User talk:Sfmammamia

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ye olde talke archive

[edit] Because I have no barnstars to give, nor am I near any barns from which to steal them...

For your tireless and totally uncompensated efforts against the vandalism, stupidity, and other assorted crap that have been almost magnetically drawn to Virginia Tech-related articles since news of the massacre started to filter onto Wikipedia, I award you a bonus of ten Norton dollars, redeemable in gold from His Imperial Majesty's Treasury at some point in the indeterminate future. --Dynaflow 04:22, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Welcome

Hi, Sfmammamia, and welcome to WikiProject San Francisco Bay Area! We are a growing community of Wikipedia editors dedicated to identifying, categorizing, and improving articles relevant to the Bay Area. Here are some points that may be helpful: Our main aim is to help improve Bay Area-related articles, so if people ask for help with an article, please try your hardest to help them if you are able. Most important discussions take place on the project's main discussion page. It is highly recommended that you watchlist it. The project has several ongoing and developing activities, such as article quality assessment, which you are welcome to participate. Our system for improving lower-quality articles is Jumpaclass. If you'll be editing stub, start, or B-class articles, consider using Jumpaclass to track your progress. If you have another language besides English, please consider adding yourself to our translation section, to help us improve our foreign Bay Area topics. If you have any questions, feel free to ask on the talk page, and we will be happy to help you. Again, welcome! We hope you enjoy working on this project.

Peter G Werner 17:03, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bob and Tom Show Edit

Hi Sfmammamia,

Your edit to the Bob and Tom Show article removed David Crowe rather than just removing the WikiLinks.

There is a David Crowe who is a comedian and he is the person to whom the article refers.[1]

I replaced the name in the article and removed the WikiLinx.

Take care,

Larry --Lmcelhiney 23:56, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about the error--as penance I will add the external link to the Bob and Tom Show page.Sfmammamia 00:04, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! No penance required, but I do appreciate your help. Normally it might have been a case for disambiguation...Take care. --Lmcelhiney 02:25, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Larry, I'm new enough to Wikipedia that even though I'm studying the guides, disambiguation is still over my head. It sounds like you consider David Crowe the comedian notable enough for a Wikipedia article, so by all means disambiguate! (is that a verb?)Thanks again, --Sfmammamia 19:50, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] underscores

Hello. Please note that you don't need to write

[[Roman_Inquisition|blah blah]],

but instead you can write

[[Roman Inquisition|blah blah]].

The former makes newbies think the underscores are necessary, and then sometimes they even put them in visible links. Michael Hardy 20:27, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip! -- Sfmammamia 20:29, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] dead sea

I do understand what you are trying to improve the clarity of the introduction - that there is a certain logical misunderstanding that readers *could* make as it stands, however allthough your contributions do help somewhat, they introduce a complexity of language which is just not correct, regards sbandrews (t) 17:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. Needless to say, I disagree with your assessment. If my suggested edit is too complex, the lead sentence can be broken into two sentences. May I suggest that we discuss this on the article's talk page? I will be happy to introduce it there. --Sfmammamia 17:28, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd rather we discussed it here or on my talk page - I don't think it belongs on the article talk page - though if you want that then ok, sbandrews (t) 18:44, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

the logical problem with your edits is that you bring in ocean - the bottom of the dead sea is not below ocean - and so would qualify in your system as a lower point than the surface of the dead sea - which is the point we are interested in - i.e. the lowest point not below water. Stricly speaking I agree that the article should begin 'The surface of the dead sea ...' but that would read worse than the original - anyway we'll see what commets your post on the talk page gets... kind regards sbandrews (t) 19:04, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sex education

Thanks for adding very informative and well-written content to the United States section of the sex education page. Fionah 23:41, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your suggestions on the talk page that inspired me to take it on! If you have a moment, I would appreciate your review of my latest work on Abstinence-only sex education as well. -- Sfmammamia 00:23, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

I had a look at the Abstinence-only sex education and it's also v good.Fionah 20:11, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Spam?

