![]() | This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
"Donald Henry Rumsfeld (born July 9, 1932) was the 21st United States Secretary of Defense, since January 20, 2001, under President George W. Bush."
"Having served under President Gerald Ford, he is both the youngest and oldest Secretary of Defense
e was BOTH he was secretary under 2 different administrations Tomgreeny 18:24, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
In "(AB, 1954)", what does "AB" mean? -- Mpt 18:38, 2 May 2004 (UTC)
Some of the schools in that time period and before reversed the abbreviation-- if Princeton did that then AB is right and perhaps AB could be linked to an explanation that it's a bachelor's degree
It seems to me that "quotes" in a wikipedia article are supposed to be clever or witty things a person has said. Not these bizarre, damning, selected quotations with square brackets and so forth. They make the article look awkward and blatantly biased. user:J.J.
I wouldn't hesitate to include infamous quotes if they were really important (Chamberlain's "Peace in our time", for example). While I suspect the quotes currently selected for Rumsfeld are part of a subtle hatchet job, he did say them and they are of interest. I guess the counter-balance is to find some more positive/brilliant quotes. -- M4-10 18:51, 8 May 2004 (UTC)
Excellent page, well done to all concerned. -- bodnotbod 13:54, May 9, 2004 (UTC)
This page is has a decidedly "anti-Rumsfeld" lean which should be obvious, even to the casual observer. --JR
Abugraib was unacceptable-- but was a war-crime only in the eyes of a rabid Lefty.
Saddam Hussein committed REAL torture, how come you don't talk about that?
More lies from the Left, that's why.
128.138.96.17 03:37, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
Rumsfeld is a war criminal. How come the article doesn't mention this? -- 24.200.35.253 23:54, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
There's far too much detail about Abu Ghraib in here IMO. The stuff about what he knew, when, doesn't need to be here especially considering that it's all breaking news changing day by day anyway. Especially considering that there is almost no other info about his military campaigns. There wasn't even any mention that he ran the Iraq War at all until I just added it. Mdchachi| Talk 15:55, 11 May 2004 (UTC)
For what I have understood, "war criminal" is a legal notion. Rumsfeld has not yet been trialed and found guilty of being a war criminal. Casting a moral judgement is one thing, legal matters are another. Rama 16:42, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
still, Abu Ghraib was a big thing, and at least deserves plenty of attention.
AndrewAL
22:29, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
On June 17, 2004, Rumsfeld admitted during a news conference that he had personally ordered two prisoners to be concealled from the International Committee of the Red Cross, one at Camp Cropper, at the instigation of CIA chief George Tenet - in apparent violation of the Geneva Convention.
Where is the evidence that this violated the Geneva Convention? Who was the prisoner and do we know if the Geneva Convention applied in his case, i.e., was he a legal combatant captured wearing the uniform of a signatory nation? Because if he wasn't, the Geneva Convention explicity states he would not be protected under the Geneva Convention. TimShell 08:45, 12 Sep 2004 (UTC)
"Persons protected by the Convention are those who, at a given moment and in any manner whatsoever, find themselves, in case of a conflict or occupation, in the hands of a Party to the conflict or Occupying Power of which they are not nationals." -Part 1, Article 4, GCIV
Kevin Baas | talk 17:38, 2004 Oct 5 (UTC)
Perhaps the 'Articles' section should provide some sort of disclaimer or notification that some of the articles linked to are POV. - Fogger 22:10, 7 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Is it just me, but there is no mention of his military service, considered for both John Kerry, and President Bush there are extensive sections, shouldn't there be even a basic mention of Rumsfeld's Service in the US Navy? PPGMD
Mr Rumsfelds' Naval survice was "truncated". Therefore the original mention of "three Calander years of Navy service". It seems that he, Mr. Rumsfeld wast TAD on an U.S. Army Post. His personal actions toward a "femail U.S. Army person" was not appreciated. A complaint was made and Mr. Rumsfeld was then in "hac" for his personal actions to the young U.S.Army person. Should this complaint have gone to Courts Marshal, it was likely tolead to a conviction! So he used his influence and exited the Navy quietly through the side door. My source was a serving Army Person from that Army Base. I find no reason to believe that he lied or had anything to gain by such a disclosure. S// G.E. Anderson USMC Serial :1054898 FMF Korea 1950/51
Mmmh. Perhaps you don't care, but you've just violated Wikipedia's policy against personnal attacks. Remember that repeat violations will get you blocked, or banned altogether.
As for the rest, I will not answer to personal attacks that try to bring in irrelevant factors to the issue at hand. David.Monniaux 15:56, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I was about to make a similar remark, but David beat me to it. Perhaps we might want to focus on the discussion and let othe factors aside. Rama 16:04, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Keetoowah, why do I get the felling that you are just some angry person who hates people??? ps. watching an angry investment banker argue with a genius is fun.
The two tables, located near the end of this article (Preceeded By) are quite confusing. Can someone who understands the intent improve the organisation? -- Philopedia 30 June 2005 10:11 (UTC) Wow what a childish non-debate. You should probably grow-up and cut France a break, they gave you the STATUE OF LIBERTY, be nice or they might take it back!
If I'm not mistaken, Donald Rumsfeld was a professor at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School during the late 70s. If correct, this ought to be taken up under privat career. Can anyone confirm. -- Philopedia 30 June 2005 10:11 (UTC)
His biography on defenselink.mil fails to mention that. If he dropped out of law school and doesn't have a PhD, it's safe to say that he was probably never a professor at Princeton.
What is the second from last quote in the list:
"...or the people who attacked the United States in New York, shot down the plane over Pennsylvania and attacked the Pentagon" (a possible slip up refering to the September 11, 2001 attacks [2])"
...supposed to mean. Am I, the reader, to believe that this is some kind of evidence of the truth of a wacko conspiracy proving the government actually shot down the plane and that the statement wasn't a simple gaffe in the same vein as when people inadvertently refer to the "9-11 WTC 'bombing'"? The quote is obviously simply one of Rummy's many phrasing flubs and is entirely non-notable. I will remove if there is no counter argument. -- Deglr6328 07:22, 3 October 2005 (UTC)
Counter argument: Should be kept as evidence of his verbal incompetence.
That's hardly a relevant argument. It was a mistake.
And the word "possible" clearly shows it was the author's intent to troll
I did a little cleaning up and and added a "Controversy" section. Can't believe there wasn't one before. BTW, major kudos to whoever is maintaining this page. Palm_Dogg 04:17, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
I am a registered independent, supported the Iraq War, and I am no fan of Rumsfeld. The Iraq War was controversial from the start, and Abu Ghraib is a sub-controversy of the same. Both deserve mention here, because Rumsfeld is a key figure in both. However, both deserve their own pages and details of Rumsfeld’s involvement and criticisms belong on those pages, specially sense no completely objective analysis is still possible.
