Talk:Julie A. MacDonald

Redirect
Needs a redirect to this page from Julie A. MacDonald (can't create the page without an account). 35.9.6.175 16:16, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

WP:LEAD
I removed the material about MacDonald's defenders as per WP:LEAD guidelines, which are that material in the lead section must be reflected in the body of the article. No such material was there, and so while I have no problem with including that perspective, it should be out of the lead until such time. Arjuna (talk) 04:13, 25 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Transferred material out of lead into body. It's simply a reference to an editorial: it probably belongs in the body, not the lead. hike395 (talk) 04:18, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Agree, and thanks. Arjuna (talk) 08:19, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Attack tag
I just tagged the article as an attack page. According to WP:Attack page this is: "A Wikipedia article, page, template, category, redirect or image created for the sole purpose of disparaging its subject is an attack page. Under the criteria for speedy deletion, these pages are subject to being deleted by any administrator at any time. Non-administrative users who find such pages should add the db-attack tag to them, and should warn the user who created them by putting the tag on their talk page." Northwestgnome (talk) 02:36, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I declined the deletion. The page contains numerous cites appearing to support the allegations. WP is certainly allowed to write negative content about a topic if the material is verifiable. DMacks (talk) 02:40, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * There is also a WP policy about articles on a person only noted for one thing, which is also a problem with this one. I agree 100% that Bush's science policies should be covered in WP. The way to do that is an article on them, not on an individual. Northwestgnome (talk) 02:42, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Maybe you could find something nice to say about her, Nwg? Johnbod (talk) 03:21, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * That's the problem. She is not important enough for anything to be written about her, herself. Northwestgnome (talk) 03:43, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I also disagree. The article is sourced reliably and its subject is clearly notable. Even though she resigned over a year ago, her actions have kept her in the news as recently as this week. Seems pretty important to me.Athene cunicularia (talk) 04:18, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Post RfD comments
This article is a disgrace to Wikipedia. It is a political debate and a policy debate, neither of which are appropriate for Wikipedia articles. The revert by Hike395 shows the naked partisan inspiration of this article by quoting statements by a member of Congress (expressed after MacDonald quit the job) which are mere polemic; that such remarks violate WP policies is beyond all reasonable dispute. A case could be made that the text of a court ruling and declarations by a senior administrator, H. Dale Hall, in MacDonald's agency are objective enough to qualify for inclusion in a Wikipedia article.

Hike395 has given a deceitful edit summary in claiming to have "fixed" the Colorado quote. No, Hike395 restored the misquote unchanged. Hike395 quotes the Colorado Springs Gazette newspaper as claiming that "but MacDonald's actions were questionable and created the appearance that politics unduly influenced ESA-related decisions". First of all, this violates WP:BLP (and apparently, misapplies WP:RS) because the intent of WP:RS is certainly not to permit editorial comments. But aside from that, the Gazette's editorial is attributing such criticisms to the Inspector General of the Dept. of the Interior. Admittedly, that this is the case may be obscured by the sloppiness of the wording, but despite that, a careful and scrupulous reader of the Gazette's editorial will see it to be the case, the newspaper is not itself adopting these criticisms. Hike395 is totally misrepresenting the Gazette's stand. After all, the whole editorial is a defense of Julie MacDonald!! The problematic passage is in the second paragraph. The first through third paragraphs will make clear that Hike395 is wrong.

As for the substance of the accusations, she has been condemned by an internal investigation. This is not as big a deal as being criminally convicted. In fact, there is no assertion that anything she did is a crime. May have been egregious, may have violated regulations, may have violated government policies; but in violation of statutes?

