Talk:John Poindexter

Untitled
I lifted the background section from a government page still cached at I think memoryhole.org, though it might have been at Google (the cache, that is--the original got taken down shortly after the TIA program was announced). So adjust as necessary; I noticed a lot of attempts to sugarcoat things & removed most of them but probably missed some others. --KQ

Totally Disputed and Why
This article - like the Oliver North one - is factually wrong and riddled with bias.

I don't get why Poindexter and North have to be tagged as criminals when they are clearly not.

Can someone without liberal or conservative bias please tackle this one too. Lagavulin 01:14, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

With quotes like this:

Funding for the IAO was subsequently cut and with his already tattered credibility permanently damaged Poindexter resigned from DARPA on August 12, 2003.

Controversy over Poindexter's integrity followed his appointment to the position due to his role in the Iran-Contra scandal.

In protest against what he feels is Poindexter's plan to effect the systematic destruction of Americans' civil liberties and privacy rights,

How can anyone in good faith put trash like that in an encyclopedia article?

Lagavulin 01:15, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I don't see how you could deffend a slug like Poindexter. However I would agree that the article must be without bias. I don't subscribe to any political idiocy, I mean ideaology. So I may re-write it myself. --Hierarchypedia 23:01, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Strange, idiocy sounds like it could be right up your street. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.156.122.5 (talk) 01:00, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

This from another web site: www.hereinreality.com/bigbrother.html - 38k -A retired Navy Admiral, John Poindexter lost his job as National Security Adviser under Ronald Reagan, and was convicted of conspiracy, lying to Congress, defrauding the government, and destroying evidence in the Iran Contra scandal.

 don't get why Poindexter and North have to be tagged as criminals when they are clearly not. - I think it has something to do with the fact that they were convicted. LamontCranston (talk) 14:56, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Philippines
The article says he helped with the "peaceful transition of government in the Philippines". What does that mean? If it's talking about the U.S. granting independence to the Philippines in 1946, he was only 9 years old at the time. And if it's talking about regular presidential elections in the Philippines, what did he have to do with it? Thanks. Coffee 05:40, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Probably something to do with when Marcos fled. LamontCranston (talk) 14:54, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Poindexter Has a Family
Wikipedia reports finding no internet references to indicate Poindexter has a family. warblogging.com reports otherwise.

http://www.warblogging.com/tia/poindexter.php

"He was the father of..."
does one really say someone "was the father of" a deceased person? I thought the phrasing was, "he is the father of recently deceased...", or similar - yes, it takes longer, but it has the virtue of being less confusing and accurate. Schissel | Sound the Note! 01:24, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

External links tag
I agree that the quantity of external links seems disproportionate to the length of the article. But if the tagger would discuss them a bit, it might help. Thanks. Student7 (talk) 23:11, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Discuss criminality

 * I fit that criterion and am fairly familiar with the subject matter but won't have time to work on it very soon. In the meantime, there is a fairly good NPOV discussion of this topic in the history section of [Information Awareness Office] that might be massaged fairly quickly to fit in this article. (Note that Congress specifically directed that he be terminated as the head of the IAO.) For further background, see U.S. v. Poindexter, 951 F.2d 369 (D.C. Cir. 1991). For further detail on the crimes alleged and evidence see L. Walsh, Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra, Vol. I, part III section 3 (4 August 1993). There was no contention on appeal that the charges were false, only that the trial had been tainted by evidence received by Congress under grant of immunity from the evidence's use in a criminal prosecution. I think that the causes of his celebrity deserves more discussion than the article currently has. Poindexter is easily most widely known for his role in the Iran/Contra Affair and his brief reappearance at the head of a closely-closeted federal program to develop technology for NSA to use for electronic surveillance of digital communications and face recognition, the antecedent of the NSA programs so much in the news recently. Other than those two flashpoints, the rest of his career went largely unnoticed outside the Beltway and DoD. Marbux (talk) 04:02, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Antonin Scalia
Scalia was last seen alive at John Poindexter's ranch. At what point will this information be added? 2607:FB90:24A4:3C0E:9B28:8C74:EFD1:D1D4 (talk) 21:25, 17 February 2016 (UTC) Different John Poindexter. http://www.jbpoindexter.com/professionals/poindexter.htm Cross Reference (talk) 04:00, 20 February 2016 (UTC)
 * User:Cross Reference is right - please check John B. Poindexter & his talk Optim.usprime (talk) 10:14, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

see: http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/18/opinions/justice-scalia-no-autopsy-melinek/index.html