You recently edited the page on male escort, removing a valid link to a popular sex-worker's blog. If you had taken time to look further into the page, you will also see that additional sexworker blog links are listed. This is NOT a spam issue. I'm reposting. User talk:24.243.5.91

My understanding of what constitutes an acceptable link on Wikipedia must be a stricter than yours. According to WP:EL, blogs are normally to be avoided except for "those written by a recognized authority." Given the subject matter, I plead ignorance on what constitutes "a recognized authority" on this article, and will leave it to others to decide. However, the presence of another's blog link on the page does not by itself justify the addition of another. WP's guideline is "but they should be kept to a minimum of those that are meritable, accessible and appropriate to the article." -- Sfmammamia 22:00, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Blogs and Wiki

Most of what you're relying on in arguement is symantics: Blogs are to be AVOIDED (not banned), unless the linked blog is posted by an authority on the particular subject. I would say that a male escort's blog would be precisely what this page could use: Perspective from where the buck stops. User talk:24.243.5.91

Okay, but just be aware that if another editor comes along today and deletes the same link from the same article and you reinstate it again, you may be called out over the three-revert rule. By the way, Wikipedia etiquette is to put new posts on talk pages at the bottom of the page. See WP:TALK -- Sfmammamia 22:30, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please take a look at Controversies over the film Sicko and comment on merge proposal

Hi,

The title says it all. I am requesting your opinion only because you've edited the Sicko (film) article and therefore appear to have an interest in the movie. I created the "Controversies" article and think it should stay, but I'd welcome your opinion whatever it is. If you consider this message annoying, I apologize. I'm leaving this message with you and some others without violating WP:CANVASS. I won't be leaving another message asking you to comment again. Noroton 23:03, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

P.S. I have no connection with The Imperial Government of Norton whatsoever.

[edit] Existentialism

Just a note: In fact existential philosophy began with Aquinas, so to say that Aquinas pre-existed existentialism by several centuries is incorrect. It came from "existential theology", which also came from Aquinas. I'm not really sure why you deleted this information from the existentialism page. Are you unaware of this? Feel free to write me. I'm an old editor, too. A E Francis 03:16, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

The existentialism article as currently written defines existentialism in the narrower, more conventional way, as having its origins in the 19th century. See the lead sentence, "The movement had its origins in the 19th century thought of Kierkegaard and Nietzsche." The article already has a "Historical background" section, where its other antecedents are mentioned. That would be a logical place to add in Aquinas. If you want to assert the origins with Aquinas more strongly than the other antecedents already mentioned in that paragraph, may I suggest that you reference it to a credible source and deal with the apparent contradiction created with the lead paragraph? Without a source, it's original research. In my view, that would be an appropriate way to link these two subjects and articles together. Throwing a "see also" reference in, without any credible context, is hardly the way to improve the article, in my view. -- Sfmammamia 16:44, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

OK, I see your point... and I am willing to go with that. For references on the subject of Aquinas and extentialism, see Etienne Gilson, "The Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas" University of Notre Dame Press, 1997, (pp. 84-95) ; Copleston "History of Philosphy Book I, Vol 2", Paulist Press, 1950, (p. 308); There are many others. Anyway, it is not original research. The point being, that Existentialism as it is cast today likes to view itself as originating in the 20th century. In fact, it didn't. It began with Aquinas and existential theology. This is documented in many places. But if you think that not to be a significant point, that is your editorial position. I am willing to accept that position. But it raises a deeper question: Do we want to improve these pages,or not?

Improve, by all means! That is why I made the specific suggestions I did. -- Sfmammamia 17:32, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, actually it is an interesting point: does the 20th century movement called existentialism come from Aquinas? It is a topic debated in philosophy circles. Even Descartes "Cogito ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am [I exist]) is an variant of the age old philosophical question about existence. It was in response to Aquinas, and existentialism. But the way existentialism is taught in schools today, there is an avoidance of anything before the modern existentialists. So, do we leave this page as it is, or re-vamp it, and incur the wrath that is likely to follow? I am at a loss. So comment if you want!A E Francis 18:28, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

I for one do not feel that the addtion of Thomas Aquinas to the "Historical background" section represents a revamp to the article. I have added Aquinas to that section. We'll see if that gets any argument. Note that I have linked the main Thomas Aquinas article. I have enough concerns about the "Thought of Thomas Aquinas Part I" article, which I've expressed on that article's talk page, that I suggest the link remain with the main article until those issues are resolved. -- Sfmammamia 18:49, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

I saw your note on Aquinas - Existential page. I will re-write this. Actually, most of it is taken from Etienne Gilson's book, previously noted. It is not plagiarized. This is probably what gives it the "personal reflection/essay" tone. The other things are just standard philosophy. I will re-write, and put in some references to clear this up. (and if that doesn't work, I will re-write it again!)... anyway, thanks for your input! A E Francis 19:19, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

