Talk:George W. Bush/Archive 35

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Sigh.....

Personally, I don't like George W. Bush. I'm not an American, I like freedom (I'm not "commie scum"a as someone colorfuly described it.) But, whatever issues, sarcastic comments etc we have, we shouldn't bring them in here. Would Oxford dictionary put "George W. Bush - American President - Common idiot" in its dictionarys? No they wouldn't. Why should we do it here? Maybe we should have a completely seperate Wikipedia (Like the one for BattleStar galactica) for things like this. If I ever get a webserver I will set up something like that for such discussions.

NightOwl91 10:50, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Daily Mail

The description of the Daily Mail as an 'anti-Iraq war newspaper' is fairly spurious. While the Daily Mail does print stories that criticise the war, and American foreign policy in particular, it is no more anti-war than most other British newspapers. In fact, the Daily mail is intensly loyal to British servicemen serving in Iraq, and the suggestion that their anti-war stance defines them as a publication is frankly ludicrous. In the past year, public opinion in Britain has shifted considerably, so that the prevailing mood is fairly critical of the war and its motives, with criticism being vaguely anti-american in nature.

It's a shame this comment isn't dated. Anyway, The Daily Mail, though it doesn't have a history as a home for peaceniks, consistently criticised the war right from the start. Of course it is loyal to British Servicepeople, but there is no contradiction here. If you're loyal to someone you don't support sending them to face possible injury or death in a pointless oil war which doesn't benefit your own country. Gwaka Lumpa Dec 15th

intro

When and why did we get rid of the last part of the intro describing his family? Marskell 10:21, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Ha ha. Since when does anybody have the facts about George W. Bush? He's got so many personas and personalities it would take 50 qualified psychologists to keep up with all of them. Kudos to all of you who are trying to keep the page from being vandalised. Guess that is proof that George's popularity keeps going down the toilet.

Ah well.

{Hahaha politics, no.} --Zorak 08:36, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

The debate over the reference to Salem bin Laden. If it is inaccurate - then it should not be there period. If it is accurate - then it's not a cheap shot to include it in some way. Not disproportionately prominently. But an en passant reference is not a cheap shot. We need to know what percentage of the company or funding came from that source. If it was a significant amount then it should be referenced. If it was a petty amount - then to mention it would be unnecessary and one could say its inclusion was inflammatory but added no substantive knowledge. The structure of the Arbusto financing must be on public record. Someone should look it up and see the merit or otherwise of including the info.Davidpatrick 18:06, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Whos sensability is used in making this page and how come changes are considered vandalism? I thought this was the peoples free encyclopidia not the mans propaganda page. --Micfri 02:01, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Anti-vandal solution

Apply vprotected and protected tags to stop vandalism! It will work well!! --Prestaugh 11:05, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

I really think until bush falls out of the limelight should be a block on the page. Maoririder 14:56, 23 November 2005 (UTC) vandalism will just increase if nothing is resolved. Maoririder 14:56, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

SOmeone added {{Template:stopvandalism}}. Let's see if it works (highly unlikely). Izehar 23:04, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Of course it won't. This article will be an edit war 'til Doomsday. Rogue 9 22:41, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

George Bush's "lack of popularity" has been a rant of the Democrats ever since his last term. After winning his second term with nearly 60 million votes, the democrats carried on an identical rant.

The president has been illusionised to have his "popularity going down the toilet" when really the democrats have been saying it all this time- even before a successful appearance in the 2005 election.

Democrats? Call them what they are! They're freedom-hating commie scum! We should kill all ragheads, if you ask me. Viva el presidente! comment by anon 69.235.138.71

Why do you call this 'vandalism'? Surely its just a means of expressing our dissatisfaction with the Bush administration? Frankly, though I'm not American, I reserve my right to call anyone a 'Douche Bag' (British for 'complete fag') if I so choose, and I resent that right being limited by a site editor! In any case, I reckon that Bush (supposedly the leader of the free world...) would be able to fight his own battles, and without your help! Oh, well, I suppose he does have his hands full in Falujah...

Its vandalism because a wikipedia article is not the proper venue to vent your "frustrations" about American politics. Just calling him a Douche Bag(which by the way is a phrase accross the pond too) is not fair, and is espessially not warrented here. I apoligize if I have missread your article, and missed some sort of tongue and cheek, british humor just goes over my head sometimes...:)

Historical comparisson

The debate over what to do with this article is somewhat similar to the the one over the controversial decision to permanently protect the Main Page to deal with the high levels of vanadalism to that page. It's somewhat interesting to go back through the page history and see that the "unmanageable" level of vandalism that was then being debated was an attack once every couple days. - SimonP 20:09, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

I don't think that there's an unmanageable level of vandalism here. Every time a vandal "strikes" a group of people immediately revert; do you know how many times I've tried to revert, but someone else has beat me to it? I mean if this page is locked, then were will it end? After all, Wikipedia is "The Free Encyclopaedia". Reverting vandalism is the price we have to pay if we want Wikipedia to retain that title. Izehar 20:20, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree that we must deal with some bad things in order to keep our favorite encyclopedia free and open, but I really don't think vandalism is one of them, except on a small level. There is no reason why we should have to constantly revert this page, and if we can impliment a better solution, we won't have to. Would you mind considering the options posed in the threads above? P.S. This page is still too long, and no one is axing it! (I would, but I'm not too sure how to go about doing this). Thanks and good luck, Mysekurity 21:02, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

no, the level of vandalism is quite manageable. I just feel bad for the database :\ the edit history becomes almost unreadable. Maybe we should have pruning bots that silently remove edits that were immediately reverted from the edit history. Regarding vandalism, sneaky changes to little-watched articles are a much more serious problem. No vandalism to this article goes unnoticed, but I've found months-old vandalism in less prominent articles before. dab (ᛏ) 15:49, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Listen, guys, I respect your website and all, but I still reserve my right to sate unequivicably that your president is a complete douche-bag. cheers

How about creating checkpoints along the website? In order to edit the site, you must receive a complete system scan of any/all hdds attached to your computer (searching for liberal propaganda and the like), and carry a cookie at all times identifying all your personal information. That way if some terrorist / liberal troll decides to edit our Glorious Commander's wiki we can send in the Freedom Enforcers to go Falluja on their arses.

famous personalites??? lol

What a laugh. Mandela and chavez! any other bush haters you want to quote? How bout Castro? North Korean dictator Kim? Or perhaps the famous bin laden. That would be a nice conclusion to this excellent fair and balanced wikipedia article.--Capsela 22:31, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Kinda reminds me of the Oscar Wilde quotes on Unencyclopedia. -Mysekurity 00:01, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

This is why quote sections are usually POV. This article is too long already, I support removing the quotes. They're out of context and obviously cherrypicked from among Bush's most notable critics. Rhobite 06:39, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Or else we should try to find some quotes that show international opinion of a favorable view of Bush...and that aint going to be easy. I'm sure the opinions of folks like Chavez or Mandela are likely to be biased. But with an approval rate of almost zero internationally, it is doubtful any leader outside the U.S. is going to upset his/her constituants with any prose about Bush. But everyone already knew that so I'm just chiming in.--MONGO 08:08, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

it's easy to cherrypick quotes of international leaders who think Bush is a moron, because there's whole orchards to choose from. You are free to try the opposite, but you won't be cherrypicking so much as hunting for the proverbial needle in the haystack. Maybe known Mafiosi like Berlusconi or Aznar, yeah that'll make GWB look better. Maybe the Uzbek chief of intelligence, too. And I think even Berlusconi is not as chummy with Bush as he used to be (of course, now that it looks like Bush is sinking, Berlusconi has no reason to stick around with him) dab (ᛏ) 15:43, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

on second thoughts, Chavez isn't exactly a beacon of integrity himself, so that Chavez dissing Bush needn't be a negative experience for Bush, at least not as much as being dissed by Nelson Mandela himself ;) dab (ᛏ) 15:58, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Tony Blair maybe? He has supported Bush's foreign policy although he has still been critical of other conservative aspects of Bush's administration. Rhobite 16:39, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Considering Tony Blair's opposition party is suggesting he resign, and his popularity is just as low as Bush's it's probably not a good idea to use him to make Bush look good. See below link: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/11/09/world/main1028144.shtml

I rm'ed (propably being reverted as I write...). It's impossible to have a section of that sort which is NPOV. Marskell 17:00, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. Good riddance. Trying to keep a selected selection of quotes NPOV is impossible. Besides, we already have a link to Wikiquote for that sort of things. Shanes 04:34, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Hint: use [[q:George W. Bush|Wikiquote]] instead of an external link. This produces Wikiquote. -Mysekurity 04:46, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks! Didn't know or had forgot that syntax. Shanes 04:51, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Template

I made a template for this article to bring attention to the fact that this article is vandalized 100 times per day. This article is pretty much complete. I think it should be permently protected, but that is just me.

I added the template to warn portetial vandals about the policy, but made it flexible enough to be used in other heavilly vandalized articles. --Karrmann

This page should be protected.

I'm sorry, but this page needs to be protected considering that this page was vandalized 100 times today, it despritely needs protection.

--Karrmann

Yeah, but there are probably 100 admins looking at every edit done to this page, and that's without counting the Counter Vandalism Unit. I'm starting to think that there should be some sort of semi-protection status, but not full protection. Titoxd^(?!?) 00:43, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

We could go on about this forever. If you protect this page, then you have to protect all of them. We can't do anything about Bush's popularity (or lack thereof), and feeling is high in this country (and in the international community) against Bush. You have to take into consideration things like this will happen with a person like Bush, and just deal with it. Asking if we should protect this one page (which has exploded into many) is like asking if we should throw out the Constitution now that we've got the Patriot Act. It's about Wikipedia, the FREE encyclopedia. That's it. 142.151.143.157 04:10, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

By the way, that 2004 IPSOS poll in the section "other countries" should be updated to reflect current antipathy towards Mr. Bush. There was one done this year as well. http://www.ipsos-na.com/news/ap/?CFID=3323812&CFTOKEN=36009387 142.151.143.157 04:16, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Do we have proof of Bush being anti-Catholic?