Arydberg (talk) 02:32, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 5 external links on John Poindexter. 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/20050306011439/http://www.computerbytesman.com/tia/poindexterbio.htm to http://www.computerbytesman.com/tia/poindexterbio.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080202080702/http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YmFlMzdlNDQ2OTk4NWE0MDI4NTljZmQxNTQ0NWMxN2Y%3D to http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YmFlMzdlNDQ2OTk4NWE0MDI4NTljZmQxNTQ0NWMxN2Y%3D
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20050601082031/http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/18/archive/ to http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/18/archive/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20050517005013/http://www.dreamscape.com/morgana/reagan.htm to http://www.dreamscape.com/morgana/reagan.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20050325032857/http://www.citizinemag.com/politics/politics-0302_feingold.htm to http://www.citizinemag.com/politics/politics-0302_feingold.htm

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) 17:39, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on John Poindexter. 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/20130202105855/http://www.brightplanet.com/about-us/board-of-directors/ to http://www.brightplanet.com/about-us/board-of-directors
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20021209180434/http://www.politechbot.com/p-04186.html to http://www.politechbot.com/p-04186.html

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) 16:50, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

"False" is not POV
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=John_Poindexter&curid=65504&diff=1023288298&oldid=1023286604

It is fully supported by countless reliable sources. The POV tag should be removed,. soibangla (talk) 15:22, 15 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Of course it is a POV. "False" is an adjective, it is expressing an opinion. Facts can be presented without such words. As here we are not dealing with generally accepted facts, it is called a "theory", a "conspiracy theory". Therefore, some wikipedians with a partial point of view may feel it is not strong enough, and an adjective is needed to strengthen their claim. Which makes it entirely a POV issue. KPX8 (talk) 15:29, 15 May 2021 (UTC)
 * One might plausibly argue "false" is superfluous to "conspiracy theory," but it is most certainly not POV. It is more plausible to argue the POV tag itself injects POV. soibangla (talk) 16:16, 15 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Apologies if I've jumped the gun, but I've readded "false," along with four of the countless reliable sources. PRRfan (talk) 04:47, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

2020 Election
The section "Promotion of falsehood about stolen 2020 election" is poorly sourced and highly biased against Poindexter. Along with many other retired military officers, Poindexter signed a letter which says "The FBI and Supreme Court must act swiftly when election irregularities are surfaced and not ignore them as was done in 2020." One can debate whether there were any irregularities worthy of action by the FBI and Supreme Court, but this is far cry from saying that Poindexter endorsed a conspiracy theory that the election was rigged. For example, the FBI and the Supreme Court could have investigated and heard cases about election irregularities, and still determined them to not have a material effect on the result. I propose deleting this section. --Westwind273 (talk) 04:40, 9 July 2021 (UTC)
 * It's not poorly sourced. There are irregularities in every election, typically found to be simple human error, and there remains zero evidence this election was any different. The FBI did investigate and found nothing material, and members of SCOTUS presumably watch news and read papers like anyone else and saw the parade of clowns making preposterous claims and all the preposterous suits being filed and declined to hear the preposterous Paxton suit that came to them. The signatories of the letter attributed the election process to Marxists and assert Biden is a dictator. They also assert "Without fair and honest elections that accurately reflect the 'will of the people' our Constitutional Republic is lost," but there remains no evidence the election wasn't fair and honest. Their guy lost fair and square and they're really upset and claim it's a commie takeover. They are adding their names to those who have promoted conspiracies that the election was somehow rigged. The content is accurate and should remain. soibangla (talk) 13:50, 9 July 2021 (UTC)