< Talk:U.S. presidential election, 2000
I am opposed to subpages basically on principle. I am inclined to think we should completely eliminate them, and I wish Clifford had never added that feature. :-) (Except that it sure has made talk pages easier, and without them this project would be a mess.) If you read my essays, Pink, you'll see why I say this. (Although I haven't, admittedly, given any defense of eliminating them entirely. That would require a bit more argument--or, probably, just extension of the argument I've already given. Generally, after months of experience working with them, I have grown to loathe them. It's mainly because I don't understand them--what the hell does the slash mean? It doesn't mean anything determinate. The slash just indicates that the subject of the part of the title after the slash was thought by someone to be in some fashion subordinate to the subject of the part of the title before the slash. Anyway, I feel like I'm just starting to repeat what I've already written (though, please, bear in mind that the above is only one of my arguments), and it's getting to late for me to be doing this anyway. --LMS
The problem here is that Presidental elections isn't quite first past the post system because of the electoral college. If it were Gore would have won. Now one could argue that the electoral college reinforces the two party system, but that isn't Duverger's law. One might try to argue that Gore lost because Nader took away votes in some key states, but that's different from what the paragraph says and is also different from Duverger's law.
I'll try to make the subtleties a little more clear, but the applicability of Duverger's law to U.S presidential politics (and Bush/Gore/Nader specifically) can hardly be refuted.
Does it mean:
A number of voters were listed as felons despite never having committed a crime and despite the alleged crime having been stated as occuring in the future. It was a huge goddamn scandal... Lir 23:31 Oct 15, 2002 (UTC)
On another note, WHAT THE FUCK! How could this not have been a huge goddamn scandal?!? Is this true? Am I living in Guatemala or something? I'd REALLY like to see a reference for this (mostly for my own education). Graft
Another background factoid: other democratic countries have had as much, if not more.
My favorite factoid: most countries called "democratic" are in fact totalitarian (like "People's democratic republic of tarfustan")
--Ed Poor
I can't think of a better way to word this, but it is not factually true. Florida's electoral votes no more determined the outcome than any other conglomeration of the same number of electoral votes. Florida was simply the last state to come to a conclusion about who won in the state; if the race hadn't been close in rest of the country too, Florida's debacle would have been a footnote outside of Florida. Tokerboy 21:58 Oct 25, 2002 (UTC)
How about US presidential election of 2000 Susan Mason
Why? Are elections in the US usually written as the 'election of {year}'? In Europe they are usually written as 'Election 2000' 'Election in 2000' or 'Election, 2000' never 'Election of 2000' unless in a sentence where one talks of the election of 2000. But that is the only context I've ever seen it mentioned in. It makes far more sense stylistically to say 'US president election, 2000' because it draws attention to the fact in the title that there are to aspects, 'US presidential election' and '2000'. Turning it to one complete sentence would be cumbersome and would require all past names be changed. There would want to be a fery good reason to change everything and rename everything from scratch. I cannot think of a single reason for doing it. STÓD/ÉÍRE 00:58 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
Well, everytime I refer to the election I write US Presidential Election of 2000 and it seems gramatically incorrect to have a comma for, as far as I can tell, no reason at all. Susan Mason
The comma is used in the context of the title to divide between the two main facts contained in the title, that it is concerned with the US presidential election and that it is concerned with the year 2000. That format would not be used in a sentence, because it would look, sound and be grammatically incorrect, but it is often used in a title, where the title is not itself self-contained but but is in effect part of a series; US presidential election, 1996, US presidential, 1960. US presidential election, 1940s. Sometimes commas are used, sometimes colons. The effect is to the same, to indicate that the title is part of a chain and not completely self contained. It is complicated but I suppose we seem to be stuck with it. But it is the format used in titles referring to elections in Europe, etc. For example, the general election in Ireland last year was described in titles and in screen graphics as 'General Election, 2002' or 'election 2002'. It is the standard form in titles that makes it clear it is part of a series, where the year varies. US presidential election of 2000 would make the title too self-contained, or so the theory goes to people who design these things. STÓD/ÉÍRE 01:18 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
If we seem to be stuck with it, it is only because you don't want to let me change it. Substituting the standard , for of would transmist just as much information, and agree with the style of having article titles match a commonly used phrase -- I don't think it's common to say, "And the winner of the US Presidential election, 2000, was GW!" People do speak of the election of such and such a year. Susan Mason
