Talk:Americans for Limited Government

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hi! because i'm studying land use initiatives and related legal battles, i'm interested in 'americans for limited government' and the inititaive its supports. while i agree that to organization is very conserative, i don't think it's fair to call it 'a far right' organization in the first line of the entry. better to objectively describe the debates that have arisen around ALG's activities than to begin with such a loaded phrase.Benzocane 17:24, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 TABOR 2 Expansion, Stop OverSpending Nebraska 3 Revert Decision 4 Claim that ALG was "forced out" of Illinois

[edit] TABOR

This is obviously highly controversial policy and midwestmax is right to note that. But you can't just say contested policy has been a disaster (I recognizie midwestmax is new to this community: see NPOV tutorial). I have removed the more inflammatory rhetoric from the description and added the pro-TABOR view. Let's make this a strong, balanced entry!Benzocane 20:45, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry about that, I am new to wikipedia and you are right that I did not do a good job following the NPOV guidelines. My apologies and I will be more careful when editing articles like this in the future. I do think it's important to mention how controversial TABOR is so thank you for showing me how to do that in a neutral way. Midwestmax 20:56, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

No need to apologize. I'm studying these issues closely for a seminar I'm teaching and finding the NPOV is always tough. But I think this article is on its way... Thanks for doing your part.Benzocane 21:02, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

I think that the whole third paragraph should be removed. It reads like campaign literature, is unnecessary, and violates NPOV. --Maineusa 19:13, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I have to disagree. Supporters of ALG would admit it's been a source of ongoing controversy. The description of that controversy seems seems objective to me. Benzocane 16:25, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Expansion, Stop OverSpending Nebraska

Stop OverSpending is also being considered in Nebraska for 2006, yet this article mentions nothing of it. In this case, ALG is the co-sponsor for SOS Nebraska. Things that this article should include are its affiliation with National Voter Outreach, and criticism. For example, how Nebraska's own Secretary of State was approached by an underage 15 year old circulator, how ALG was able to get away with violating private commercial property owners' Fourteenth Amendment rights by petitioning in front of big-box stores, how ALG threatened to sue radio stations for merely airing anti-SOS ads, ALG and NVO received criticism because of the shady people that it hired to circulate this, like this nice 41 year old petition circulator from Florida that got arrested in Lincoln for punching a 20 year old university student, etc. Oh, and let's not forget ALG's point of view. Tuxide 04:17, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Revert Decision

I reverted the recent changes by Rlorenc. Rlorenc cut about half the article's content, including what seems like important material, without offering any justification or starting any discussion with the editors whose hard work has built the entry. Object to specifics and offer solutions, don't just cut other editor's contributions unilaterally. Legosoldier 17:26, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

I think that if anything controversial needs to be posted, it should, perhaps, be placed in a Controversy section rather than in the section that describes what ALG does or what its intent is. Your feelings? Rlorenc 14:53, 27 October 2006 (CST)

I added a Controversy section as suggested, and grouped some of the general controversies there. Since there are no specific challenges to the neutrality of the article on the Talk page, I'm going to remove the flag on the main page as well. -Pete 04:44, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, everyone, for your guidance in following good Wikipedia form. You were right to take issue with my edits from last year, and I appreciate the work. -Rlorenc 14:36, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Claim that ALG was "forced out" of Illinois

The article says that ALG was "forced out of Illinois", but the link given for that doesn't substantiate the claim. The link says they were "apparently" forced out of IL by the Center for Public Integrity, which is a partisan political organization, and gives no documentation or links to substantiate the claim that some government agency forced them to leave. I know first-hand that this assertion is inaccurate and based on politics; it should be removed. What are everyone's thoughts? In the interests of full disclosure, I used to work for ALG, but no longer do. I currently work for the Sam Adams Alliance. My group shares much of the same staff as ALG did, but shares no decision-making with ALG as it now exists in VA. They are two fully independent organizations. Thanks for your input. -Rlorenc 14:36, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Rlorenc, please take a closer look at the article, you're mistaken. The title is "Organization That Bankrolled ‘Takings’ Initiatives Forced Out of Illinois by Attorney General." The article says that the C.P.I. learned of the event, not that they did the "forcing." The article essentially says that the group chose to leave rather than comply with the state's laws, including financial disclosure. (Do you question the accuracy of that? If so, do you have an alternate source?) To my mind, that's compatible with the phrase "forced" to leave, but I'd be open to rephrasing. -Pete 18:58, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I added the NPOV tag to the article because of this assertion in it, along with what strikes me as excessive loading of weasel words like "controversial".

The question about the CPI report is whether CPI is a reliable source in this regard. They make the claim, but they don't provide evidence for it. At any rate, I wouldn't rely on CPI as a reliable source in this regard without noting that they report they created-- the takings initiative project -- in which they make this claim was produced (according to them) with money that they received from the Wallace Global Fund. The same year the Wallace Global Fund funded CPI to produce the Takings report, the Wallace Global Fund gave direct donations to at two groups (Futurewise and Idaho Smart Growth) that funded political campaigns in two states (Washington and Idaho) opposing ballot initiatives sponsored by Americans for Limited Government.

The CPI article indeed does say that CPI "learned" of the event. Nevertheless, they provide no evidence substantiating that there was such an event. They just make the claim. The idea of the editor above that Rlorenc should have to substantiate that the "forcing" didn't occur in order to justify taking that out of this article has the burden of proof in the wrong place. The claim shouldn't go in the article unless there is positive evidence to support the fact that it happened. CPI can claim all it wants that they "learned" of this event, but they are arguably partisan political opponents and they provide no proof. Including the assertion fails to satisfy Wikipedia's standards.Jkought (talk) 02:29, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Like I said before, I am open to rephrasing. I understand your concern about CPI not being the best source. I found an article from a better source, that seems to take a less biased tone: Oppenheimer, Laura. "Illinois looks at allegations against developer's groups.", The Oregonian, November 4, 2006. 

Maybe that's a good starting point for rewriting in a way that reflects a more NPOV. (I'm sure that if it was covered in Oregon, there was probably some Illinois coverage too, but I haven't been able to find it yet.) -Pete (talk) 16:59, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't find anything in the Oregonian article you link to above that substantiates the claim (also unsubstantiated) made by CPI. The article in the Oregonian mentions late filings, ALG says the late filings were of minor import. If you can't find any articles in the Illinois press about this, that is suggestive that, as ALG said, it was a matter of minor import, easily corrected. The fact that ALG seems, in fact, to continue to exist, albeit with a passle of hardnosed political operatives who dislike it, one would assume that if those oppositional political operatives had been able to make more out of this, they would have. If you want to do original research on whether or not ALG had to pay a fine, or on what the size of the fine was (which would be evidence as the whether or not the matter was of minor import or not) certainly you could do that, publish it elsewhere, if anyone cares, and then link to it on the Wikipedia page. (I can't find my password, so I created a similar username). Jkought2 (talk) 01:43, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

The fact that I found a source in the Oregonian but not the Illinoisian results from two things: (1) The O. was a national leader doing investigation on this particular story, and (2) I live in Oregon, know all kinds of ways to search Oregon media, but don't know a thing about finding older Illinois media articles. Anyway, I'm open to rewriting it using the Oregonian instead of the CLI as the main source. I'm working on too many articles right now, so have at it if you like; if you don't propose anything in a week or so, maybe I'll take a crack at it. -Pete (talk) 06:37, 31 March 2008 (UTC)