The main issue concerning Aquinas and existentialism is from the interpretation of the Biblical "I Am Who Am". Augustine and all those before Aquinas interpreted this in one way: "I Am" what?, then went on to describe what God was, or was not (negative theology). Aquinas wrote that the essence of God is "to exist". This was revolutionary, and ultimately led to existential philosophy. Granted, it is a far-cry from today's existentialism. But it seems to be a point that should be described somewhere in here. Adittedly, the piece I wrote doesn't explain this to well; hence I will re-write it. You know, writing is a lot of fun, but sometimes it is difficult to get it just right! (I write for a living, and still, it is difficult to get the style just so, for a given forum.) Thanks for your in-put. A E Francis 19:27, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Virginia Tech Massacre

I have two articles to cite. It is a matter of my not knowing how to cite/footnote. I will check out the "Help" pages and make those additions. Thanks for your work.

You'll see I made reference too the question of a lock down as it relates to the first two murders. This is important because Tom Ridge's quote is in regards to this issue specifically rather than that of the university's overall response.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/21/AR2007042101439_pf.html

Thanks for cleaning that up.

If you have the second URL, please feel free leave it here and I will add it, or use the following format to add it yourself:

Start by placing a <ref></ref> pair at the end of the statement you want to reference. Between the "open ref" and "close ref" tags, copy the "cite news" template from this page and fill in what you know about the article.

If you can learn to cite sources properly, that will help you be effective on Wikipedia. Thanks for your help. -- Sfmammamia 05:16, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Scroll box

Regardless, a footnotes actual web link isn't visible when an article is printed anyway. box contents could be aquired - click and drag - copy - paste. Thomas Paine1776 23:17, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

See my reply on your talk page. -- Sfmammamia 23:43, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Susan G. Komen for the Cure

Hi Sfmammamia - do you have a good reference for the largest breast cancer funder claim ([2])? I deleted the initial claim because I couldn't find a decent source for it, and I didn't see one for the US while I was looking either (though that wasn't the focus of my search). Thanks. -- SiobhanHansa 18:40, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, the "nation's largest" claim was referenced very briefly in the San Francisco Chronicle.[3] That reference appears further down in the article. It's my understanding from other WP article reviews that it's preferable for the lead section to remain free of footnotes if the facts are supported by cite further down in the article. -- Sfmammamia 19:11, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I thought I'd looked through the sources already in the article. Sorry about that. I'm going to make a small tweak from "private" funds to "nonprofit" funds since that's the wording in the article (and I read private as including companies - some of which could potentially spend more). -- SiobhanHansa 19:39, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sicko and cultural attitudes

Thanks for the comments at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Health_care_in_the_United_States#Society.27s_values_-_.22everyone_for_himself.22_versus_.22lets_look_after_each_other.22 . I have not seen the film Sicko but I have heard about if of course. I've not seen it on release here in Finland but I guess it will come around. The Finns have a pretty international outlook even though the subject of US health care system may not be terribly relevent to the life of the average Finn.--Tom 16:09, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

update Nov 16. I saw the documentary yesterday. For all of its faults (the biggest of which was describing extremes like the government does your laundry in France and US hospitals put the uninsured into taxis and dump them outside the public hospitals) the big picture is undoubtedly correct. The main story being that private insurance is a bad way to finance health because companies have a huge incentive to deny treatment to make more profit and how much the health care industry has been buying off the politicians, including Hillary Clinton. I was also surprised to discover that Medicare is still expensive for the end user. --Tom 10:48, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

I sometimes wonder whether the debate raging in the US is a reflection of US history. My comment about "every man for himself" was perhaps provocative but I do think that it reflects a shared culture in the US. The struggles of early settlers, the gun-totting Wild West and the need for self protection, and also the resentment of taxation going right back to The Boston Tea Party - these seem to have a strong hold on public perceptions of the way things should be. I also wonder whether the "every man for himself" attitude is reflected in the high rate of crime in the US. --Tom 16:09, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Tom, thanks for your comments. You seem very aware of U.S. culture and politics for someone who doesn't live here. Like most Americans, I couldn't begin to display reciprocal knowledge about your culture, and although I consider myself well-educated, and having an "international outlook," there are great gaps in my cultural and political knowledge of other countries. The U.S. is so big and diverse that it's difficult to generalize about it. Of course, you're correct there's a strong thread of individualism in U.S. history. But I believe there's another thread you should consider -- the communitarian impulse -- that has expressed itself throughout our short history in such things as utopian communal living experiments, social and charitable activism, labor and political organizing, and even Internet-based grassroots political efforts. That thread is perhaps just as strong and just as deep within U.S. history, and there's an ongoing political dialogue between them. As a liberal-progressive, that's the only thing that gives me hope that despite the political divides, entrenched power/money/authority structures, and diversity that characterize our democracy, we can keep moving forward on such issues as health care. There's still in this country a really deep-rooted idealism, sense of optimism, and belief that the will of the people can change things. As far as the crime rate, I see that as more related to other issues -- the prevalence of guns, racial disenfranchisement and poverty (which many European countries are now struggling with as well), and perhaps the violence that also weaves throughout our history.-- Sfmammamia 18:46, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

