User talk:Newross

Newross talk page

Malia Ann Obama's birth year
There was further discussion of Malia Obama's birth year on the talk page last week. It's since been archived to Talk:Barack Obama/Archive 18. In short, the sources for saying that she was born in 1999 are more solid than those saying she was born in 1998. Please don't change the year back to 1998 unless you have more definitive sources. Thanks. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 20:08, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Nice contributions.
Shem(talk) 06:46, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Except for the plain links. It would be much better not to put external links into the body of the text. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:51, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Barack Obama article
This edit was unconstructive potentially contentious. The materialy you apparently seek to delete was boldly deleted already, a discussion begun, and the material re-inserted pending outcome of the discussion. By re-deleting it while discussion is ongoing this edit serves to initiate a revert war. In case you do not know, this article is under special supervision due to its contentious history, and editors may be temporarily blocked by administrators well short of WP:3RR violations. Your edit also had the effect of removing a number of uncontroversial changes that had been made to the article during the intervening period. Please respect our efforts to keep the article stable, and editing orderly. Thanks, Wikidemo (talk) 21:17, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

support request
I am hoping you can join in arguing to support and keep an article on Obama's brother. Check out the discussion/debate at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Abongo_Obama#Abongo_Obama

Regards,--Utahredrock (talk) 01:24, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

A "new" article for Malik Obama
is sure to be nominated for deletion; so I've actually done so myself here even though I believe it now passes muster due to Maliks multiple press mentions (which had not yet been catalogued when contributors had so very recently weighed in on its "Obongo" iteration. Please be patient with this proposal while those interested weight in again. (I'm notifying those who commented.) — Justmeherenow  06:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Please look over the current options for Rezko language and pick one to help us get to consensus
This is a form notice, not a personal message. I'm sending it out to the most recent contributors to the Rezko discussion at Talk:Barack Obama. Sorry if this is inconvenient, but we may be close to consensus if we can get your help. Hi, I've noticed you've been a part of the Rezko discussion but haven't said which of the options now on the table you'd prefer. It would really help us to get to consensus if we could get your input on that. There's been plenty of discussion, but if you have questions, I'm sure other editors would answer them. The four options now on the table are the three in Talk:Barack Obama and Talk:Barack Obama (which doesn't contain the word "criticism"). So far, the two most popular versions seem to be Clubjuggle's Version 3 and Scjessey's. Please help us try to wrap this up. Noroton (talk) 17:51, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm inviting your comment
Here (and also, if possible, ) $\sim$ Justmeherenow     05:18, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama
May I ask why you have added so much Palmer-specific information to Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama, almost none of which is related to Obama, rather than to Alice Palmer (Illinois politician)? -- Scjessey (talk) 17:58, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Ann Dunham
Thanks for the edit - I agree completely that we have to be careful when basing an encyclopedia article on memories that are 47 years old - especially when they are contradictory. I hope we can stick to your wording. Tvoz / talk 18:00, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Dunham again
You might want to look at Talk:Ann Dunham. Thanks. Tvoz / talk 18:34, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

February 2009
You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24 hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing. Please do not repeatedly revert edits, but use the talk page to work towards wording and content that gains a consensus among editors. If necessary, pursue dispute resolution.  Sandstein  15:00, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Gerald Walpin article
I would encourage you to read the sources listed before jumping to errant conclusions. The wording used in no way qualifies as a soap box, as it is the precise wording the Hill used, and perhaps you meant some other source when claiming that the Hill is not RS, because that is an incorrect assertion. Good luck! Trilemma (talk) 12:51, 26 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I have replied with a clarification at Talk:Gerald Walpin. Newross (talk) 17:38, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Editing study
Hi. My name is Mike Lyons and I am a doctoral student at Indiana University. I am conducting research on the writing and editing of high traffic “current events” articles on Wikipedia. I have noticed in the talk page archives at Barack Obama that you have contributed to the editing or maintenance of the article. I was hoping you would agree to fill out a brief survey about your experience. This study aims to help expand our thinking about collaborative knowledge production. Your participation would be immensely helpful in making the study a success. A link to the survey is included below.

Link to the survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=P6r2MmP9rbFMuDigYielAQ_3d_3d

Thanks and best regards, Mike Lyons lyonspen | (talk) 19:54, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Please don't delete relevant information from reliable sources.
In this edit, you erased relevant information from Politico and Breitbart. Both of those are reliable sources. The article about Obama's political positions is not supposed to be a puff piece to make him look good. Instead, it is supposed to accurarately report his positions on issues - even the ones that might make him look bad. Grundle2600 (talk) 15:56, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

This new edit by you is another example. Please do not remove relevant, well sourced info from articles. The goal here is to make the encyclopedia better, and we can't achieve that goal if editors keep removing relevant, well sourced info from articles. Thank you. Grundle2600 (talk) 22:34, 2 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes, I agree with Grundle2600; please don't remove relevant information that has been properly sourced, as you recently did at Kevin Jennings. Thank you for your consideration. KevinOKeeffe (talk) 13:57, 7 October 2009 (UTC)


 * And yet, 27 minutes later, you revert the same material a second time, despite its containing references from Fox News, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Examiner, and Google Books. Please be advised that if you revert my edits a third time, you will be in violation of the three-revert rule.


