Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/Venezuelan regional elections, 2008/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was not promoted by The Rambling Man 22:10, 29 November 2012.

Venezuelan regional elections, 2008

 * Nominator(s): — ΛΧΣ  21™  01:45, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

The 2008 regional elections of Venezuela were held on 23 November 2008 to choose 22 governors, 2 metropolitan mayors, 328 mayors and 251 aldermen for a four-year term beginning in 2008 and ending in 2012, when the next regional elections are held. This were the second regional elections held during the goverment of Hugo Chávez Frías and the first since he founded the United Socialist Party (PSUV). In this elections, a total 17,308 candidates competed for 603 elected positions, whith around 59 national and 236 regional political parties participated. I am nominating this for featured list because after rewriting the list, it is now up to standard. Thanks. — ΛΧΣ  21™  01:45, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

Comments


 * Alt text needs to be added to the images, as per MOS:IMAGES and WP:ALT, perhaps you could add one to the template itself
 * The template is not completely part of the article, but i'll see what i can do.
 * I added some images of several candidates (the ones with images, honestly).


 * "Following, the list" doesn't make sense, how about "The following list"
 * Done.


 * Add table captions to the tables as per MOS:DTT
 * Done.


 * "British Broadcasting Corporation" should actually be just "BBC" per MOS:ACRO exceptions
 * No, as it is the first time it appears and many people wo't now what is BBC, specially on an article about Venezuelan elections.


 * Categories should be sorted in alphabetical order
 * Done.

TBrandley 03:12, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I have adressed your comments. Thanks. — ΛΧΣ  21™  04:10, 12 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Support TBrandley 18:42, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks! — ΛΧΣ  21™  05:13, 23 October 2012 (UTC)

Oppose badly written I'm afraid. The Rambling Man (talk) 08:32, 16 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Could link "when the next regional elections are..." appropriately to the 2012 page?
 * "This were " This was or These were, but not "This were"...
 * "In this elections" similar comment applies.
 * "whith around 59 national and 236 regional political parties participated" whith should be with, and this sentence is still grammatically incorrect, perhaps "with 59 national and 236 political parties participating."
 * "in this elections "... these elections or this election....
 * Could do with a serious copyedit.
 * Don't just use colour to indicate the winning candidate, per WP:ACCESS.
 * Image captions that are complete sentences need a full stop.
 * Willam Lara -> Willian Lara.
 * "whom became presidential candidate in 2012, " -> "who became a presidential candidate..."
 * "44.97%" is 44.94% in the ref. Suggest you double-check the rest.
 * What is "contrincant "? is that English?
 * Why aren't the states or areas linked in the tables?
 * The two tables have identical captions, can you fix that?
 * "the governor or Miranda state" for the Miranda state?
 * I think I have addressed all the issues. Mark Arsten gave me a hand with the copyedit. I added bolding to winners to meet accessibility. — ΛΧΣ  21™  02:45, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually, now it violates WP:CONTEXTLINK because bold links should not be used. What to do? TBrandley 02:50, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, I guess that accessibility is more important than WP:CONTEXTLINK, IMO. There is no other practical way to denote the winner apart from colours. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:08, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Oh and also, WP:CONTEXTLINK is a guideline for the lead section, not for the tables. Please re-check :). Thanks. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:10, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I said not just colours. Unbold it please (WP:BADEMPHASIS) and use a symbol, like an asterisk or a dagger. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:43, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Unbolded. Where should I put the dagger? In all the row? Or just beside the name of the winning candidate? — ΛΧΣ  21™  18:11, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Suggest that since it's indicating the winning candidate, it goes beside the winning candidate's name. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:31, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Okay, then it's done :) — ΛΧΣ  21™  19:48, 17 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Support Regards.--Tomcat (7) 10:14, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks! — ΛΧΣ  21™  18:11, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Comments NapHit (talk) 23:41, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
 * "Venezuelan General Comptroller" is that right Comptroller? not meant to be Controller? Never heard of this before, if it is correct, is there a page it could be linked to?
 * Yes: A comptroller is in most countries the external auditor of the budget execution of the government and of government-owned companies. Another definition is "the director of the Government Accountability Office" in the case of the United States.
 * "in this elections" this should should be these.
 * Okay.
 * "Henrique Capriles Radonski, the former mayor of the Baruta municipality" comma at the end of this
 * Done.
 * "the Zulia state and succeeded Manuel Rosales" -> the Zulia state, he succeeded Manuel Rosales
 * Done.
 * move ref 10 to the end of the para, as refs are supposed to come after punctuation
 * Done.
 * I would add a note stating what % refers to, just so its clear
 * Okay.
 * ref 6, you need to add the parameter
 * Oh thanks, I thought it was |type= instead of |format=
 * The further reading article from The Guardian needs the author adding
 * Done. I didn't see the author; thanks for reminding me of it.
 * Thanks for the review. — Ṟ  Ṉ™  01:06, 5 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Comments from Crisco 1492
 * Any reason for going for a list and not an article format? Indonesian legislative election, 2004, for comparison, is in an article format and is a GA.
 * Not enough information to warrant an article like Venezuelan presidential election, 2012.
 * Be ready to change the sentence "when the next regional elections will be held."
 * I will, lol.
 * That is a lot of candidates. Is that the reason you haven't included the mayoral and alderman elections? If so, you should note this in the article. You mention them in the lede but they are nowhere to be found in the list.
 * I am developing a separate list for them. I will remove them from the lede. This list is only for regional elections, i.e. governors and metropolitan mayors.
 * banned almost 300 candidates, who were accused of corruption. - They were then accused, or had been accused before being banned? (i.e. should this sentence be the simple past or the past perfect)
 * May I rewrite "After being accused of corruption, the Venezuelan General Comptroller banned..."
 * LOL, that's suggesting the Comptroller was accused of corruption. In that case, I'd change the original clause to "banned almost 300 candidates who had been accused of corruption." — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:38, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
 * LMAO. True. Reworded. — ΛΧΣ  21™  04:01, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I suggest removing the empty parameters from the citations. They're just clutter.
 * Okay.
 * Metropolitan municipality - Why the capital M?
 * Nothing special. Removed.
 * who would run in the presidential election of 2012, - Don't think this is really relevant to the 2008 municipal elections
 * I may remove it, although I consider that it's a bit relevant.
 * What's with repeating "municipality", "state" and whatnot near the links? They are linked, those interested could click the link.
 * i.e. they could (should?) be removed without harming the article. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:40, 13 November 2012 (UTC)