Other flaws in the disallowed material.
 * As for the block quotes, their purpose here was to further dramatize the critique of MacDonald. Hike395's assertion that without block quotes a reader would misidentify the passages as editor's opinions is a bogus assertion. I do not oppose block quotes in general.
 * The old compositional conception of the lead sentence, "she was appointed by ..." is stupid. You're supposed to say "Person is/was a lawyer/scientist/mayor", etc. MacDonald was certainly appointed by the president of the U.S., but the chief thing to be said about her in the opening is "what she was", what position she held.
 * The version I undid (and I'm undoing it again) was replete with failures to reconcile (coordinate) different edits (e.g., twice giving Hall's position).
 * The following statement by a newspaper is a clear case of WP:Coatrack: "Julie MacDonald's interference with scientific findings were not a personal aberration, The Washington Post concluded".
 * Note that I retained all allegations against MacDonald. I have shown how the article should be composed as long as it's being retained.
 * The composition was tedious in spots, e.g., quoting from the report of the internal investigation: "Through interviewing various sources, including FWS employees and senior officials, and reviewing pertinent documents and e-mails, we confirmed that ...." This quote was appropriate in the report itself. But in WP, we are already saying MacDonald was condemned by an internal investigation -- and of course an internal investigation is going to interview agency employees and review internal documents. Hurmata (talk) 06:38, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
 * When editing, espcially when there is discussion about the edits, please many the minimum changes needed to change the content, not also simple spacing changes, etc. It is difficult to see "what words has changed" when so many of the "changes" in a WP revision differences display are just due to insertion of line-breaks. DMacks (talk) 15:11, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

I have made some changes that hopefully everyone can agree with. I agree that the article needed/needs work. There were definitely sections that needed to be condensed, summarized, and/or worded more objectively. I removed some parts that seemed to be cloaked attacks, and I also included some important elements of the Colorado article that defends MacDonald. I also cut back a lot of the previous blockquotes and reorganized the summaries to be more intuitive and chronological. I also added a new section called "Aftermath" because a significant part of the article details events that resulted from her resignation. I think that we should work from here—and discuss any future ideas here—rather than attack each other or make unfortunately comments that hurt our individual credibility as editors (like NWG's below).Athene cunicularia (talk) 19:05, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
 * In other words, to anyone with interest in this article, please take a moment to review the changes that I made before making a blanket reversion. I just spent about an hour trying to clean it up. :)Athene cunicularia (talk) 19:08, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks A.C. You have improved the article quite a bit. Northwestgnome (talk) 19:58, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Comment
I mentioned on the BLP page that Senator Obama's (trying to be) supporters seem to have a pattern of attacking women and that this could cost him the election. Northwestgnome (talk) 17:40, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

