Talk:Ron Arnold

amazon.com links
Is it necessary to link his books to amazon.com? It is probably prefeable to put in ISBN numbers. The books can then be found at libraries. Alan Liefting 09:49, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Amazon links should be deleted or replaced wherever in the Wiki they appear. Amazon bought IMDB so they could sprinkle their links through it. Let them try to buy the Wiki. Bustter (talk) 05:38, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Ronarnold (talk) 20:13, 20 December 2013 (UTC)Ron Arnold. Belated thank you. I'm compiling an ISBN list now Dec. 20, 2013 and will replace Amazon links with ISB entries shortly.

Attempted speedy deletion
There's no way an article this well-established for this long is going to be deleted based on an anonymus speedy request. Take it to AfD. Fan1967 23:10, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm not even an author or editor of this article, but this one seems pretty clear. Fan1967 23:11, 3 July 2006 (UTC)


 * It's hardly well-established. The article text was lifted verbatim from Sourcewatch about a year ago, and has had about 20 minor edits since then, mostly to wikify, bring in line with style guidelines, and keep it up to date with the Sourcewatch article. While Sourcewatch uses the same GFDL license (allowing reuse within Wikipedia), it would have been a better utilization of resources to simply add a single External Link to the Ron Arnold article, pointing to the Sourcewatch article (the Sourcewatch article dates from May 2004, while the Wikipedia version dates from May 2005).


 * The Wikipedia version of the article continues to lift text from Sourcewatch without attribution. For instance, on 4 March 2006, User:128.122.253.212 added text to the article with an integration comment of "Arnold on environment ('eco-terrorism')". The identical text had been added to Sourcewatch two months earlier on 24 December 2005, by 63.196.193.169 with exactly the same integration comment. Copying without attribution is a violation of the GFDL. In fact, no attribution to Sourcewatch is mentioned within the body of the article - there is only a single mention in the history associated with the initial checkin.


 * Well-establishment aside, it still doesn't change the fact that the article is a polemic against Ron Arnold; it's obviously written from a Green POV. Arnold's viewpoints as a vocal anti-Green antagonist are valid for inclusion, but the article is no more than a series of quotes and facts specifically selected to place Arnold in a bad light. The article offers no introduction to the Green/anit-Green controversy, and has absolutely no overall structure. It's a piss poor article using any criteria you wish to select. PostHuman 00:02, 4 July 2006 (UTC)


 * First of all, POV is usually not an argument for deletion, it's an argument for clean-up. We have many articles on controversial people that are problematic and difficult to handle in an NPOV manner. Second of all, if an argument is to be made for deletion, it's going to need to be through AfD. I really would be very surprised to see any admin deleting it on a CSD. Fan1967 00:32, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I have edited this page to insert and delete several items
Additions include my honors in the "100 Best Books" reader list of the Modern Library, my Left Tracking Library website, and my Washington Examiner column with a link to its use in the Congressional Record.

Deletions include an apparently fabricated quote attributed to me that I cannot find in its claimed source in the archives of the Boston Globe, so I assume it is incorrect, since it uses words I don't normally use for philosophical reasons. However, if whoever posted that that quote can find it in the Boston Globe and send a true copy to me at arnold.ron@gmail.com, i'll be happy to restore it. Meanwhile, I have replaced the contentious quote with a real one from the only article about me I can find in the Globe.

I don't mind being beaten up for the truth.

If some editor wants to talk to me to clean this article up, I can be reached at 425-454-9470.

It would be nice to be actually contacted by people who write about me.

Ron ArnoldRonarnold (talk) 19:38, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

effective? By what estimate?
"one of the most effective adversaries of the environmental movement." Effective by what standard? And in whose judgement? If Ron were even successful in getting anyone other than his closest acolytes to adopt his pet phrase "Big Green" as an epithet for non-polluting industry, I might be inclined to agree. I've tagged this and other over-reaching claims for needed citation.Bustter (talk) 05:14, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

"Big Green" isn't my coinage. I began using it when I first wrote for the Washington Examiner, and found it was the editor's favored epithet. I use it to maintain the editorial style of the newspaper, and find it particularly useful when examining the sybiotic relationship between foundation grants and environmental group behavior. Before the Examiner I never used the phrase, and it has no special meaning for me beyond a generic term for the money side of the environmental movement, which includes the foundations that fund the activist groups.