 * What's the point of having acronyms if you don't use them again? (COPEI, AD, etc.) — Crisco 1492 (talk) 02:42, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
 * i.e. they could (should?) be removed without harming the article. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:40, 13 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Supreme Court or Supreme Tribunal? — Crisco 1492 (talk) 02:44, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Supreme Tribunal. Thanks for your comments. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:33, 13 November 2012 (UTC)


 * A couple comments above (both the "What's with..." ones) remain. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:40, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Oh I got your point. Solved. Thanks. —  ΛΧΣ  21™  03:47, 13 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Support - Looks like a strong list. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:33, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

This is a very small sampling of missing sources-- there are scores. This candidate should be withdrawn, and the article should be rewritten after a comprehensive literature search, and upgraded to higher quality sources to deal with comprehensiveness and POV. I am aware that other Venezuelan articles and lists have attained featured status when they do not meet standards: see WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS -- that does not make it acceptable. In the event I am not able to revisit my Oppose, delegates can ... be delegates :) :)  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 02:17, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Oppose; this list article appears about on par for the equivalent of a C- or B-class article, but there are numerous issues that should be addressed before it is considered as approaching Good or Featured:
 * 1) Crit 1, prose.  There are prose errors throughout, some samples:
 * 2) "Henrique Capriles Radonski, whom became presidential candidate in 2012, ..."
 * 3) "Pablo Pérez Álvarez defeated his adversary" ... opponent ?  Adversary is not necessarily incorrect grammatically, but it's not optimal prose.
 * 4) "The government of the state of Amazonas and nine municipalities were not chosen in this elections because they had been elected after the 2004 regional elections."  This sentence is indecipherable, repetitive, and has grammatical errors.  Why does this List have three supports already with this kind of prose?  I'm aware that prose and sourcing standards are slipping in Featured Processes (due to a lack of qualified reviewers), but these are blatant issues.
 * 5) "The 2008 regional elections were the second during the government of Hugo Chávez Frías and the first since he founded the United Socialist Party."  Please explain how we get to "second" (2000, 2004, 2008), and why the clause about the founding of the United Socialist Party is even there ... the reader is left wondering the significance of these statements or why they are included, and I'm not following the math on "second" regional elections.
 * 6) There is no explanation or link for Alto Apure.
 * 7) Crit 2, lead, "engaging", "defines the scope and inclusion criteria".  In addition to the 22 governors and 2 mayors, the lead discusses "17,308 candidates competed for 603 elected positions; around 59 national and 236 regional political parties participated", which are not further discussed.  What is the scope of the article?  Why is the List confined to a few Mayors and Governors?  Previous versions had more coverage.  It appears that the earliest versions of this article were more comprehensive, but that the faulty sourcing used in earlier versions was never improved to anything close to Featured status.
 * 8) Crit 3, comprehensiveness, "It comprehensively covers the defined scope", no.  See at minimum the lack of coverage of the issue of candidates being removed on corruption charges.
 * 9) General requirements for all Wikipedia articles:
 * 10) Sourcing: WP:NONENG-- English language sources are preferred on the English Wikipedia, and there is very little content in this article that was not covered by high quality English-language sources.  Using those sources would also help with some POV issues.
 * 11) Sourcing again:  Several of the sources are not high quality or without bias.  Considering the coverage available on this topic, it should not be necessary to resort to sources like www.voltaire.net, globalexchange, and stratfor.  Why is an editorial/opinion piece listed in Further Reading?
 * 12) POV, or lacking in balance and comprehensiveness:
 * 13) Note as but one example this source included in Further Reading, with pretty much none of that content making it into the article.  Similar for this article.
 * 14) "During the elections, the Venezuelan General Comptroller banned almost 300 candidates who had been accused of corruption. The Supreme Tribunal ratified the bans and removed the candidates from the process." Severely POV, the story did not stop there, and a human rights issue amply explored by the international media, completely left out of this article.
 * 15) "The Venezuelan opposition managed to attain the metropolitan municipality of Caracas, ... " Managed to attain??  POV, and hardly reflects what the sources say.
 * 16) A random sampling of English-language sources not included:
 * 17) Time magazine
 * 18) CNN
 * 19) CBC News
 * 20) One example of the trumped up corruption charges (dealt with by numerous human rights orgs), covered by USA Today, explored further at Manuel Rosales.
 * 21) Discussion of 2008 charges from Human Rights Watch.