More partisanship driven misquoting of sources
Somebody just quoted a Fish and Wildlife service document as declaring MacDonald engaged in "political manipulation". Those were actually the words of the LA Times in reporting the document. Hurmata (talk) 04:51, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm really sick of one editor's reckless misquoting of newspapers, which occurs in the course of his/her insistence on piling on condemnations of the subject. This person is not satisfied with the objective record: MacDonald resigns after being accused by her department's inspector general and as a congressional hearing is imminent; a federal district court in Idaho, as right wing Republican a venue as any in the country, concurs with the inspector general and with liberal advocacy groups. No, they keep digging for sharper invective and puts words in the mouth of first the Colorado Springs Gazette, then the Los Angeles Times. The best thing this person could do is refrain from editing. Hurmata (talk) 06:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm also impatient with the same editor's evasiveness in refraining from either acknowledging any of their editorial misdeeds or disputing that they committed misdeeds. Hurmata (talk) 07:17, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Inappropriate partisan tone
In the last 24 hours, the article had this passage: "Eight other endangered species decisions were re-opened, . . . The Union of Concerned Scientists lauded the decision." For an encyclopedia, it is rarely relevant that there was some group that lauded or bemoaned an action. Even more so in this case, where the same UCS is credited with setting in motion the departure of MacDonald. It is inappropriate for Wikipedia to approach either someone's biography or a public policy evolution like a sports event and identify with the triumphalism of either side. Hurmata (talk) 06:44, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Inappropriate advocacy of the subject of the article
Two editors have insisted on inserting a certain passage because most of the article relates criticisms of the subject and the passage in question counters the criticism. But this particular passage is not appropriate for citation against these particular criticisms. Fairness and objectivity in an encyclopedia do not necessarily entail that we insist on including rebuttals, and it especially does not entail that even rebuttals of bad journalistic quality or little relevance are better than none at all. Here is what objectively happened in America involving the subject: a highly placed executive branch official was officially accused of malfeasance and misfeasance by her own inspector general, she resigned, and as a result many of her most important official acts were subsequently reversed. This all could be argued to make her notable. It is also all public policy history, so even if hypothetically the inspector general's report was erroneous, it's an official act, she's moved on, and one year later there is no "movement" to reverse the judgement. It is not necessary or appropriate to defend her by citing a passage like this one: "Defenders of MacDonald called Devaney's report one-sided, noting that it was leaked to the media without any rebuttal, which MacDonald says was never solicited. One editorial called Devaney's report and MacDonald's resignation the result of partisanship from knee-jerk Endangered Species Act defenders, and claimed that she'd been 'railroaded'." This passage is paltry defense anyway: it references anonymous persons, unconfirmed acts, and contentious worldviews and contentious standards of conduct. AND IT'S ONLY AN EDITORIAL!!, as I point that out for the third damned time in only about 36 hours. Hurmata (talk) 07:16, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Violation of WP:BLP in the use of the Los Angeles Times article
I now emphasize to Hike395 that they are violating WP:BLP. I have already pointed out that Hike395 is relentlessly trying to pile on sharply worded condemnations of MacDonald at the cost of outrageous editing judgements and in any case Hike395 is being redundant. Hike395 reinserted a reference to this LA Times article. The article's lead sentence says a Fish and Wildlife Service proposal "cit[es] scientific miscalculations and political manipulation by former Interior Department official Julie MacDonald". This text seems to misrepresent the FWS statement in two ways, if we can judge by the attendant FWS press release which our WP article references: the FWS press release does not refer to MacDonald by name or description, nor does it use the wording "scientific miscalculations and political manipulation". I make two criticisms of quoting this LA Times passage. The passage is demonstrably false, it attributes wording falsely; so to invoke WP:RS (i.e., the LA Times said so) would be to take abusive advantage of what is a badly designed policy, WP:RS. That policy ought not be invoked to justify blatantly incorrect reporting. But WP:BLP is a stronger objection. Part of WP:BLP emphasizes that BLP's are afforded stricter protections than what WP:RS offers. In other words, WP:BLP states that WP:RS is insufficient when it comes to BLP's. The article already contains sharply worded condemnations of MacDonald's official acts from a federal court, MacDonald's department's inspector general, and the civil service employee director of the bureau (the FWS) that political appointee MacDonald used to direct. If you can find more condemnations in some government document, then by all means cite them. DO NOT cite some news medium's dubious quotation of the official document. Hurmata (talk) 08:00, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Revert by Arjuna808
Arjuna808 performed a revert without bothering to discuss it on the Talk page. The edit summary given (rv pushes of POV) is contradicted by the rampant POV of the restored version. This article has attracted plenty of biased and/or negligent editors. Just consider the two inaccuracies in recent versions having to do with her being appointed deputy assistant secretary. She was appointed in May 2004, and a year ago the article was reporting 2004. Somehow, some careless editor confused her DAS-ship (started 2004) with her start in the Interior Dept overall (2002). Although I've extensively edited the article the last 36 hours, I can't check every damn bit of every article I edit, so I didn't learn of the incorrectness of the year until just now. By the way, one of the two references given for the lead does say 2004. And somebody carelessly assumed she was appointed by the president of the US. This is false, I corrected it a few hours ago, but Arjuna808 has spoiled that, so I've corrected it again. Too many editors of this article have too little concern for the facts of this BLP. Hurmata (talk) 11:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I have reverted this revert. The reasons can be found in the many comments I have posted here in the last three days, but here's the summary of the bad stuff that Arjuna808 restored.
 * Undue weight given to the UCS by excessive citations from them.
 * POV by citing irrelevant reactions to relevant events involving the article's subject. The citation of the irrelevant reactions (e.g., "cautiously lauded" her resignation) was moreover conducting in a manner that constitutes piling on, and again the citations were lengthy. One of the citations was of a politician's satisfaction with the subject's resignation.
 * A grave misquoting of an editorial in The Gazette of Colorado Springs, a misquote which I had already twice deleted WITH EXPLANATION ON THIS PAGE -- and another editor who had reinserted it had already acknowledged my objection.
 * The misinformation that she was appointed deputy assistant secretary in 2002 -- it was two years later.
 * The misinformation that it was Pres. Bush who had made the appointment.

