Talk:Linda Chavez

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Biography Portal
Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ]
This article is supported by the Arts and Entertainment work group.
WikiProject Mexican-Americans Linda Chavez falls under the scope of WikiProject Mexican-Americans, an effort to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Mexican-Americans on the Wikipedia. This includes but is not limited to Mexican-Americans as well as those not so affiliated, country and region-specific topics, and anything else related to Mexican-Americans. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the quality scale.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the importance scale.


Contents

[edit] Gaffles by Linda Chavez

Why take out the blatant error in her syndicated column? It's an indication of her work. Granted, if there were thousands of such errors, it would be pointless to list them here. However, given that the article is currently a stub, why not keep it for now, until there is more information to place there? --Asbl 19:54, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The Historical Significance of a Human Error

First of all, I would like to apologize for deleting those sentences from the article without discussion. I am very, very new to Wikipedia (in fact, I didn't even have a "name" when I deleted those sentences earlier). I have been doing some reading on Wikipedia policies and now see that it is best to not just delete without first engaging in discussion. I actually am not even sure that this is the forum where I am supposed to be doing the discussion; please correct me if I am mistaken.

Allow me now to explain why I would delete from this article everything between the words ". . . is a syndicated columnist" and the words "Chavez is the president of the think tank . . . ". I believe you may have misunderstood my point about the difference between having just one error vs. thousands of errors. What I am saying is that a single error in a single column about a subject over which there exists--even weeks later--substantial confusion, is simply too insignificant to warrant inclusion in an encyclopedia article. I think it is safe to say that there is likely not a single columnist out there--be they on the left or right--who has not made an error of fact at one time or another. The question to ask is not if the columnist is human. The question to ask is, is there a pattern to this person's behavior? Richard Nixon had a life-long pattern of maintaining shady associations with people who thought that the rules did not apply to him. Bill Clinton had a long pattern of providing factually correct (yet deceptive) answers to difficult questions. Stephen Glass had a pattern of outright fabrication in his articles. And it is these patterns that we note when we find these people on the pages of history books or encyclopedias, not the aberrant errors they may have committed.

Granted, there are exceptions, and the reason for this is clear. When someone commits an act that is out of their normal pattern, it can still qualify for historical or encyclopedic mention. But only if it is something of major significance, with far-reaching consequences. Throughout his political career, Gerald Ford was considered above reproach for his honesty and ethics (which was part of the reason Nixon made Ford his VP during the height of scandal--in a vain attempt to insulate himself with Ford's squeaky clean armor). But when Ford pardoned Nixon--something that violated Ford's lifelong patterns, well then of course it is something that gets placed in an encyclopedia. Because it is an undeniably noteworthy historical event.

I frequently read Chavez's column. And I can state that, like all of us, Chavez has made mistakes. But unlike most people, she has no problem owning up to them. In her column of August 24th of this year she acknowledged an error of fact that she made regarding Jamie Gorelick, the former Clinton official and member of the 9/11 commission. There was no public outcry for Chavez to retract her error--after all, political columnists are not generally expected to maintain the same standard of accuracy as regular journalists (though even they, too, make mistakes). But she did it anyway.

So when the history books and encyclopedias are written in 2010, will this error of Chavez’s really merit inclusion? That’s just not the way I see Wikipedia. But I’m new. Maybe I’m wrong. I’m interested in what others have to say.

Granted, this "error" is not serious. However, as far as I know, she did not issue an appology (BTW, I do hold columnists to the same standard as journalists). I therefore have to question whether it was an error, or a fabrication, which should reflect on her career. --Asbl 16:25, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
Don't apologize for making the edit. That's what Wikipedia is all about. You make the changes, and let the community determine whether they are appropriate. --Asbl 16:27, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, coming back to it a few weeks later, I think that the reasons I offered for my edit stand up well. It just is not important that she made one error of fact (I am here presuming that User:Asbl's version of the facts is correct, but I really don't know) in light of the fact that there is no pattern demonstrated. Unschool 05:04, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] A Newbie's Plea for Help

Argghhh! I don't want to post anonymously, but when I just made my post on the Linda Chavez column, my name did not appear. I am Unschool, and I see that Asbl's name shows up on his comment. How do I get mine to do the same?