My sister and her family have lived in the US for more than 20 years and I have visited the US many times... and of course the US TV and movie industry is very dominant globally so that is another window through which to view the US. And yes, San Francisco is not quite like the Beltway :=) And of course I am prone to over-simplifing a lot. I do sense there is a lot of political division in the US and I think that does not help matters...logic sometimes gets thrown out of the window when one feels one has to defend party lines and I see politicians are careful not to push people to be too radical. I also sense that Americans are conservative with a small c even if not always with a big C. The political right in the US did a hatchet job over the years to make words "liberal" and "social" so dirty that few will dare to be associated with them. But the sands are shifting now and I hope that when that settles down as it will probably do in a year or two, that some old prejudices will be wiped away.

I am quite concerned about the misuse of statistics and there seems to be a lot of it about. If you can spare 3 minutes, try following this real media link http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/ram/today0_0700_20070901.ram. When the file starts to play, just skip straight to the news piece that starts at about fifteen and half minutes in.

Yes, we are struggling to cope with changes in Europe. Mobility of peoples across borders is one of them, both within the expanding EU and the legal and illegal flows into Europe from Africa and the Middle East. And with that comes many "East meets West" issues such as Eastern religious practices and customs and religious laws, versus Western values such as freedom of speech and secular law. We live in interesting times.--Tom 22:05, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act NPOV tag

I conservatively tagged a single section of this article that had clear NPOV problems. The first discussion topic was the article's neutrality, so I thought the implications of the NPOV template were clear. Either way, I have added a justification on the article's talk page. --Vince | Talk 06:54, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

See my reply on the article talk page and my revisions to the section in question diff --Sfmammamia 23:47, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Breast cancer

Thanks for cleaning up that section. It reads a lot more like and encyclopedia now! futurebird 17:30, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

My photo of an actual breast cancer tumor seems to have disappeared. Thank you for keeping a close watch on this important section. Was there a problem with my photo? Haymanj 01:10, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

See this diff [4] You might want to post on the article talk page or ask Optigan13, the editor who deleted the photo in a major reorganization of the article. --Sfmammamia 02:13, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks.

I was trying to answer the most vocal proponent directly by posting there at the end of that live subthread. Feel free to reuse my argument, if you think it'll help, as this thing inevitably gets dragged out further and further. The whole message, really, is just, "Stay on topic." That's all there is to it. --Dynaflow babble 04:28, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Happy Holidays!

Open your card →→→

Happy Holidays from BoL @!
If you live in San Francisco, this is located at 21st west of Church.

Credits: This card was inspired by Macy's123, assistant of V's Shop

—BoL @ 00:38, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Have a userbox ... and a barnstar

		The Current Events Barnstar
		For her tireless months of work in getting the Virginia Tech massacre article to Featured Article status; fending off vandals, POV, and cruft all the way. --Dynaflow babble 05:46, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! (Userbox promoted to my userpage with pride) --Sfmammamia (talk) 20:00, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Congratulations!

My congratulations on getting Virginia Tech massacre promoted! Quite an impressive feat for all the editors of this article, I must say. Two of the victims and the gunman graduated from my high school, so I feel affected as well. Have a happy new year! Arsonal (talk) 02:20, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I second the emotion! Well done. Ronnotel (talk) 19:40, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Front page nom

I was thinking that it would be appropriate to nominate Virginia Tech massacre for the front page on April 16th, 2008, the one-year anniversary of the event. What do you think about that? Ronnotel (talk) 19:45, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Health care in Canada

Hi!