It is very unlikely that Arjuna808 would have restored such a serious collection of combined misinformation and POV after reading the discussion available on this page. Let me repeat that Arjuna808 did not bother to offer a rundown of how my version was full of POV and his/hers wasn't. And let me note that Arjuna808 had had no virtually involvement with this article for months. Hurmata (talk) 18:30, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Please note that the latest edits (along with other edits I have made in the last three days) professionalize the article by doing more explaining, by assuming less prior knowledge; and by adopting a less casual wording in places. Hurmata (talk) 18:33, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

It's "Fish and Wildlife and Parks", not "Fish, Wildlife, and Parks"
Please make a note of it. Hurmata (talk) 11:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Neutrality disputed
There does not seem to be a consensus about what would make this article NPOV. Until we can agree, let us label the article as having disputed neutrality. hike395 (talk) 02:38, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I am restoring my cleanup tag, but I'll leave your neutrality one, as well. Regardless of whether anyone thinks it's NPOV, it still needs to be cleaned up. But since you added the neutrality tag, it would probably be a good idea for you to add a new argument for proposed changes in this section. Merely saying it's non-neutral doesn't really support adding the tag.Athene cunicularia (talk) 19:50, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
 * As for the cleanup tag, for this article at this stage in its history is false and also unfair because I single handedly cleaned up the article with sophisticated statements and sound attributions. Athene cunicularia needs to take into account that for my editing of this article, I was awarded a Wikipedia barnstar (see my User page). And not by just any old Wikipedian simply because they held some particular POV, but by a professional journalist who is also a distinguished copy editor of Wikipedia. Since editor Athene cunicularia, like Hike395, was heavily involved in editing this article in the distant past, it is possible she was responsible for some of the problems that needed to be *cleaned up* (although I have made no attempt to investigate which edits were hers). Now of course one may want to revise some of my edits, but then they can do so likewise intelligently and with sound attributions. As for the Neutrality Disputed tag, Hike395, after being caught in reckless editing, refused to engage in debate, refused to genuinely defended themselves, and resorted to placing that tag -- which in turn they never followed up with discussion, with justification. Whether out of lack of reasoning ability or guts, people ought not be participating in Wikipedia (except for menial tasks) if they are going to refuse to defend their insertions, deletions, opinions with engage substantive discussion. Hurmata (talk) 05:11, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I believe that the article is still POV: it gives undue weight to governmental sources. It had previously had some (slight) coverage on the reaction of both conservatives and liberals to Ms. McDonald's actions and consequences to the actions. I think that the editorial from Colorado should be referenced and described, and I think that the reaction of the Union of Concerned Scientists should be references and restored. This would add three sentences to the article, which would add some balance. If these external sources are described in an NPOV way (i.e., not that they are correct, but that they stated what they stated), then I believe the article will be NPOV.
 * I have found the editing atmosphere on the article to be extremely poisonous. I believe that the comments by User:Hurmata above constitute personal attacks. I have tried to do the edits myself, but have been immediately reverted.
 * Under these circumstances, I would prefer that a third party look at the history of the article (esp. the version written by Athene at ), check to see what has been edited out, and see if it can be restored in an NPOV way.