 * You may wish to peruse the material at this link at your convenience: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Edit_warring KevinOKeeffe (talk) 14:29, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I see that you have done it again with yet another article. In this edit to the Kevin Jennings article, you removed the information about Jennings' admission in his autobiography that he had a past history of illegal drug use. Given that Jennings is Obama's Assistant Deputy Secretary for the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools, this information is extremely noteworthy. Grundle2600 (talk) 03:36, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

I would like to point out this ARBCOM ruling:

"Removal of sourced edits made in a neutral narrative is disruptive"

"8) It is disruptive to remove statements that are sourced reliably, written in a neutral narrative, and pertain to the subject at hand."

"Passed 5 to 0 at 05:54, 10 December 2006 (UTC)"

Grundle2600 (talk) 06:42, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

You have done it again here. Did You See the Sunrise? (talk) 05:24, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

You owe me an apology
WTF?! "QueenofBattle’s dislike of Obama is not a valid reason to remove a neutral, well-sourced, historically accurate description..." Who in the hell said I disliked Obama? Hell, I wasn't even the latest one to remove the term "rising star"! It's uncivil and just plain uncalled for. My opposition to the use of the term "rising star" is largely because it is unencylopedic, despite the many, many (and many, many) paragraphs you have devoted to defending or somehow attempting to justify it. Clear evidence that there is controversy surrounding the use of such a term. We don't win any arguments around here by dumping our homework on the table and giving an A to the heaviest pile. Pursuasion, compromise and consensus is the trick; yes, I'm sure I've read that somewhere... QueenofBattle (talk) 10:56, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Barack Obama edit war
I am not trying to have an edit war with you, but we are trying to find consensus on this issue on the talk page. You should participate there rather than insisting on your narrow-minded edits on the article page by reverting my edits and the edits of others. That is not how we do things here. You either need to follow the protocol or stop editing. QueenofBattle (talk) 22:34, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Obama 2RR
You've reverted twice today over the needless redundancy/trivia of stating the margin in an old primary race two different ways. It's a silly thing to edit war over, and as it stands you've already violated the article probation. I'd really appreciate it if you'd restore the shorter version, or some other variation that removes the redundancy. LotLE × talk 03:32, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Sign your edit
at the Baracxk Obama talk page. YOu edited two sections at once, signing only one. ThuranX (talk) 18:09, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Saul Alinsky Quote
Dear Newross, Saul Alinsky was a communist and believed that the only path to communism was the destruction of capitalism. He wrote, ""A Marxist begins with his prime truth that all evils are caused by the exploitation of the proletariat by the capitalists. From this he logically proceeds to the revolution to end capitalism, then into the third stage of reorganization into a new social order of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and finally the last stage -- the political paradise of communism." in his book Rules for Radicals. I think that is very relevant to his 'history' and career. Why do you keep removing it? Is this your attempt to revise history? Nonrevisionis (talk) 22:06, 27 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Repeatedly adding a quote deliberately taken out-of-context by you to reverse its meaning and adding your own uninformed opinion is unacceptable, disruptive vandalism. Newross (talk) 00:27, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

I edited my contribution to state that the opinion of some was that he was a communist based on his own quote. That is a fact. If you choose to dispute that fact, than ADD TO the debate rather than simply omit it. If you continue to simply omit rather than contribute to the debate, then it tells me that you are not a true scholar and would rather omit facts than put them in context. Nonrevisionis (talk) 12:52, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I have replied to your repeated vandalism of the Saul Alinsky article at Talk:Saul Alinsky. Newross (talk) 16:16, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Notification
As an user who commented at this discussion, you may wish to weigh in on Grundle2600's topic ban modification request. Ncmvocalist (talk) 09:15, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

