Talk:List of U.S. executive branch czars/Archive 1

Rearranged the table so that senate confirmed and non confirmed positions are grouped separately
The revision I just did of the table includes all of the same positions and text as the prior version. I simply grouped the senate confirmed ones at the top.

I made this change because it has become a real issue as to which positions are confirmed by the Senate, and how many are confirmed by the Senate and how many are not. With the revision I just made, it is easier to see, and count. 69.219.54.174 (talk) 00:11, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Discussion related to Nature of Position and Grouping
It's fine to split up the Czars into two groups (Senate-Confirmed and Non-Senate-Confirmed Executive Branch Appointments)... However, we need citations that back up the appointments or senate confirmations of each czar position. Also, would it make more sense to split the list into two (Confirmed and Non-Confirmed) - instead of having it all run together? Perhaps it would help to add a column or an entry that explains who each Czar reports to (directly and indirectly)? Thoughts? Jnkish (talk) 03:42, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments, Jnkish. I hadn't really noticed, but there are a LOT of citations needed. However, since it has only been one or two months, I think we should allow some time to see if people will add the cites.

I arranged the table so that the czar name was in the first column. It seemed more logical and readable that way because this is a list of "czars" and anyone who wants to look up a particular czar on the list will find it easier now. 69.219.54.174 (talk) 13:09, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Now that more and more czars are being added... I think that it is more appropriate to simply list ALL of the czars- First alphabetically and then by year of term. I don't see the point in grouping them by Senate confirmation. Can anyone make a good case why we should sort the list by senate confirmation? Thoughts please. Jnkish (talk) 03:17, 11 August 2009 (UTC)


 * As far as Senate confirmation grouping: there is a growing concern that appointing Czars may be un-constitutional. So there is value in seeing which Czars have gone through the Senate confirmation process and which ones have not.


 * Also, I am going to create a new topic to ask about the type of table that allows sorting by clicking on a collumn head "twisty". That would provide the most flexibility.  Wimfort (talk) 16:56, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Reformatting for readability
I am making changes in format because the table was becoming difficult to read. Rather than go into a long explanation, I will just show the changes in the AIDS Czar portion of the table. The second table is the new format.

W E Hill (talk) 08:11, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

A brief explanation on the advantages of the new format
The new table makes it easier to count the number of czar positions each president had, as well as to see at a glance who each president appointed during his administration. It will also be easier to check the cites and reduce the repetitions of the cites since the czar titles do not span across different administrations. W E Hill (talk) 13:19, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

New comments sections at the top or the bottom of the discussion page??
We need some consistency. I think putting the new sections at the top makes the most sense, and it makes them easier to find and read. I will re-order the sections based on when they were created with the newest at the top, if no one objects. W E Hill (talk) 12:25, 21 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Standard practice is to put new comments at bottom. I put "Criteria for inclusion" up top because that's an anchor piece of information. --The Cunctator (talk) 17:11, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Deleting an inaccurate statement
I am deleting the following sentence because it is inaccurate, and I will re-write it later today using the appropriate sources.

Nixon appointed drug policy officer Jerome Jaffe in 1971, but the drug czar title was first published in a 1982 news story by United Press International, which reported that "Senators... voted 62-34 to establish a 'drug czar' who would have overall responsibility for U.S. drug policy."

The fact is, the Senate vote in 1982 concerned the establishment of the Office of National Drug Enforcement Policy and the use of the term "drug czar" to refer to the director of that particular office. The term "drug czar" had been applied to Dr. Jaffe's office 1971. Here are a couple of references to prove it.

"'You are going to be a czar, directing a national campaign against drug abuse,' Representative Paul G. Rogers told (Dr. Jerome H. Jaffe)-- Dana Adams Schmidt. "New Drug Abuse Chief Is Told He Doesn't Have Enough Power", New York Times, June 28, 1971.

"last August, in an interview in "Psychology Today," Dr. Jerome Jaffe, the Director of the White House drug abuse office from June 1971 to June 1973, said that 'nobody came home from Vietnam actively addicted' after he became the Federal drug czar" M. A. Farber, "Veterans Still Fight Vietnam Drug Habits", New York Times, June 2, 1974. W E Hill (talk) 14:31, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Deleting another inaccurate statement
I am striking the language that says that Simon was the first to be called energy czar. The statement is not supported by the reference given to the Time magazine article. 