To show I'm a good sport, I added an example of U.S. citizens travelling to Canada to use medical marijuana. This is area where Canada is clearly superior to the U.S. Grundle2600 (talk) 23:57, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Abstinence-only sex education

This was a clear-cut POV edit. You're welcome to properly rewrite the lead, and I agree it's too long. But you may not simply move referenced material you do not approve of. User:Dorftrottel 19:03, January 24, 2008

Dorftrottel, I think you misintrepreted my edit. I did not move the addition because I did not approve of it (in fact, I share the POV of the author you cited). I just did not think it belonged in a lead that is already too long and for which it has been difficult to maintain brevity as well as consensus on its balance. If you review the edit history, you will note that I have done quite a bit of work on the lead, and the article in general, in the past. I did not revert or delete the addition, I merely moved it out of the lead. May I suggest we discuss this on the article talk page and solicit other opinions? --Sfmammamia (talk) 20:05, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I see now that I was totally mistaken both to revert and to kick the door in on you like that. Damn, where was my patience to at least look twice before starting to shout two hours ago? Sorry for that, and thanks for reacting so unjustifiably friendly. The only (and weak) excuse I can bring forward is my own rather strong emotional relationship to this kind of thing. And due to similar past experiences on WP, I was actually preemptively assuming bad faith and half expected someone to revert me.

Also, I went over your contribs to the article, and although you do appear to have a tiny bit of POV (as you say yourself), it's indeed rather similar to mine. That doesn't make it all good, and I'd complain, but who'd listen?

As to the article itself: As I said, I agree the lead is too long and should be rewritten. Maybe we can exchange ideas for that, as I suspect we both have a rather strong interest in a good article on this issue. Let me take another look at the article, then I'll post my ideas to the article talk. User:Dorftrottel 21:27, January 24, 2008

[edit] admin?

I'd be happy to nom you if interested. Be careful, it's a long, sleepless week. Cheers. Ronnotel (talk) 14:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the offer and the implicit vote of confidence. I'm currently on the fence about this. Would you be willing to correspond by email about your experiences with both the nomination process and since? --Sfmammamia (talk) 19:52, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

but of course. Ronnotel (talk) 19:53, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 3RR warnings

Have you read [[5]]? Could you issue a warning for Hauskalainen? --Doopdoop (talk) 23:18, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

At the moment, I'm concerned with your behavior on the Universal health care article. Hauskalainen has not violated 3RR on that article. If you feel he has violated it elsewhere, you are free to issue the warning yourself and bring it to the attention of admins. --Sfmammamia (talk) 23:29, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I have not violated 3RR and I understand this policy. So warning messages are not needed. Before last revert, I have left a message on the article talk page, no reply from you yet. --Doopdoop (talk) 23:33, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] You are a Wiki-facist

I entered factually verifiable text regarding Pelosi, which you subsequently vandalized by calling it a "POV" reference. This should not be a forum for political debate, but for verifiable facts about this person's record. You should correct your error and adjust your motives. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adamrock (talk • contribs) 22:10, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Please stop censoring the Virginia Tech massacre article

You keep censoring the Virginia Tech massacre article even though the stuff that you erased was relevant and well sourced. Please stop censoring the article. Grundle2600 (talk) 23:27, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Virginia Tech and the Romanian proffesor

I was running across some FAC's and found Dr. Liviu Librescu. I didn't know that a Romanian was killed in the VT Shootings. I voted in it's FAC. Basketball110 _{vandalise me} 15:58, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] It snowed on March 10, 2006

It did snow in San Francisco on March 10, 2006. I saw it on cbs5 and on youtube and google images! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arad4 (talk • contribs) 06:26, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Universal healthcare - lead

Your last version is almost OK. However words "health care coverage" are too ambiguous. Would you support changing them to "coverage of public health care", or "coverage of public health care system", or "coverage of publicly managed health care", or to something else that is more specific than the current version? Also note that the source [6] seems to support the fact that Germany has a public health care system. --Doopdoop (talk) 23:23, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate your effort to work toward consensus on this, however, I do not think the phrase "health care coverage" is ambiguous. I see no clarifying value in inserting the modifier "public" in the the lead sentence of the article. It seems your entire effort is aimed at linking the topics of universal health care and public funding. Several editors have objected to this, not just me. As I've indicated, I think the assertion that universal health care is somehow synonymous with publicly funded health care is just plain inaccurate, and I've cited data to back that up. So perhaps if you are willing take the time to explain what your objective is, without blanket dismissal of other editors as biased, then perhaps we can reach some middle ground. --Sfmammamia (talk) 00:11, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