One organization that tries to find a court to accuse Rumsfeld as a war criminal doesn't make a significant controversy. Such an item would belong in a book long biography. Mentioning it here is an attempt by his detractors to legitimize their accusations, where no court will. Its mere mention here is biased. It would be more appropriate to mention it an the Abu Ghraib page. User:IndependentThinker 00:16, 25 October 2005 (UTC)
why is his wife the former Joyce Pierson? is Pierson her maiden name? was she married before? to whom?
if it's her first marriage then maybe Joyce nee Pierson??? Wikipedia must have a style rule for this. But former sounds like she changed bodies
I was bemused by it as well, but took it as a synonym for 'late' as in deceased. Can someone who knows what was meant by it please clarify that sentence. Far Canal 06:45, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
FYI, it does not mean "late" as in "deceased." It's just an older way of giving her maiden name, commonly used in the United States until the '80's or so. The idea was that before she was married, her "public" name was Joyce Pierson, and after marriage, it was Mrs. Donald Rumsfeld. If you were sending her mail, you'd have addressed the mail to Mrs. Donald Rumsfeld. References to her in a newspaper or magazine article would have been likely to have included a sentence informing readers that Mrs. Rumsfeld was "the former Joyce Pierson." You don't see this type of writing very much any more (if at all), and Wikipedia may well have a style rule on the subject.
why was he given it. And following the swine flu discussion it comes out of the blue
sub-section proposed:
Some critics say Rumsfelds conduct in the morning of 9/11 might be inadequate to the duties of a secretary of defense. The allegations reach from `criminal negligence` to complicity and cover his duties as a political leader and as a military commander. [3]
The criticism to the transition of the military and society (mentioned above, see chapter `G.W. Bush Administration) was to be expected. So Andrew Krepinevich, Executive Director, before the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities testified already in 1999 "One may conclude that, in the absence of a strong external shock to the United States—a latter-day “Pearl Harbor” of sorts—surmounting the barriers to transformation will likely prove a long, arduous process." [4]
`The expression `Pearl Harbor´was used by Rumsfeld himself too 9.August 2001: “Rumsfeld further gave the game way by warning of the "increasing vulnerability of the US" to a "Pearl Harbor in space". [5]
As Bob Woodward informed us in "America's Chaotic Road to War" (Washington Post), "Bush tries to keep a daily diary of his thoughts and observations. That night, he dictated: "The Pearl Harbor of the 21st century took place today." [6]
In the morning of 9/11 Rumsfeld did not what his critics judge as being adequate to "the Pearl Harbor of the 21st century". Documents show that Rumsfeld got the information about the ongoing hijackings and that he then decided to take his breakfast with Wolfowitz and Senator Cox. [7]
So he was not present in the `war room´(National Command Center, about 300 feet from his office), he did not confer with his generals, with the FAA, with NORAD. Critics point out that he did not care for the scrambling of the jet fighters of Andrews Airforce Base, 10 miles away from the Pentagon. This missing of direct information of interceptors doing the so-called àir policing´ added up to the lack of information by his staff caused by his absense.
So no decisions were taken by him untill about 10:30. When Bush -25 minutes after getting the information "America is under attack" finally spoke to the press at 9:30, Rumsfeld still had breakfast with Senator Cox. [8]
Defenders of Rumsfeld argue
- he was not informed about the hijackings. (This is not true proven by fact, logic and law.)
- he was not responsible: as a political leader he had not to care for military duties (This is false again. If the standard operational procedures to scramble fighter jets fail it is the job of the superiors to ask why. In case of a `normal´ hijacking Rumsfeld would have to take decisions about release of prisoners, sending money, saving atomic plants, phoning Castro or whatever. Together with the president and vice-president or alone. His first duty is to be well informed in general and especially by the inspection of the hijacked plane by `his´ interceptors.)
- it was a police job to care for hijackings or a military job on low, local level (completely wrong: how could anybody know that the attacks were not the preliminaries of an all out war ?)
- he was misjudging the situation ( like the statement of Wolfowitz "There didn't seem to be much to do about it immediately" [9] .But the opportunities to act otherwise are already pointed out. A misjudgement of a leader in this position by being not informed can be called criminal negligence)
- he was so shocked and unprepared that he could not act appropiately to the crisis (the MASCAL plan [10] shows how exactly Pentagon officials were prepared. The PENREN Pentagon Renovation ptrogramme was to be finished five days later for the wedge where AA77 plugged in. Hundreds of firefighters, police, paramedics and camerateams knew exactly what to do after the first impact, without having any foreknowledge about hijackings. Hundreds of millions of TV watchers knew already that the situation is critical and asked if the impacts must happen completely unhindered. `Jumpers´ knew what to do. They chose death when Rumsfeld chose breakfast.)
- he did not know how to react since the impacts of the four planes were so fast.
( This statement implies a thought from the aftersight: the knowledge of the attacks ending with Unuted 93. How could any commander know that ? At least after Andy Card stated “Amaerica is under attack” the plausibility check was done that hijacked planes – 3 at that time – impact into symbols of the U.S.A. –2 at that time. But should we not assume that the staff of Bush and the Pentagon officials had no foreknowledge that there was no more attack was to come ? How did they know: that`s all ?)
Critics and defenders both agree that the skies over the U.S.A. were full with interceptors in the afternoon and the following days. But this is not the subject of this argument.
I want to add that Rumsfeld didn't sign the cards for dead soldiers families in Iraq and that he had a machine do it. I don't know if I can find it considering this was 1-2 years ago and briefly showed on the news. Can someone find and add it?
JJstroker 03:06, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
Is there ANY basis for this claim? I can't find confirmation of it anywhere... ka1iban 21:47, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
That's exactly why it's controversial..
Project2501a
23:59, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
Interestingly evcen the discussion is vandalized. But whoever does it: you will never stop the information: ANDREWS AFB is existing 10 miles from Washington. 2 squarons of fighters there. 2 fighters have ben in QRA mission (24h a day alert, ready to scramble within 10 minutes). And RUMSFELD KNOWS THAT AND DID NOTHING to ask why the SOP to scramble these fighters failed.
Besoides: even unarmed fikghtes would have been able to provide informations. If they got scrambled. 84.159.87.12 19:35, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
I thought it was rather relevant that on 9/11, Secretary Rumsfeld was helping to carry injured people out of the Pentagon. It's the most important recent event in our country. Shouldn't what he did on that day be included?
Isn't this the full text of the quote? the tail end of the phrase "not with the army you WISH you had" was removed a few days ago, but I believe he said all of it. A Google search or two could confirm it... ka1iban 16:54, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
---
Actually, I don't need to...I just restored it to how it was before.
It appears that the page has been vandalized. I have put up a little notice.
Some mention of the rumsfeld doctrine needs to be made, to refrence the page refering to it --maximusnukeage
I reverted the image to an earlier version. The white background just doesn't go along with the whitespace on the page. -- Jiang, Talk 06:25, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)
The Kissinger quote isn't in the cited source. Could somebody try to clarify it, or find a better source?
No "edit war"? Good. I had the impression before. Now I will follow most of your advice. In my opinion the so-called "neutral" sentences like "Some critics have also argued that Rumsfeld" sound like bad jokes in comparison to what must be said. But "no war" - so I will rewrite it. About two days from now. This was me
84.159.92.83
17:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
And I will agree not to post in "career" - but I am not at all convinced not to do it. It is the top and turning point of his career. So I urgently ask you to open a section "9/11 - just for now as a part of the section "controversies". Have a nice weekend." "
I agree. Took out the vandalism allegation here. Posted a new version under `controversies`. Know that it is hard stuff - and I am very much looking forward what defenders might say and argue. It is me again 84.159.84.217 10:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC) Have a good day and please post the section as son as possible. I do not find more neutralty than I put in. Defenders can only argue more when they see the allegations and the quotes. ---
Five days later now. I offered my 9/11 section here in the `discussion`and nobody discusses it. I see no edits. So I understand that I can post it into the article without being vandalized again.