Edit here [1] states that bush spoke at Bob Jones University and attempts to connect with the later statement in the edit that doing so somehow means he is anti-Catholic...does anyone have anymore substantive proof of this other than this editors opinion?--MONGO 20:43, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

I don't think so - even if it is though, there cannot be many sources about the subject. Izehar 20:46, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

• The passage in question reads "In 2000, after having received the Republican nomination for President of the United States, Bush visited and lectured at Bob Jones University. This caused considerable controversy, as the university in question has had a long record of anti-Catholic indoctrination. Bush attempted to play down his visit, claiming that he did not endorse the university's views, even going so far as to write a letter of apology to the Archbishop of Boston, however many maintain that Bush's visit indicates that he is more closely alligned with the anti-Catholic fundamentalist Christianity sects in the United States." The first sentence is fine because indeed, he did give a speech there...but how much controversy did it cause? Does the Bob Jones University have a history of anti-Catholic "indoctrination"? Furthermore, it states that he "attempted" to down play his visit...and who are the "many" that maintain that Bush is therefore anti-Catholic? It seems to me that Bush has a strong support from Catholics in the U.S. due to stance of opposition to abortion rights. The passage is unsourced, POV and is unencyclopedic.--MONGO 08:36, 26 November 2005 (UTC)
  • I've been reverting even stronger POV from 66.32.126.54 (talk · contribs). Although I simply don't think that portion of the article is accurate or POV. I might take it out if no one comes with sources. Titoxd^(?!?) 08:40, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

I would be inclined to think that BUsh may very well be anti-Catholic in his relious views, but that doesn't mean I think that he has a problem with Catholics as people...regardless, it would be nice if a source for this type of thing could be found...I've looked and turned up nothing except opinion [2] and then this one which states that Bush isn't against Catholics [3] and here brother Jeb defends Georgie after he went to Bob Jones (as if that isn't a biased source!)[4] and then Bush defends himself here [5]...so indeed there were some questions to be answered about his visit to Bob Jones University, but I see nothing except the same innuendo he was defending himself from 5 years ago trying to be passed off as encyclopedic.--MONGO 08:54, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Even if there is evidence he is anti catholic, there is little reason to mention that here as that in itself is controversial and easily disputed. To mention it sounds quite POV to me as well. Cowman^Talk 19:59, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

I think if it were true, everyone would know about it already (liberal media would have jumped on the bandwagon). I'll take it out now. Titoxd^(?!?) 21:27, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

I have evidence that Bob Jones University also forbids interracial dating. How POV was it in the first place for Bush to offer a speech there? I believe it may be worth mentioning. Gilliamjf 00:49, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Not really. It is an introductory-level article on Bush, not Bush-bashing. If there is mainstream media criticism of the speech, and it can be sourced, then it goes back in. Otherwise, it's out, not just according to WP:NPOV, but to WP:V. Titoxd^(?!?) 06:13, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

There was criticism of Bush for this incident, but it was based on the university's racism, not its anti-Catholicism. I believe one critic pointed out that, if Jeb Bush and his Hispanic wife had met each other as students at Bob Jones University, they wouldn't have been allowed to date. JamesMLane 23:31, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Semi-Protection

I realize that the relevant conversation has now been archived to archive 34, but I honestly wish not to see this proposal die down. The vandalism at this article is too great to just sit back and watch it, and I feel that semi-protection would be the best option. I am unsure of what needs to be done in order to establish semi-protection, but I wish to make it available as soon as is humanly possible. But the more important question is in regards to peoples' feelings about protecting/semi-protecting said article. What do you, as an editor, feel? Thoughts, please. -Mysekurity 03:11, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

I say bring it back, that was an active ongoing discussion. --kizzle 04:19, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

JanesMLane already dragged it out of the archives once I think...maybe we need to take it over to the Village Pump and never shut up about it till something is done.--MONGO 04:34, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with all three of you. Titoxd^(?!?) 05:03, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

(After edit conflict) That was me who brought it out (I was editing the page, then Voice of All archived it, I got an edit conflict warning, and moved it back. I agree about the Village Pump thing, as I've heard (never actually been there), that things can be easily forgotten/passed over, and so I really hope this isn't one of them. If we know what language this should be programmed in, I can send a note to everyone in Category:Wikipedian programmers/try to contact the devs, but I don't know how well this cold-calling will work. I really think this needs to be implimented and "never shut up about it"; otherwise, we'll all get screwed. Oh, I think I'm going to file a Bugzilla reqest. Thanks, Mysekurity 05:07, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Yes, "never shut up" seems the strategy--cold-call away, I say. There's a thread open on Jimbo's talk. Perhaps he'll rouse himself to comment if a dozen people show up and note agree. Marskell 05:12, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Bugzilla requests are probably not the best idea, since there are dozens of feature requests that are currently on the back burner. I suggest asking someone farther up for her opinion until there is some substantial discussion about this. Titoxd^(?!?) 05:12, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Agreed with both above. I was just filling out the Bug report, when I saw this, and I had been feeling similar thoughts as yourself. As for cold calling, whom should I "call"? What language will this be written in? And what to do about rousing the editors to leave a note on Jimbo's page and demand semi-protection? Where should I/we go to get more people interested, and have Jimbo himself declare a national state of emergency? -Mysekurity 05:40, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

• As a side note, it seems that aside from my complaint above, much of the talk on this page is about the vandalism...that in itself shows that we are all so busy with our own duties and dealing with the constant reverts of vandalism here that we don't even have time to really edit this article and make it better! I also just want to add that until we get a bunch of folks who are willing to keep at tis ad nauseum, we don't stand much of a chance of Jimbo allowing it to happen. I myself am somewhat torn as to whether I want to change anything at all and continue along a path as we have had of constantly dealing with vandalism (the wiki way) or of some form of semi-protection, subpaging or another idea. I am a strong advocate of an open wiki, but obviously something needs to be done here. Maybe an installment at the Village Pump and an Rfc on the issue? We did a bugzilla approach to semi-protection and it got shot down...kizzle is the man to ask about that.--MONGO 08:44, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Two suggestions: Copy and paste the discussion ongoing on Jimbo's page to each of the high level wikipedia people (wasn't there just an election of some sort? try those people who just got elected)... second, maybe create a Wikipedia:Combating_extreme_vandalism project page and invite as many users as you can. --kizzle 20:17, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

You guys are going about this wrong way. Wikipedia is not so hierachical as you appear to think and you won't get an edict from Jimbo or anyone just by talking. If you really feel the "simple-minded vandalism" problem is so bad, please go ahead with an idea along the lines of the kludge solution I mentioned on Jimbo's talk page. This is something you can do now without twiddling your thumbs waiting for a developer who may never materialise. I guarantee you at the very least this solution will get the attention of more people. Wikipedians fear change, so the solution may get crushed, but it will be better than just sitting with nothing but a bugzilla page.

I know I am not on the arbcom so you may not see me a "senior" Wikipedian, however I have been contributing for three years and have seen time and again how policies actually change. Indeed I have been responsible for several of them myself ;). Pcb21 Pete 11:18, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

This page should be fully protected like the Main Page, not semi-protected. The vandalism to this one article is extraordinary. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 11:20, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Pcb, didn't mean to reference the "high-up" wikipedians as being somehow superior to you, as I've only been editing for about a year now. Its just more likely they have clout with developers, which is truly where this will get fixed. I agree the kludge solution should be put into effect, but its a temporary band-aid to a problem that needs to be addressed within the software itself. --kizzle 21:38, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Added: Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy. Comments/additions welcome. -Mysekurity 05:40, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Latin American viewpoint

{In Latinoamerica is common the expression "Bush go home!" in the hundreds of manifestations that happened when he went there.} It's TRUE, even thought you don't want to believe it. Thousands have died because of Bush's administration, we don't say "thank you, Mr. Bush". It will be like saying "thank you Führer Hitler for the Holocaust". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.89.187.201 (talk • contribs) 22:06, 26 November 2005

{I have an idea. Stop bringing bloody politics into these discussions and keep it OBJECTIVE. Bush isn't recieved well by all, point. No American president is loved by the world, because the "primary" power is disliked.

Comparing the Holocaust to the Iraq War is LAUGHABLE. George Washington lost more soldiers in Valley Forge (not even combat) then we have in Iraq and Afghanistan. Compare this "war" to any other war in US History, and this is a minor engagement. Compare it to the Holocaust and you will see the same thing.

Of course there will be individuals in nations who dislike Bush. Thats part of a hate of US; we'e the main military power, as stated. People dislike that, to be honest. Though www.theotheriraq.com is worth mentioning...} --Zorak 08:35, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

A Vampire?

C'mon guys, give it up. I wonder how many people saw that This man is an evil man and some say he is a vampire and burst into uncontrollable waves of laughter like I did? Are you liberals really that desperate that you have to stoop so low as to do that? Funny, funny, funny. Roygene 22:34, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Sadly, some are. Please don't forget, however, that a similar situation has been going on at Kanye West, which we've dealt with here. Wikipedia is nice because its good editors are able to cross partisan lines for the purposes of building a better encyclopedia. -Mysekurity 01:47, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

publication

would you like to publish this article? -- Zondor 22:48, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Publishing policy states that we cannot edit the page unless we want it to get published again. Since he's still in office, this doesn't make too much sense. Maybe after he dies in 25-50 years. Redwolf24 (talk) Attention Washingtonians! 01:54, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

i am not sure i follow you. the article can always always always be editable forever. publishing involves making a copy of one particular version in time, frozen, subject to approval, to announce to the world "this is a reliable piece of information and i recommend this to you but not our editable development version that we are working at the moment". yes, they can get out of date quickly, so you are suppose to republish as you should. -- Zondor 05:16, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

I must agree that very few liberal debates are in relevance of true fact, but rather making fun of Bush's looks and speach.

It would seem that liberals would rather follow the media and push Bush out of the office than constructively criticizing his errors.

Perhaps an "I do not agree with Bush here. He should have done __________. Here is proof..." would be more productive

A rude statement very much shows a person lack of knowledge.

Semiprotect poll

I boldly put a poll on Jimbo's talk page :-).Voice of All^T|@|ESP 05:52, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Check out Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy, and please offer any feedback and insight you have. Thanks, Mysekurity 05:41, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

NPOV-section: Death Penalty

I tagged the Death Penalty section with a NPOV tag as I find the word choices to be overemphasizing and misleading. The section as it is now:

• George W. Bush is a fierce supporter of the death penalty. As Governor of Texas, George W. Bush was responsibe (through the signing of death warrants and the refusal of clemency) for the deaths of 152 people. As President of the United States he has continued in his fervent and active support for capital punishment, including presiding over the first federal execution in decades, that of Timothy McVeigh. For this reason, he is viewed as a particularly evil person by many opponents of capital punishment.

