Wikipedia:Peer review/The Political Cesspool/archive3

The Political Cesspool

This peer review discussion has been closed.

This article currently has Good Article status, and has undergone two previous peer reviews and two FACs (neither of which were successful). Since then, however, I've significantly improved the article with new content from a variety of different sources.

The reason it failed the second FAC was because it relied too heavily on the Anti-Defamation League as a source. Because of this, I've been expanding the article recently with new content representing a wider range of sources, also making the article more comprehensive than it was before. I nominated this article for another Peer Review because I'd like to know: is there anything else I should do before I send it back for another FAC?

Thanks, Stonemason89 (talk) 00:25, 30 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Finetooth comments: This is interesting but still has prose and Manual of Style issues that will not survive FAC. I fixed a few small errors, and I have several suggestions for further improvement.

Foundation and history

"in the words of cofounder Austin Farley" - It's clear from the preceding sentence that he's a cofounder, and we already know his full name. Tighten to "in Farley's words"?
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 16:49, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"Prior to joining the show's staff, Frith had worked for a number of other radio stations including... ". -Tighten to "Before joining the show's staff, Frith had worked for other radio stations including... "?
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 21:26, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"because the staff said they" - Since "staff" is singular and "they" is plural, perhaps "because staff members said they" would be better.
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 21:26, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"It was initially broadcast on AM 1600 WMQM on Tuesdays and Thursdays." - I think it would be very helpful to add the geographic location of this and all of the other stations in the article. That would give a more clear sense of the regions the broadcasts reach and who might be listening. I realize that you've said "Memphis" in the lead for this particular one, but I'd repeat that here in the main text as well and add the missing locations of the other stations to the main text.
- Done. I removed the mention of KANC from the article after being unable to find out where it is or was located; a quick Google search shows there appears to be no evidence of a station with those call letters existing or ever having existed. It's possible that the station is now defunct, or that it was a typo on the part of the TPC staff. So I've removed KANC altogether, at least for now. The other stations have had their locations added. Stonemason89 (talk) 01:57, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - Thanks. I think that adds interest and important information. Finetooth (talk) 01:39, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"a number of other radio stations including AFRTS" - Abbreviations like this should be spelled out and abbreviated on first use, thus: American Forces Radio and Television Service (AFRTS).
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 21:26, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"As of August 2009, Jess Bonds and Goeff Melton are no longer affiliated with the program. Art Frith... ". First names are normally used only on the first instance; these three should be "Bonds, Melton, Frith". Ditto for similar situations in the article. I see many such situations.
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 21:26, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - I still see quite few of these. For example, "James Edwards attracted about 200 white counter-demonstrators to the Confederate Park vigil. In the aftermath of the city park controversy, show affiliates James Edwards, Austin Farley, Jess Bonds, and Bill Rolen received the "Dixie Defender Award" from the Sons of Confederate Veterans." Maybe the "James" is helpful here at the beginning of the first sentence, but why not strike the others since they've all been listed in complete form at least once before; i.e., "In the aftermath of the city park controversy, show affiliates ~~James~~ Edwards, ~~Austin~~ Farley, ~~Jess~~ Bonds, and ~~Bill~~ Rolen received the "Dixie Defender Award" from the Sons of Confederate Veterans"? Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    - Done. I also removed another extraneous mention of Farley, which had appeared later on in the same section. Stonemason89 (talk) 18:18, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Primary host

I think it would be helpful to include a brief explanation of American Third Position Party and Stormfront in the text of this article. Otherwise readers must click away from your article to find out why these party affiliations are important. They will naturally wonder what the "third position" is and whether "Stormfront" is related to storm troopers or something else. Just a few words of explanation would suffice in each case. It might also be useful to give similar brief explanations of other parties and organizations mentioned in the article. This might require more citations, I realize, but the organizations' self-descriptions (condensed) might be all you'd need in most cases.
- Stormfront was already described as a "white nationalist and supremacist website" in the lead. I added a similar description of it into the body of the article as well. As for American Third Position Party, I've added a brief mention that the A3P is a white nationalist political party that advocates a form of economic nationalism known as Third Position. Is this enough, or do you think further explanation is necessary? Stonemason89 (talk) 02:12, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - I think this is fine. Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Guests

"in July 2008; during that appearance, he discussed his financial newsletter and promoted his book.[21][19][22][23][24][25]" - The refs are normally arranged in ascending order when a group of them appear together like this; i.e., 19 should come before 21 in the list. Also, do you really need six sources to support this claim?
- Out-of-order ref (19) removed. Stonemason89 (talk) 02:02, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - I found two more instances of out-of-order refs, and fixed those as well. Stonemason89 (talk) 18:14, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"and British National Party leaders" - Needs the abbreviation on first use; i.e., British National Party (BNP). Ditto for other abbreviations in the article.
- Done. Stonemason89 (talk) 16:40, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Statement of principles