Type four tildes at the end of your contribution, four of these ~. Moriori 21:39, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
Click here to go to your own talk page. Moriori 21:52, 24 September 2005 (UTC)


Thank you very much for the helping hand. Unschool 04:05, 25 September 2005 (UTC)


[edit] Media Matters List

Media Matters for America goes to great lengths to document why their posts are noteworthy. In some cases, Linda Chavez herself took back her statements as a result of being called by Media Matters. If you can show even one instance in the list which is an objectionable mention, I would be OK with your phrasing "what it regards as errors...." --Asbl 05:12, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Another comment: we have already gone above and beyond the call of duty vis a vis NPOV, by using the words "errors and mis-statements" rather than "lies and distortions" (which are probably more accurate, but less NPOV). --Asbl 15:58, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Liberal/Progressive

Egads, we could argue until the cows come home about this. Personally, I think that the term "liberal" is the most accurate term for those individuals who largely share the agenda of the American political left. (Obviously, it is important to specify "American", as Americans on both sides of the aisle have by and large abandoned the original meaning of the term.) Plenty of people on the left are proud to use the term "liberal". In my experience, those who tend to use the term "progressive" to describe themselves tend to be running in constituencies where it is necessary to mitigate their left-leaning views. Those who run without fear of rejection are more likely to use the term "liberal". In other words, a Democrat on the left side of his party is more likely to describe himself as a liberal if he is running for office in Boston than would be a Democrat with similar views who is running for office in Charlotte. In Charlotte, "progressive" would be the more-likely moniker.

On the other hand, quite inexplicably, when discussing plans for governance, it appears that the term "progressive agenda" is almost universally favored by those of the left. If someone says "liberal agenda", they almost always have an "R" next to their name, and are spitting venom.

Anyway, I prefer "liberal", as I believe it is a term of pride, not cowardice. But I've substituted in here "left-leaning", as I hope that this is a term that no one would take issue with. Unschool 00:09, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

For the reasons you've pointed out the term progressive is more NPOV than the term liberal. Similiarly, the term conservative is more likely to be acceptable than the term fundamentalist. I'm okay with left-leaning, however. LegCircus 00:16, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Chavez--Union Buster?

Hey, Leg Circus, I just noticed something else. We can all agree that Chavez is not a fan of unions--that's why Bush the Younger sought (unsuccessfully) to place her in charge of the Labor Department. But I don't know if this statement of yours is accurate. For one thing, when exactly has she been in a position to "bust" unions? She certainly is highly critical of them, but that's not the same thing.

Given that she was a highly-placed staffer of one of the nation's largest unions (The American Federation of Teachers) for several years, she has some limited credibility on union issues. I don't think we can make this statement without some corroboration. I'll leave it in there for now, awaiting your thoughts. Unschool 08:31, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for giving me the benefit of a doubt. There are two Linda Chavez's, and ironically enough, one is a big time union buster, and the other is a big time labor organizer. See Linda Chavez-Thompson. Linda Chavez the conservative is CEO of Union Politcal Abuse, which is routinely hired to give support and technical assistance to union suppression campaigns. As you would expect, the organization is funded through kickbacks from anti-union corporate donors. LegCircus 22:15, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Maintaining NPOV

Mccommas, I want you to know that I share much of your perspective on Ms. Chavez, and I have sought to keep her from being wrongly maligned on this page. But your changes here amount to being a Chavez Cheerleader. You need to tighten up your writing, and make your contributions indisputably factual and at the same time maintain NPOV. You do not help Ms. Chavez, or anyone else whose perspective you share, by using Wikipedia as a cheering section.

Go ahead, make your additions. Just tighten it up. Unschool 05:30, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

I took bias OUT. "union-buster" for example is a loaded term and has no place here. Nor should a nobody from the DNC (whose name is not idenical) be mentioned. Now that is advertising. Someone you know perhaps? And why shouldn't I write something about her views? I think her quote about the intruder in her house was very good. Its from years ago but I have always remembered it.

Your version also did not contain many facts about her charity to that illegal. She was not employing this lady but giving her a place to stay as she has done with countless people. She is a nice lady and her good deed did not go unpunished as they say.

To bad you can't errase my entry from the history page. I should change my user id to something like bias-buster. Just like a liberal to try to re-write history. And I don't really admire Ms. Chavez because of her views on homosexuality but your version was unfair. Tighten it up yourself and stop sticking your pro-union propaganda in where it does not belong. I am a journalism student and I am correcting bias on this website for practice. My version was far more fair than yours.

Now pardon me while I go study. "tighten up" indeed! Eat my shorts.