"fierce supporter", "fervent and active support", "he is viewed as a particularily evil person" are all POV, unreferenced and unencyclopedic.--MONGO 11:48, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Take a look at it now. --BadSeed 11:52, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

I see that, thank you.--MONGO 11:53, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Protection

Can we protect this page against re-direction by the Dublin redirect vandal?? --Sunfazer 15:55, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

No. There's no point protecting this page sicne it will then remain permanently protected. It's protected against outright moves, however. -Splash^talk 15:58, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

First of all, when you unprotected it, you didn't re-protect it against moves, at least I don't think. Second of all, there's no point in unprotecting it, and yes, until we have semiprotection, I am now suggesting it stay protected permanently. We don't have time to clean up after the lower elements of internet society. We can either revert vandalism every four minutes, thus damaging Wikipedia's reputation, or we can prevent vandalism altogether, thus damaging Wikipedia's reputation, but less so. --Golbez 20:34, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Golbez on this issue. This page should be protected for the time being. It seems kind of silly to just let people keep vandalizing it and reverting them. I believe protection is the best solution for right now.--Alhutch 21:25, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Do you think people will ever stop vandalising??? Maoririder 21:25, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Sadly, no. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 18:14, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

simply look at the page history and see what percentage of the recent edits are substantive and meaningful. the great majority of edits to this page are vandalism and subsequent reverts.--Alhutch 21:29, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

you know why look at what the man has done no arguement... Maoririder 21:30, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

The problem I have with this situation is that this is an article that needs to be updated frequently. Since Bush is the current President of the United States, many of his daily actions may be notable enough to merit inclusion in the article. In particular, Bush's ongoing statements and actions on the Iraq War should be included as they take place. Protection may make the article severely outdated, which in its own way may be as damaging as vandalism. Firebug 21:30, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

We have hundreds of administrators. If an update needs to be made, it can be submitted here. The page history speaks for itself, there's no reason I and the other good editors on this site should have to waste our time cleaning up after people when we could be expanding and improving the pedia. Perhaps permanently protecting this article will accelerate the development of a semi-protection mode. --Golbez 21:32, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

That's the rub. Admins have no content control role, yet you propose we engage in one by having people submit their edits to our approval. Yuk. I'm going to unprotect this again, and protect against moves only. -Splash^talk 21:39, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Splash, if you continue to constantly expose a heavily vandalized article to further vandalism, I'll be forced to open an RfC on you. Please stop this insanity. --Golbez 03:42, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Sigh. Please calm down and read Protected pages considered harmful and WP:AGF. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)}

{{attention}} {{update}} {{pov}} {{npov}}

If you feel that way, why not come to Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy and tell us what you think? This will greatly reduce vandalism, while still allowing good users to edit.

The death penalty shall only be taken into effect in two conditions:

- There is damage being done from inside the prison cell - The person has confessed and attempted to earn redemtion of there sins.

Vprotected, but temporarily of course

There's some guy with a lot of IP's available having his fun with penises at this page, and with Jimbo's number. Thus, it's vprotected, though this should be undone quite soon. Just get this guy to wander off (plus this is such a visible page its not one where I particularly want Jimbo's homephone number). Redwolf24 (talk) Attention Washingtonians! 02:36, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

This is what the protection option is for. Immediate problems that cannot be solved by other means. -Splash^talk 02:41, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

But how many times must we do this in order to keep it from being vandalized? I completely see your point in allowing new users to edit this article, but I think the number of vandalisms this article faces by newcomers is far too great. How many times do we have to protect this page? I want non-admins to be able to edit this too, which is the point of having semi-protection. I'm sorry we're having this disagreement, but I think that we should try to keep Wikipedia as clean as possible and retain our already valued editors. This is not to say that we should not actively recruit new users, we just need a little more of a buffer on pages like George W. Bush. We have 800,000 articles: If a new user can't edit a dozen of them, do you honestly think they're going to be turned off forever? People outside the project don't care that much if you can't edit a few pages, but they care when they see an image of Hitler when they're looking for information on George W. Bush. -Mysekurity 21:34, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Newbies cannot edit the Main Page anyways, and that doesn't stop them from joining Wikipedia. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 18:35, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Bush's Training in the Texas Air National Guard

Earlier, the article stated that, in 1968 at the height of the Vietnam War, Bush entered the Texas Air National Guard and spent 2 years learning to fly. However, someone has removed the latter part. I think that this is relevant to the article, and complements the timeline. I am considering readding it, and don't regard it as being POV. Any objections? Gilliamjf 03:04, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

No objection. Might be helpful if someone can find out the average pilot-training period in the late 60s. The Land 17:07, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Gilliamjf; I changed it. Originally it read as if he didn't do his other duties; only flying around goofing off. The current "He trained in the guard for two years, learning to fly during this time" that we wrestled over is more direct and to the point. If this were of an accelerated time then adding that would be more prudent rather then dancing around the fact. Although, I suspect that two years is ample time to learn at least "how" to fly; becoming an expert might take longer. --Supercoop 17:26, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Two years for a Reserve pilot sounds reasonable, considering this would involve basic flight school, intermediate training, and training on the F-106, which would be several hundred hours. In the Second World War, it took about 280 hours training for an RAF pilot to pass basic flight training, and it was about 1500 hours in total. Bush was compentent enough to fly Delta Darts, which was a high-speed interceptor. Personally, I've always said "You can lie to your friends, you can lie to your boss, you can lie to your loved ones, and you can even lie to God, but you can't lie to an airplane. It will kill you."--GABaker 1630 30 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Tired

There really should be comments on this page about how Bush has used a false understanding of terrorism to endorse a national aggression. Terrorism is not a nation, rather it functions like an organization. To fight it with massive military action will only cause more distruction. How much more obvious does Bush need to be that he is filling us with lies and using terrorism as a ploy?

Thank you for your opinion. If you can provide specific sourced examples of Bush using terrorism as a ploy, or using a false understanding of terrorism, we would be happy to include it in the article. However, I find it unlikely that you will be able to find actual proof of these things. I do wish you luck in your endeavors though. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 18:23, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

what do you mean, unlikely? How about pretty much anything he said over the past four years? It's not like they are trying to hide what they are doing, they just shrug off criticism as long as they can get away with it. The problem is not that there is no proof, the problem is that his electorate is beyond giving a damn, so it doesn't matter if there are proofs. dab (ᛏ) 19:14, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Once again, I ask for specific sourced examples of said activity. How do you prove that what he is doing is using terrorism as a ploy? How do you know that that's not what he and his administration really thinks? I am trying to be NPOV here. If there are specific sourced examples of him deliberately using a false understanding as a ploy, please provide them. But since, I am going to assume, you cannot read Bush's, or his administraion's, mind, you cannot prove it. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 19:21, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

agree with LV, it is unlikely that you can find sourced examples. NPOV!!!!!--Alhutch 21:17, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Evidence for using a false understanding of terrorism:

Bush own words: Speech, novemeber 30 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/11/20051130-2.html

Bush:

"As we fight the enemy in Iraq, every man and woman who volunteers to defend our nation deserves an unwavering commitment to the mission -- and a clear strategy for victory. A clear strategy begins with a clear understanding of the enemy we face. The enemy in Iraq is a combination of rejectionists, Saddamists and terrorists. The rejectionists are by far the largest group. These are ordinary Iraqis, mostly Sunni Arabs, who miss the privileged status they had under the regime of Saddam Hussein -- and they reject an Iraq in which they are no longer the dominant group.

Not all Sunnis fall into the rejectionist camp. Of those that do, most are not actively fighting us -- but some give aid and comfort to the enemy. Many Sunnis boycotted the January elections -- yet as democracy takes hold in Iraq, they are recognizing that opting out of the democratic process has hurt their interests. And today, those who advocate violent opposition are being increasingly isolated by Sunnis who choose peaceful participation in the democratic process. Sunnis voted in the recent constitutional referendum in large numbers -- and Sunni coalitions have formed to compete in next month's elections -- or, this month's elections. We believe that, over time, most rejectionists will be persuaded to support a democratic Iraq led by a federal government that is a strong enough government to protect minority rights.

The second group that makes up the enemy in Iraq is smaller, but more determined. It contains former regime loyalists who held positions of power under Saddam Hussein -- people who still harbor dreams of returning to power. These hard-core Saddamists are trying to foment anti-democratic sentiment amongst the larger Sunni community. They lack popular support and therefore cannot stop Iraq's democratic progress. And over time, they can be marginalized and defeated by the Iraqi people and the security forces of a free Iraq.

The third group is the smallest, but the most lethal: the terrorists affiliated with or inspired by al Qaeda . Many are foreigners who are coming to fight freedom's progress in Iraq. This group includes terrorists from Saudi Arabia, and Syria, and Iran, and Egypt, and Sudan, and Yemen, and Libya, and other countries. Our commanders believe they're responsible for most of the suicide bombings, and the beheadings, and the other atrocities we see on our television.

. . .

"In the short run, we're going to bring justice to our enemies. In the long run, the best way to ensure the security of our own citizens is to spread the hope of freedom across the broader Middle East. We've seen freedom conquer evil and secure the peace before. In World War II, free nations came together to fight the ideology of fascism, and freedom prevailed -- and today Germany and Japan are democracies and they are allies in securing the peace. In the Cold War, freedom defeated the ideology of communism and led to a democratic movement that freed the nations of Eastern and Central Europe from Soviet domination -- and today these nations are allies in the war on terror."

Fascism definition: "A philosophy or system of government that is marked by stringent social and economic control, a strong, centralized government usually headed by a dictator, and often a policy of belligerent nationalism." (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&oi=defmore&defl=en&q=define:Fascism)

Communism definition: "is a system of government in which the state plans and controls the economy and a single, often authoritarian party holds power, claiming to make progress toward a higher social order in which all goods are equally shared by the people." (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&oi=defmore&defl=en&q=define:Communism)

Terrorism definiton: "defined by the U.S. Department of Defense as "the unlawful use of -- or threatened use of -- force or violence against individuals or property to coerce or intimidate governments or societies, often to achieve political, religious, or ideological objectives."

"A suicide bombing is a bomb attack on people or property, committed by a person who knows the explosion will cause his or her own death (see suicide, suicide weapons). Suicide bombing is a kind of tactic planned and organized by extremely committed military or paramilitary groups. This tactic became widely known during Second World War in the Pacific as U.S. ships were attacked by Japanese kamikaze pilots who caused the maximum damage by flying their aircraft into _targets. ..." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_bomber

Are terrorism, communism, and fascism applicable to be compared?