My objectives for editing healthcare related articles are WP:NPOV and avoidance of Wikipedia:Content_forking. Publicly funded healthcare article covers all public healthcare systems (both with public and mixed funding) and describes the same systems that are covered by universal healthcare article. At this time WP has at least three articles about the same subject (publicly funded, universal and socialized healthcare). Achieving consensus for the merge of these articles would be too difficult and the next best alternative is to cross-reference these articles. --Doopdoop (talk) 00:14, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply and clarification. The second sentence of universal health care cross-references to publicly funded health care. What's wrong with that cross-reference as is? Also, as I read publicly funded health care, I do not see the detailed descriptions of various country implementations that I see in universal health care, so there are significant differences in the ground the two articles cover. The article on publicly funded health care devotes a great deal of space to the debate around public health care in the U.S., so I actually think it has more POV problems than the universal health care article. --Sfmammamia (talk) 00:43, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Do you agree that the existence of three articles about the same topic (each of them with a different POV bias) creates problems with Wikipedia:Content_forking and lowers the quality of Wikipedia? --Doopdoop (talk) 10:42, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

It's an interesting question. As WP:CFORK says, "Articles on distinct but related topics may well contain a significant amount of information in common with one another. This does not make either of the two articles a content fork." As I think I've indicated in some of the discussion on these articles, my main complaint with them in terms of content forking is multiple attempts to summarize the debate over health care reform in the United States. This is treated in universal health care, health care reform, publicly funded health care, and interwoven to some extent into Canadian and American health care systems compared and health care in the United States, as well as the highly contentious socialized medicine article (and no telling where else that I don't even know about!) I actually think a balanced treatment of the debate belongs in its own article and should be extracted from the more global articles, but so far I don't think I've succeeded in convincing other editors of this. --Sfmammamia (talk) 19:21, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Great job reverting vandalism!

You may also want to consider getting rollback so you can click on the diff link, then rollback, and the edit will be reverted like that! If you want, you may list yourself here! Just a suggestion... —BoL 00:58, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Not really, I'm just making some much needed changes and receiving edit conflicts in the process. Check the edit history and verify this for yourself. I'm taking a break from that article, it's obviously prone to tendentious editing and I don't need the headache. There are plenty of other articles in the wiki-sea which are in need of the same. Thanks anyways. RFerreira (talk) 19:01, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Socialized medicine

Thanks for your summary of the discussion and references - I think you've summarized my own argument to some degree better than I have.--Gregalton (talk) 21:13, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your note. I have to admit, I'm at something of a loss for how to move us any closer to consensus on that article, particularly its lead section. I keep trying different approaches and we end up back in the same revert war. Until I got your note, I was just about ready to throw in the towel on that article and move on to other topics -- a little too much (if you'll pardon the sexism) macho blustering, too little actual progress toward middle ground. Is it time to seek page protection (again?). Start calling editors out for disruptive editing? Any other brilliant ideas??? Feel free to email if you'd prefer to take the discussion offline. --Sfmammamia (talk) 01:15, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Healthy San Francisco

I didn't see any place to use this new issue brief from the Kaiser Family Foundation on the Healthy San Franciso program. You may have already seen it, but if not, I thought you might be interested, and that you'd have a better sense for where it should go. EastTN (talk) 19:24, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Hadn't seen it, thanks! I think Healthy San Francisco is mentioned in a couple places, I'll look around for proper places to link it. --Sfmammamia (talk) 22:39, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Here are two more articles on Healthy San Francisco: (Phred Dvorak, "Firms Adjust to Health-Care Law," The Wall Street Journal, May 5, 2008) and (Wyatt Buchanan, "734 businesses sign up for S.F. health program," San Francisco Chronicle, May 2, 2008). I'm not sure where they should go - I don't see an obvious slot in the main article on San Francisco. They might make sense in the Health care reform in the United States article, if we want to get into local initiatives - but that could become a massive endeavor to keep up with. What do you think? I hate not to pick this stuff up, because it seems worthwhile to know how the program is starting to play out. EastTN (talk) 20:26, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Here's one more - "Coverage & Access | Healthy San Francisco Program Prompts Some Companies To Shift Costs to Consumers but Appears Effective," Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, Kaiser Family Foundation, May 5, 2008. EastTN (talk) 20:31, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Susan G. Komen for the Cure

Hi. I wanted to thank you for doing the work I should have when I edited this article. I know we've had the IP making the change from "nearly" to "over" a bunch of times and I really should have looked back to see if we'd ever referenced it (I have a vague memory now of having discussed that particular claim with you before). And I should have taken the time to look for the charity navigator source which is a pretty obvious one and easily available. I apologize for my lazy ways - I will try to do better in the future. -- SiobhanHansa 18:27, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

No apology needed; you were right to delete the long-unsourced "world's largest" claim, and the rest was easy. --Sfmammamia (talk) 19:06, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Universal Health Care Foundation of Connecticut

Thanks for your help in explaining how the article for this foundation can be revised and improved to better fit the Wikipedia format. Your advice has been invaluable!