Thank you for the flowers. i do not fear any discussion and edits. Especially I hope that information about the subject flourishes. If aspects get another note - why not ? The only thing which makes me feel uneasy is getting erased. This day and this man are too important not to shade a light on it.
Thank you for your offer to help in registration. If it gets necessary I will adress it.
I have removed the following content:
The first paragraph uses weasel words to attribute a viewpoint to nebulous 'critics'. Please provide a credible and verifiable source for these claims. The second sentence is also an uncited claim.
This paragraph also attributes a viewpoint to nebulous 'critics'. It also presses a point of view in referring to Rumsfeld as "taking his breakfast", which none of the official sources describe.
Again, nebulous 'critics'. "so-called" air policing. These are opinions which must be sourced.
All the sources cited on the "alternative theory" site [16] seem to indicate that the breakfast with Cox ended sometime between 9am and 9:30am, if it matters. Most of that "research" seems to be a whole lot of confirmation bias.
What's left appears to be verifiable, though may need some grammar work. KWH 08:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
So my friens- what kind of discussion is this ? You REMOVE the whole text instead of asking me to prove this or that word, this or that allegation. Do you call such behaviour a discussion ? Imagine you would silence me in a public discussion and then, here in the private, "explain" why you silenced me ....
I expect YOU now to restore the text - I did my best several times. You are urged now to integrate what YOU demanded to know. "Weasel words", because YOU do not know, because YOU do not read the quotations. So here is the nebulous critic No.1: "Paul Hellyer, former National Defense Minister of Canada:... Why did the President just sit in the schoolroom when he heard the news? Why did he not acknowledge that he already knew what was going on? As a former Minister of National Defense, when the news came out I had to wonder. Why did airplanes fly around for an hour and a half without interceptors being scrambled from Andrews [Air Force Base]? Is it Andrews right next to the capitol?" [17]
Oh I see my friend- you trust "official sources" only. This is a so-called `circulus viciosus´ since "official sources" are not very eager to feed controversies in Wikipedia. But to make you happy I have an official one: "At 9 a.m. EDT Tuesday, as a hijacked Boeing 767 slammed into the World Trade Center, I was in the Pentagon in the private dining room of the Secretary of Defense. Don Rumsfeld, the Secretary, and Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Secretary, and I were discussing how to win votes for the Bush defense plan that is now pending in the House and Senate." [18] I must admit that I do not know hat they had, coffe or tea. There is no official source for that. I only know: they are not sitting in the "war room" nor in an office but in the morning in the private dinig room. If you believe private dining rooms are command centers I cannot help you any more. But you ask for "weasily critics" again. Her is no 2. Mr. Meacher was minister in the Blair government. "The war on terror is a bogus" he writes, and read what he writes about the missing jet fighters: [19]
And again from me: I will add some more "nebulous critics" later. But what you call "opinion" is fact. You spread your opinions here. A fact is: there were no fighter jets from Andrews AFB. How shall I prove something which nobody has seen in the air? If your opinion is that there were jet fighters please be so kind and tell us which interceptors were there to saveguard Washington D.C. And about "air policing": it is a NATO terminus technicus. If you do not know what it is - although the word explains itself and although the AFBs having interceptors to be scrambled can were discussed in teh internet it is YOUR problem. Now I am going to stop arguing. First I want the artile to be restored, if you want with edits and the above quotes. But do not try to censor "controversies" by eliminating them and launch meta-discussions. I do not fear the discussion, as you see. But the subject of discussion must be existent. Be aware that YOU showed that YOU are not informed and that I try to fill in the needed informations. Ask me, no problem. But do not remove informations which were unknown to you. The sources "seem to indicate" ? Is this the kind of quote you prefer ? You do not quote anything, it is just a pure allegation. in comparison I quote her Mr. Cox: "...and I were discussing how to win votes for the Bush defense plan that is now pending in the House and Senate. When minutes later, the Pentagon itself was hit..." As you may notice there is no remark that indicate that he stopped discussion before the "minutes later"-event. As you said "if it matters" For sure it does not matter even if you were right. Especially it does not matter as a cause to remove all the work I have done. Be ashamed. That matters. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.159.94.197 ( talk • contribs)
Please note that it is incredibly confusing for you to interject your comments within my message, as I can hardly even tell who's talking. I have copied them above, probably mostly intact.
I won't respond to your individual points as they have nothing to do with Wikipedia's goals, and I think I have been clear in pointing out the problems with the text. Please read Wikipedia's policies on Verifiability and Neutral point of view. These are some of Wikipedia's core policies and are non-negotiable. You are very welcome and encouraged to contribute to Wikipedia if you follow these and other policies and guidelines. If you disagree with these policies and don't feel that your writing should be subject to them, then you are at the wrong place. KWH 06:51, 15 March 2006 (UTC) ---
"If you disagree with these policies " nice try. I like that. Obviously for everybody it is you who disagrees with Wikipedia. It is you who tries to prevent any information about the two hours when Rumsfeld had to act as a secretary of defense. Wikipedia readers would like to know about Rumsfeld. Even IF YOU were right in your judgement about what I wrote (you are not, and the above controvery about vandalism shows that people agree that my words are according to Wikipedia rules)
So EVEN IF you were right and my work must be banned:
your position would be a lot stronger if you could provide an alternative version what Rumsfel did to protect America.
You are unable to do that. You just try to censor the Wikipedia article. That is all. it is obvious. More in the next days. it will have consequences.
(BTW: no problem with the edition of my answers as you did it. Good edits and good discussion: no problem. We cann all improve. ) This was me again 84.159.122.234 15:31, 15 March 2006 (UTC) :-))
---
So many words to camouflage your censorship. If I would follow you I would say "Rumsfeld sat in his dining room with Cox and Wolfowitz together" - which is of no interest and meaning at all.
Notice: I do not say once: "R. is an evil man" like you try to insinuate in your newspaper example. I point out the MEANING of sitting in the dining room without further assessment. The MEANING is only deductable by showing the duties and opportunities of a secretary of defense. The comparison may be judged this or that way (critics-defenders).
Without both informations (dining - no interceptors) nobody can ever understand what Rumsfelds role was on 9/11. You should decide if you make the proposal to send me into the nirwana of another article or that you have no problems to write about Rumsfeld on the monring of 9/11.
For sure the subject needs to be placed HERE. It is about Rumsfeld. He sat on his hands - without any speculation. It is fact. You cannot deny it. So you try to censor what others here already agreed to. More about that later. —This unsigned comment was added by 84.159.83.226 ( talk • contribs) .
. Not too late for Happy Hour !
My offers to vandals and Censors
Answer a simple question first (yes/no): Is it important to know what the secretary of defense did on 9/11 to defend his country ?