Except he's not just comparing the three. If you read the quote, he clearly states that, "We've seen freedom conquer evil and secure the peace before..." He isn't comparing them, he is simply showing that he thinks freedom can conquer evil. Any evil. It doesn't matter what evil it is. And he isn't even comparing Fascism and Communism in general. He is comparing the Nazis in Germany and their agressiveness to the agressivness and evil of terrorists. He is not saying the three are the same, rather they can all be defeated through freedom. Whether or not this is true is not your point. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 15:50, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

That is the problem. He always attempts to relate such things as fascism, communism, 9/11, terrorism, WMD, Hitler, terrorists as somehow against freedom, etc. etc. to Iraq - in such a way that the lay person will be motivated thinking that Iraq is bad like those things are bad. He words it in such a way that when reviewed there is only slight logical complaint alowed, but the way it is set up creates a sense of hatred for the listener. That is, using such things to get negative PR towards Iraq despite the fact that they are unrelated!!! If they are so unrelated, why add them in? Because he full well knows that Americans despise anti-freedom, terrorism, WMD, hitler, fascism, communism, 9/11 etc. etc. He knows how it will effect them when they hear it, so just put it in context to Iraq and the average lay person will start to build the same sentiments towards Iraq. And thus, as I said in the begining, a missuse of the terms for negative PR towards Iraq. e.g he used the name Osame in the speech speech previously quoted. -Jason

state definition: a politically organized body of people under a single government;" (wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn)

War definiton: "the waging of armed conflict against an enemy; "thousands of people were killed in the war" a legal state created by a declaration of war and ended by official declaration during which the international rules of war apply; "war was declared in November but actual fighting did not begin until the following spring" an active struggle between competing entities; "a price war"; "a war of wits"; "diplomatic warfare" a concerted campaign to end something that is injurious; "the war on poverty"; "the war against crime" make or wage war " (wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn)

Again, are terrorism, communism, and fascism applicable to be compared?

See note above. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 15:50, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

IN 2001, right after 9/11 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010911-16.html "America was _targeted for attack because we're the brightest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world. And no one will keep that light from shining. . . later And for those who try to pit religion against religion, our great nation will stand up and reject that kind of thought. We won't allow that to creep into the consciousness of the world. We're going to lead the world to fight for freedom, and we'll have Muslim and Jew and Christian side-by-side with us. " (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010919-8.html)

(http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010920-8.html) "Americans are asking, why do they hate us? They hate what we see right here in this chamber -- a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other."

Again "A suicide bombing is a bomb attack on people or property, committed by a person who knows the explosion will cause his or her own death (see suicide, suicide weapons). Suicide bombing is a kind of tactic planned and organized by extremely committed military or paramilitary groups. This tactic became widely known during Second World War in the Pacific as U.S. ships were attacked by Japanese kamikaze pilots who caused the maximum damage by flying their aircraft into _targets. ..." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_bomber

What is the definition for the following? Terrorist Actual Terrorism Freedom 'Dying for a cause' 9/11 Public relation Negative public relation propaganda

-Jason

Eternal questions, my friend. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 15:50, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

etc. etc..... put all together, maybe one can figure it out. More quotes where these all come from. It is necessary to read Bush's words away from you own point of view, and really read them. Put them together logically. As a historian one ought to treat this work no different than any other historical research related to another government time or place. The same critical thinking, by the nature of its study, is needed. Go back to the archives and read his speeches with an open mind - from 2001, and in fact earlier, all the way to 2005 . . . much can be gained from this.

Best regards -Jason

• And just so you know before you accuse me of bias, I am not really a fan of Bush. But I am a fan of being open-minded, and your reading of these quotes are limited by your hatred for Bush and intolerance of war. So... what's your point? BTW, please sign your posts. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 15:50, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
• My dear anon, I'm replacing my statement because I assume that you accidentally removed it. Please be more careful, after all, I'm doing my best to ensure that you are heard, even as you rant. Rest assured, however, that if you push the issue I will cease to do so. Now, I see that this topic means a great deal to you, which I understand. We are all passionate about the things we care about. Unfortunately, we simply cannot accept this information. Even if it can be made perfectly NPOV (which is unlikely), it still is original research, and is therefore inappropriate in this article. – ClockworkSoul 15:50, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I do not feel that it is original research. There is an article about the use of PR related to Bush, I will add it here. Also, I am using quotes directly from Bush and a common sense understanding towards the misuse of definitions he uses. Furthermore, I know a lot of people who say the same thing, so if it is somehow original research than the MANY people have already caught onto it before someone has published it. I am sure, however that something like this has been published. And I will find it. Now, I have a final for my history 349 class so I will write more later. There may be a slight bias, but not to reflect some bias would show me as a very cold and unethical person. Just read the actual words of Bush and think about it. - Jason

Some quick sources for his use PR:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/politics/04strategy.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/29/AR2005062902792_pf.html Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq (Paperback) by Sheldon Rampton, John Stauber http://www.wsu.edu/~moonlee/pr475msgs/art.449.html www.infowarscom/articles/ps/propaganda_bush_admin_efforts_come_under_fire.htm http://www.truthout.org/docs_05/012905Z.shtml

There are so many more.

This is just what I found in five minutes. There is one source I am attempting to find that I read several months ago that was perfect, but I am having trouble finding it again. I think I sent it via email, but it will take some time to find again. - Jason

ps google the term Bush and PR or Public Relation and an ample supply of info and sources will pop up, related directly or indirectly. I have my last final paper for the semester to work on, so I cannot research this furhter at this moment. But I will supply more sources soon. Best regards - Jason

Did something get messed up?

My edit, 16:43, 30 November 2005 Lord Voldemort m (revert vandalism) definitely did not show up as I had made it. Perhaps a few things got messed up too (look at the history). Any idea what happened? --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:45, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

It's there now. Maybe it's a problem with your browser?--Sean|Black 21:51, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

I meant that the vandalism I reverted now shows that I put it there... see? I am confused. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:54, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Hmm, that's odd. Maybe you have dissociative identity disorder? :).--Sean|Black 22:04, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I'm some guy in Ohio. I was researching Bush and deleted the offending phrase concerning conservative inbreeding--I got rid of that, that wasn't vandalism. Sorry for the confusion; I'll find a more official way to edit next time. 12:08AM Dec 1

Ethan, don't worry, you just beat him to the revert, and he reverted to an old version. We'll fix that. You're not in trouble. That said, you should really create an account! Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 05:11, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

In short, LV, your revert came at just the wrong moment, (but said vandalism had been there long before you made that edit). BD2412 T 05:13, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Edit conflicts sometimes screw up things. I did one a while back on this page, got an edit conflict message, then saw in the page history that I was credited for reverting TO the vandalized form. Pollinator 05:24, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I just wanted to go on record saying that it was a WP, not operator error. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 14:50, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Semi-protection

Please look at Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy and vote. It would directly affect this article directly. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 06:16, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I have a question... How many times is this going to get linked here? --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 14:47, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

More than once. -Splash^talk 15:10, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

As many as it takes to get you guys to come discuss the proposal so we don't have to spend so much time complaining about vandalism on this page. --kizzle 02:20, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Iron fist

Splash says that protection is only to be used temporary to save from a wave of vandalism.

If I look at the history, last 50 edits, and see that every. single. edit. of the last 50 has been within a 24 hour period, and has either been a vandalism or a revert, I will protect. It is quite simple. If y'all want it unprotected, slip in a valid edit here and there. But if no valid edit can have been made in the last 50, then clearly there's nothing valid to add, and no reason to further risk our reputation by allowing editing.

This is a wave of vandalism, and the protection is as temporary as the vandalism is. --Golbez 15:24, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

And how do we acquire good edits when the page is protected as at present? I wanted to copyedit the first section (I could, I'm an admin, but I won't edit a protected page). Protecting it and then demanding good edits is an impossible situation. -Splash^talk 15:32, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Because I'm sure someone will unprotect it. Maybe you. But what I meant was, is it too much to want a single valid edit every 25 edits within a single day? If we can't get that then there's apparently no valid edits to make. Perhaps you could unprotect it and make your edit - that would certainly reset my timer!

But I decided to expand it to 100 edits, and look!

02:30, December 1, 2005 128.192.206.55 (→Education, military service, and early personal life - changed "after his family moved" to "as his ..." -- makes more sense) 

A valid edit! Made within the last 24 hours! Hallelujah! So I'll expand it to 100. But please tell me why you think this article should be unprotected before the devs give us new toys? To get valid edits? Of which there are about 1 in 100, and yes, we CAN vet them, we were chosen by the community to be administrators, and we aren't being content masters, we are being the heads of a moderated mailing list, moderated solely to keep out spam. Make your edit. It's our article now. Thank the vandals. --Golbez 15:52, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Deal. -Splash^talk 17:42, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Protected again *sigh*. I know most of the world (myself included) thinks the guy is a gobshite but the scale of vandalism here is flaming ridiculous. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 20:52, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

That's why we need to do something. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 20:53, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Again with the linking. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:03, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

It occurs to me that this would also be made easier by foregoing the traditional four warnings. · Katefan0^(scribble)/my ridiculous poll 21:04, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

What's "gobshite"...most of the international world thinks a lot less about him than the average American...besides...if you people want semi-protection, then the best way to have it is to leave the darn article unprotected....build your case!--MONGO 21:05, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

That's what we're doing, we tag them with {{bv}} and then block if they continue. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 21:07, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I think you missed my point....I want the supporting evidence for the need for semi-protection to be in the form of the edits displayed in the activity to this article. If we leave it protected then whomever will decide this matter will just say that, well, just keep protecting it whenever the vandalism is out of hand. It's been out of hand for a long time and I would prefer if we continue with rollback and warnings as much as possible.--MONGO 21:15, 1 December 2005 (UTC)]

I think (correct me Titoxd if I'm putting words in your mouth) that he was probably meaning that comment more for me than for you, Mongo. · Katefan0^(scribble)/my ridiculous poll 21:17, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

(edit conflict with Katefan): Yes, it was intended for Katefan, not for you, Mongo. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 21:18, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm beginning to think that semi-prot is a policy for one article. That won't fly. -Splash^talk 21:16, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