FCOL Susan, I've just explained to you. There is a difference between the title that is used generally to refer to elections, and the words spoken.This is a title, repeat a title. What people say are words, not a title. And no you cannot try yet another unilaterally change, this case a title that is part of a series without getting widespread agreement just because you feel like it. What is it about you trying to unilaterally change titles or listings that are the work of many people without getting agreement of other people? I didn't pick this title. I simply explained to you why this form of title is generally used by sourcebooks, by media organisations in their graphics layouts, by books, by magazines. It is not me stopping you. It is the collective of everyone who has worked on a series of these pages. Do you have some sort of fetish about trying to annoy as many people as possible? Not a single person has supported your idea. All I did was come on constructively to explain to you why this format probably was chosen for all the election pages. STÓD/ÉÍRE 02:52 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
Well, who are these shadow people who created this naming system and for whom you are speaking? So far, only you have spoken about it, so please don't try to use some kind of bandwagon argument. Furthermore, how is this naming system better than US Presidential Election of 2000[?]. How would you say, "The US Presidential Election of 2000 occurred in 2000", surely you would not say, "The U.S. Presidential Election, 2000, occurred in 2000". I am often argued against by people stating that what we have to use is the name which people are most likely to write when editing an article, as I am sick of using a redirect, I am curious what other people are using to link to this page when they write about it.Susan Mason
So far I am the only person who has even bothered to take your idea seriously enough to warrant talking about. And I think it is ludicrous idea. Are you going to take on the responsibility of renaming every single article on wiki to confirm to your unique idea? To fix hundreds and hundreds of links? Or do you simply want to cause chaos here to and then move on somewhere else? STÓD/ÉÍRE 03:07 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
I highly doubt that I am the only one who feels the name should be changed, I would guess most people are afraid to argue with you and your insulting behavior. It is clear that your argument eventually collapses to "its too much work", luckily its really not that hard to move a page. Susan Mason
Im not asking you to make the move. Furthermore, changing the name of the page means that one doesnt have to use a redirect when one writes, "The US Presidential Election of 2000[?] resulted in a victory for GW!" Susan Mason
Of course the only reason why Lir (excuse me, I mean Susan) wants to change this is to cause as much chaos as possible. He wasn't succesful in changing all names from English recognizable to the names as used in their native langauges. He wasn't succesful in putting his own POV on such articles as New imperialism[?], so here he comes again, with wanting to rename all of the presidential election articles and changing the way all lists of names look. It's just a way to keep him in the public eye and in the center of attention. He seems to have a need to cause trouble. -- Zoe
Would somebody explain what Zoe's problem is? Im tired of her harrassment. Susan Mason
But at some point it would be nice to improve some fundamental issues which Jtdirl-Zoe seem to wish to maintain as is solely because they don't appreciate my dissent with their consensus. Susan Mason
My apologies. I had thought Lir had deleted my comment, but I missed that it was still there. -- Zoe
Susan Mason has made a good point that writing about the US Presidential Election of 2000 is a lot more natural if one can link to it as the US Presidential Election of 2000[?], and I also find that title just generally more aesthetically pleasing. Well, actually I prefer abbreviations to be written with dots to make it clear that they are abbreviations, although I admit that I'm not entirely consistent about this IIRC... ;) On the other hand, making a redirect would pretty much solve the problem; then people could link to whichever version they preferred. But back on the first hand again, the "Redirected from..." text does irritate people, and many people find linking to redirects distasteful. But then back on the second hand, changing this title would require lots of other titles to be changed to make things consistent, and that would be a lot of work. But in conclusion, I think Susan's title is better, as long as someone is prepared to move all the similarly titled pages and fix all the double redirects! Except... no, wait! U.S. Presidential Election (2000)[?] would also have advantages, because although it's not as aesthetically pleasing and you'd have to use pipes all the time because you'd never want the text as it is, you'd get to use the pipe trick! Hmm, okay, forget that last suggestion. -- Oliver Pereira
Thank you Oliver. I believe the best way to make changes such as this is to follow the policy I have been engaging in with regards to lists. For example, lets say I was going to change this page. Id move it, then id move perhaps the election of 1996. Then id call it a day and later when I might move the election of 1992 and then of 1988. If others are informed of the change, it will gradually change. Or...we could program a computer to do it. Susan Mason