If you answer YES, it is definetly necessary to put it into this encyclopdia
- restore my entry uncensored - restore my entry and edit it - make your own account what Rumsfeld did in these srucial hours
If you answer NO, these hours are of no interst for anybody
- remove the words of Armstrong about his first steps on the moon. They are only some words of an unimportant pilot some decades ago, and they lasted less than a minute. - Prepare for an edit war until the “Donald Rumsfeld” must be closed or - Let a third party decide what to do. Wikipedia community has wisdom enough to understand that it is impossible to hide that rumsfeld was sitting on his hands that morning. 84.159.119.16
Sec. Clarke - Well, the terrible moment was actually earlier at about 8:40, 8:45 when we realized a plane and then a second plane had hit the World Trade Center. And immediately the crisis management process started up. A couple of us had gone into the secretary's office, Secretary Rumsfeld's office, to alert him to that, tell him that the crisis management process was starting up. He wanted to make a few phone calls. So a few of us headed across the hallway to an area called the National Military Command Center. He stayed in his office. We were in these rooms maybe 200 feet away where we felt the concussion. We immediately knew it was something bad. We weren't sure what. When it first happened, we didn't know what it was. But again, all the wheels were in motion. Everybody was doing what they were supposed to be doing.
The secretary was in his office, really not that far away from the side of the building that got hit by the plane. He and another person immediately ran down the hallway and went outside and helped some of the people, some of the casualties getting off the stretchers, etc.
I 84.159.113.94 13:07, 20 March 2006 (UTC) took the quote, edited it a bit, and posted it in full length. It would be nice if you add the source of that quote, and I will add the source of the Bush quote.
I knew it would be possible to come together since I made my six proposals. Long live Wikipedia ! Mr. Admin:
Whatever you believe, if you love Mr. Rumsfeld or not, nobody cares. You stop vandalism. Okay. You look for a good impression of the wikipedia information. Okay.
But even if you were a Republican, if you were a Rumsfeldian I do not understand why you take out any information what Rumsfeld did on 9/11. It was the only day in his entire life when he could prove his abilities as secretary of DEFENSE (not “attack”). The crucial two hours of terror he did not do anything. That is a proven fact. And you sort it out.
WHY?
answer (A-E):
A) “Where is this proof”? Look for “Articles”.
B) “"nothing" in the hours following 911?” This is a wrong question because obviously I was not talking about the FOLLOWING hours but about the hours WHEN 9/11 occurred. And so it is obvious too that the issue is not NOTHING he did but “nothing about 9/11”
C) “he didn't do what you thought he should have done” This allegation makes the issue a personal problem between me and Rumsfeld. Which it is not. To make it cristal clear: What did you think he should have done? What does anybody think he should have done? I am so free to state: everybody expects the man responsible fpr defense to defend. Which includes: - go to the war room - confer with your generals, FBI, FAA, NORAD about the situation to get a picture - ask for the interseptors especially of Andrews AFB (“Where are they ? Why are they not been scrambled?” and so on) - make first decisions
D) conclusion “Wouldn't it be more accurate to say …” No, not at all. It is a fact that the two hours existed. If you do not want me to fill the description of this period of time feel free to do it yourself. YOU TELL US what he did when you have better information. My guess is you cannot tell the public that these two hours were not crucial in world history. Additionally you cannot find other information than that which I tried to provide.
E) So my question stands: WHY ? Why are you blocking ANY information about what Rumsfeld did in these hours ?
Yes . ka1iban, I like that edition very much now. It is to the point, written by a native speaker, concise. Just okay. The only thing I wanted is that these hours in his life are mentioned. Now every reader who is interested may go on, read more, conclude this or that - but he knows where Rumsfeld was and what he did. Tht`s all. Finish. Thank you. 84.159.113.94 20:57, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
This Text was removed: "Within 60 minutes of American Airlines Flight 11 striking the World Trade Center, Rumsfeld raised the defense condition signaling of the United States offensive readiness-to DefCon 3, the highest it had been since the Arab-Israeli war in 1973. [20] " Norad actions can not be pointed back to Rumsfeld. And even if the statement was true it was much too late. Remeber Andy Card saying "America is under attack" at 9:05.
Additionally: hijackings without any impacts in towers are under NORAD and Rumsfeld duties too. So the timeline for their failure begins at 8:13.
84.159.105.190
07:59, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
his text has again been removed:
I see that as soon as this text was added to the article, it appeared shortly thereafter on the cited site www.medienanalyse-international.de. I don't believe that this is coincidence, and shows that the site in question is a personal website which should not be used as a source per our policies and guidelines on verifiability and reliable sources. It appears that our policy on no original research and advertisement may also apply. It is believed that the events in question are (nominally) truly described (though the interpretation is subjective), but if this is to be included as a "controversy" then the existence of the controversy and interpretation must be shown by a citation which meets our standards. I was unable to find such a citation. KWH 06:11, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
1. The issue is: What did the secretary of defense do to defend his country. Nothing else, nothing less.
2. The issue is NOT this or that website allegedly "in question" and not that you are "unable" to do this or that.
3. The above text was widely agreed, it was the fith version after a long discussion. It was not at all my text, I am 84.159.124.241
4. Instead of adding information about what Rumsfeld did to defend his country you remove it. This is against all sense of Wikipedia. If you try to rely on Wikipedia rules try to understand them first.
5.What you are "unable" to find is widely described in the internet. I add two more sources to the text which are widely known and reliable. Do not dare to censor them again. Feel free to argue how Rumsfeld defended the U.S.A. in the morning of 9/11 when America was attacked.
And what do we read written by you:
“I've removed”
“I feel I'm justified.”
“If you don't like”
“hell, I hate the bastard”
“But this isn't the place to try and slander him or argue whether or not he did enough on 9/11.”
Exactly. I never used the word “enough”. My simple demand is an account what he DID on 9/11. Any judgement if this was ENOUGH can be done by the readers. I do not , NOT AT ALL , need any refernce to critics who say this or that. It was you who wanted to make the text neutral by mentioning critics. Instead of just telling: “Rumsfeld made some phone calls, R. met Senator Cox in the dining room, R. did not confer in the National Command Center, R. did not order the interceptors.”
“It's an online reference resource.”
YESYESYES ! When you want critics in the text then I offer you my favotite one. When you said it is not enough I offered you some more (and left out the italian, german, frendch websites). But again: I would prfer the pure facts without ANY reference to critics, without ANY judgement.
“going to be editing so much. “
I do not want to edit “so much”. I want a simple account what Rumsfeld did on 9/11 in the morning between 8:15 and 11:00. It is as if I were asking Wikipedia to give an account what a certain Neill Armstrong did when setting foot on the moon.
It is about the reliability of Wikipedia. Nobody cares if you hate bastards or if you are quoted and quoting or not. BTW, I am sure the website which you hate so much gets enough attention without Wikipedia, I must not advocate it.
The issue is Wikipedia and a fill account of Rumsfeld in the Rumsfeld section. It is not your guts and not me. 84.159.119.144 08:12, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
If the "I am done" means that you refraine from censoring the article and remove the version nr.6, it is okay and we save a lot of time. Feel free to add more information - but do not remove because of every-day-changing causes. I will keep an eye on it. It is my obstinacy, btw.