69.182.121.62 (talk) 02:41, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Medical tourism

Dear Sfmammamia,

Re: Medical Tourism:

While I am delighted that you have taken an interest in the subject, which is good as increasingly large number of Americans are travelling overseas for medical care, there is a huge issue around whether or not those services are safe as well as if the organisations operating those services are operating in an ethical manner. Likewise, there is a a real problem potentially of people from the USA failing to understand that the legal issues that they might encounter should they have problems while being treated overseas may, indeed will, be of a quite different nature to those they would encounter in the USA. I don't think it is very responsible to have a alarge Wikipedia article which tends to extol the virtues of this place or that place, and then has no counter-argument in place. The points made within this short section on ethics and law in medical tourism cross-referenced to other web pages within wikipedia, each of which contain references. By its very nature, bad medical practice will try to be covert, and to provide a useful article which balances positive and negative can be challenging but I belive that is right and proper.

I would therefore very much like to put something back into this section dealing with medical ethics as relevant to medical tourism, bristling with references, and would be happy to rely on the good Wikipedia-modifying public to turn it into something of greater value. Surely it would be good for the US citizen who reads the wikipedia article about medicla tourism to also learn something about the problems of organ donation in China, the issues around ante-natal gender determination and abortion etc., or the practice of fee splitting, which the AMA explicitely outlaws but is nevertheless tolerated in many places (ncluding the USA), despite its enormous potential to damage human beings.

Would that be OK ? Sorry to be a nuisance. Thailander (talk) 21:23, 18 March 2008 (UTC)TailanderThailander (talk) 21:23, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Not a nuisance at all, no apology needed. Your additions must be reliably sourced and neutral. Cross-referencing to other Wikipedia articles is not an adequate method of citing sources. Keep in mind also that any content should be written from a global perspective, not aimed only at US readers. --Sfmammamia (talk) 21:39, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I will work at it this weekend, and do my best to source adequate references. Point well taken re US vs rest of world. (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 09:46, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Article on Health care reform in the United States

I've taken a first stab at creating the article you suggested on Health care reform in the United States. I've tried to pull into it the US-specific materials from all the various articles that had been suggested, and done some very basic blending of them together to start making it readable. I haven't deleted anything from the existing articles yet, or started linking to the new one. At this point I think it would help if you could take a look at what I've done to see if it's headed in the right direction, and perhaps sprinkle some some copy-edit magic over it to make it look a bit less like a literary Frankenstein monster. EastTN (talk) 13:27, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up -- I did notice the article and will try to get to it soon. Thanks for making the first move on this. I'm a bit busier this week with paying work, but I'll try to put in some time on this article in the next few days. My first impression is that the lead needs an additional first paragraph. Per WP:LEAD, the title phrase should appear in the first sentence in bold, setting the context for the article. I think first paragraph needs to say why there's a debate about health care reform in the U.S. -- it isn't just the lack of universal care, it's the high(est) and rising costs that everyone (on all sides of the debate) acknowledges as a growing problem and an indication of inefficiency and unsustainability. --Sfmammamia (talk) 16:53, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I certainly understand the need to do real work  ;-) I agree that the lead needs work; basically, I just grabbed what looked like the best existing summary and dropped it on top. If I get a chance I'll see what I can do (and then you can fix it when you get a chance - you're better at lead-in's than I am). EastTN (talk) 17:51, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to clean this up. Now that you're working on it, I'm going to back off a while so that I don't get in your way. EastTN (talk) 15:58, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TFA request

FYI, I managed to slip Virginia Tech massacre into the TFA request queue for April 16. There is no guaranty, of course, but I think there's a good chance the article may be front-paged on the one-year anniversary. Ronnotel (talk) 18:12, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Great! Do we need to resolve wording issues for the blurb? I'm wondering if we can involve other experienced editors in the question of whether Cho's name should be mentioned.--Sfmammamia (talk) 18:15, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Maybe a third opinion would be in order?