How about guideline and policy pages, or pages like Wikipedia:Introduction to name a few?--MONGO 21:20, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I surely hope not. They are fluid by design. Why on earth would we want to protect pages that receive next to no vandalism. The idea fundamentally misunderstands the point of both protection and semiprotection. -Splash^talk 21:32, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Since when are guideline pages and policy pages "fluid by design", especially when vandalism may be concerned. I have no fundamental misunderstanding of the protection policy...as far as I am concerned, I never use it. But the semi-protection feature is an excellent idea and is a far cry better than having a one in five chance that the passing reader will open the Bush article and see a picture of whatever or text filled with obsenities.--MONGO 02:15, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

That was nowhere close to 24 hours and I and others made good edits. Easy on your protection button. It's harmful. -Splash^talk 21:16, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

That deal was with me. I don't care anymore, you probably won't find me around this page much anymore. One less vandal watcher, congrats. However, Jtdirl did it, and I did revert because it was a bit of a disrespect to him to undo his probably reasonable protection so soon. (See a theme?) --Golbez 21:21, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I undid, because we're trying to collect some data here. No offense intended, Jtdirl, but we need to have it open to see how much problems it causes being that way. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 21:24, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Not really. He can read this talk page as well as anyone else can. -Splash^talk 21:25, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

OY!!! --LifeStar 21:26, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

I'll see your OY!!! and raise you a Good Lord Jesus Please Take This Sin Away From Me!!!. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 21:41, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Amen! --LifeStar 21:46, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Its only the persons point of view to edit because they think he is a bad man by calling him satan and stuff but wikipedia adminstartors what can you do with this iron fist? Maoririder 21:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Protected again?

Why is this page protected AGAIN?? Some of us would actualyl like to make some changes here.

Because other users haven't been able to play nice. and keep this page from vandalism for even the shortest period of time. If you check the page history, you can see the ratio of productive to unproductive edits—it's not good. Until then, you may post sugguestions to this talk page, or wait until the vandalism passes before adding the information. Sorry for the inconvenience, Mysekurity 06:27, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Please sign your posts on talk pages by using four tildes (~~~~)

I'll unprotect. If you reprotect, at least use {{protected}}. The alternative to protecting is rolling back and blocking vandals, of course. Just slap vandals to this article with 24h blocks without warning, they know what they are doing. dab (ᛏ) 11:12, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Self-sustaining problem?

I've tried to make a number of actual edits to this page (especially the Immigration section -- which specifically asks for more information) only to have them be seemingly reverted without even being read. The reason Vandalism is such a problem is because everyone wants it to be, IMO.

Ahem. Do the math and then tell us that we don't have a real problem. Alex Schenck (that's Linuxbeak to you) 14:55, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

That's a poor excuse for blindly reverting good edits, if that was done. -Splash^talk 16:05, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, it wasn't me. I read what the editor put in before reverting. However, it's possible that this did in fact happen. Alex Schenck (that's Linuxbeak to you) 16:18, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

No, I figured it wasn't. I commented just because we had another anon complain of the same treatment yesterday on John Seigentheld Sr. (however it's spelt), and it's very poor form of whoever did do the revert. -Splash^talk 16:22, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, I finally got my stuff on immigration to stick. Guess you really need to use the Edit Summary?

Wanted to add new section

Since yesterday was AIDS Awareness Day, I thought it would be good to add a section to foreign policy regarding his HIV/AIDS program. Here it is. If someone wants to add it, great!

====HIV/AIDS====

In the State of the Union message in January, 2003, Bush outlined a five-year strategy for global emergency AIDS relief. Bush requested $15 billion for this effort and Congress supported the president's proposal. The emergency relief effort is led by U.S. Ambassador Randall L. Tobias, the Global AIDS Coordinator at the Department of State. $9 billion is allocated for new programs in AIDS relief for 15 countries most affected by HIV/AIDS. Another $5 billion will go to continuing support of AIDS relief in 100 countries where the U.S. already has bilateral programs established. And $1 billion will go to support The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. This budget represents more money contributed to fight AIDS globally than all other donor countries combined.[6]RonCram 14:56, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

That's good. I'll add that in. Alex Schenck (that's Linuxbeak to you) 14:59, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Alex, this is part of Bush's foreign policy, not domestic policy. Ambassador Tobias works for the Department of State and all of the money is spent overseas.RonCram 15:04, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Oops, my bad. Fixing now. Alex Schenck (that's Linuxbeak to you) 15:10, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

No problem. Thanks for adding it! RonCram 15:11, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Sure thing. It's too bad that we have to watch over this article so closely, but when you see how much this page is vandalized... Alex Schenck (that's Linuxbeak to you) 15:13, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Vandalism hindered?

Ever since the warning and the no section edit variable were added to the article, vandalism to the article has dramatically decreased. Your thoughts? Alex Schenck (that's Linuxbeak to you) 17:32, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

You've given it about two hours, since ~10:27am. In the 2 hours and 15 minutes since, I count ten vandalisms (and ten reversions), a few refinements to your warning, and one legitimate edit. Going only based on history, it has spent eight minutes in a vandalized state. So, it has been in a vandalized state 6% of the time, with a vandal edit made approximately every 13.5 minutes.

Extrapolated, this "dramatic decrease" means that this article will on average be vandalized 86.4 minutes a day - nearly an hour and a half - and collect over a hundred vandalisms (plus up to a hundred reversions).

Over the space of a year, this means it will only be vandalized for 31536 minutes, or 21 days - a mere three weeks time. And it means administrators and kind layusers will have spent their time reverting nearly forty thousand vandalisms.

If we call this an improvement, there are far, far deeper problems. --Golbez 17:48, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

There have only been 5 vandalisms since I added the __NOEDITSECTION__ variable, 2 hours ago. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 17:55

It appears to have helped, even if it isn't a dramatic decrease, any decrease in vandalism is a good thing. A single __NOEDITSECTION__ is much better than when we used to have individual warnings posted in each section of the article. This guarantees that all of our editors will clearly receive the message that this article is not the sandbox. Hall Monitor 18:42, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

We have no evidence saying that NOEDITSECTION reduces vandalism. Even if we did, protecting it outright would reduce vandalism too. For the most part, it just makes a huge inconvenience for those seeking to edit the article. Redwolf24 (talk) Attention Washingtonians! 02:25, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

• Yes, we do have evidence. See the section lower down, titled "Seems to work". In any case, how can we get evidence if we don't even try it? — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-5 02:27

re: NOEDITSECTION

While this may help prevent vandalism to a section of the article, it makes it much more likely that the ENTIRE article will be blanked or vandalized. Anyone doing statisical calcuations should take that in to consideration as well. xaosflux ^T/_C 02:31, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I did all of that. Can you please reply down further in this page where I mentioned all of this?? — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-5 02:33

Salem bin Laden

I would like people's comments on whether his partnership with Salem bin Laden in Arbusto Energy should be mentioned in the article. I think if it's true, there's no reason to leave it out.--Alhutch 17:59, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

• I don't see why not. It has it's significance in its own little way. Only people who want to whitewash GWB would want to omit that. Izehar 18:05, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
  • We're not here to sneak in subtle suggestions of conspiracy theories. As for your second sentence, you know what happens when you assume... — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 18:06
• It should obviously be left out, if we're not going to mention any of the other investors. Read the company article at Arbusto Energy. Bush established the company, and had several investors, one of which was representing this half-brother and cousin of Osama bin Laden, so it is obviously a cheap shot to sneak in "bin Laden". — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 18:06
• Indeed, this is already covered sufficiently in Bush family conspiracy theory. BD2412 T 18:09, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

The two choices are: You either list all the investors listed in the company's article, or you don't list any of the investors. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 18:09

Thank you Brian for expanding that portion of the article. I strongly agree that we should disclose all the investors in the interest of completeness, but disagreed that making mention of Salem bin Laden in this section was even remotely "sneaky", although it did need some rephrasing for accuracy. Hall Monitor 18:29, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Excuse me, but including all the investors in Bush's company to balance out the Bin Laden presence so to speak, is a prime example of propaganda. If John Doe who invested in Bush's company was involved in the most horrific national tragedy in the history of the U.S. the past 50 years, he would deserve a mention, like a member of the Bin Laden family does, but alas John Doe did not and a member of the Bin Ladens did, and that is the factual truth plain and simple. Demonstrating the close knit ties between members of the Laden family and the Bushes, and in particular G.W. in view of the death count, horror, and trauma a whole nation had to go through is not something that should be dismisively labelled conspiracy theory and thrown aside on a separate article. If I had so much as crossed the street across a bin laden and had been a muslim i d probably be spending some rewarding torture time off at Gountanamo for some good long time, i cant see how this guy is above even mentioning the fact that he used to be bussiness partner with the family of the alleged perpetrator of a crime of monumental proportions. It's shocking, but it's even more shocking to see the whitewashing that goes on here. Oh the irony of it all...

This is supposed to be an effort to write an encyclopedia, not post every bloggish innuendo that comes along. The bin Laden family is huge and they were big contractors in Saudi Arabia and had their hands in lots of cookie jars all over the mid east and the U.S. Therefore, the brother of my enemy is my enemy? Since when?--MONGO 13:42, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Bush's foreign policy

It seems odd to me that the description of his foreign policy begins with European criticism of his position on the Kyoto protocol. It would seem a better beginning might be a short description of the goals of his foreign policy. I was able to find this mission statement on the Department of State website. "Create a more secure, democratic, and prosperous world for the benefit of the American people and the international community." I think this statement should find its way early in the foreign policy section. RonCram 19:09, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Also, I have written a new section under foreign policy dealing with development assistance.