I think we should have a little more on his congressional career. What committees did he serve on? Did he vote for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, for example, etc. -- Blue387 08:58, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
Other people without an academic background in any subject that would suit them for work as Secretary of Defense have fulfilled their responsibilities adequately. However, Rumsfeld has been very active in pushing his own strategic decisions on the Joint Chiefs. Is there anything in his academic background that would have prepared him for performing this function? The article does not even say what his undergraduate major was, and it seems his only post-grad work was a brief stint in law school. P0M 00:16, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
I like the layout of the table, which details the reasons given by the six Generals as to why they would like Mr. Rumfeld to go. Very professional indeed! Wallie 13:22, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
it may be 'professional' (an odd characterization for an open-source pseudo-encyclopedia, but i digress), however it takes up an inordinate amount of space merely to reproduce seven quotes. it should be trimmed into a conventional list of quotes. it will take up less space. Anastrophe 07:15, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
an encyclopedia is supposed to be a clear, concise, NPOV source of information. not a current events depository. relative to his long career, the table betrays its bias/POV basis. it's a huge table created to display prominently exactly seven quotes. why? because it's a hot political topic....right now. in the scheme of history, and probably his legacy, compared to the descriptions of his past history and legacy, it's an absurd inflation of a current tempest. as it stands, i converted it to plain formatting of quotes, reducing to one the number of quotes attributed to easy person, and while it did reduce the space consumed, it's still way overblown - again, when taken against the overall entry of a political figure with a long career. it's called 'balance', and it's not there yet, by any stretch. Anastrophe 15:17, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I wanted to add this but I don't understand the table formatting. Wesley Clark is actually General #7 to come out in support of Rumsfeld's resignation, giving us 8 total. Can someone add Clark to the list? See here for details.- csloat 21:28, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
table removed. took up too much space for seven quotes. Anastrophe 07:37, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Salvador Option
Can you get back to Senator Kucinich on the
iraqi death squads thing? Thanks,
Okthen
16:01, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
This section should be removed or moved to Ray Mcgovern's own page becouse of its irrevelence to donald rumsfeld, and its obvios non-NPOV -- MadDogCrog 05:38, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
If it's news than let the researcher get the info from the newspaper. This is an Encyclopedia, ya, add the whole interview, and the interview on This Week that Mr. Mcgovern referenced-- MadDogCrog 08:39, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
The McGovern exchange was covered in all the national media and has remained an issue since then. It is notable and has been picked up in subsequent calls for his resignation. Homey 19:02, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
This area also seems to be a violation of of the Wikipedia NPOV. Either have republicans praise for Mr. Rumsfeld added, and also Praise from retired generals added . Even then I dont think they really belong. These sections should be deleted or moved to there own page.-- MadDogCrog 05:53, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Mr. Rumsfeld has been asked these same questions by the media a hundred times before, and has respoded to them with the same answers he gave Mr. McGovern. nothing new! And no security doing there job does not bother me, It's not Illegal for disrupters and protesters to get kicked outside, Then they can stand on there soapbox somewhere else if they want to. And the media can make there choice too . Mr Mcgovern was respectfull and so he was treated with respect. so again, Small footnote in Rumsfelds life (not a chapter). Raphael1 your bias shows in your comments. And I am not going to beat this dog till It's dead! So I will let it lie for now.--
MadDogCrog
08:13, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Though my political views probably come closer to Raphael1, I must agree with MadDogCrog's point on the relevance of the McGovern interview. It reads like a blog entry and it degrades the WP article as such. A more appropriate article for that info would be
Criticism_of_the_Iraq_War. That would also be a more appropriate place for the quotes from the generals. The Rumsfeld article would more appropriately mention the wide ranging criticism of the conduct of the war and link to it.--
Mikebrand
18:22, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Surely this isn't the only article in which a transcript is quoted. I don't see how a verbatim transcript of a brief exchange makes the article look like a blog entry given that no opinion has been added. 19:05, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
== Moved from Rumsfeld page (Needs review) The omission is obvious. Facts, witnesses, sources and especially logic say: Andrews AFB provides QRA (Quick Reaction Alert, the highest state of alert) for Washington D.C. QRA as part of air-policing is a NATO SOP, measurable in minutes (less than 15 minutes untill take-off).
"Within minutes of the attack American forces around the world were put on one of their highest states of alert - Defcon 3, just two notches short of all-out war - and F-16s from Andrews Air Force Base were in the air over Washington DC." [24]
The capital of the U.S.A., home of Pentagon, White House, Congress, Airforce #1 being protected from Cape Cod is ridiculous and simply not true. (/Needs review)
Somebody introduced a quote concerning the fighter jets and abilities/responsibilities on 9/11. By relying on the 9/11 commission he wants to let it appear as if Andrews AFB in Washington was NOT responsible for the airspace over Washington and as if Rumsfeld had no choice to adress the AFB in his very neighbourhood.
The impression is wrong. Andrew AFB WAs responsible AND had fighter jets in highest state of alarm. The colleague who always cuts out my comment concerning that fact may come here to discuss it. He may ask for more proof, he may improve my English, he may make proposals. Whatever. But do not remove facts which contradict the "official" legend only because the 9/11commission said so or so. The commission is wrong as it is in the case of "able danger" and dozens of other issues. 84.159.105.89 06:21, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
All this arguing over a few airplanes at Andrews - cf. NAS Oceana, which has more squadrons than Andrews has aircraft! Hopalong1
it was PoV and VERY anti-semitic.
In the Private career section:
I think I cleaned that up correctly. In doing the clean-up I tried to verify the information — but I could not! Any pointers that lead to citations would be welcome. -- Charles Gaudette 01:24, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I think for most people it goes with out saying that "Rummy" is not suitable for Wikipedia articles. It does appear on the Nixion Tapes. Elsewhere on the Intrernet and print media it is used either derogatory, or in levity, or both. Led "I'm a dude" Zeppelin321295 added "Rummy" to the lead identifier, I am reverting it back. I think, anyone placing "Rummy" — outside of a verifiable quote — should present their argument for including it on this Talk page first. -- Charles Gaudette 17:29, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The above was removed by someone else, I just wanted to make sure it was on the talk page. If someone can find reliable citations, it can go back in the encyclopedia article. If it was revealed under the Freedom of Information Act, then citing shouldn't be a problem. -- Charles Gaudette 17:16, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
This was posted by IP 85.146.85.61 (19:18, 26 July 2006), and it needs citation:
This might even just belong on the Aspartame article. Please find a reliable source ... and FDA paper online? Then give a persuasive rational for placing it in the Donald Rumsfeld article, here, on this Talk page first. -- Charles Gaudette 07:13, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
Hello Charles,
That was my ip address. I'm new to editing Wiki. Excuse the silly username ;-) ... That will become apparent when I start some fresh articles about DIY. Now on to the subject of Donald Rumsfeld.
I've spent several hours researching the internet to verify and find better sources for the text I added after reading several websites on Rumsfeld and aspartame. Boy, are good referenes hard to find... The actual report from the FDA, I could not find anywhere. After spending a few hours, I'm pretty much convinced it is not available anywhere online. I have however found an article that uses the correct references to the report in question:
I found another link to a clear timeline showing the start of the investigation and when Skinner 'left the building': http://www.taxtyranny.ca/images/HTML/Aspartame/Articles/Preapproval.doc (scroll down to "On January 10, 1977, FDA Chief Counsel Richard Merrill")
Again, no direct online links to the referenced documents, but I assume that the many references to files of the Congressional Records and of the U.S. Senate is as good as any reference... I read on the wiki pages that in these cases, the reference should point to the webpage where the relevant references were found (instead of only mentioning the relevant references themselves).
In this document named 'Preapproval' we learn that on July 1, 1977, U.S. Attorney Samuel Skinner left his job to work for the G.D. Searle law firm Sidley & Austin. And he's not alone: Skinner was replaced with Assistant U.S. Attorney William Conlon, who let the Statute of Limitations run out on the aspartame charges. Fifteen months later, Conlon accepted a job with the law firm representing G.D. Searle, Sidley & Austin. How on earth do two US Attorney's change jobs to go work for the law firm that represents the company under investigation? Or is it all just innuendo?
