Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Rashad Hussain's comments on Sami Al-Arian


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus, with a merge discussion highly encouraged on the article's talk page. Regards,   A rbitrarily 0    ( talk ) 14:24, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Rashad Hussain's comments on Sami Al-Arian
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It's not appropriate for Wikipedia to have an article on this transient and relatively minor controversy. We're giving readers the impression that this story was much more important than it actually was. Prezbo (talk) 09:31, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * A good case for a merge to Rashad Hussain, assuming there is information that is not yet present. &mdash;siro&chi;o 12:49, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think there's really a case for merging. If a large portion of the article was merged then serious undue weight problems would be raised.  Actually I think those problems are there even if the content is split between two articles.  Since both articles were written by the same person I assume the section on this issue in the Rashad Hussain article is a good summary that contains all the important information.Prezbo (talk) 13:47, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep -- too big to merge too. It is not necessarily a bio article but can be a sub-section there as well. Wikid as&#169; 13:04, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete: merge a few sentences and sources into main article. If the editors think the minor details of this minor issue is such an important issue, they should write an article, get it published and use that as a reference in the Rashad Hussain article. Just not at all encyclopedic and seems like a POV attempt to discredit all involved over a minor incident. CarolMooreDC (talk) 14:42, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep. Judging by the refs, the suggestion that his is a relative minor controversy is an exaggeration.  Meets wiki notability standards, as reflected in RS refs.--Epeefleche (talk) 18:45, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Fine, let's look at the references in detail. Six of them are news articles about Sami al-Arian which don't have anything to do with Hussain.  14 of them are conservative news and opinion sites like Cybercast News Service and Power Line.  These aren't necessarily reliable, and I don't think their presence indicates notability--the political blogosphere produces vast quantities of text on trivial issues all the time.  Incidentally all of those sources are from between February 15 and March 4, which shows this controversy's staying power.  Four sources are other opinion pieces: Marc Lynch, Claudia Rosett, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, Josh Goldberg.  Three sources are blog entries from Politico and Jake Tapper; these are reliable, but since these bloggers' mission is to cover political minutiae they don't really demonstrate notability.  Two of the references are news stories that are actually about this controversy--one in Politico and one from Fox News.  The article also cites a profile of Hussain from the Washington Post which devotes two paragraphs to this controversy--that's probably a good indication of the weight it should have in Wikipedia's coverage of Hussain.  The best measure of notability is the amount of attention the mainstream media has paid to this controversy, and that isn't very much.  Compare the Google news results for this story to those for another Obama administration controversy, Van Jones' 9/11 truth petition.  That story was a much bigger deal but Wikipedia has gotten by fine without having an article on it.Prezbo (talk) 19:28, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Excellent analysis of sources. Thanks for doing it. CarolMooreDC (talk) 03:21, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Which of those refs are not RSs? I note your analysis mentions that some are "conservative" -- The point is made time and time again at the RS noticeboard that the political leaning of a source is not reason to denigrate its use as an RS.  You also look into the mind of those who write on other sources; if they are RSs, its really not noteworthy what writers' "mission" is in your opinion.--Epeefleche (talk) 04:57, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * In general editorials and blogs (Marc Lynch, Power Line) aren't reliable sources--and they aren't used as reliable sources in this article, they're used to say "Marc Lynch wrote X". CNS is straight news but I don't know Wikipedia's verdict on its reliability.  It doesn't require clairvoyance to say that Politico's bloggers often write on very minor events, and I'd say that fact is relevant in deciding how important this controversy was.  Since it isn't Wikipedia's job to cover the news, just the presence of reliable sources isn't sufficient.Prezbo (talk) 17:38, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The presence of RS coverage is what suggests notability for the purposes of WP. Politico is an RS, for example, as I believe is CNS.--Epeefleche (talk) 18:37, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Is it actually necessary to quote a guideline on this? WP:N says that "significant coverage in reliable sources establishes a presumption, not a guarantee, that a subject is suitable for inclusion. Editors may reach a consensus that although a topic meets this criterion, it is not appropriate for a standalone article. For example, such an article may violate what Wikipedia is not."  I"m saying that this article violates WP:NOTNEWS.  It's about an unexceptional controversy that attracted attention from conservative online media for a few weeks, but very little attention from the mainstream press.Prezbo (talk) 18:43, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * There is significant coverage by many clearly RS sources in the article that you completely ignore in your analysis. Including Fox News, ABC News, Forbes, National Review, Foreign Policy, The Washington Post.  Those RSs are precisely the type that are considered RSs for purposes of the notability requirement, and I find your having avoided mention of them to make your analysis something less than complete.  The article clearly has the appropriate RS coverage.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:02, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I mentioned all of those, usually by author rather than title. Foreign Policy is Marc Lynch's blog, ABC News is Jake Tapper's blog, etc.  