That article describes Love as "the man [Simonson] will replace as energy czar - and thus it strongly implies that Love was called energy czar also. It certainly does not establish that Simon was the first. Even the title of the piece, "Nixon's Decisive New Energy Czar" implies a predecessor. The final words of the article also support the strong inference that Love was energy czar before Simon, and provide some insight into the powers of many so called czars: "Simon's confident words sound distressingly similar to language once used by John Love. Even Simon admits that only the President can commit the Government on the most difficult questions, like rationing. Whatever Simon's prowess on the job, the U.S. really has the same energy czar that it has had all along: Richard Nixon."

Besides all of this, I have references that show that John Love was considered to be the first, and I will provide them when I do a re-write of the paragraph.

For now, please see ref #18 and #50    already cited on the table, next to John Love's name. W E Hill (talk) 14:31, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible to create a sortable table?
A sortable table would provide the most flexibility. I'm thinking of the kind of table that has "twisties" at the top of each column. Click to group by Senate confirmation. Click again to sort by President. Wimfort (talk) 17:27, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

It is technically possible in Wikipedia to create a sortable table. See Help:Sorting. In order to do so correctly, data cannot span rows.

Example A (This format should work):

The downside to this is that grouping (rowspan) must be eliminated and data separated into specific rows. I wouldn't object to turning the list into a sortable list. However, it will be a lot of work to keep everything straight and not lose information during the reformat. Do you think that the sortable end-product would be worth the effort? Jnkish (talk) 00:21, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

If you want to move the list into a sortable table, or not. Please enter your reasons for or against the move. I think the the list would be more useful as a sortable table. Jnkish (talk) 10:25, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

In order to start the conversion process we can begin to list each separate czar into their own unique row, doing away with the rowspan entries. Jnkish (talk) 10:25, 26 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I obviously should have responded sooner because you have already started converting the table to a sortable table, but I didn't see the downside during first two days that this was proposed.


 * I believe that separating each czar into their own row will give false weight to the number of czar appointments per administration. It will increase the size of the file, and there will likely be some problems loading the list for people who do not have extremely fast connections. It will also require meticulous renaming in the cells to produce the uniformity needed for sorting. In other words, I think the work isn't worth the effort, and the table, in the end, will be less informative than it was before. In the meantime, we could be adding more information on the czars. There are at least 10 more, by my countW E Hill (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 09:18, 28 August 2009 (UTC).


 * Well, Kish, you did a lot of work, and the sortable table works. I still think it gives a somewhat distorted view. One thing that might help is the small chart I made that distinguishes between czarships per administration and number of appointees - so I will move it from the bottom of the page to the top.


 * Continuing your work, I will rename entries in columns to make them more uniform. Right now, some entries meaning the same thing such as "senate confirmed" and "confirmed by senate" will sort into different areas. I have already change names on the table to last name first so that the sorting feature will correctly alphabetize names.W E Hill (talk) 12:13, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Reverting page as edited by 74.196.101.237 at 21:41, 26 August 2009 to the prior version
Yesterday, an IP id user, 74.196.101.237, started to reorganize the czar list by administration, and they only completed about 1/4 of the work. I am reverting to the earlier version which is organized by czarship name because the changed list was too incomplete and disorganized the way it was left. To put it another way, I think the partly reorganized list was too much of a work-in-progress and I reverted it because it was not being actively edited.

I did look at it carefully first, however, and I see a couple of shortcomings to organizing by president's name. First, the original organization by czar name gives an idea of the history of some of the positions that have carried over between administrations. For example, you can look and easily see that Nixon started the drug czar, and Clinton started the AID's czars and the position was continued for many years. When the tables are organized by president they do not readily show this sort of information. Another obvious disadvantage of reorganization is that it will likely take a lot of work to finish the job, and I wonder what will it accomplish? Also, how many cut and paste and formatting errors will creep in, no matter how carefully the work is done?

If determining how many czars each president had is the objective then, a simple czar count table would do the trick, and it would be much easier. In fact, I have added such a table to the bottom of the page. I have not made any changes to the table itself, so if 74.196.101.237 wishes to continue reorganizing by president name, he or she can do so. But again, first I would like a brief discussion here of the advantages of such a reorg. before anyone spends a lot of time on it. -- W E Hill (talk) 20:26, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

I noticed the attempt to group by president name and also noted similar shortcomings as W E Hill describes above. I also would like to understand the thought process and benefits of grouping the list by president name. It seems to me that the tally sheet and/or a sortable list is a better way to go. -- Jnkish (talk) 01:41, 28 August 2009 (UTC) names