Here I would suggest compressing rather than expanding. I'd paraphrase rather than quoting so much, and I'd turn the list into straight prose. WP:MOS#Bulleted and numbered lists has details.
- I'm not sure how to condense this without sacrificing valuable information (and making the article less comprehensive--1b--in the process). Stonemason89 (talk) 00:40, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - Now that you've removed the links, I'm inclined to agree. Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Nothing inside a direct quote should be linked, according to WP:MOSQUOTE. Any links inside direct quotes anywhere in the article should be unlinked.
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 23:01, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Controversy and criticism

Watch out for overlinking. Southern Poverty Law Center and Stephen Roth Institute are linked twice each in quick succession. One link per article is often enough for most things. It's OK to link something once in the lead and again once in the main text sometimes, but I'd avoid linking anything more often than that without a good reason.
- The reason why I link a lot is because this is a potentially controversial topic, which means that people often reflexively remove statements that don't have inline citations attached to them. So there are some cases where duplicate links may be necessary; still, if I see any that I think can safely be removed without causing controversy, then I will do that. Stonemason89 (talk) 19:52, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - I meant wikilinking rather than citing. The wikilinks aren't what satisfy WP:V since Wikipedia is not a reliable source for itself. To head off well-intentioned removal of unsourced claims, you might add an in-line citation right after the claim or at the end of the sentence in which the claim appears. Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    - Sorry for the misunderstanding. I've re-added some of the inline citations that I removed before. Stonemason89 (talk) 18:14, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

- - What appeared to be duplicate links to the SPLC and the SRI were actually links to two separate SPLC and SRI articles, respectively; this seems legit, in my view, so I don't see a problem with these two sources. However, I did remove some duplicate links to the ADL and the Commercial Appeal. Stonemason89 (talk) 19:57, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In the first paragraph of "Controversy and criticism", the first two SPLC links are identical, and the Hatewatch is linked to the same SPLC page. Why would a reader want to visit the same page three times in quick succession? Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

- - - - Fixed. I also removed a redundant wikilink to White nationalism from the "Primary Host" section (there had previously been two in quick succession). Stonemason89 (talk) 18:22, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

City park demonstration

"Sharpton also said in an interview that his objections to the park were not related to race, but to Forrest's leading an army against the United States." - Not sure what this refers to. How is Forrest Park leading an army?
- The "Forrest" who led an army is Nathan Bedford Forrest, not Forrest Park. Is there a way I could possibly rephrase that sentence to make it more clear? Stonemason89 (talk) 16:37, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - How about "Sharpton also said in an interview that his objections were not related to race but to the actions of Lieutenant General Forrest, who led an army against the United States"?
    - Thanks, I think that will work. Stonemason89 (talk) 14:35, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      - Done. Stonemason89 (talk) 15:06, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Radio stations that air the show"

I'd turn this list into straight prose too.
- Done. Stonemason89 (talk) 00:46, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"micro1650am is a 100 milliwatt FCC Part 15 station, and as such it has no call letters." - I'd rewrite this to start the sentence with a capital letter. That means moving "micro1650am" to the middle of the sentence somewhere.
- Fixed. Stonemason89 (talk) 23:03, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

References

Make sure the citations are as complete as possible. Citation 18, for example, should include the name of the author, Liz Spikol, which is easy to find. Ditto for Max Blumenthal for citation 19.
- Done. While going through the refs I noticed that two of them ("home" and "official") pointed to the same page, so I removed this redundancy as well. Stonemason89 (talk) 00:38, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
What makes Media Matters for America reliable? What makes VDare.com reliable? Dot-coms, personal opinion pages, blogs, and social networks often fail to meet WP:RS.
- I've had several other people review this article before and no one found any problems with using Media Matters. As far as VDARE is concerned, that website is normally not a reliable source, however in this case, the article linked to is only being used to showcase Jared Taylor's opinion of the show. Since the VDARE article was itself written by Jared Taylor, this falls under WP: SELFPUB, which allows otherwise questionable sources to be used as long as we are only using them to provide information about the sources themselves. In other words, Jared Taylor is a reliable source for Jared Taylor's views. At least, that's my interpretation of WP: SELFPUB. Stonemason89 (talk) 16:35, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - I've made this even more clear by adding the author's (Jared Taylor's) name to the citation, to make it clear this is a case of SELFPUB. Stonemason89 (talk) 00:50, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK. Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I hope these suggestions prove helpful. If so, please consider reviewing another article, especially one from the PR backlog at WP:PR. That is where I found this one. Finetooth (talk) 02:12, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've left a few comments on the Fat Freddys Drop peer review; I don't have much experience with peer reviewing, but I contributed what I could: Wikipedia:Peer_review/Fat_Freddy's_Drop/archive1. Stonemason89 (talk) 01:25, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Further Finetooth comment: This is looking better. I've made a few further comments above in response to your most recent request. Hope this helps. Also, thanks for helping with a review. As you can see, demand for editing almost always runs ahead of supply. Finetooth (talk) 02:02, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks again! Stonemason89 (talk) 18:34, 11 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

- I think I'll take it from here. Stonemason89 (talk) 23:29, 11 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]