Talk:Stockwell Day

Miscellaneous comments
Hey folks, I just made a change and forgot to document it (sorry, new user and figuring things out!) The chocolate milk incident actually occurred at Conestoga College in Kitchener, not the University of Waterloo... (Inchim was, however, a UW student). I was actually at the event in question, and it can be verified at http://imprint.uwaterloo.ca/story.php?f=2&t=734&i=&v=f&story=734 and http://www.bulletin.uwaterloo.ca/2000/oct/06fr.html. Theolad 19:10, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Good catch. HistoryBA 01:17, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

This is one of the most embarrasingly non-NPOV articles I've ever seen on Wikipedia. It doesn't belong with serious articles about public officials. Sad to see Wikipedia hijacked in this way.
 * His propsed referendum law was 3% of the electorate, not 4%.


 * 149.99.162.182 please explain how all these things you have deleted are 'serious factual errors' when many of them a quite easily verifiably true. SimonP 20:25 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)


 * MLA? Kingturtle 02:51 May 12, 2003 (UTC)
 * I was just coming here to ask that question. What does MLA mean? RickK
 * Member of the Legislative Assembly, I guess. FearÉIREANN 05:36 22 Jun 2003 (UTC)


 * Yeah, Member of the Legislative Assembly...but I'm not sure if there is a difference between that and a Member of Provincial Parliament. Maybe MPP is just an Ontario thing (it seems that way from a very brief Google search) Adam Bishop 05:39 22 Jun 2003 (UTC)
 * The representatives are MLAs in all provinces except Ontario, Quebec (Member of the National Assembly) and Nfld-Lab (Member of the House of Assembly). - Montr&eacute;alais


 * Note: Simon will repeatedly edit pages to re-insert serious factual errors. He apparently knows these things are errors, but hopes to propagate them in order to further his personal biases on various subjects. --149.99.164.172


 * I do aknowledge the article did not say much good about Stockwell Day, but what it said was the truth. Could you please demonstrate how the facts were in error?  The article could certainly use more editing, it definetaly has more about Day's failures than his successes.  The article would be stronger if you would add positive facts about Day, rather than just delete any negative facts you ma not like. SimonP 20:51 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)
 * They are not 'facts.' They are lies, they are false. Since you have to couch your language in phrases like "reportedly implied," to cover-your-ass with these non-facts you are obviously aware of this. --149.99.164.172
 * I'm not a Stockwell Day fan, but you are simply slandering the man.


 * I repeat: What facts are you questioning?  Why don't we have a discussion, then I can find sources to prove what can be proven, and if anything is found to be false we can remove them.  Rather than you just deleting valuable content while adding nothing of your own.  SimonP 02:01 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)
 * P.S. While I do support the content here I did not write most of it, it is a colabarative work of many people from all over the political spectrum. I did not, for instance, remember the specifics of the lawsuit, someone else wrote that bit, but I do believe it to be correct.
 * OK, then, start with the lawsuit. Start by firming up the 'reportedly implied' comments.  I personally wouldn't recommend you waste your time looking, personally... --149.99.164.172


 * I removed the lengthy paragraph about Kinsella's dinosaur joke. It was a minor incident and we already have more than enough embarassing Stock Day incidents. - SimonP 00:45, Jun 14, 2004 (UTC)

Picture
Uh, where did the picture go? Digging.holes 02:50, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I was wondering the same thing. The best guess is that it was deleted for improper citation. CJCurrie 03:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Hmm. Funny. I'll try uploading it again. Digging.holes 05:12, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Clarified why Day wrote the letter regarding Lorne Goodard
I made it clearer as to why Day felt compelled to write the letter regarding Lorne Goodard. It also helps explain way there was little negative reaction the letter in Alberta or Red Deer.(Progressive Conservatives were re-elected in a massive landslide in the next election dispite the Liberals attempts to make the letter an issue).

Possibly he was compelled by the same bad judgements he showed while he was leader of the party. His basic lack of meaningful education is also probably a contributing factor.