Forbes, NR, and FP are all opinion pieces and/or blog entries.  I don't consider a Daniel Pipes post on The Corner to be a reliable source.Prezbo (talk) 19:09, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Blogs come in different flavors. Fox News, ABC News, Forbes, National Review, Foreign Policy, and The Washington Post are all undoubtedly RSs.  RS blogs such as the above are certainly RSs.--Epeefleche (talk) 21:18, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I think I already said this but NR and FP are opinion pieces being cited to attribute commentary quoted in the article, not to verify facts, so the reliability of those publications isn't really relevant. It's still ridiculous to consider a blog entry by Daniel Pipes to be an RS for this though.  The others I've already addressed.Prezbo (talk) 21:46, 13 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delete per WP:NOT. Let's just ask ourselves whether a similar incident in, say, Japan, Germany or Brazil, which attracted the same brief flurry of news reports in its country, would even be considered for a moment to be a suitable subject for an article here. Of course it wouldn't. So why should this be so considered? Phil Bridger (talk) 21:30, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Germany yes, Brazil no, Japan maybe. Just kidding.  Yes, I can think of an incident in Germany that I discussed recently at an AfD.  We needed help translating some sources, so for that purpose I noticed some of our German speaking colleagues.  There was sufficient interest that it was kept.  In any event, we don't delete the information on the NCAA basketball tournament, even though there may be little interest in the Japanese college basketball tournament ... I don't see that as the applicable standard.  With all due respect.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:36, 14 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep per Wikidas and Epeefleche. In addition, I would like to add that a significant portion of this article (and the second controversy) is the section "Controversy over deleted comments." There are multiple reliable sources for which this is the subject. This section would be Undue in any bio article as it involves multiple persons, so its proper place is in this article. Per Epeefleche, I couldn't agree more with your comments above. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 03:51, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Editors on web sites are known to delete comments which later are found to be inaccurate, as Rashad Hussain claimed they were, or against some editorial policy. This isn't Nixon's secretary deleting the 18 minutes - and that does not have it's own article only Watergate_tapes. I haven't read the article itself for accuracy, since the topic is so unencyclopedic, but the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs article does accurately describe the whole content of the debate as: Editor Delinda Hanley told Fox News she believed the change was made in February 2009, because the comments attributed to Hussain were actually made by Sami al-Arian's daughter, Laila, who also attended the event. But article's author, Shereen Kandil, told Fox News that she did not confuse the two people. The White House also attributed the comments to Al-Arian's daughter. In other words it's a minor squabble about who said what, evidently with no audio recording. Under the article's authors' logic quoted at length above, we also need an article on Huffington.com deleting Jesse Ventura's 9/11 conspiracy article recently and one about what Ariel Sharon meant when he allegedly said on radio - often quoted by numerous Arab and Muslim WP:RS - that Israel controlled America?? Just a bad precedent to let this article survive. CarolMooreDC (talk) 13:30, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * That is not correct. While at first there was no audio recording provided, see CNS News article on the WRMEA, Publication Denies Cover-Up on OIC Envoy, Implies Anti-Muslim Bias Lies Behind Story, later a journalist from Politico obtained a recording; see Islam envoy retreats on terror talk, where the audio is provided. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 19:15, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Good! that recording surfaced. It proves how silly the debate and this article are. All he really said was: "The case that Laila just reminded us of is truly a sad commentary on our legal system. It is a travesty of justice, not just from the perspective of the allegations that are made against Dr. Al-Arian. Without passing any comment on those specific allegations or the statements [that] have been made against him, the process that has been used has been atrocious,” Hussain said, according to the recording. In his presentation, Hussain, then a student at Yale Law School, was careful to insist that he was not offering a view on Al-Arian’s innocence or guilt on charges that he served as a top leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the U.S. But, Hussain said, the treatment of Al-Arian fit a “common pattern ... of politically-motivated prosecutions where you have huge Justice Department press conferences announcing that a certain person is a grave threat to American security.” Any number of civil liberties attorneys could have said the same. As Politico says his "comments touched off criticism from conservative commentators." The article is a POV attempt to undermine and drive a political appointee from office for an incident of his expressing civil liberties concerns. Such political gamesmanship is NOT the purpose of wikipedia. CarolMooreDC (talk) 12:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * That is not correct. Ad hominem arguments such as stating that the "article is a POV attempt to undermine and drive a political appointee from office," and that it is "political gamesmanship," are neither correct, nor are they constructive. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 18:02, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delete. Much of the sources are unreliable (for example, FrontPage magazine). Others are from biased commentators (such as Daniel Pipes).Bless sins (talk) 05:03, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Merge. There is material that is reliably sourced and should be merged into Rashad Hussain.Bless sins (talk) 05:07, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.