====USAID====

The U.S. State Department and Agency for International Development (USAID) published a strategic plan for the years 2004-2009. The principal aims are established in President Bush’s National Security Strategy: diplomacy, development and defense. President Bush initiated a new direction for development assistance with a goal of increasing development assistance by 50 percent for countries that take responsibility for their own development “by ruling justly, investing wisely in their people, and encouraging economic freedom.” Development assistance must also be aligned with U.S. foreign policy which means the USAID strives to support those “countries that are committed to democratic governance, open economies, and wise investment in their people’s education, health, and potential.” [7] RonCram 19:14, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

The best judge of a country's foreign policy is other countries. Kevin baas 15:39, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Abusive edit summaries

User:Gallian, under a number of identities, has been using the Bush article to post edit summaries accusing named individuals of among other things child sex abuse. He now has created an identity and resumed the quest. In the past because of his behaviour using IPs he was instantly banned when he did so, and requests had to be made to have the offending comment deleted from the records of the page (a torturous process). Given his history of this behaviour and the defamatory nature of some of the claims, I have imposed an indefinite ban on him. He no doubt will return using IPs or a new identity and try to continue. If he does, I'd advise you ban IPs the moment he does it. If he uses an account, post an indefinite ban and put in the sockpuppet proven command linking back to the Gallian account. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:04, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Back already I see *sigh*. The asshole. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:04, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Very Important: don't scream but I have had to protect the page. The numbskull above is attacking it. The attacks will have to be deleted from the records of WP. If we allow him continue the attacks then some poor sod of an admin is going to have to spend ages wiping all the records and rebuilding them. I'm temporarily protecting it to stop that. I know its hassle but but the idiot above has previously posted allegations of child abuse against Jimbo so we can't allow him post more defamatory stuff in edit summaries. As soon as he goes it can be unprotected and some poor sob can start wiping the records AGAIN *sigh*! FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:17, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• I've unblocked the article. The offending summaries have been removed. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 02:46

Well done. I didn't want to leave it unblocked and leave someone with the hassle of clearing up pages of them. I guessed if I blocked it he would go away and that would minimise your work. I think the moment this asshole comes back (as he will) we should immediately impose a block. Blocking him personally doesn't stop him because he uses so many accounts and IPs. But a short block is all we need to get rid of him. Again, well done. With Jimbo, the arbcom, various users' reversions and my instant indefinite blocks on his accounts we seem to have got rid of him for the moment. Until next time *sigh* FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:57, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

NOEDITSECTION Seems to work

George W. Bush vandalism estimate over past 3 days: 83, 45, and 24 (dropped dramatically since adding __NOEDITSECTION__ and the big notice). Meanwhile, our 2nd most vandalized article hasn't been touched in a day, since it had these same changes made. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-4 05:59

What's the second most vandalised one?--Sean|Black 06:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

• I thought the second most vandalized article was John Kerry, but that doesn't have a __NOEDITSECTION__ header. Is there a page somewhere which lists the most vandalized pages? A good deal of the less-than-mature edits appear to originate from school IP addresses, so today being a Saturday might also explain the lull in activity. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 06:13, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
• Since vandals can read this, let's not go into that :) — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-4 06:22

That's fascinating, and insightful. One point to bear in mind: today was Saturday, which presumably influences edit-rate. -Splash^talk 06:05, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

• Well, I had planned to analyze a week's worth and compare to the previous weeks. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-4 06:24

Can we move this to WP:AN instead? :-) --HappyCamper 02:26, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

More specifically, before the notice was added, the time between vandalisms was about 2-5 minutes. After that, it was about 5-10 minutes. After the NOEDITSECTION was added, it was 20-40 minutes. There is no real problem with removing the section edit buttons, since no really big changes need to be made to the article. And in any case, anyone can still edit the article, so I don't see the problem. Consider it partial protection. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-5 02:35

I'm personally against this. Alot of browsers (Firefox) can't search inside the edit box, and forcing someone to scroll through the whole article to make a grammatical change seems like torture to me. We shouldn't sacrifice usability to stop vandals. -Greg Asche (talk) 21:19, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• in this case, we should. if its really an important contribution, then one should go to the trouble of looking through the whole edit box to make a contribution. If this works against vandals, it needs to be kept, at least for the time being.--Alhutch 21:27, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• The most popular, most hated browser, Internet Explorer can search in edit boxes. Someone should bug Firefox to fix this bug. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-6 21:36

The great thing about Firefox (Freudian typo: I just typed "Firefix") is that such shortcomings can often be addressed. That tiny extension keeps the normal "find" behavior, but will pop up the old-skool find dialog box when you have a textarea selected. Also see this extension which allows you to resize textareas on-the-fly. —HorsePunchKid→龜 2005-12-07 20:42:16Z

We have two choices: permanent protection or a no edit section. The scale of vandalism is such that we cannot leave it as an ordinary article. Sometimes this article has been vandalised by the minute. Other times it has been used to post defamation. The no edit section seems to have cut back on vandalism substantially. I'd much prefer the hassle of editing the article as a block rather than never being able to edit it. Yes it is a pain in the backside, but by making it more difficult it acts as a discouragement to vandals. They can't as before pick a paragraph to vandalise. If they are a vandal they probably aren't au fait with digging through the entire article to find the bit they want to vandalise. If it stops 3 in 5, then it is worth it. Things could not continue as it was, with crazy amounts of vandalism by the minute. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 21:29, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• exactly.--Alhutch 21:33, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• Just use IE, then you can search in edit boxes :) — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-6 21:34
• Or install this extension that allows Firefox to search within the textarea. See here.

Public (and academic) perception of George Bush's place in history

"The History News Network at George Mason University has just polled historians informally on the Bush record. Four hundred and fifteen, about a third of those contacted, answered -- maybe they were all crazed liberals -- making the project as unofficial as it was interesting. These were the results: 338 said they believed Bush was failing, while 77 said he was succeeding. Fifty said they thought he was the worst president ever."

from: 1

I think this would be a useful addition in the article, to cover the early formation of the historic place of the Bush presidency, but I'm not going to add it without checking it here first. Trilemma 20:19, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Sounds iffy. -User:Fennec (はさばくのきつね) 02:29, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

(copy from higher section) While this may help prevent vandalism to a section of the article, it makes it much more likely that the ENTIRE article will be blanked or vandalized. Anyone doing statisical calcuations should take that in to consideration as well. xaosflux T/C 02:31, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Executions

The statement:

It is worth noting that, during his time as Texas Governor, more juvenile offenders were executed than in any other jurisdiction in the world (http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=27&did=203); this clearly only applies to official, openly state sanctioned executions, and not to extra-judicial executions which may happen elsewhere.

Is this in fact the case, and is it easily verifiable using the link provided? The website referenced merely talks about reported executions: are there nations where the death penalty is still in place and for which there is no information on the number of juvenile executions? If so the statement is unverifiable. -- Francs2000 16:33, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, there are countries with the death penalty that do not have verifiable records of numbers, ages, sexes, etc. (Think certain Middle Eastern countries.) --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 17:11, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

I have removed the statement from the article then. I did this twice last night because the anon who added it was not providing me with enough evidence that the statement was fact, but was reverted both times. That's why I brought it up here. -- Francs2000 17:25, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Speaking of executions, I'd like to see some more information on that as a whole. For instance, Karla Faye Tucker and his mockery of her death. - AWF

Could we just protect this thing?

I'm sick and tired a million times over of this crap happening over and over again. Pictures of penises tiling across the page should not happen on this page or any page. There needs to be a new criteria for banning vandals. This is just disgusting, and I've had enough. Protect this page permanently--heck, only allow admins to edit it. I really don't care. I've had enough.

On an unrelated thought... is there any way that we could prevent anons or users with less than, say, 100 edits from linking to pictures (that weren't already linked to)? It seems like that's the real problem. Nobody's offended (really) by the word "penis" getting randomly inserted into sentences, but a picture of a penis in an inappropriate place--now, that's offensive. It would seem like that might solve the problems. Just throwing that out. Matt Yeager 00:12, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

See WP:AN/I#Permanent protection of George W. Bush (spoiler: the answer is no), and also see Wikipedia:Semi-protection. -Splash^talk 00:30, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Can we protect it without ruining the layout, though? JHMM13 (T | C) 07:22, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Somebody protected it, so I threw a vprotect on it. They should get bored eventually. By the way guys, we get it: you don't like Bush. Let us run our encyclopedia already. – ClockworkSoul 07:23, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

It was only move-protected, so I took off the {{vprotect}}. It's confusing, we never know when it is fully protected instead of move-protected... Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 07:27, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• Temporarily unprotected to allow vandalism? Maltesedog 14:33, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
• This should remain unprotected. Enough people watch it for vandalism that it is reverted quickly. Protecting it will simply mean that vandals will go to less viewed pages and vandalize there. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-6 16:14
• Thus we find the inherent flaw of open-source editing. We would hope that people who participate in this process would have the maturity and dignity to contribute meaningful and helpful data. Unfortunately, there are more children then adults in this world... I don't know what really can be done. My fear is that one day the admins and CVU people will get so tired of all this vandalism on any page on wiki that we just give up and run away. If that ever happens, these articles are gonna degrade really quick. --LifeStar 16:44, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• Someday, hopefully soon, we will get the ability to prevent anonymous editors editing selected pages. While this would be a major issue of Wiki-purity, for this page an Adolph Hitler it would be a significant advance. In the meantime, so many admins have this page on their watch page that I wouldn't worry about them getting fed up. For a lot of admins it's just part of the morning ritual - log on, check talk page, revert George W, Bush. DJ Clayworth 16:50, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• LOL! It's funny, but so so true. One of the things I do as a CVU member is to check the United States, George W. Bush, Cheese, and the French Revolution. There are whole lot more, but you guys get the picture...the very disturbing picture. Why would anyone want to vandalize an article on Cheese of all things?!?! --LifeStar 16:53, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Why wouldn't anyone want to vandalize an article on Cheese? Matt Yeager 23:51, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Because hopefully that person has more of a life than to go around mucking with an article on Cheese. I can partially understand people's persitence on vandalizing articles that are related to anything about the USA, like Bush, Democracy, United States, etc... but there are just some really bored teenagers out there if their only source of fun is to mess up an article about cheese. Go outside, play in the snow or something, talk with PEOPLE!!! --LifeStar 06:17, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Anyone who wants to restrict any editing to admins needs to think about whether they are interested in the wikipedia concept or not. CalJW 18:06, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Alas, the Wikipedia concept is NOT "internet democracy"--it is to build an encyclopedia. [[8]]. Matt Yeager 23:51, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Grammatical correction reverted

Hello. I fixed a sentence to read "Bush is a member of a prominent political family" instead of "Bush is a member of the prominent political family". The latter does not make sense as it reads as if there is only one prominent political family. However, my edit was reverted and I am wondering why. I look forward to feedback. Thanks. Trojanpony 13:30, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Older user please make edit

I'm a newbie so the edit I described above was automatically reverted. Understandable, considering the sensitivity of the article subject. But I still believe it is a valid edit and I would like to ask a more experienced user to make it for me. Thank you. Trojanpony 14:04, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Done, I dunno why it was reverted. I put a note on the reverter's talk page. -Greg Asche (talk) 21:09, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

picture description: German chancellor

As Mr. Schroeder is no longer German chancellor, you may perhaps add "former" within picture description. Thanks --Taxman 160.62.4.10 14:01, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Done -- Francs2000 14:06, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

While discussing titles...