I am going to ignore the lack of maturity in your response and simply deal with facts.
  • First of all, you obviously have done zero research on "my version" of the facts regarding Ms. Chavez. In case you are wholly new to Wikipedia, you should realize that just because someone's name is on the last version of an article, it does not mean that they wrote that entire article. Now calm yourself down, and go back and look at my actual edits. In particular, you need to look at my edits of
October 22, where I removed the POV of Asbl, who wanted the reader to just take the word of a liberal organization that calls Chavez (and other conservatives) liars. Asbl and I carried on a debate without either of us resorting to telling the other to eat soiled undergarments [which I assume, given your maturity level, yours are :) ]
October 16. where I specifically include Chavez's version of events regarding the illegal alien in her home. Yes, I have read her biography (published after she was knocked out of the running for Labor Secretary), and yes, I believe her story. But most people, unfortunately, did not see her as anything but a Republican version of Kimba Wood or Zoe Baird.
September 18 (editing as 68.154.205.20), where I removed Asbl's almost completely irrelevant slap at Chavez for one of her columns.
  • And if you take the time to just read on this very page, you'll see that I have not called her a "union-buster", but rather, I challenged that terminology. And I accurately pointed out that, rather than be a union-buster, she actually was a high-ranking official of a major labor union (hence, her credentials for the Labor Secretary position).
  • Go back and look at the history. It was not I that included the name of Linda Chavez-Thompson. Nonetheless, I think that given the partisan nature of both women, and the obvious potential for confusion, that it makes perfect sense to include that line to avoid any such confusion. And, I might add, it makes sense to do the same on Linda Chavez-Thompson's page (as has been done). It's not advertising, it's clarification. Neither woman would want to be confused with the other.
  • And what in the world are you talking about homosexuality for? That is so off the wall that I wonder if your entry is serious or if you are just trying to stir up troble for the sake of having fun.
Look, I don't agree with every word in this article, but you need to learn how Wikipedia works. You just can't go around making every page read exactly as you want it to, you have to work with others to arrive at something approximating NPOV. And when someone who shares your POV thinks that you have crossed the line, it should at least give you pause.
I appreciate your passion. But Wikipedia is not the place for passion, in my personal opinion. It is about providing the best, most NPOV information possible. Unschool 07:15, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Disambiguation?

Asbl, I disagree with changing the article in this manner. I don't think a bio article, unless absolutely necessary, should have a parenthetical subtext, such as "conservative activist". And it is not absolutely necessary here, since these two women do not have the exact same name.

I do think that the disambiguation page is actually probably a good idea. But the subtitular description is not. I actually think that whoever wrote the original sentence "She is not to be confused with . . ." (which, you probably know, was in both women's respective articles) was the perfect way to handle it.

I think any figure who merits an article in this or any other reference work is entitled to not have their existence summarized by a mere two words, such as "conservative activist". While I doubt Ms. Chavez would object to this in any way, I think it sets a poor precedent.

Propose that the old sentence be restored, and that the parenthetical subtext in the title line be removed, as unnecessary. Unschool 05:15, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Unschool, I believe this is the proper way to "disambigufy" pages, rather than put in the body of the article that "X should not be confused with Y".
As for the text inside the parenthesis, if you do not like the "conservative activist" moniker, propose another one. --Asbl 18:43, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Confusion with Linda Chavez-Thompson

I'm sorry that I assumed that readers would know about Linda Chavez's history with the AFT. No, when calling her a "former union official", I was not confusing her with Linda Chavez-Thompson. It is ironic, I suppose, that two women with such similarity in their names would have such totally opposite positions on unions today, but not nearly as ironic as it is that, twenty-five years ago, they were on the same side.

Linda Chavez also was originally registered to vote as a Democrat, like most union personnel, but I don't know dates on when she made the switch, so I've left that out. Unschool 05:58, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup

Excellent cleanup of article, Asbl. It's much better now.

Only issue I have is a minor one. I don't think her senatorial campaign is "trivia". On the other hand, I can't say that it belongs in any of the other sections, so I'm not touching it. Unschool 06:50, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Since I have now discovered more information about that campaign, I put it in its own section. Basically, I created the "Trivia" section as a cleanup for information that I could not place anywhere else. Remember what I started with. Everything under the sun came in one section, and I had to define new sections. Prior to the new information about the campaign, there was not enough information to justify the campaign receiving its own section. --Asbl 18:46, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cruella DeVil a gay basher now?

NPOV Alert !! Liberal bias strikes again!!

Being gay myself I must demand some substation of this sentence other than Mr. Michelangelo Signorile’s say so (whom ever he might be).

“In 1986 Chavez ran as a Republican from Maryland for the United States Senate against Democrat Barbara Mikulski. Chavez made Mikulski's sexual orientation a central issue of the campaign. Chavez went on to lose to Mikulski by a very large margin “.

Who says other than Michelangelo Signorile (very buff on the cover of his new book by the way!) that she made the alleged homosexuality of her opponent the central issue of her senate campaign? I find that very difficult to believe.

A quick check of Michelangelo Signorile shows him not the be the best of sources. He is best known (according to Publisher's Weekly) for his columns outing closeted gays whose opinions he doesn't like.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0786716193/ref=ase_michelangelosign/002-6625230-3292847?s=books&v=glance&n=283155&tagActionCode=michelangelosign

I have thumbed through Linda's books and recall one tongue in cheek comment (which was funny not mean) and that’s it.

I do know Linda does not approve of homosexuality and she is free to think that because this is after all still a free country. Now here is where I have to point to your bias. What you are attempting to do is do the thinking for the reader. You are telling them what to think.

