Talk:Barry Goldwater 1964 presidential campaign

Announcement section
The first paragraph of the announcement section discusses the Civil Rights Act, which passed in July 1964. This was several months after Goldwater started his campaign.--William S. Saturn (talk) 18:10, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The intent was to discuss Goldwater's objection to the act, which had been initially called for in June 1963. Johnson, shortly after JFK's death, encouraged Congress to pass the bill. Goldwater's opposition during this time period (not only of the '64 bill but federal civil rights legislation in general) was the primary driver of his rise in popularity in the south. We can reword if necessary. Tyrol5   [Talk]  18:17, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Then it should be discussed from that perspective. Discussion of the impact of the actual passage would be better placed in the general election section.--William S. Saturn (talk) 18:25, 23 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Agree w/ William. It would be better to discuss the proposal of the Act (as it was at the time of Goldwater's announcement) in that section rather than the passage of it. Since the actual passage didn't take place until several months after Goldwater announced his candidacy, mention of the passage may confuse or mislead readers, though that clearly was not the intent.--JayJasper (talk) 18:34, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Neutrality and lack of serious historical sources
I'm reading Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party by Geoffrey Kabaservice right now. It's about the ideological right turn in the GOP that started in the 1960s. I was curious about how this would be described here on Wikipedia, and I was very surprised that virtually none of it was mentioned in the GA on Goldwater's campaign.

According to Kabaservice, who has based his work on interviews, archive material, contemporary newspapers and other political histories, there was an extremely bitter contest between moderates and conservatives for control over party control. The conservative wing is described as polarizing minority at the time that pushed through Goldwater as a nominee by more or less wholesome organizational maneuvering and by isolating moderates at the '64 RNC. His candidacy is described as a complete disaster for Republicans, not just nationally, by locally, and a major step in the direction of making the GOP a distinctly ideology-based party with less room for moderates.

This perspective is basically absent in this article and from what I can see, it is quite partial to Goldwater's political views, even to the extent of smoothing over his vote against the 1964 Civil Rights Act by pointing to his own underlying ideological motives. From what I've read in Rule and Ruin his vote against the Act, and many other of Goldwater's views, were seen as political poison by many Republicans, and was what caused the catastrophic results in the elections. Yet the article describes it more as a long term victory by pointing to the establishment of a far right wing Republican party in the Deep South, even though the losses in other areas and minorities were far more serious.

How do we fix this, and how does it reflect on the article's GA status?

Peter Isotalo 16:44, 6 August 2012 (UTC)
 * There's an edit button on the page.--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:26, 6 August 2012 (UTC)


 * I prefer not to mess about with GAs in any major way based on only one book and minimal previous knowledge of the topic, even if I might have suspicions that it's off the mark. I'm trying to solicit discussion about this, since I assume that 1960s U.S. political history might also be somewhat controversial. You know, consensus-building and all that.
 * You seem to have experience with writing about presidential campaigns, William, and I gather that you've helped with this article. Do you have any thoughts on the topic?
 * Peter Isotalo 22:19, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Barry Goldwater presidential campaign, 1964. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120202114146/http://www.kennesaw.edu/pols/3380/pres/1964.html to http://www.kennesaw.edu/pols/3380/pres/1964.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110101145600/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1568/is_n4_v30/ai_20954419/ to http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1568/is_n4_v30/ai_20954419/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 04:28, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

Goldwater Girls
The picture of them is good to have, but it sits there unexplained. Might this article someday add a few sentences about them and their role in the campaign? Possibly they even deserve their own article. I'm left wondering whether the exploitation of this kind of group - uniform in gender and dress, perhaps also other ways - was unique to, or an innovation of, the Goldwater campaign. I notice that the Goldwater Girls are also mentioned here in contexts that make their role seem to have been important: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Chancellor and  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Us_Tareyton_smokers_would_rather_fight_than_switch! They are mentioned as well on p 159 of Nickerson's Mothers of Conservatism (2012), among other books. (I wonder, too, whether the neatly attired young women leafletting cars in the pile-up scene in Altman's Nashville don't parody the Goldwater Girls? Would they have been memorable enough in 1975 to warrant such a reference?) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.17.179.75 (talk) 00:39, 17 December 2019 (UTC)