CSD nom
You nominated Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation for CSD. The article isn't eligible for CSD, regardless of who created it, because it survived an AfD nomination before you made your nom. Niteshift36 (talk) 20:42, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Barack Obama Presidency edits
Newross, please see the   Presidency of Barack Obama‎ page about discussing the edits. The edits you reverted were being developed by a consensus and were different than that of Little runt sitting there on a log's original. Also, he is a suspected sockpuppet, not confirmed. Let me know if I am wrong. Also, the edit you reverted on transparency isn't POV, it appears to be a GAO fact that has due relevance with the preceding paragraph. I don't understand why it wouldn't be included. Thanks--NortyNort (talk) 08:37, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Your medical cannabis edit
Hi, Newross! Thought I should inform you that I introduced some commentary at medical cannabis/talk about your deletion of an improperly-sourced mention of the Feb 2010 Colorado medical cannabis dispensary arrest by the DEA. Kudos for noticing that improper source, and more generally for your obvious devotion to accuracy re BLP matters. And kudos, too, for the great article you created on the Illinois Senate elections of Barack Obama that I also looked at. Very nice work, indeed. Cheers, –  OhioStandard  (talk) 02:22, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I was wondering: I just noticed your edit summary line for the deletion, and was curious to know whether you still consider the deleted text "inaccurate and misleading" in light of the Denver Post story? Was your objection just that the text was originally cited to a blog, or was there something else? You can reply here. Thanks, –  OhioStandard  (talk) 09:39, 20 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your comment on the Illinois Senate elections of Barack Obama article.


 * I have replied at Talk:Medical cannabis with an explanation of why it would be "inaccurate and misleading" to cite The Denver Post article by John Ingold, Owner who bragged of large medical-pot operation jailed in DEA raid, as saying that the DEA raid "was contrary to Obama's stated policy directive." Newross (talk) 03:28, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Revert of WP:BRD massive change to organization of Barack Obama article
Likewise, kindly see what you edited because you removed tags that were put up for discussion and other intermediate edits that cleaned up the ref tags too. Also if you feel against the tag then it would be nice to actually discuss in order to get the WP:BRD cycle cited.Lihaas (talk) 11:56, 19 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Reply at: Talk:Barack_Obama.
 * Newross (talk) 03:46, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Good work on Ann Dunham
 Hello Newross, Viriditas has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling at someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Go on, smile! Cheers, and happy editing! Smile at others by adding {{subst:Smile}} to their talk page with a friendly message.
 * I have some issues with your latest edits to the references. For only one example, you removed a full print reference and replaced it with a shorter, online citation. That is not best practice. Whenever possible, the full print citation should be used. Viriditas (talk) 05:05, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

and news websites and news services (time.com, washingtonpost.com, newsweek.com, Associated Press, BBC World Service, Bloomberg.com, Reuters.com, msnbc.com, etc.) to avoid a "sea of blue" wikilinks in reference section citations.
 * To address your concerns, I have added secondary print citations to supplement the Ripley, Maraniss, and Meacham article online citations, and restored wikilinks for Salon.com, FactCheck.org, and BookTV.org to citations.
 * Some of the other changes I had made earlier on 3 January 2011 to revise references for format consistency were to:
 * only list the author or co-authors of an article as the author or co-authors in a reference citation for the article (e.g. Amanda Ripley was the sole author of " The story of Barack Obama's mother "—Zamira Loebis and Jason Tedjasukmana were not  co-authors  of the article.
 * consistently avoid wikilinks in reference citations for newsmagazines, journals, and newspapers (Time, Anthropology News, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times, The Honolulu Advertiser, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Standard (Kenya), The Seattle Times, The Kansas City Star, Lawrence Journal-World, Capitol Hill Times, Seattle Gay News, Redoubt Reporter, Newsweek, The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times, The Sunday Times, Los Angeles Times, Punahou Bulletin, Jawa Pos, The Irish Times, The Jakarta Post, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, New York Post, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Chicago Reader, The Christian Science Monitor, New York Daily News, etc.)
 * Newross (talk) 06:20, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Barack Obama, Sr.
I split some references apart that were from different authors but supporting the same fact. In some instances the reference didn;t seem to have anything to to with the fact. Some of the references seem sketchy and could possibly be challenged, like some of the WND sources. Other early sources are broken now. The bibliography of the article is getting to be a chore. I would like to test this source in the WP:RS forum. Just because it is from a birther site doesn't mean it's not factual but there are RS criterion to test these against. Has this been done already? My only current concern is for the signature of Obama Sr. Is it his? Where did that letter come from? Is it a forgery? Alatari (talk) 23:46, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

These are your sources. So where did you find them? Why did you bind them together with divergent sources? Do you think they are reliable? The entire rewrite is in question if these sources are not WP:RS. Alatari (talk) 00:17, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

