally, Klein makes all sorts of strange claims in his book. For example, he claims to have interviewed Obama's physician. Really????? His doctor gave an interview about him? Seems hard to credit. William Jockusch (talk) 14:19, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

To carry on with the two above, this info makes fun reading in a blog post. We're not supposed to be a blog, we're supposed to be an encyclopedia.--Cube lurker (talk) 14:29, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Obviously, no. Speculation from unreliable sources. Leave this one open a few more hours then close as a proposal that does not have consensus. - Wikidemon (talk) 16:53, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

William, you posted "I am certainly no friend of Obama, and am arguing strongly for more criticism of him." I have hardly ever seen an editor decalre a more blatant, non-neutral POV approach. You obviously don't understand what this encyclopaedia is, and what the requirements are for BLP articles. Please stop wasting your time and ours here. HiLo48 (talk) 18:36, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Woah, easy there. You took that comment in the worst possible way it could be taken. That says more about you than him. Arkon (talk) 18:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Bullshit. William's goal is clear. His approach doesn't belong here. This place as an encyclopaedia, not a campaign opportunity. HiLo48 (talk) 19:00, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

QED. Arkon (talk) 19:04, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

You want Misplaced Pages to provide campaign opportunities? If you had been paying attention, you would have noticed that I expressed very similar concerns over at the Romney article. HiLo48 (talk)

You want to continue to misrepresent peoples comments? Ease off, address the editors concerns, and ffs, go find your good faith whereever you left it. Arkon (talk) 19:12, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

HiLo48 I'm on your side here, on Mitt's page, and commented on a 3rd state politician with the same type of issues. But I too think you should AGF at least until you disagree with something he's actually trying to insert. There's silly season garbage, but there can be a NPOV need at times to keep BLP's from being hagiography's. If he's here for the second, well and good, if he proves to be here for the first, then you can start ranting.--Cube lurker (talk) 19:19, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Arkon. The comment has been misrepresented and HiLo48 would do well to refactor it at the very least. That being said, even the most cursory examination of William Jockush's Misplaced Pages contributions makes it abundantly clear that he's engaged in politically-motivated editing. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:23, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

I just think several of us have fuses that are beginning to burn short. I don't mind explaining things to editors who may not understand all of the intricacies of editing on Misplaced Pages and genuinely want to edit in good faith (I'm sure we've all made our fair share of mistakes when first editing Misplaced Pages), but once we've explained something two or three times, people begin to get tired and short tempered. I'm just not sure what else there is left to say and I'm personally getting ready to "tag out" myself for a while.--- Crakkerjakk (talk) 20:26, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Newt Gingrich Claim

Newt Gingrich brought up recently the most major controversy surrounding Obama, which dogged him through his 2004 and 2008 elections. It was brought up by Alan Keyes, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and Sarah Palin, four different political opponents, not counting Gingrich. That's the Born Alive controversy, that Obama voted against the Illinois version of the federal Born Alive Infant Protection Act - a bill mandating medical care for newborn children FULLY OUTSIDE THE WOMB SEPARATE FROM THE MOTHER. In the words of Pam Sutherland, head of the Illinois Planned Parenthood Council, Obama led a movement to prevent Americans from knowing Illinois Senators were voting against the bills using present votes:

"He came to me and said: ‘My members are being attacked. We need to figure out a way to protect members and to protect women. A ‘present’ vote was hard to pigeonhole which is exactly what Obama wanted. What it did was give cover to moderate Democrats who wanted to vote with us but were afraid to do so" because of how their votes would be used against them electorally. A ‘present’ vote would protect them. Your senator voted ‘present.’ Most of the electorate is not going to know what that means."

These were babies left to die after botched abortions and we passed the federal act making it a crime to let them die - Obama while in the Illinois Senate led the effort to stop the passage of Born Alive legislation, voting against 7 different bills related to it.

In Obama's own words (pp. 84-88 of transcript):

"Senator O'Malley, the testimony during the committee indicated that one of the key concerns was - is that there was a method of abortion, an induced abortion, where the -- the fetus or child, as - as some might describe it, is still temporarily alive outside the womb. And one of the concerns that came out in the testimony was the fact that they were not being properly cared for during that brief period of time that they were still living. Is that correct?"

"Well, it turned out - that during the testimony a number of members who are typically in favor of a woman's right to choose an abortion were actually sympathetic to some of the concerns that your - you raised and that were raised by witnesses in the testimony. And there was some suggestion that we might be able to craft something that might meet constitutional muster with respect to caring for fetuses or children who were delivered in this fashion. Unfortunately, this bill goes a little bit further, and so I just want to suggest, not that I think it'll make too much difference with respect to how we vote, that this is probably not going to survive constitutional scrutiny."