2000 election
I think that the account of the 2000 election needs some editing. First, I wonder whether we might not dispense completely with the chocolate milk incident, which imo is not significant enough to justify the space. Frankly, I feel the same with the Ottawa high-tech event and the Niagara Falls gaffe. Can't we shorten this to something like "some staged events turned out poorly" Bucketsofg 23:59, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I've removed the Conservatives from the sentence "The Liberals and the Progressive Conservatives would use this to their advantage: The former campaigned on Day having a "hidden agenda", and the latter would title their campaign "Change You Can Trust"." Not, of course, that this wasn't true, but was the slogan solely about Day, or the Reform/CA movement generally? And was this about the 'hidden agenda'? or the agenda as presented?  Also, I'm not sure that even if it was true, that it adds enough to the article to justify including it. Bucketsofg 02:25, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I've deleted "The result of the campaign Day's credibility and popularity would soon wane under the media and opposition accusations, and he proved unable to show Eastern Canadians that the party was not simply Reform revamped. Many in the Alliance Party, and other Canadians, condemned the "Campaign of Fear" they said was being run against Day." I'm not sure what this paragraph aims at.  Saying that Day was harmed by the campaign?  Surely no one would deny it.  But it's far from clear how credible and popular before.  'Eastern Canadians' is not NPOV.   Yes, 'many in the Alliance' condemned the '"campaign of fear"', but 'other Canadians'?  Maybe there is something to be salvaged here.  But shouldn't it be added to next section? Bucketsofg 02:26, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Personal water craft footage
I think that a clip from the water craft footage should be added. It has certainly had a big impact and seems to get used whenecer Stockwell Day is mentioned on several Canadian comedy shows. Kc4 00:57, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree, I came to this page trying to find out what the story on that appearance was, it was pretty big news at the time and was his calling card in the early days. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.193.142.225 (talk) 17:37, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Milk
No, you should keep the chocolate milk in and expand it to include his reaction to "homo" milk. Was it Mary Walsh or Cathy Jones who ambushed him again? - Vaudree —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.58.47 (talk) 13:16, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Unclear
In the sentence: "He attended the University of Victoria and Northwest Bible College in Edmonton, AB (formerly), but did not graduate from either," what does "AB (formerly)" mean? Adam 07:16, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
 * The AB means Alberta, Canada, and I think the "formerly" refers to the fact that Northwest Bible College is now known as Vanguard College. Sarah Ewart (Talk) 12:20, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I think it should be deleted. Adam 12:36, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Stockwell Day spells 'maroon' with one 'o' Chris66 15:43 October 17 2006

ACE curriculum controversy
As I remember it, the controversy over the ACE curriculum had to do with anti-semitic lessons. This is not to say, of course, that Day is/was an anti-semite, which my edit doesn't mean to imply but some may misinterpret. Can anyone improve it?

22 Minutes
I think it's a stretch to say that had Day's proposal for national referenda been in effect at the time, the "Doris" proposal would have gone up for a vote. My recollection is the "signatures" for the 22 Minutes campaign were submitted by Internet. Ballot petitions generally require backers to go out and get the physical signatures of registered voters. -- Mwalcoff 04:35, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Exactly right. The law would only apply to petitions that collected real signatures, not Internet petitions that can be signed multiple times.  (Four of the "signatures" on the 22 Minutes petition are mine.)  I'm removing the sentence. --The Invisible Hand 13:08, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Controversies
It is important to keep the right balance between acknowledging the various controversies ("brain drain", Doris, dinosaurs, etc.) that attached themselves to Day in 2000 while simultaneously not overplaying them. The appropriate response to this imperative, however, is not to bury everything remotely unflattering or controversial in a "trivia" section at the end of the article. In fact, Wikipedia policy is quite explicit that "Trivia" sections are not appropriate in most articles, and have to be integrated back into the main article body.

The appropriate solution here is to acknowledge these matters in the article, but not to dwell on them. We do need to mention them as briefly and neutrally as possible, but obviously we shouldn't insert meaningless, unverifiable hypotheticals about whether Elections Canada would really have approved a Doris referendum or not. WP:NPOV doesn't mean this article has to be a flattering puff piece that buries anything that anybody might read as even remotely unflattering to him; it means we have to acknowledge the facts without interpreting them. Bearcat 05:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Wording
Do other editors believe that this wording is appropriate:


 * The Liberals used this tactic in order to drive NDP and Progressive Conservative-leaning voters into voting Liberal, though at no stage in the campaign did polls suggest that the Canadian Alliance would form a majority government needed to implement such policies.

I would argue that "used this tactic in order to drive" is a rather clear instance of "weasel-wording", while the second part of the sentence seems to violate our policies against Original Research. Do others agree? CJCurrie 21:47, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

This is detailed in this article: 2006 Liberal Party of Canada election ads. Jack Layton himself described the Liberal tactics as "scaremongering" GoldDragon 00:05, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

We don't know exactly which voters it was aimed at. Perhaps it was aimed at libertarian voters who are turned off by social conservatism. There were many of those in the urban and suburban ridings where the Liberals competed with the Alliance.Or maybe just turning people away from Day generally. Or maybe they just saw a weakness and attacked there. I don't remember the last time a political party held back when they saw a perceived weakness in an opposing party leader. I'd want to see a source from a Liberal insider to make that kind of inference.Otherwise I suppose there could be something that is clearly attributed to a particular commentator.