Or not. Please see this note from the talk page of Raul654, the "Featured Article Director". --Sfmammamia (talk) 21:50, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cleaning up a sockfarm

Hi there - it took a few days, but I think the sockpuppet bonanza at Planned Parenthood has been cleaned up. See Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Jackcashman. They've all been blocked. Sorry it took so long. MastCell ^Talk 20:51, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking action and for letting me know, and no need to apologize! --Sfmammamia (talk) 20:58, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

Thank you for your corrections in Uruguayan chapter of Medical Tourism. With few words you say it better. Regards: Macelo15 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Marcelo15 (talk • contribs) 13:27, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for moving the paragraph on breast cancer TNM clasificatin....I was about to do the same thing so you can imagine my suprise when I found you had furfilled my vision of a well edited article.

All the best —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.168.148.211 (talk) 01:32, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] inclusion

Hello. I noticed you've been active, including on the AS in the US article, but you have not yet responded to my argument on the discussion page that the quotes in question meet the standard for inclusion in WP. I would appreciate it if you would so that we can resolve this issue. Thanks! --Illuminato (talk) 18:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

done. --Sfmammamia (talk) 19:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Front page, good job

I point you in the direction of this comment on Ronnotel's talk page. Sharing the love...--Moni3 (talk) 17:18, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to leave a note, I appreciate the comment, even though it was a massive shared effort. --Sfmammamia (talk) 20:20, 16 April 2008 (UTC) (Go Gators! my alma mater, but I haven't been back since I graduated many many years ago...back when the J-school was still in the bowels of the football stadium!)

[edit] Corporate social responsibility

I removed the ones that looked like mostly spam and kept a couple ones that seemed to provide decent information. I also fail to see how re-adding a bunch of spam in a blanket revert of my edit was at all helpful. That was not at all an excessive removal, I considered removing all of them. Please see Wikipedia:External links - "Links should be kept to a minimum." The article already has a detailed "further reading section," 15 additional links is not a minimum. Mr.Z-man 23:03, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for the revert, I've restored two that I think are of equivalent value to the ones you left. --Sfmammamia (talk) 23:59, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] State organizations

Re: Health care reform in the United States links: I do believe it's important to list state organizations because that is the ONLY level that significant health care reform is occurring in the U.S. Currently, reform at the national level has been almost nothing but talk. --Lifeguard Emeritus (talk) 23:37, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree, because this could end up being a ridiculously long list. Per WP:EL, I suggest instead that we link to the Open Directory Project's listing of such organizations, see [7]. --Sfmammamia (talk) 00:04, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

What do you think of making a stand alone list of organizations promoting health care reform. I've been considering doing this but I'm concerned about organizations appearing on it promoting pseudo reform, like Cato, et al. I'm open to other viewpoints, but Cato has about zero empirical evidence to back up most of their claims. Even Ron Paul has rejected their policy recommendations on health care and other issues. --Lifeguard Emeritus (talk) 00:12, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't have strong feelings about such a list either way, but given NPOV I think it would have to include organizations that promote what you consider to be "pseudo reform". Conservative think tanks that have high visibility on the topic would have to be included, in my view. --Sfmammamia (talk) 00:24, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

It's not a violation of NPOV to require legitimate analysis, and I'm not opposed to conservative organizations being included. We can play on Wikipedia all day but our job should be to inform and right now all the action is at the state level. The Heritage Foundation and other conservative groups have a lot of stroke with members of the Republican delegation in Congress, Cato does not. --Lifeguard Emeritus (talk) 00:28, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, and Wikipedia works by consensus. This would be particularly true if you try to keep someone's pet organization off of a stand-alone list. Good luck on that. --Sfmammamia (talk) 00:44, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia is SUPPOSED to work by consensus, but you and I have both witnessed editors who consistently ignore that. I was just using Cato as an example of poor research. --Lifeguard Emeritus (talk) 00:47, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Let's connect

Hi Sfmammamia,

I have a question for you about San Francisco. Can you email me at ericwu01@gmail.com?

Thanks and I look forward to hearing from you!

-Eric —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ericwu01 (talk • contribs) 00:46, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Howard Johns book

Have you actually read this book:

• Johns, Howard: Hollywood Celebrity Playground, Barricade Books, Fort Lee, NJ (2006). ISBN 156980303X

I think all of the instances of this book being added to Wikipedia were done by either the author or publisher as blatant self-promotion.

IP4240207xx (talk) 01:47, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

No I haven't read the book. You may well be correct, but it may also be a perfectly acceptable reference where others aren't provided. --Sfmammamia (talk) 03:53, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Uninsured in the United States

Good work so far! Bearian (talk) 20:25, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Featured Article review of San Francisco, California

San Francisco, California has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. GaryColemanFan (talk) 15:47, 7 June 2008 (UTC)