 * hike395 (talk) 16:57, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Hurmata's proprietary view of his edits make it difficult for other editors to provide input, and thus require a third party to step in and improve the article. I don't think the article flows very well, but since in the past, Hurmata has categorically ignored others' edits (occasionally justifying his edits with personal attacks), I think the neutrality tag should stay. However, I disagree that the government sources have been overused. I think that the article has been improved, but it still needs work, and Hurmata's hawkish oversight of this article makes improvement very difficult. There, I said it.Athene cunicularia (talk) 19:47, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Three points have been deleted from your version of the article:
 * MacDonald supporters believe that she was railroaded, and the IG report does not point to any laws broken (source: the Colorado editorial). The article currently does not have any reference to a conservative opinion: I think this is a POV flaw. Other reactions could possibly be substituted for the Colorado editorial: I don't have Lexis/Nexis, so I don't have a solid alternative here, the Colorado editorial seems fine to me.
 * That the Union of Concerned Scientists was in favor of revisiting the FWS decisions, although still was suspicious about the process. (source: UCS press release). Again, it would be good to cite and briefly summarize the non-profit viewpoint (I'm assuming that UCS is liberal). Again, removing the reaction seems POV.
 * The Los Angeles Times interpretation of the September 2008 FWS decision was redacted. This is a problem: the last paragraph of the current article talks about "the involvement of Department of Interior personnel which may have inappropriately influenced the extent and locations of critical habitat", but it is not clear who they are talking about. The LA Times (presumably a WP:RS) interprets that sentence to mean Ms. McDonald. The LA Times seems like a standard secondary source, who can add context to the raw information from the primary sources.
 * All of these have been deleted by Hurmata, based on his/her interpretation of WP:BLP. Hurmata, above, claims that WP:BLP should trump WP:RS, and that only (?) official/governmental information (direct, or transmitted through the news media) should be used. I cannot find explicit guidance in WP:BLP for this philosophy. Thus, I believe that official/governmental information is given undue weight in the article, and non-governmental information (i.e., interest groups, or interpretations due to reliable sources) should be used to some extent.
 * If the consensus (i.e., more editors than just Hurmata) think that it is OK for the article to systematically exclude non-official reactions and interpretations, then I'm willing to compromise. I think that the current article is depriving its readers of information that they can use to make up their own minds about the controversy. It is a shame to delete references to all non-official points of view.
 * hike395 (talk) 04:07, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't see anything about the LA Times article being redacted. It's still available online in its original form with no corrections.Athene cunicularia (talk) 18:32, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Sorry if I was unclear: I meant crossed out from this article. The WP article used to refer to the LA Times to discuss the Sep 2008 decision. This was taken out, and replaced with the primary source (the FWS web site, currently reference 16 in the article). I think that both the LA Times and the primary source should be cited, and the interpretation of the LA Times should be used in the article (i.e, that "Department of Interior personnel" refers to Ms. McDonald). Hurmata, in the section above claims that this violates WP:BLP. I believe the LA Times to be a verifiable, reliable source, necessary for the context of the final paragraph. The LA Times would be a secondary source. The WP guideline about no original research says that "Wikipedia articles should rely mainly on published reliable secondary sources" (see WP:SECONDARY).
 * Thanks for asking! hike395 (talk) 01:16, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

10/29/08 edit
I cleaned up the article. I didn't really add or remove anything, but just cleaned it up to make it easier to read. Hike, if you want to make additions, I'd suggest that you add them here in the talk section so that we can assess them.Athene cunicularia (talk) 19:20, 29 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm happy not to edit the article any more. Do you want to remove the neutrality dispute? hike395 (talk) 05:19, 11 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Done. Thanks!Athene cunicularia (talk) 18:51, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

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