I have to be clear. I liked your chronological rewrite. It appears to be in order but the sources are a mess and some are questionable. I made a sandbox on the discussion page with your rewrite to work out the sourcing. Splitting the sources into individuals with unique name= and putting them into long hand form would speed up this process immensely. Alatari (talk) 00:54, 5 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Reply posted at Talk:Barack Obama, Sr.. Newross (talk) 19:32, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Lolo Soetaro
Curious as to the source you used to change Mr Soetaro's occupation from geologist to geographer. With respect. Bellagio99 (talk) 15:40, 16 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I have replied at Talk:Lolo Soetoro.
 * Newross (talk) 01:36, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Kapiolani Medical Center
Excellent work at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children! I was hoping someone would take the time to find and read some actual references, rather than speculate about it all. I suppose various people will complain that an article normally does not have a timeline, but in this case it is very helpful. Johnuniq (talk) 07:35, 29 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you. The layout of the main source for the timeline, Yardley & Rogers' A History of Kapiolani Hospital, now (coincidentally) mirrors the layout of the Wikipedia article. The original text of the book covered (in paragraph form) the first 50 years of the hospital through 1941; to which was appended a detailed year-by-year timeline (pp. 31–39, "Highlights as Kapiolani Hospital continues through the next 50 years...") covering the years 1942–1982.
 * Newross (talk) 01:04, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

"Against consensus"
I am requesting that you strike the words "against consensus" from your recent posts about my New Party additions. If you read the very discussion under "narrower statement", you will see that there was not a consensus against my addition. We can debate the merits of adding it or not. But it is not fair to claim that something was "against consensus" when that is not the case.

Such action on your part will help me to AGF. Thank you. William Jockusch (talk) 19:52, 6 July 2012 (UTC)


 * I changed " against consensus " to "over objections without consensus". Six veteran Wikipedia editors (Newross, Scientizzle, Loonymonkey, DD2K, Wikidemon, Cramyourspam) explained to you and "new" Wikipedia editor Wookian on the Talk:New Party (United States) page over the past month that the Stanley Kurtz June 7, 2012 " Obama’s third-party history " opinion piece on National Review Online was not a WP:RS and was unacceptable as a source for the article. After this, you re-added this unacceptable source four times ( 1 2 3 4 ) over objections without consensus. I (and several other editors) do not have a problem with the content of the sentence: "The New Party endorsed Barack Obama in his successful 1996 run for the Illinois Senate" if it is reliably sourced. I (and several other editors) do have a problem with using totally unreliable sources, like Stanley Kurtz National Review Online opinion pieces, for Wikipedia articles. Newross (talk) 00:33, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for listening. And thanks for that change -- sort of. But I still think you are not characterizing fairly what I did, while ignoring the far worse actions of Cramyourspam. Let's start there. I am reproducing below his only contributions that are currently visible on the talk page of that article [I don't know about the archives].
 * we're not going to allow any obama info on the page. period. none of the partisans have come up with sources that are non-FRINGE and/or non-blogs. i wish the right-wingers would just stop wasting our (and their own) time trying to add their obama rumors. Cramyourspam (talk) 19:23, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
 * my conspiracy? no no no. you misunderstand. i'm very much with the leave-obama-off-of-the-new-party-page faction. of course *i* don't speak for all of wp, but also of course this rumor twaddle is not going to be accepted here by editors who matter and who watch this article and some related ones. i guess we're not supposed to actually *say* that nothing about obama is going to last if put onto the new party page, but, well, reality is reality. as i say, i wish the FRINGEy folks would stop wasting everyone's time by continuing to add that that stuff. we're going to carry on removing it. Cramyourspam (talk) 21:22, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Sure looks to me like he is saying that he is just going to edit war to get rid of any Obama contributions. In light of that, I believe I was 100% justified in putting zero weight on his removals, and in re-adding over them. Furthermore, under "Narrower statement", I had started a discussion of precisely my proposed addition. That discussion had been going for some time. But cram had not participated at all. Clearly looney didn't like the additions, but after some discussion, he had correctly stopped arguing RS, and moved on to a rather absurd claim of undue weight, which I had knocked down very easily. Demon [whose political POV appears to be the opposite of mine] was not objecting to adding it and indeed had suggested a location. Wookian and I were in favor. DD2K also clearly didn't like the addition, but had conceded that I was making good points in the discussion. I will concede to you that this did not amount to iron-clad consensus. However, remember that these things are supposed to be evaluated on the strength of the arguments, not merely on numbers. When you combine that with Cram's actions as described above, your characterization remains unfair. As to the linking the Kurtz article, there is nothing wrong with that, provided there is overall RS for the claims being made. Opinion pieces are linked all the time. The overall question of whether there is RS for this I will respond to elsewhere. I believe there is, and I further believe that I had clearly won that portion of the argument in talk by the time I made the addition. William Jockusch (talk) 17:18, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Stanley Kurtz National Review article about Obama and the New Party
This discussion may involve you: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard&pe=1&#Stanley_Kurtz_National_Review_article_about_Obama_and_the_New_Party William Jockusch (talk) 19:33, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

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