If you have confidence in your opinions than you should consider that truth to be self-evident. Trust people to come to the right conclusions and who knows. Maybe they will if your position is in fact the correct one.

I must confess to being angry when she defended Santorum's infamous remarks but these biased articles have prompted me forgive her.

The writer of this clearly hates this woman. Let’s prove it the gay bashing (if there is any merit to the charge) and lets do so in a fair and honest way.

Also it shows bias to say she lost by a “very large margin”. That shows opinion. Actual numbers should be supplied. Lets allow the reader to make up his or her own mind how big or not so big it was.

Let’s tighten this up boys!

-mccommas

You want other references: here is what I found when I googled "Linda Chavez Barbara Mikulski". [1], [2], [3]. There are more. I did not want to spend the time inspecting them. Take any one of them and transfer them to the article if you wish. --Asbl 05:54, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Good move

I heartily endorse the move of this from Linda Chavez (conservative activist) to just plain Linda Chavez. I just didn't think that she and Chavez-Thompson were similar enough in any respect--including names--to warrant the label in the title of the article. This is much better now. Unschool 09:31, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I should point out this is a move back to plain "Linda Chavez". I started the articles on both women, and started them as Linda Chavez and Linda Chavez-Thompson.
Angr (t • c) 11:02, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
BTW, Linda Chavez-Thompson is still a two-sentence stub. If anyone knows anything about her, or cares to research, go right ahead! :-)
Angr (t • c) 11:11, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
_ _ For anyone who finds "[not] similar enough" vague, my reasoning in making the move back was not, IIRC, a judgement that confusion was unlikely, but
  1. a judgement that a ToP dab was an adequate resolution of what confusion can be foreseen, and
  2. an understanding of policy as limiting titles that end respectively with parenthetical expressions to (almost exclusively) cases where the "bare" title serves better as the Dab than as the title for the article on one of the Dab'd topics.
Those apply here, bcz LC is (apparently) so much more prominent than LC-T, and the principal reason for an LC-T article is to correct the rare confusion.
_ _ (For the alert and terminally curious reader, the exceptions i contemplate in saying "(almost exclusively)" are those like "Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolshevik)". That expression would not have to be invented as a WP Dab'n mechanism, but rather appears (at least) as part of the title of a political history attributed to Stalin.)
--Jerzy•t 16:39, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bonnie Erbé incident

Linda Chavez was never hired by Bonnie Erbé, so she cannot have quit the show. She may have left the show, but that is another matter. I have removed this until this can be straightened out and described accurately. Also, Erbé herself might well be worthy of an article. Danny 18:11, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Where is the contradiction? Chavez quit the PBS show. Presumably, PBS hired her. --Asbl 15:14, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] contradicts Barbara Mikulski

the current wording in this article is as follows:

Chavez was accused of making Mikulski's sexual orientation a central issue of the campaign by the Washington Post, who misquoted Chavez's claim that Mikulski was a "San Francisco-style George McGovern liberal." The Washington Post, as it turned out, hadn't realized the line was a play on Jeanne Kirkpatrick's 1984 Republican Convention speech and instead the Post believed Chavez was implying Mikulski was a homosexual.

compare this with the current wording on the same event over at Barbara Mikulski

During the campaign, her opponent, Linda Chavez, made Mikulski's sexual orientation and her relationship with one of her staffers a central issue of the campaign.

These are very different descriptions of the same events, one says Chavez simply made a misinterpreted statement the other says that she actively and deliberately pursued a particular campaign strategy.

Please fix this! --Xorkl000 13:31, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

The account of the Mikulski incident provided here is a blatant NPOV violation. Chavez's side of the story is presented as fact. If there is any evidence of "misquoting" by the Post, please provide it.

[edit] Radio show

The page needs an entry describing Chavez' radio show experiences; how she started, what the public reaction is, etc. Binksternet (talk) 16:28, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Political Action Committees

Sorry about the deletion I made to this section: I was editing too quickly and assumed that the second paragraph was simply an earlier version of the first paragraph. I think the two paragraphs that discuss salaries pulled by the Chavez family members from the various PACs should be rewritten into one paragraph. The two paragraphs bounce between years; they don't flow neatly in chron order. Binksternet (talk) 20:49, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I've revised the section to try to make it clearer that the family got income from two different sources - PACs and non-profit foundations. To that end, I've also retitled it. Please feel free to reword it further for clarity, but I do think that the two separate paragraphs should stay separate. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 21:17, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! Looks good. Binksternet (talk) 21:43, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Bruin Alumni Association

Somebody keeps deleting the paragraph about Chavez being named to the Bruin Alumni Association. It's cited, it's online. Why remove it? If Chavez isn't active in the association, cite something along those lines. Binksternet (talk) 03:46, 15 May 2008 (UTC)