 * I have no POV. Also, this is a list, not an article. I found that enough information to warrant a detailed article is not out there. Elections such as these are always better explained by the numbers with a brief explanation at the lead rather than a full article. I am not withdrawin this nomination, and I consider that all main issues have been adressed. Thanks. — ΛΧΣ  21™  02:25, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * If this is a list, and not an article as you say, where is the corresponding article then? It's not linked from the list.  And information to make a comprehensive list or article is most certainly available in sources, only a few of which I've listed above, but a trip to the library will reveal a multitude more.  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 03:21, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I am planning to develop a main article including all these information, like Venezuelan regional elections or something. That should be better, in my opinion. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:22, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * But this is the article about the 2008 elections, and it does not comprehensively cover the 2008 elections, or elections in general. I have not examined the quality of, for example, Venezuelan parliamentary election, 2010, recently, but that more closely resembles what a fully developed C-class election article should look like, and this isn't even on that level. Venezuelan constitutional referendum, 2009 is another example of a more developed Venezuelan election article.  This page is, can be, warrants, and there are sources for an article; we shouldn't arbitrarily denote an article as a list, allowing us to have it become featured without writing the article.  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 03:31, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, parliamentary elections are different, I can tell you that as a venezuelan who lived and voted on both elections, actually. Parliamentary elections are usually more covered and the 2010 ones were very different from the ones in 2005. There, Opposition participated and achieved a high amount of seats and this was unprecedent since 2000. And this is not the article about the 2008 elections; this is the list about the winners and candidates for government and metropolitan mayorships of the 2008 elections. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:34, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I am well versed in Venezuelan politics and elections, including the 2008 regional elections and their significance, there is and was a story in 2008, I've listed only a few sources (the issue of corruption charges, for example, was so significant that it is still mentioned in 2012 sources): this is the 2008 election article-- it just hasn't been written yet, and we shouldn't arbitrarily call a topic about which much can be written a List. The structure of all of the Venezuelan election articles makes this ... an article ... just like the rest of the suite of Venezuela election articles. It's unfortunate that folks are supporting without considering prose, sourcing, and even more ... the distinction between an article and a list.  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 03:42, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * It is not unfortunate because this was written as a list, not as an article. I know you are well versed in Venezuelan politics, although I am afraid not better than me, who has lived all elections and voted on them since 2000 and still have no POV or political affiliation [But my off-wiki work is not relevant]. I guess that the main issue is that I see this as a list [the specific article] and you consider the topic as an article, rather than the article itself. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:45, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Take a look at all regional elections pages. Then, you will see it, I guess. — ΛΧΣ  21™  03:59, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
 * No, that won't do it. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, regional elections are a new phenom in Venezuela (part of Chavez changing elections in Venezuela) so we don't have a lengthy history to look at, and the question is not what other stuff exists on Wikipedia but whether sources exist to write this article.  They do.  I'm sure you're aware of the controversy surrounding the 2012 regional elections, which still warrants an article even though no one has bothered to write it (the sources exist) -- but the relevant question on Wikipedia is not whether any editor tries to make a list an article or makes the effort to expand a beginning article beyond a list, but whether there are sources to write the article.  There are, and this is the 2008 regional election article.  Focus on the sources; there are plenty-- well beyond those I listed. Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 04:06, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I am aware of the 2012 controversy and I am thinking that a list may not do the trick for the 2012 regional. Also, I still don't think there is enough information to write to make this an article. Otherwise, I would have done it as I am planning to do with all presidential and parliamentary elections. I can't make a reasonable detailed article about the 2008 elections when the only controversy was the human rights issue and all the information is very well explained by the table itself. It is not that I am not open to write a detailed article about thise elections, it is that I believe it couldn't be long enough to fall outside the list class. — ΛΧΣ  21™  04:14, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

Sandy has raised some valid points about the scope of the list, and whether it should be a list as opposed to a regular article. If sources exist to write an article that goes beyond a simple list, that is probably the course that should be taken. The resulting page can then go through GAN/FAC, if it's of sufficient quality. Giants2008 ( Talk ) 18:12, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
 * You can close this if you wish. I am not interested into deveoping this as an artice rather than a list, and I have no internet service to follow any other concerns written here. Thanks. — ΛΧΣ  21™  17:42, 28 November 2012 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.