Please take your time to read several pages of the document about the period 1977-1985 in which Rumsfeld is CEO/President/Chairman of Searle. It's along read, but worthwhile. Apart from two US Attorneys leaving or failing to act at a crucial time, there are many more examples of very strong pressure in favour of getting aspartame to market. I'll cut and paste a small number of the pieces that I feel are relevant here:
As said before, Rumsfeld was hired by Searle in the beginning of 1977. One of the attorneys (Jim Turner, also mentioned in the above document) involved had a meeting with Rumsfeld and several scientists of Searle. Listen to the interview at: http://www.soundandfury.tv/pages.rumsfeld2.html
He tells how Rumsfeld took on the issue of getting Aspartame on the market: from a political point of view, not a medical one. The 'science' and 'investigation' done so far were heavily(!) flawed and the results that were reported to the FDA had been tampered with: some information was withheld and some of it was impossible to be true (mice in the experiment dying but reappearing later on in the results, alive and well). Rumsfeld was not interested in facts. He was just there to get the job done, so to speak.
So there is no question in my mind that Rumsfeld has used his (political) power to push aspartame to the market. I doubt it could have been done without him, or someone with the same large amount of influence.
Nobody can 'prove' that Rumsfeld as CEO of Searle was directly behind the career change of Skinner or that of the replacing U.S. Attorney, Conlon. I leave that to the reader to decide.
So, after reading a lot of info about the history of aspartame, the way in which Rumsfeld approached the problems of Searle and lead the company and after reading the current version of the wiki page, I decided to edit the page. As it already mentioned the following text
I decided to provide an example of the statement in the form of Skinner. I initially thought this whole story qualified to be mentioned in the chapter called 'Controversies' ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rumsfeld#Controversies), but then decided against a large edit of the Rumsfeld page and chose to simply add the example of Skinner. One could also 'move it' to the aspartame page, but what's the point in that? It concerns a major part of Rumsfeld's career.
My small addition about Skinner's career change is factual and verifiable. Without mentioning names, it was already mentioned in the version before my edit. So I see no reason not to re-edit it into the Rumsfeld page. -- DIY Freak 01:18, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Cheers, Hans.
See, the problem with this paragraph, to me, is that it seems POV while trying to pretend it's not POV... does that make sense? It's like it presents data in such a way that the reader has to come to the conclusion that the writer intended, instead of just putting the facts on the table and not drawing any inferences from them. It's an accumulation of paragraphs like these that make articles hopelessly slanted to one side. Is there a name for what I'm talking about? - Vontafeijos 13:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
See my response to Charles above. -- DIY Freak 01:18, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Diy Freak
First; 30 years later, Aspartame is safe. Second; the political and lobby effort from the sugar industry and its industry states was enormous, and was filled with just as much bad political backroom politics and backbiting. Just my $0.02!
Your editing had nothing about Rumsfeld's involvement in your edits accusations! Just innuendo! Sorry Diy Freak, but that was a poor edit. But I commend your hard work and research. Please see why your edit seems so POV in the Rumsfeld Article. That Information would possibly belong in the Aspartame article, I believe.
There are already so many POV trolls editing and protecting poor content in these articles. They just don’t have a clue how they are ruining Wikipedia as a reliable research tool. Which also is turning good editors away. Good Luck.
Vontafeijos
That I think would be called sophism. And Wiki is full of sophistic content! By the highly educated, and sophisticated. Pun intended. (Wikiophistic), (Wikifiction), ( Wikiflexure), ok I had my fun! The higher education system of most the planet is an infective virus! I am just a simple caveman with a simple mind.-- MadDogCrog 10:30, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Hi guys,
let's stay open and friendly, ok? I'm not a 'Sophist' and certainly not a troll. You are very quick to mention terms like these, since I've only been around for a few days... I'm not even American, neither do I have any affiliation with political parties either in the USA or my homeland. So I'm not going through the Wikipedia with an agenda, like some seem to be doing. I know... I could be Elvis Presley for all you know, but let's assume that I have good intentions. I think that is one of Wikipedia's principles/rules, isn't it?
MadDogCrog, The term 'sophism' has very little to do with higher education, which isn't all that bad or laughable as you seem to think.
Vontafeijos, "First; 30 years later, Aspartame is safe." See the Aspartame page and the history of 'testing' that was referenced in my previous post. I can only form a 'POV' on it, as I'm unable to verify medical claims or facts, so I see no point in discussing it.
But the main issue is... Please point out exactly where in my edit of the Rumsfelt page I introduce innuendo or POV to the Rumsfeld page. AFAIK, I'm only providing one example of the information already stated there. In other words, how can that be objectional?
Charles asked for citation. I believe I have found the proper references: files of the Congressional Records and of the U.S. Senate. Since my edit only consists of an example, I'd be happy to simply change the entire edit into: "for example, U.S. Attorney Samuel Skinner.", including one if the references above. Personally I, as a reader, would find it more useful to have a bit more background info instead of just a name coming out of nothing. That is why my original edit is a few lines instead of one name.
Now... If you guys feel that mentioning a name as an example is still too controversial, I, again, suggest we move the mentioning of aspartame to the 'Controversies' chapter. Still, why would you insist on that now instead of having it done in the past? Afterall, the information was already in there long before I added the example to it.
As for my previous lengthy post in this talk section concerning the aspartame timeline, I agree that most, if not all of it would probably fit better in the aspartame article. If I have time, I'll try to fit it in there if there is a need for it. The page seems to be pretty much up to date as it is now.
I've spent quite a bit of time on this. Please show me the same respect and consider the suggestions I have made. -- DIY Freak 23:14, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
So far no response from either Vontafeijos or MadDogCrog. Disappointing.
Charles, have you had time to think more about this to continue the discussion? -- DIY Freak 16:24, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone know why refs are showing up more than once? I can't figure it out. Rlevse 00:36, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Can those persons who have a distaste for Rumsfeld's being please refrain from vandalism in the main page. It ill becomes those of us who disagree with his politics to resort to statements such as 'RUMSFELD IS A WAR CRIMINAL'. Arguable, but belongs on the discussion page with accompanied facts. -- The Three Jays 01:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Scribner removed a section I rewrote on the controversy over whether Rumsfeld came into office wanting to invade Iraq. His reason for removing the section was that the source said "If these notes are accurate," which seems ham-handed to me: the section clearly stated that the comment was from notes. Certainly this controversy needs to be expressed in some form in the article. I'm reinstating the section, trying to better emphasize the incomplete nature of the information. If others have ideas on how to better represent the "hell-bent on war" accusation, go for it. But it does need to be in the article. !melquiades 19:06, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
Speculation would be, "The notes say X, therefore Rumsfeld planned to attack Iraq on Sep 11." The article was careful not to say any such thing — which is more than I can say for many of Rumsfeld's critics. The article did not speculate on the meaning of the notes; instead, it quoted them as they stand and characterized the debate surrounding them, I think accurately.
On sourcing: CBS obtained the notes and published them in the article in question, so they seem to be the best source we have. Note that secondary sources are not only allowed, but preferred: "In general, Wikipedia articles should not depend on primary sources but rather on reliable secondary sources who have made careful use of the primary-source material." ( WP:RS) That would be the CBS article, I believe. Or is does investigative journalism fall under special rules?