"Number one, whenever we define a previable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or the other elements in the Constitution, what we're really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a - a child, a nine-month-old -- child that was delivered to term. That determination then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it - it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute. For that purpose, I think it would probably be found unconstitutional. The second reason that it would probably befound unconstitutional is that this essentially says that a doctor is required to provide treatment to a previable child, or fetus, however way you want to describe it. Viability is the line that has been drawn by the Supreme Court to determine whether or not an abortion can or cannot take place. And if we're placing a burden on the doctor that says you have to keep alive even a previable child as long as possible and give them as much medical attention as - as is necessary to try to keep that child alive, then we're probably crossing the line in terms of unconstitutionality. Now, as I said before, this probably won't make any difference. I recall the last time we had a debate about abortion, we passed a bill out of here. I suggested to Members of the Judiciary Committee that it was unconstitutional and it would be struck down by the Seventh Circuit. It was. I recognize this is a passionate issue, and so I - I won't, as I said, belabor the point. I think it's important to recognize though that this is an area where potentially we might have compromised and - and arrived at a bill that dealt with the narrow concerns about how a - a previable fetus or child was treated by a hospital. We decided not to do that. We're going much further than that in this bill. As a consequence, I think that we will probably end up in court once again, as we often do, on this issue. And as a consequence, I'll be voting Present."

This has received substantial news coverage over the years, played a major role in the last two elections for Barack Obama, and is already an issue in 2012. CNN did a major expose on it in 2008 and the Obama campaign admitted he had 'misspoke' in saying for 4 straight years that he hadn't voted against a bill identical to the federal bill which in his own words "everybody supported", following a confrontation between him and the NRLC. If you want notability, there is no way to deny this controversy. --98.220.198.49 (talk) 09:41, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Obviously if this was the typical pro-life vs. pro-choice debate Obama would have nothing to worry about, but this was the Born Alive Infant Protection Act he was opposing, an entirely different subject from abortion. The bill was so popular that it passed the entire U.S. Senate unanimously. Even ordinarily pro-choice Senators like Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Ted Kennedy, and Barbara Boxer voted in favor of it, en route to it becoming U.S. Law. Opposing this bill at the time was a political death sentence, and every politician in the U.S. Senate knew it. No wonder Obama acknowledged that it was "the bill everybody supported" and tried to deny he'd voted against an identical bill for years. The bill dealt with protections for newborn babies who survive late-term induced D&E abortions (made illegal by the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act passed in 2003) and Obama was the primary reason the bills were stopgapped in Illinois for years - he was the frontman for Planned Parenthood in opposing bills that had over 90% public support. It's why this issue is so dangerous to him, and keeps coming up each election. It's why Jill Stanek - who with Allison Baker were the two Illinois nurses called to testify in both the federal and Illinois cases for the Born Alive Infant Protection Act - has been criticizing Obama on the subject for years. --98.220.198.49 (talk) 09:52, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

From a very much outside perspective, I can honestly say that I have never heard about this. At as far as reporting in Europe is concerned, this "most major controversy" is a complete nonentity, compared e.g. to the birther controversies, "ObamaCare" or the failure to close Camp X-Ray. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 10:23, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Reporting in Europe is irrelevant. Obama is a major U.S. figure. The sourcing, as given below in more detail, is clearly more than sufficient to merit mention on the page. Just because you individually were completely ignorant of a major controversy does not make it any less prominent and just shows you didn't research or look closely enough.

Notable Sourcing for Born Alive Controversy:

"Obama's Vote in Illinois Was Often Just 'Present'." New York Times. Also at MSNBC.

"How He Really Voted on Abortion: Obama's Record Under Attack." CNN. Also here.

"Obama's Voting Record on Abortion." Washington Post.

"Obama Abortion Dodges Blessed by Planned Parenthood." ABC News.

"In Republican Presidential Debate Gingrich Fashions Another Intriguing Slam Against Elite Media." Washington Post.

"Obama's Rejection of 2003 Abortion Bill Comes to Forefront." Chicago Tribune.

"McCain/Obama Forum." CNN.

"It's Not Just 'Ayes' and 'Nays': Obama's Votes in Illinois Echo." New York Times.

"Obama Campaign Defends 'Present' Abortion Votes." Time Magazine.

"Obama and 'Infanticide'." Newsweek. Also at FactCheck.org.

"Barack Obama's Opposition to Born Alive Act." CNN.

"Clinton Camp Criticizes Obama 'Present' Votes." Chicago Tribune.

"2003 legislation had neutrality clause." PolitiFact.

"Obama Facing Attacks From All Sides Over Abortion Record." New York Sun.

"Obama's 'Present' Tension." PolitiFact.

"Obama's Infanticide Votes." National Review.

"The Republican National Convention - Keith Olbermann." MSNBC.

"How Valid is Palin's Abortion Attack on Obama?." Time Magazine.

