Talk:Evan Dobelle

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Dear Dobelle Booster,

Wikipedia is warts and all. Feel free to provide relevant links supporting your claims. I have done so with mine. If these are truly "scurrilous lies," Dobelle should sue the Hawaii Reporter. Even public figures can do so if the errors are uncorrected and promulgated with malice and "a reckless disregard for the truth," as U.S. libel law clearly allows.

Are you saying the Dobelle evaluation The Reporter cites is false? That would be pretty serious stuff and Dobelle should demand that it be taken down.

Chicagogood, stop responding with emotion. You're obviously a friend of Dobelle's. If you don't like the paragraph, then put a tag on this article questioning its neutrality or alerting readers to a reversion war. It's not hard to do. Oops, I've already done that but you keep taking that down, too.

Better yet, you could add a paragraph that you think would complete the story. But to cite Dobelle's accomplishments at Hawaii without acknowledging he left under a cloud is irresponsible.

As for sources, anyone who cites them does so "selectively," to use your term. You can't cite them all. And voter repudiation of the regents is hardly an affirmation of Dobelle's tenure. That's a classic example of a logical fallacy.

This is the paragraph you keep taking down:

However, in 2004 Dobelle was fired from his post as president of the University of Hawaii system for allegedly abusing his spending authority. The university later rescinded the firing and paid him more than $125,000 a year for two years as part of the settlement that led to his resignation.

Wiffer 21:42, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] My opinion

I have no dog in this fight. I've never heard of Evan Dobelle, or hadn't until I noticed this disagreement while doing recent changes patrol. Here's my opinion, for whatever it's worth.

• If the president of the University of Hawaii was fired, rehired, and paid off, that's a noteworthy part of his career and can reasonably be included here.
• However, the sources that are cited look rather biased, and I'd hate to hang a controversial paragraph on them. If this happened as described, there would surely be some more neutral sources covering it? If there aren't any sources more neutral than these, then I'd hesitate to include the paragraph, for fear that biased sources might be distorting what happened.
• WP:BLP reminds us to have an especially high standard for sources when adding potentially controversial material to the biography of a living person, not just because of the chances for lawsuit, but also because if the information turns out to be inaccurate, it could badly damage a person's career or reputation.
• There are lots of ways to deal with a content dispute- discussion on the talk page, asking for a third opinion, Request for Comment. Constant reversions without any real attempt to seek consensus doesn't really achieve anything, because you can do that forever without coming to an agreement.
• I don't have any special powers, or any authority to tell anyone what to do. I'm just offering a third opinion for whatever it's worth, because the two of you appear to be at an impasse.

To sum up: I think that the paragraph in dispute needs to be sourced from a mainstream print newspaper or magazine source. I think that if it can be, then it should stay, and if it can't be, then it should be deleted. That's my opinion. -FisherQueen (Talk) 01:20, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

Dear Fisher Queen, Thanks for the fair and common sense approach. Of my three sources, one is the University of Hawaii's own statement on rescinding Dobelle's firing, another is the Hawaii Reporter, which quotes Dobelle's publicly released evaluation at length, and the third is a conservative blog which has reprinted a story from the Honolulu Star-Bulletin for which the direct link has expired. I think my citations are credible.

And there are others such as this one and this one that confirm his firing.

I carry no brief against Dobelle either but get ticked off when people take down material they think is unflattering to their friends or idols. They labor under the illusion that Wikipedia is a PR vehicle.

I agree that reversion wars do not reflect well on the parties involved, That's why I tagged the article as such and have tried to engage Chicagogood in a debate on this page, which s/he has so far declined to do.