In any case, this needs to be addressed in some form in the article. Rumsfeld is often charged with coming to power with an agenda for invading Iraq, and this conversation is frequently cited in that debate. The article needs to address it, preferably by pointing out the incompleteness of the information on the conversation in question. The omission serves nobody. !melquiades 00:08, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Is he lying about his age? 1932 is a very long time ago. -- Soothsaya 09:02, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
I`d like to know who cut out this :
It is a rich information, comprehensive and all documented. So why take it out?
What is the source linking this to Rumsfeld? Pgc512 16:45, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
The "Calls for resignation" section was deleted because some editors did not think it was notable enough that a number of retired Generals publicly called for his resignation (something that has never before happened in US history). Now that the main newspapers of America's servicemen and women is also openly calling for his resignation, isn't it about time Wikipedia acknowledged the significance of this fact? Here's the editorial.-- csloat 08:43, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
No need to call for it, he just quit
Where is this being reported?
TacoDeposit
18:00, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
People won't top editing the article long enough to make a change! Let's state - his term isn't over yet - he has only announced plans to step down. He will do so when (and if, given a new congress) his replacement is confirmed. - Patstuart (talk) (contribs) 18:29, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Your're correct; Just to add, had Rumsfeld's resignation been immediate, I believe the Deputy Secy of Defence would have assumed the duties (as Acting Secy of Defence, until the Senate confirmed the Secy of Defence nominee). GoodDay 19:34, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
I added a small clause saying that it was months of criticism that effected Rumsfeld's decision to resign. Of course it was also the mental stress of the job (he would have been longest serving sec of def in a month). I added the clause because the section above about the Army Times article makes it seem like that is the only reason he resigned when in actuallity it was months of criticism from the public and Senators (ie. Clinton) for mainly not listening to his Generals and not providing enough troops to Iraq. REscano 22:19, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Please stop editing the word "Terrorists" to the generic "Men". Like it or not, they are both war-criminals, and terrorists. Using the generic terms implies that they were civilians. We're getting like, 10 vandalizations a minute, lets SP this mother already. Piuro 18:45, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
This needs much expansion, especially for Rumsfeld's first term of Secretary of Defense. This was the immediate post-Vietnam period and a hugely important time for the US military. At the moment, the "swine flu" episode gets double the text coverage of the post-Vietnam military reforms (which also may be key to why Rumsfeld was given the highest civilian award for his service in this period), and the insinuating/"suggestive" text about the mysterious scientist death gets almost as much prominence (claim about Rumsfeld's involvement in "response" comes across as possible OR too). The section current reads as if Rumsfeld did this sinister coverup and then this swine flu screwup and my god! he was awarded the highest honour despite this!. This section is too small and out of balance. (No, I am not a Republican or a conservative or even American) Bwithh 18:48, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
This article needs to be locked until further notice. I just took some nonsense out of it. Check the history. can you clean up the resignation part of the article if you are going to lock it and keep people from removing POV 69.140.73.128 20:03, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Hi, newbie here, just want to correct a typo:
>>ABB is a European engineering giant based in Zürich, Switzerland; formed through the merger >>between ASEA of Sweden and Brown Boweri of Switzerland.
That should read "Brown Boveri" of Switzerland (v, not w).
Nick
can someone tell me what rumsfelds religious faith is? Keltik31 22:02, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
just thought with a name ending in "feld" he may be jewish.
Keltik31
22:32, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
The introduction should begin defining what Rumsfeld is, the secretary of defense. The fact that he submitted his resignation is important, but not the defining factor of who this person is. I've changed the intro to reflect this. -- ZimZalaBim ( talk) 23:43, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
CNN just said Rumsfeld's resignation letter was accepted by Bush yesterday - November 7th, 2006 - CNN reported this specifically as a response to the question of when Rumsfeld actually steps down Bwithh 03:16, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
Well he isn't secretary anymore, and someone who is unblocked from editing needs to change that. It still says till present. Superbowlbound 22:08, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
He is still technically the secretary. He has resigned, but won't officially leave office until Robert Gates get confirmed. Until then, he's still in. Slinky317 12:06, 9 November 2006
This is true; however, someone has changed the sidebar stating that he served UNTIL November 9, 2006. The fact is that he will serve until a replacement (Gates?) has been confirmed by the Senate...—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 72.161.211.215 ( talk • contribs) .
We've fixed it multiple times, and we've embedded huge comments in the article begging people to leave it alone...the editors who insist on changing it are in a huge hurry to edit the article, don't look at the surrounding comments, or God knows what. I just fixed it for probably the 10th time. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 21:03, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
I am just concerned about protection of the article that currently appears on the main page in "in the news section". With featured articles on the main page there is a recomandation not to protect them so that new users can actually try the whole of Wikipedia. Is it not the same with other articles on the main page. I know the vandalsim is heavy right now, but still it always is with articles that appear on the main page. -- Jan.Smolik 21:59, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
It seems that the article could be cleaned up to flow more chronologically. For example, the part dealing with ABB and North Korea, which deals with an event from 1990 to 2001, is followed by his Reagan years, 1983-1984. Any one else agree? LinuxSneaker 01:51, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Rumsfeld was not Chairman Emeritus of the Carlyle Group from 1989-2005. Frank Carlucci was.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 67.113.229.219 ( talk • contribs) .
I removed this anon edit. It occured just before the page was sprotected so I guess it snuck through. From a brief look throught the edit history, this anon had made numerous reverted edits, most apparently not backed up by reliable sources and which appeared to violate NPOV. This particular edit is similar, without sources (disputed by who? etc) and is probably not NPOV either (to what end - are you implying they have sinister motives in saying they were tortured). Also, it doesn't make much sense in context of the paragraph either. As far as I can tell, the case is still ongoing and we don't mention it has been settled... Nil Einne 04:35, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
I readded some coments which were removed by an AOL proxy anon here, hopefully by accident. As there had been no new sub-headed comments, I simply added them to the bottom Nil Einne 12:39, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
The article said Evanston, three sources I found indicated Chicago, none Evanston. Anyone who can argue with thiw with could be my guest. And the reference to his previous generatoion German source was very POV and should not be as a source for geneology - put in in the later criticism of the man! -- Dumarest 22:43, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Well this is interesting. This AP bio says he was born in Evanston:
A NYTimes article from Saturday November 13, 1971 (which I can't provide a link for as it requires TimesSelect membership) says he was born in Chicago and attended New Trier High School in "suburban Evanston".
I think we can definitely say he was born in Cook County, Illinois. I'm inclined to stick with Chicago as that's what his official DoD and Congressional bios say. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 23:55, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Hart Seely in today's (Fr Nov 10 2006) LA Times: "Of course, ex-dentists and off-season lawn-care experts will spend the next 30 years warring over Rumsfeld's rightful Wikipedia entry." Rather condescending for someone whose main claim to fame is the challenging scholarly project of adding line breaks to Rumsfeld's press conference transcripts and presenting them as haiku. Definitely some warring in this talk section but who is the ex-dentist and who is the lawn-care expert? David Watson 23:41, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Someone put him under Worst Supporting Actor Razzie. Probably vandalism. Someone should remove it. -- 66.218.13.156 03:27, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Military/Industry history WikiProject
I removed this line from the awards section: Royal Order of the Intare, awarded by King Kigeli V of Rwanda. [1]
I am not sure if Rumsfeld was a founder of the PNAC as stated in the Clinton Years section. It is true that he cosigned a letter, but I have heard Kristol on a Colbert Report show distancing himself from Rumsfeld stating that Rumbsfeld was never a part of the PNAC.