Is it notable that every figure pictured has their title listed in the caption, with the exception of Al Gore and Mahmoud Abbas? Trojanpony 14:17, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I believe Abbas was prime minister of the Palestinian Authority when that photo was taken, and I have added that title to the caption.--Alhutch 17:11, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

grammatical change to be made after unprotection

I believe that "supplementing" should be changed to "supplanting" the following sentence:

76% of Iranian adults believe that the U.S. occupation of Iraq is supplementing in Iran emerging as a free democracy.

— goethean ॐ 18:45, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Nevermind...my mistake. — goethean ॐ 18:47, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Either way, the sentence still doesn't make any grammatical sense. What is it trying to say, anyway? Rogue 9 19:01, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

{{vprotect}} To much on him need to cleanup better.Maoririder 19:40, 6 December 2005 (UTC) vprotect what are you going to do keep editing it??Maoririder 21:01, 6 December 2005 (UTC) ask Jim WALES

Copyvio

This article is a copyright violation. --Danielle Whitman 11:37, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

What material vilates whos copyrights? Thanks. The Land 11:38, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

How is it a copyright violation? You have mentioned http://www.q103.co.uk and http://www.foxfm.co.uk. I see no copyright violation - could you be more specific, please. Izehar (talk) 11:40, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

At Fox FM, BRMB and Invicta FM, we have pages that are not accessible to the public but are still on our websites - and the George W.Bush page is one of them. It may appear on Fox, BRMB, Invicta, Power and Southern FM's websites Apologies for copyvio tagging, but we are protecting our reputation here. --Danielle Whitman 12:26, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

And, we're supposed to accept your word that this article violates the copyright of an internal document which, presumably, you're not willing to produce? And "reputation" has nothing to do with copyright law; "does not defame" is not a fair use exception, so either this is a copyright violation or not; if it's not, no matter how much it might damage your reputation, it's still not a copyright violation. Either provide some proof or keep your silence. --Nlu (talk) 12:32, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

This person also did the same "copvio" crap on other articles to promote her site. I've blocked. Why she thought we would believe such idiocy, who knows... — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-7 12:48

I think this is a bit harsh. Danielle has a fair amount of explaining to do, but her behaviour is improving (eg by coming to this talk page). If there are further incidents then we can always block here later. I'd urge Brian (or another admin) to reconsider the block for the time being. The Land 13:00, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

DNFTT. -Splash^talk 13:01, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

She can explain all she wants on her talk page. Unless you plan on watching her contributions for the rest of eternity, there's really no reason to give in to such obvious vandalism. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-7 13:03

Danielle, assuming you to be acting in good faith, I suggest that you check the possibility that your site administrator copied our article onto the nonpublic portions of your website, so that Fox staffers could use it as a reference. I personally wrote several of the passages in the current text; I'll be happy to say so under oath if need be. JamesMLane 16:43, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

__NOEDITSECTION__ ???

Eh, what's the point of having __NOEDITSECTION__ turned on for this article? android79 16:49, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

It believe it is aimed at stopping vandalism. --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 18:07, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

It is also a pain for non-vandals. It makes good edits take longer to do and dramatically increases the chance of edit conflicts. CalJW 18:08, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

See #NOEDITSECTION Seems to work. -Splash^talk 18:09, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Ah, okay. Weird that this cuts down on vandalism. Easy workaround: if you want to do some section editing, remove the flag before you start working, then add it back. android79 18:17, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Presumably this is so that everyone editing the article sees the warning tag comment at the top. I wish we could make it so that only anonymous users had to edit this way and registered users could edit by section. Firebug 23:08, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Tony removed the notice. Why was NOEDITSECTION added back in? What's the point of restricting section editing if there's no notice for everyone to see? android79 13:28, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Tony shouldn't have removed the notice. It can go back in, if you like.-Splash^talk 13:33, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I didn't want to get into a revert war with Tony. Add in both or leave them both out. Having NOEDITSECTION turned on for no reason is silly. android79 13:37, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

needs to be shortened

The article is way to big, it needs to be separated. See Wikipedia:How to break up a page Mike92591 22:07, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps, but blanking sections of the article isn't the way to go about it.--Sean|Black 22:11, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

It's not as though information was lossed. I linked it to another article.Mike92591 22:56, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Semi-protection proposal v.02

A revised proposal for an {{sprotect}} function has been made. This is especially relevant to the George W. Bush article, please see Wikipedia_talk:Semi-protection_policy#Semi-protection_proposal_v.02 for details. Best regards, Hall Monitor 22:16, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Is someone keeping count of how many times this gets listed here? --LV ^{(Dark Mark)} 22:54, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

$count=\lim _{x\to \infty }x$. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 23:20, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Page move

Why was George W. Bush moved to George W. Bush/Development? Firebug 23:37, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I think this was an accident? Ashibaka ON WHEELS!!!! 23:38, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

nope it was done by User:MarkSweep who wrote "experimental vandalism protection; bear with me". He should have discussed it before doing it...*scans topics above*... Broken S 23:45, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

This definitely should have been discussed beforehand!--Alhutch 23:46, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I hope he is not doing what I did...as we already know(and I have learned) that forks are evil.Voice of All^T|@|ESP 23:48, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

It broke the archive and peer review links. Broken S 23:49, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm almost positive that having the main article lack an edit history is in violation if the GFDL.--Sean|Black 23:51, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm all for being bold, but this was taking it too far.--Alhutch 00:02, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

anti-Vandal fork removed

I tried this exact same idea before(with much less errors though)...the community has a consensus against it. Look at the recent archives of this talk page and you find it. With this being added, pages being moved, and vandalsim mixed in...I protected the article for now so we can sort this out. Someone unprotect in a few minutes(if I don't).Voice of All^T|@|ESP 00:00, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Now the page is protected, uneditable, with no editable version, and it doesn't even have a notice telling people that! Yay for Wikipedia!! :) :) :) >_< Matt Yeager 00:02, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Now that I have your attention, I am unprotecting it...please read my above comments.Voice of All^T|@|ESP 00:03, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

It did have a notice, with a pointer to the editable version. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 00:06, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Please read the "tag" related portions of this talk page..Voice of All^T|@|ESP 00:08, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Page protection

Why was the page protected again without first discussing the issues on the talk page? Firebug 09:07, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

New template

I added this new template {{ Template:GeorgeWBush which produces: {{GeorgeWBush}}

Please do not remove it, it is a vandalism template warning. --Everton Toffees Fan 11:55, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, it's a dire one. Reverted. The Land 11:58, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Just in case anyone's confused, that user was blocked for persistent vandalism, and the template redlinked above was an act of vandalism. The Land 14:13, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

It seems more like trolling to me. Izehar (talk) 14:14, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Ignore this linkspammer. It happens all the time on Wikipedia! --Sunfazer 12:13, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Being bewildered

I don't know whether this anonymous contribution merits reversion; it was reverted after all. Izehar (talk) 14:09, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

http://www.godulike.co.uk/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1073&view=previous&sid=271196ad18d427696ec75c329ad78aab Susvolans ⇔ 14:12, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Those are probably all well-covered in Bushism, which is linked from this article. This article certainly doesn't need a long list of malapropisms. android79 14:30, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

My idea

I think that the quotes should be removed. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not The Enquirer. Personal Opinion doesnt belong on pages. If one is to be put, the opposite must be too.

Maybe you can give both sides a small section. Then protect the page.

Unbiased news and readings are always the best in forming a open opinion.

He is very unpopular and from what i hear vandalised alot. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Synthetic coma (talk • contribs) .

Weasel words

There seem to be a lot of weasel words in this article. I've removed two examples I found, but, skimming over, there are some more. Should I include the {{weasel}} template, or is that inadvisable on such a high-traffic article?

The notice came back so I deleted it again

I removed the notice. Don't tell people not to stick beans up their nose. There was also some nonsense about blocking vandals immediately. I hope I don't catch anyone blocking first-time vandals without warning. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 12:36, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I understand your rationale for removing this notice, but I think that it is a bad idea. Apparently, the notice actually did reduce vandalism, which is very important, especially on an article this prominent. How do you think it affects the reputation of Wikipedia if someone loads the George W. Bush article and is deluged with photos of penises? And we both know this has happened incessantly. As for the blocking policy, anonymous users fooling around (blanking articles, adding a string of nonsense, etc.) should be given a warning or two, but blatant vandals should be blocked immediately, and for 48 hours. If blocking policy requires that everyone be given all four warnings before being cut off, then blocking policy is flawed and should be changed. Crotalus horridus 15:23, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Note that blocking is a remedy not a punishment. 24 hours is usually plenty, if not too much. -Splash^talk 15:51, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Blocking the first time is never the right thing to do. What you've got is someone who finds the wiki, sees that it is completely editable and says "shit, they'll let me do this?" And he gives it a go. It's easy enough after this happens to leave the usual "test1" template, saying that his edit has been reverted and would he please use the sandbox. Historically we have found this softly-softly approach to be tremendously successful in (a) letting the user know that someone is watching and there will be consequences, (b) letting them know we're friendly and really dedicated, and (3) making them feel welcome, and perhaps making them want to join the project or at least not mess it up. Blocking a first-time vandal will do none of these things, he won't buy in to the project, he'll feel like it's a fun game and you end up with repeat vandalism. That's why we warn, rather than block, first time vandals. It's all about not telling people not to stick beans up their nose.