No experienced editor will contact you, Ron, because that would be "original research," which is forbidden in these pages for reasons that might make sense to you if you thought it through [Essentially, to avoid all the fact-checking and arguing that original material must bring.] This article is supposed to represent how you are viewed by what's considered "reliable sources," the idea that you may not think it's a true reflection is the least concern of the Wiki. Bustter (talk) 05:33, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

I understand and agree with the concern and wish to provide at least one credible source to back up this assertion, which is the following unsolicited reommendation in my LinkedIn profile at http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=27258214&trk=tab_pro : “Senator Orrin Hatch was behind two laws that strengthened the hand of law enforcement to 1) track ecoterrorists and 2) put them in jail. As an aide advising the senator on the issue, I can say that Ron Arnold's work directly inspired and informed the policy formulation behind those laws. It's no stretch to say that due to Ron's work, ecoterrorists are in jail today who would otherwise be free. No American has done more to expose the radical side of the "green" movement for the conspiracy it is. Ron's regular opinion columns continue to shed light on the forces that would take away our freedoms.” June 28, 2011 1st Jared J. Brown, Legislative Assistant, United States Senate was with another company when working with Ron at Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise [Brown was in another position, Agricultural Assistant, with Sen Hatch, with whome he now works as L.A. - R.A.]. However, I don't know how best to refer to it, or whether it qualifies as a credible source in wikipedia standards, in which I'm not expert. There are numerous other such sources to back up this assessment, including transcripts of an Environmental Grantmakers Association meeting in which I and my activites were discussed extensively as the most dangerous threat the environmental movement had faced to that time (1992), which I can cite verbatim if it would help. There are many similar and more recent sources. I wish to comply with Wikipedia standards, but could use a little help in how best to do it, rather than editing it without advice and committing some unintended blunder. Any advice? Or any editor who wants the cites to enter themselves? I am non-argumentative and compliant, and will supply what is requested if I have it. I consider it an honor to have a Wikipedia entry at all.

Looking over the history of this article, it seems to have been totally transformed from a polemic against Mr. Arnold to an advertisement for him. Neither that early version, nor this present one, seems to adhere to a NPOV.

Everything tinged of controversy is gone from the article. While the Sourcewatch article certainly shouldn't be reproduced, at least some of the controversies that article touches upon should be included here; I'm sure even Mr. Arnold would agree that the controversial aspects of his career are under-represented.

I would be happy to see controversial aspects of my career adequately-represented if some editor wishes to insert them. I presume such would be subject to the same citation rules as my own editing, with which I'm obviously not knowledgeable.

One point that's omitted but which I think is quite important, the term "Wise Use," when first used by Gifford Pinchot, had quite a different meaning that it took when appropriated by those of the so-called "Wise Use Movement." Gifford Pinchot was a conservationist who felt that restraint was very much a part of wisdom with regard to use of resources. Arnold's "Wise Use" depends more on the axiomatic wisdom of market forces than upon any human restraint. It's at least important to make it clear that "wise use" was a term in use well before Arnold's time, and that it had a different meaning. 67.236.29.150 (talk) 09:16, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

I have heard this objection many times, and understand the frustration of people who question the use without having heard the many speeches in which I explained the borrowing. A famous motto of Pinchot was "Conservation is Wise Use," and that conservation consists of "The greatest good for the greatest number in the long run," both cited in numerous of Pinchot's writings that I found in publications and in the Forest History Society's archives of his personal papers, and in numerous popular biographies of Pinchot. It is my honest opinion that modern industry and technology do exactly that, providing goods and services in terms of living standards, education, medicine, freedom of movement, and many other benefits for the greatest good for the greatest number in the long run, and is not just "polluting industry," which epithet goes unchallenged with no mention of the accompanying benefits. If it would help a wikipedia biographical entry to clarify that borrowing, I am open to advice or editing by anyone who wants to accurately reflect my reasons for the borrowing.

Editors working this article need to use sources
Clicking each footnote in the text, I find that few of the links offer support to statements made in the article. Several are links to Amazon pages for books that presumably contain supporting information; someone needs to read the appropriate guideline and format these references appropriately; Amazon links are decidedly not appropriate.

Footnote 7 is just a link to one of Arnold's websites, and as such should appear as an "external link," not a footnote. But for the Modern Library's listing of EcoTerror, and the link to the Congressional Record, the present article is without citations. Bustter (talk) 17:18, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

"Modern Library List" essentially a fraud [imo]
Only when you examine the list itself do you realize the import of the fact that Arnold's book is on the "Reader's List," a supplement to the Board's List. I think users of the Wiki would get a more honest impression of the nature of this list if they knew that L. Ron Hubbard's Dianetics is the second most important of all nonfiction works accrding to this list, after Ayn Rand's "The Virtue of Selfishness". Clearly, the Reader's List was open to manipulation by organized groups. Today, we'd see one of Stephen Colbert's non-books at the top. Bustter (talk) 17:33, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Ron Arnold is editing his own article
As per WP:COS, edits by Ron Arnold himself (User:Ronarnold) should be either reverted or heavily edited, particularly considering the unencyclopaedic nature of the article so far. None of the edits as far as I can see warrant emergency editing for reasons of defamation etc. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.100.135.11 (talk) 00:05, 9 December 2013 (UTC)