"Clinton: Obama Should Vote 'No' On Abortion Issue She Backed." New York Sun.

"Keyes Assails Obama's Abortion Views." Associated Press.

"Spots Hit Obama On Born Alive, McCain On Lobbyists." CBS News.

"Explosive Audio of Obama Dismissing Born Alive Bill." FOX News.

"Clarifying Obama's Vote on Born Alive." National Review.

"Obama Ad Responds to Born Alive Attacks, Hits McCain on Abortion." Politico.

"Fact-Checking Gingrich's Charge Obama Voted in Favor of Infanticide." CNN.

"Fact-Checker: Is Obama Guilty of Infanticide?" Washington Post.

"Obama Launches Ad to Respond to 'Born Alive' Ad." ABC News.

"Did Elite Media Ignore Infanticide?" FactCheck.org.

"Former Nurse on Obama's Controversial Abortion Vote." FOX News.

"Obama Campaign Defends His Abortion Rights Record." Chicago Tribune.

"McCain Goes After Obama on Born Alive." National Review.

"Born Alive Votes Fuel Abortion Fight." PolitiFact.

"Obama's Born-Alive Cover Up. National Review.

"Change of Subject: Disparagement of Obama Votes Doesn't Hold Up." Chicago Tribune.

"Obama's Abortion Extremism." Washington Post.

"Obama Calls Born Alive Ad A Despicable Lie." RealClearPolitics (Time Magazine).

"'Born-Alive' Baloney." FactCheck.org.

"Obama Camp Hits Back at Born Alive Spot." CBS News.

"Rick Warren, Obama, and the Born Alive Act." National Review.

"Parsing the Born Alive Attacks on Obama." Time Magazine.

"PICKET: Obama's bad moves on infanticide come back to haunt him." Washington Times.

"Obama to Take On McCain Abortion Record." New York Sun.

"Obama's Confusing Abortion Stance Continues to Fuel Critics." FOX News.

"Fact Checks: Republican Assertions Against Barack Obama." Boston Globe.

As seen above, there are numerous other instances of this subject having been prominently covered by the press, the reliable sourcing and prominence according to Misplaced Pages guidelines has no excuse for being omitted from this article. --98.220.198.49 (talk) 20:02, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Sahiel/DD2K Attempt to Silence Discussion of Controversies and Start Edit War

The attempt to start an edit war by editors Sahiel and DD2K is an obvious case of dishonest bias. Both should recuse themselves from this page as they have clearly lost the ability to be objective or honest, in trying to silence a discussion that has instantly provided dozens of major sources for a major claim left out of the article. They should both just be honest and admit they are practicing multiple violations of Misplaced Pages guidelines.

Misplaced Pages:Ownership of articles - A number of editors on this page have been 'owning' this page refusing to let controversy be mentioned anywhere, no matter how prominent, notable, or well-sourced, as evidenced just now by the attempt to cover up from discussion or even viewing a controversy with numerous major sources that was relevant to Obama's past two elections and is already proving relevant again.

Misplaced Pages:Neutral point of view - According to the Due and undue weight section, all significant viewpoints published by reliable sources are supposed to be covered. Yet this page refuses to include any controversy no matter how reliable the sourcing. The Born Alive controversy for example has 10 times the reliable sourcing of many glowing accomplishments mentioned on the Obama campaign billboard page here. One editor who dishonestly closed this thread for example used the excuse "Closing POV Thread" as though having a point of view (which everyone does) makes an edit inappropriate. Rather, the rules acknowledge there is no such thing as objectivity and the key is based on prominence and reliability of sources. The editors might as well say they are closing all threads with points of view contrary to their own dishonest and biased opinions.

Misplaced Pages:Don't revert due to "no consensus" - Even though consensus is no excuse for reverting, you claim 'consensus' as the only excuse for refusing to mention controversies. There should be a reason why the edits are inappropriate, which is never given on this talk page.

Misplaced Pages:Biographies of living persons - This is used as an excuse here for omitting controversy that is very much mentioned on other politicians' pages. Yet the BLP policy says only that there should be reliable sources.

Misplaced Pages:Please do not bite the newcomers - New users pointing out the bias on this page and refusal to mention controversies suffer harassment and personal attacks, and attempts to start edit wars through immediate closing of discussion, per other recent conversations seen here.

Misplaced Pages:FRINGE - When editors here see a controversy, they accuse it of being a "fringe theory" and refuse to address it. Yet in "Reliable Sources" it's said that "A fringe theory can be considered notable enough for a dedicated article if it has been referenced extensively, and in a serious manner, in at least one major publication, or by a notable group or individual that is independent of the theory." One is supposed to follow the sources regardless, and extensive reference in at least one major publication should be sufficient for mention in a dedicated article. The Born Alive controversy of course far exceeds such standards.

--98.220.198.49 (talk) 20:32, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

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