As for the second bit, I think that one has a slight POV problem because it implies that ads were wrong in their conclusions which is not necessarily the case. I don't see why we need to editorialize about what the Liberals were thinking. We should just describe what they did. Readers can come to conclusion the same way that we do. --JGGardiner 21:29, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Why no mention of his blog, and the skeptical comments about global warming therein?
That information is valid and relavent to who Mr. Day is. It used to be here, and has since been scrubbed. Is messege control at work here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.76.229.105 (talk) 02:58, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Father
An anonymous editor removed the paragraph on his father. I don't think we need to have too much family background in these articles but it is probably relevant that his father was politically involved and ran for a seat in Parliament. I'll put it back in shortly. Does anybody have a problem with that? --JGGardiner (talk) 22:41, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Considering the Father of Day is deceased, and had minimal impact on Day's political career and the current state of Canadian politics I don't see the point. Many people have run for federal office and not all have mentions in wikipedia. KurzweilJacobs (talk) 18:41, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Broken links
These links lead to missing or unavailable pages:

How'd They Vote?: Stockwell Day's voting history and quotes In Their Own Words: quotations by and about Canada's Conservatives ```` — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.159.237.43 (talk) 20:04, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

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Opening sentence word order
I am starting a discussion here after having come across a discussion at BLP/N

Tagging the involved users here,, and. I think it's worth taking a look at the discussion referred to by in the above BLP discussion (which is already closed with a recommendation to discuss here). There appears to be no community wide consensus on the matter. I tend to be of the opinion that we shouldn't use "former" or "retired" in opening sentences at all (unless overwhelmingly supported by RSs), so I really have no dog in this war other than that position here and would raise that as a third option/compromise. &#8213;  "Ghost of Dan Gurney" (talk)  05:08, 17 May 2024 (UTC)


 * I didn't mean to start a war... Sorry about that! But it's definitely a question of style as to whether "Canadian" should come before "former." There were many pages, not just this one, where the wording was "Canadian former politician," and while it irked me each time I read it, I would let it slide. But then someone (sorry for not remembering who) systematically changed dozens if not hundreds of pages to "former Canadian politician" which, I admit, I thought was better. So I guess now seeing someone starting to revert to a form I think is off has hit a nerve in me.
 * I do understand how someone could interpret or apply "former" in "former Canadian politician" as adverbial to "Canadian," but it should be read as applying to the noun cluster "Canadian politician." If the adjective were one that referred to something other than nationality, we probably would not be having this discussion. For instance, I don't think we would be tempted to say "a conservative former politician"; we would more naturally write "a former conservative politician" (with a lowercase "c" in this case to refer to the general political leaning rather than a specific political party -- although once "Liberal" by name, the BC Liberals, which have rebranded to BC United, had more affinity with the federal Conservative Party than the federal Liberal Party, but I digress).
 * Let's pretend for argument (because I can't think of an actual example off the top of my head) that Conrad Black had been an elected politician rather than a newspaper publisher. He is someone who had once given up his Canadian citizenship. And let's say he had given up his citizenship after having been a politician. He would have been Canadian while he was a politician, so might it not be more appropriate to refer to him as "a former ex-Canadian politician," with "former" applying to the "ex-Canadian politician" noun cluster? MauriceYMichaud (talk) 11:07, 17 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Hi there! I was the one who went around systematically changing "Canadian former politician" to either "former Canadian politician" or simply "Canadian politician." I hadn't realized there had been a broader, unresolved discussion on the matter and, until I was pinged here, I believed I was making an innocuous grammatical correction. It was not my intention to start an edit war. I apologize.
 * I like the idea of dropping "former" as a compromise. A politician does not necessarily have to hold public office and can refer to anyone still involved in party politics. One could even argue that calling someone a "former" politician is original research unless we have reliable sources explicitly saying they are no longer politically active.
 * If we are going to go the "former" route, my preference would be for "former Canadian politician" since it seems to be the more grammatically correct option. I also feel "former Canadian politician" sounds more natural. While I understand the "he's still Canadian" argument, I don't believe readers are likely to interpret "Day is a former Canadian politician" to mean "Day is a formerly Canadian politician" since all the context clues indicate he's still Canadian. For example, a Canadian politician losing their citizenship is an almost mythically rare occurrence and, if he had given up his citizenship, there would be a mention of his current nationality. Jiffles1 (talk) 17:15, 17 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I couldn't agree more, Jiffles1! Either "former Canadian politican," or dropping "former" entirely unless there's evidence that the person in question has definitely turned their back from politics.
 * If this is a war, it's certainly a friendly one! I think it's more of a disagreement coming from grammar nerds, which I freely admit to being. :) MauriceYMichaud (talk) 16:51, 18 May 2024 (UTC)