I completely agree with Splash that a twenty-four-hour block is an ample maximum block period for most purposes. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 16:34, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not saying we should have absolute zero tolerance. If a new user blanks the article or inserts a phrase like "can I really do this?" then gently point him toward the sandbox. {{test1}} works fine here. But if User:Pelican shit on wheels! comes in and immediately replaces the article with a page full of penises, then an immediate block is called for. These things should be judgment calls. And a stern warning may have some deterrent effect. Crotalus horridus 16:46, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

purple stuff hard on eyes!!!!Maoririder 16:42, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Editing open to administrators-only

RE: [9] Given the amount of time this article is both vandalised and protected, I wanted to draw attention to a discussion taking place at Talk:Alan Dershowitz right now. Hall Monitor 20:50, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Protection

Can't the page be protected until the libel vandal gets bored and walks away? Izehar (talk) 00:39, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

No - he's been permanently barred - a better solution. We keep our freedom - he loses his.--File Éireann 00:42, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

suggest we protect.--Alhutch 00:51, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree, protection is vital! No reader must see the vandalised versions. We'd look silly. Izehar (talk) 00:53, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Lets protect for one hour--File Éireann 00:57, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

is there an administrator in the house to do so? the vandalism continues.--Alhutch 01:00, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Eh, my other comment should really be here. But yes, I agree. He seems to do this every two days or so. I'd say that for now on, once we notice it the first time, we get someone to protect. Deckiller 01:02, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I second that. It's just disgusting, but part of the history really needs to be deleted. KnowledgeOfSelf | talk 01:05, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Yeah. I'm not surprised that Willy lied about leaving Wikipedia. Hmm...it could also be an imposter or friend...Deckiller 01:08, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

We lost some paragraphs during the reverts - they'll have to be reinserted. Izehar (talk) 01:06, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Amen! I'd be fnie with this page being protected for 24 hours.

xaosflux ^T/_C 01:07, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Done. Someone is now going to have to delete the edits from the archives again. *sigh*. Can I remind people when blocking him to block him with an indefinite ban and nothing shorter. That was the decision given his using of edit summaries to post defamation. Also post the {{defban}} template on his page. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:09, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

What about the WoW template? Should that one remain in use? Deckiller 01:10, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes. The {{defban}} is a template that warns a vandal that the posting of defamation may leave them open to being sued by the person they defame. It covers us image-wise in the event of defamation case. While we aren't liable legally in the event of defamation, media criticism could be deflected by pointing out that we explicitly warned users that posting defamation was a breach of the law and that the person they defamed could sue them over any such posting. That is the point of that template, which was created in response to earlier defamatory vandalism by WoW. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:35, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

RESTORE

Would an Admin please restore this page or at least state why it was deleted? xaosflux ^T/_C 01:34, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

The message on the page was deleted temporarily to remove personal info from edit history; back very soon. --W.marsh 01:35, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Listed on Wikipedia:Deletion_review xaosflux ^T/_C 01:38, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

The Jimbo's-personal-information vandal has struck this page; I'm guessing it takes a while for the server to process a request to delete a few edits out of over 20,000. Either that, or the hamster's dead. There's no need for DRV. android79 01:39, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I possted it on DR before that message was up here (or at about the same time), posted the link on here so it wouldn't hang out in the other once someone got ahold of the situation. xaosflux ^T/_C 02:01, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I've removed it from the Wikipedia:Deletion_review page. It should never have been listed there. Calm down and wait, X. The page has to be cleaned up legally. When that is done it will be back, and not before. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:43, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Actually, it's back already, with the defamation intact. Hrm. android79 01:43, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Admins cannot erase all record of the edit history.. since that is what we need in this case, someone should ask a developer. Even if we deleted specific revisions, they would remain in the list of deleted revisions. Rhobite 01:45, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I listed it on DR after posting this section, while the reply by W.marsh was being made, if I had seen that first I wouldn't have DR'd it; as everyone knows this is one of, if not the most vandalized articles, and if it had been deleted by a rouge admin review would have been very needed, as there was not so much as a mention of why it was down. Hopefully the dev's will have a solution to the summary vandalism, although they will quickly scroll off the list once the article is unprotected and reopened to the usualy kiddie vandals. xaosflux ^T/_C 01:50, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Shit. I guess admins are gonna have to do it again. Maybe X's edit of the blank page confused the system. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:46, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Please don't. As I said, even if you delete the revisions the edit summaries will still be listed. And you will have to hit 25,000 checkboxes manually, one for each revision you need to restore. Trust me, this is a job for developers. Rhobite 01:48, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

OK, since the address is listed in the Wikimedia Articles of Incorporation anyway, is this even a big problem? Rhobite 01:56, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Did you miss the part where it says he rapes children? android79 02:03, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

There is no need for you to be rude to me. I think you guys are overreacting.. people insult Jimbo all the time. But if you're really offended, you can join #wikimedia-tech and explain this to a developer. I explained it to Tim Starling and he said it's no big deal. Rhobite 02:06, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Pretend there's a :-) at the end of that comment, as I had intended. Sorry. :-) android79 02:09, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Rhobite, you may be interested in this. No more hand-checking of checkboxes! —HorsePunchKid→龜 2005-12-10 02:10:36Z

I use Firefox with some kinda cool plugin (I think it's a greasemonkey script) which allows me to use multiple checkboxing in places other than Wikipedia, and plus, it's awesome. -Mysekurity^{(have you seen this?)} 06:10, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I used greasemonkey briefly, but the security scare a while back drove me away. In case you didn't notice my comment there, the Web Developer Extension is what I use (or rather would use, if I had cause), and it's got gobs of other amazingly useful features. —HorsePunchKid→龜 2005-12-10 07:09:12Z

Is it a big deal? Absolutely.

1. Wikipedia has deleted similar edit summaries on this page, so precedent is there.
2. Even though the victim of the libel obviously won't sue, leaving such claims in the records sets a bad precedent and can trigger off net rumours of the sort that would be most unwelcome to the victim (the old 'no smoke without fire' myth');
3. Given the extent of media interest in us right now, if a journalist saw those edits in the edit summaries they could have a field day ridiculing WP in the press, posing the question 'how can any self-proclaimed credible encyclopædia have such edits on open display to be seen potentially by millions of people'? Keeping them is not an option in terms of law and potentially disastrous in terms of public relations. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 02:08, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

It is a big deal, just wondering if anyone knows when those edit summaries will be removed? KnowledgeOfSelf | talk 06:49, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

9/11 Doesn't Have Its Own Section???

Why is that? Seems like one of the most important events of his presidency. Subversive 08:31, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

No, it doesn't have its own section, but it is mentioned (and linked) repeatedly in the article. —HorsePunchKid→龜 2005-12-10 08:37:26Z

Lebanon

The fact about Lebanon in the last paragraph of this article is all wrong. First, there's no sources or references for this "facts". Second, I'm a regular follower of Lebanese news and these demonstrations were never Pro-Bush, the name was never raised during these events. I'll wait for someone to add sources soon before removing it. CG 09:26, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Constituion a "piece of paper"

I'd like to see a mention of the fact that Bush has referred to the United States Constitution as "just a god damned piece of paper". 1 Pacian 17:09, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Unnamed source, in an OP-ED, hardly notable or reliable. Arkon 00:10, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

[personal attack removed]--68.54.161.91 03:44, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Pressure has been put on the Republicans and Bush for "cutting holes" in the Constitution for the Patriot Act and other infringement of civil liberties. Our forefathers meant to make the Constitution a secular document, which was revolutionary at that time. Every public document preceding, including the Declaration of Independence, mentioned God. If Bush did say that, it was probably part of his agenda. Gilliamjf 17:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Protected banner

If the article is protected, it needs a banner to explain to readers why. TacoDeposit 19:10, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

it looks like Woohookitty removed the banner but not the protection.--Alhutch 19:13, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

I think it's protected from moves, but you should still be able to edit. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 23:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

"noeditsection" directive

This article is some 95kb in size; requiring editors to load the whole thing into their browser just to do the odd edit is extremely unproductive, so I've removed the "noeditsection" directive. This was in my opinion an abuse of that directive as it can only hamper good faith attempts to improve the article. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 23:20, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

As discussed a little bit above, several users commented that it actually was working to calm the vandalism, so I've placed it back. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 23:22, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Please do not remove the NOEDITSECTION from the George W. Bush article until a developer enables semi-protection. For whatever strange reason, it has helped to reduce the amount of vandalism this article receives. Hall Monitor 00:01, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

As in the past when the nutcase posting libellous edit summaries on the article page appeared, it has been necessary to impose an immediate full protection. The user has been blocked, but going by other experience he is likely to revisit. Wikipedians are reminded that under an arbcom ruling the user is to be permanently banned for such actions. Every time he reappears please post the {{defban}} on his page. When he goes away the page can be unprotected. Someone will then be required, again, to delete the libellious edit histories from the records of Wikipedia. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 01:25, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

When in doubt, don't delete

File:Dubya deleted.PNG

We don't want visitors to see this.

Ok, folks, if you are going to delete the article to take out the defamatory diffs, please make sure you at least undelete the top revision. Ideally, you don't need to even delete the article, all you have to do is take note of the diff numbers of the offending revisions, and then, go to IRC and ask a dev to take them out of the database, if they agree. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 01:46, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Agreed.--Sean|Black 01:55, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Willy's last outburst

Pretty fast and impressive....I'd say seven accounts in 2-3 minutes. I sockpuppeted all of them, but I don't have ban rights, so I stopped defbanning. It's becoming an art just to stop him. Deckiller 03:01, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I blocked them all. Great work guys. But I'd strongly suggest protecting the page again. In the past that has proved the only way to stop this. Otherwise the turd just keep at it for hours and then some poor sod had a lot of work in having to wipe the database of the attacks. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 03:03, 14 December 2005 (UTC) PS: I'm going to bed now, so someone else can go on Willie block duty!FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 03:03, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

• The page is protected now again. That said, since the address being posted there is in the Public Record, there is no need to delete the diffs. That's what the devs told me. Titoxd^{(?!? - did you read this?)} 03:06, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

• Is there any evidence that this is Willy on Wheels, besides the fact that someone has labelled this person as him? If you go back to when this person first started, he called himself Gallian, and Willy has said he's on wikibreak. You also have not shown that the user isn't proceeding to vandalize pages watched less than this article. It is worse to protect this page, because then we don't know where he is. --BRIAN0918 03:08, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
  • No offense, but you actually trust Willy to tell the truth? --King of All the Franks 03:09, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
    • Pretty much. There's also the fact that this person doesn't move articles like Willy did (thus the "on wheels"). --BRIAN0918 03:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
      • I think what started it was when he starting using similar rapidfire patterns and similar names, like Gallian on Wheels and all. Plus, he recently posted a WoW message mocking us. He could just be an imposter for all we know. Deckiller 03:12, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
      • Maybe he's taking over Dread Pirate Roberts-style? – ClockworkSoul 05:14, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Please restore bulk of historical edits...

Please restore all but approximately 64 (the offensive summaries & their reversions) of this Article's original edits - people need to know the evolution of this article. --TML1988 03:42, 14 December 2005 (UTC)