Talk:Gary Johnson/GA1

GA Review
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.''

Reviewer: Khazar2 (talk · contribs) 21:11, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

I'll be happy to take this review. I'll start with a close readthrough, noting any issues here I can't easily fix myself, and then go to the criteria checklist. Thanks in advance for your work on this one! -- Khazar2 (talk) 21:11, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Initial readthrough
Okay, I'm part of the way through and so far this looks good. A few initial points:


 * "Johnson was elected in a nationally Republican year, although party registration in the state of New Mexico at the time was 2-to-1 Democratic" -- As a statistic, this requires a citation.
 * This isn't required by GA criteria, but for brevity, consider abbreviating "United States" as "US" after its first appearance in the text (including in the titles of positions and organizations).
 * "given his inability to gain any traction with the primary just over a month away." -- needs citation
 * Johnson's reception as governor could use more criticism. It's clear that he was a popular governor, but he nonetheless had political opponents and a contentious relationship with them, as this article itself describes; it would be interesting to hear more of how they portrayed him. Quotations like this would give a start, though I'm not saying you necessarily need this one: "Mr. Chavez, a political moderate, says he is a public policy person who will concentrate on improving New Mexico's low standing nationally in social and economic rankings. The Governor, he argues, has done next to nothing to improve those rankings because he has concentrated on killing and vetoing programs."
 * Parts of the "Political positions" should be updated to past tense--for example, his opposition to a US role in the Libyan Civil War, generally considered to now be over. We don't know for a fact that he still holds all these positions (and will even less as this article continues to age), so it's better to use past tense or a sense of when he staked out each position if possible.

More to follow! -- Khazar2 (talk) 21:52, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I have done some edits and I believe I have accomplished these tasks. yonnie (talk) 17:43, 9 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Johnson participated in third party debates in October 2012.[64] -- this sentence seems like it's in the wrong place--we're jumping too far ahead in time.
 * Sorry, I should have been more specific here--the above sentence appears in the "Early history" subsection of "2012 presidential campaign". Can this sentence simply be removed, since these debates are detailed in their proper chronological place later? I do like the additions you made for context on the debates, though.
 * Oh, I didn't even notice that. Fixed. yonnie (talk) 20:39, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

*"campaign is being run" --update tense *"Johnson's economics advisor is" -- is this guy still GJ's advisor? Probably better to say "was" *I removed a number of redundant sources for the noncontroversial fact that GJ announced his libertarian candidacy on a certain date. They're here, if you think they're needed anywhere else.
 * This is not at all a Good Article criterion, but you might consider archiving some of these citations with a website like or  and the archive parameters ( |archivedate= |archiveurl= |deadurl=no). An article like this that relies so heavily on Internet news sources is very prone to linkrot, and archiving now can save lots of time later. This is something you can tackle once the review is over, though, or not at all; it can be time-consuming. Wholly up to you.
 * "A November 1, 2012 poll of likely voters shows Gary Johnson with 5.1% nationally" --I'd suggest cutting the discussion of the Ohio poll. First of all, the first sentence seriously misrepresents its source--the linked page only discusses Ohio. Second, there's no need to show the poll results from both 11/1 and 11/2--it's getting a little redundant. Third, I'm not sure it's helpful to provide isolated data from Ohio at all; while it was a key battleground state, that's not really discussed here (nor are other battleground states), so it feels cherry-picked to find a state where Johnson did much better than his national average.
 * This is definitely an improvement, but I'm concerned that presenting a Reason-Rupe poll alone is not the best choice. Reason is a libertarian advocacy magazine, and I'm not familiar with Rupe as a pollster; I'd be inclined to give more weight to established, independent names like Gallup or Zogby. Gallup put Johnson at 3% in June and 1% in September, results which were borne out in the voting. Zogby appears to have put Johnson at 2% right before the election. What would you say to replacing, or at least balancing, the Reason figure with some more established names--either some of these sources, or others that could be found?
 * I added the Gallup polls as well as two Zogby polls. Each have one summer poll and one closer to the election. yonnie (talk) 20:39, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

*" This established a Libertarian Party record for total votes won in a Presidential election and the second-highest Libertarian percentage ever, behind Ed Clark's 1.1% in 1980" -- the sources don't appear to have this information--can we confirm this record from a secondary source? *"and has quoted that he does not" -- who is he quoting? Or is it meant here that he's just stating this? *" they were getting divorced four months later" -- a bit ambiguous -- did he announce one day that four months later they would be divorced, or four months later, did he announce they would be divorced? (If the latter, how about, "four months later, he announced that they would divorce?")
 * "Johnson is now engaged" -- another moment where it would be better to add "As of [date]" per WP:REALTIME; it's not a sure thing that someone will come back to update the page the day they marry or break up.

This looks like solid work! It covers his governance, his supporters and critics, his political positions, and his personal life. The prose is for the most part clear and moves at a good clip through the important milestones of his life. Once you've addressed the above points, there shouldn't be much left. Thanks, -- Khazar2 (talk) 21:21, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks again for your assistance and also for your additional edits. For the first point I added some info to make it seem not so sudden. I also added an actual national poll and removed the Ohio poll. The info was indeed misrepresenting the source. Also included the most recent article I could find as a source indicating they are still engaged as of November. I may get to archiving links at a later date. Thanks! yonnie (talk) 17:43, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks much for your fast responses. I clarified two remaining issues above when you have a chance. -- Khazar2 (talk) 18:48, 10 January 2013 (UTC)