So let me get this right, Susan. A chain of people have been creating a long list of files, following a deliberate naming pattern. Then along comes Susie and she decides to break that change, all because her/his nibs doesn't like the comma. In effect, screw everyone else and their work. You don't set up a debate. Don't contract the people who put together the pages. Don't start a big conversation on all the talk-pages. Just announce I don't want this page this way and I will change it to fit the way I want. And when people complain (and they do with most things you touch) you the run off and complain that there is a vendetta against you. Curiously, that is exactly what Lir did, and what Vera did. And while wiki is quite tolerant of people coming back if they change their ways, if someone comes back and acts in their old manner, the reason that got them barred in the first place, they are invariably flung out of wiki almost as quickly as George Bush will send his troops into Kuwait. Or are we going to have to deal with the other farces you have created - you unilaterally change lists, people vote down your planned move of them and them it falls to someone else to undo your unilateral changes. And if you change some of the election pages, and get stopped as invariably you do when you go on one of your 'unilateral' missions, and then get outvoted by everyone else who as usual will say 'what the hell do you think you are doing? Leave them the way they were!' you will disappear and it fall to others to undo your vandalism, while you turn to the next page you want to change to look the way you want it do. And the saga continues until as is enevitable, you get banned and reappear as yet another person. If you want to change the way wiki election pages are, start a debate and get agreement to change the template. Don't unilaterally do what you want and not give a damn about everyone else. STÓD/ÉÍRE 05:54 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
Isn't GW unilaterally sending his troops into Iraq? I any case, I am debating and you can no longer act as if I am the only one who thinks this title should change, because 2 people have agreed with me, and the rest dont seem to think its a bad idea (with the exception of Zoe). You have written a very nice personal attack, but you continue to avoid explaining why you like the comma. Susan Mason
Hi Susan - I moved the above here because I can't understand what it means, and I can't clarify the grammar without understanding what the point is. There are four commas in the sentence and I can't tell what is dependent on what. I'm getting some sort of meaning out of it like:
And that just isn't making sense to me -º¡º
This was poorly written, I am re-inserting it as:
Making changes is great, Oliver. The trouble with Susan is she
Erm, but she hasn't moved the page to US Presidential Election of 2000[?]. Look, the page is still here! Susan is engaging in discussion on the talk page, not just jumping in and moving things off her own bat. So what's the complaint? There are some users around here who are far less cooperative and willing to discuss things than Susan is[1] (/w/wiki.phtml?title=List_of_words_of_disputed_pronunciation&action=history), so I can't see why you're picking on her. -- Oliver P. 15:07 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
Well that is an improvement. STÓD/ÉÍRE 19:04 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)
Right, but you still do not adress how you would refer tot his election if you were writing about it. Do you really think people should write, "The U.S. presidential election, 2000, was a close one!", you talk about headlines and such, but the wiki-convention is that we use what is most commonly used in reference to the event so that the person writing and linking to it doesn't have to make re-directs. In the long run, changing every single one of these will save a lot of work for writers of American political history.
I would argue that one primary reason that capitalism is such a failure is that it is a hierarchial model in which authority figures decree that discussion is to stop or that dissenters are lone troublemaking radicals. I believe the wiki should strive to avoid a system in which a cabal exercises discretionary control. In short, although you are a wiki-conservative and I am a wiki-liberal; you should be glad that I'm here arguing with you, because Im trying to improve your product.
Anyways, Jtdirl/Tarquin/Zoe/Stevertigo's argument falls down to 3 points (as I understand it of course), which I refute below:
In addition, I add an additional point:
--- Having been there near the beginning of this series, I can tell you how it evolved.
That's where we left it. There was no large discussion or consensus building activity...it was a dopey, overly enthusiastic Wikiholic (me) who propogated the current madness.
If I had it to do all over again, I would probably have gone for "the 2000 U.S. presidential election". Now that moving pages is far easier than it was in the days that I mucked everything up, I don't think it would be that big of a problem to move these pages, though I think we should agree on a convention. Though not entirely inappropriate, this particular venue (a particular election talk page) seems like a rather arbitrary place to discuss. -- RobLa 05:42 Mar 11, 2003 (UTC)
Well we gotta start somewhere. I would accept 2000 US Presidential Election, however I think the U.S. is redundant and unnecessary, I would prefer US Presidential Election of 2000. Susan Mason
I don't think its necessary to show that its an abbreviation, it is a common abbreviation such as NAACP or FBI Susan Mason
Hmm... Shall we have a vote? ;) -- Oliver P. 06:04 Mar 11, 2003 (UTC)
Oh nono, the wiki is not a democracy. We have to wait for Jtdirl and Zoe to reach a consensus. Susan Mason
--- I'm okay with it being on the end. Here's the options that seem to have support:
I prefer "U.S." to "US", but I'm not sure if there's any policy one way or another (I'd prefer if this got vetted on the Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style page). The capitalization needs to be lower case unless there's a really compelling case for uppercase (I don't see one).
Regardless, I don't think this is the right forum, because (I hope) no one is proposing changing this article without changing the other 43 articles in this series. We should vet this on a more visible page. -- RobLa 06:14 Mar 11, 2003 (UTC)
I don't care which title is used, but if there is a change it will take a great deal of donkey work mending links. I volunteer some time to help with that. Tannin
Ah, that's very kind of you! But I think Susan and I will be able to cope; after all, we were the ones awkward enough to support moving everything... :) -- Oliver P. 10:01 Mar 11, 2003 (UTC)
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