I rewrote and re-referenced the swine flu section (the previous reference used did not mention Rumsfeld at all). I'm having trouble finding authoritative, substantive sources showing that Rumsfeld should take a major part of the blame for the decision. I found a single book source which recounts the accusation but not convincingly (comes across as rumour/insinuation, and does not provide sources). I will look further to see if there's any substance to this or if this should be removed entirely Bwithh 23:30, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
"and stands to become the longest-serving Secretary of Defense if he remains until December."
This quote is not true since Robert McNamara was the longest serving Secretary of Defense serving from January 21st 1961 until February 29th 1968, which is seven years and one month, and by December Donald Rumsfeld will have served from January 20th 2001 until December 2006 which would only be five years and 11 months. So Robert McNamara would still be the longest serving Secretary of Defense. Also, Casper Weinberger would be the second longest serving Secretary of Defense serving from January 21st 1981 until November 23rd 1987, which would be six years and 10 months. So to correct the quote you would say that by December Donald Rumsfeld will become the third longest serving Secretary of Defense. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mkluge ( talk • contribs) 00:32, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Per [31], he will remain in the office until the official swearing-in ceremony. The date for that has not yet (as of Dec 6) been announced. Who knows, maybe it will be after December 29? I know lots of folks want him gone, myself included, (heck, they've already started taking his pictures down at the Pentagon [32]), but let's not jump the gun in the encyclopedia. A little decorum, perhaps?
I'll change the page back. 216.46.98.249 23:49, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
On 911 Rumsfeld said: " Go massive. Sweep it all up. Things related and not. He also said: "Judge whether good enough hit S.H." (Saddam Hussein)… I've noticed that his misconduct on that day was pointed before… I'm not sure why this isn't reflected in the article? Lovelight 23:10, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
Silly rabit: news organizations don't "take positions". They report things! If there was a survey done, then cite that! Otherwise, you are being confused and imprecise. Capisce? —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCO ( talk • contribs) 23:35, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
I disagree with the wording. It is an overly simplistic (and sort of jarringly off) way of stating something. My point is that news organizations don't make judgements or issue opinions as entities. They don't make proclomations. They're not really actors or even historians. They are reporters. And they're not monolithic. For instance if one story or editorial or what have you says something, than it is not like a press release of the entire organization's opinion.
Also (different point) if you actually go to the references, you will see that even the original statements, themselves, are more nuanced. The BBC peice says "probably", not "the" most controversial. And the the ABC peice is even more caveated, saying "possibly" most controversial.
Third different point: Also, if you want to actually think about the issue, ITSELF, look into McNamara and the intense culture clash that his "wiz kids" had with the uniformed military in the 60s as well as the much more notable protest from the nation overall to the VN war as opposed to recent mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Also, I don't have living memory of it, but there were some big fiascos with some of the early DoDers (one of them even having "the revolt of the Admirals").
I'll think about putting something up, that at least expresses the main concept more fairly. However, I'm not sure I will. Wikipedia is so geared to edit wars and meme building. Also, it does NOT generally have the quality that I expect from real quality written articles (in writing or logic). TCO ( talk) 17:03, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
It's an improvement. Still think it gives too much of a "the orginazation states" when it's really some guy wrote a profile and it says (and maybe we find some other profile that doesn't say, etc.) I mean it's not like a survey of historians was done. Or of the newsroom. It's just some profile writer. Not even as good as an individual historian. That said, I agree that Rumsfeld has been controversial. (Although it's amazing that we always rate the most recent as the most notable.) Any way, no biggie. —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCO ( talk • contribs) 00:00, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
I listed two other times when there was SIGNIFICANT dispute between the military and the civilian DOD leadership over it. Also the social protest was much higher during the VN war than recently. TCO ( talk) 14:21, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
Even if you hate the guy and don't care about objectivity, it's actually counterproductive to writes stuff like this:
"Astroturf Generals In 2008 the New York Times reported that Rumsfeld responded to the Generals Revolt by using a number of high ranking retired members of the Military as puppets."
The whole article has too much the tone of a college dorm room writing an argument. This is not something that you would see in Brittanica or a real magazine or newspaper article. The word choiceage and just lack of giving the subject of the biography some dispassion is eVIDENT. People coming to this and reading it WILL SEE IT. So all you're really doing is writing articles amongst yourselves to express and crystalize and evaluation. Rather than a description. TCO ( talk) 13:47, 20 July 2008 (UTC)
Honestly, all you people aren't paying attention to the evolution of news media these days. News outlets are decidedly slanted in our time. Note that news outlets endorse candidates. Note Fixed News (oops, I meant Fox News is slanted right (no matter what they say) and all of the NBC nets are decidedly left. I could go on with the Washington Post and the New York Times. They all pick sides. The article, as I see it, presents facts with quotes and factual information. If the writer has a dog in the hunt, it's almost impossible these days to keep that dog from barking. It's just the way it is. But to say that the news media is objective is a fairy tale and no longer applies to American news media. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cleavetoo ( talk • contribs) 05:16, 17 September 2008 (UTC)
How notable are these, they seem like political theater? The German case was dismissed as soon as it got in front of the judge. I would like to remove all but a sentence or two about these lawsuits. Any objections? CENSEI ( talk) 16:19, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
Since there seems to be some opposition to removing this section, would anybody object to a content fork? We can create a separate article called "Lawsuits against Donald Rumsfeld" where we could move the overwhelming majority of the section, so that the article retains a sense of proportion as to his accomplishments without Wikipedia losing material. RayAYang ( talk) 06:57, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Donald Rumsfeld/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Caution - Not neutral.
Repetitive mentioning that "He had not served in combat". Pictures that show him shake hands with Saddam and other negative leaders. -- No mention of him personally donating $250,000 for a 911 monument. No mention of his numerous flights to Iraq, and Afghanistan, going to front line units on visits and putting himself at risk. No mention of him being an instructor pilot in the USN. -- All positives are ‘minimized’ rhetorically while all negative aspects are coincidentally emphasized. That is poor objective writing. This article is subtly biased. |
Last edited at 07:48, 2 October 2006 (UTC). Substituted at 20:26, 3 May 2016 (UTC)
![]() | This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
"Donald Henry Rumsfeld (born July 9, 1932) was the 21st United States Secretary of Defense, since January 20, 2001, under President George W. Bush."
"Having served under President Gerald Ford, he is both the youngest and oldest Secretary of Defense
e was BOTH he was secretary under 2 different administrations Tomgreeny 18:24, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
In "(AB, 1954)", what does "AB" mean? -- Mpt 18:38, 2 May 2004 (UTC)
Some of the schools in that time period and before reversed the abbreviation-- if Princeton did that then AB is right and perhaps AB could be linked to an explanation that it's a bachelor's degree
It seems to me that "quotes" in a wikipedia article are supposed to be clever or witty things a person has said. Not these bizarre, damning, selected quotations with square brackets and so forth. They make the article look awkward and blatantly biased. user:J.J.
I wouldn't hesitate to include infamous quotes if they were really important (Chamberlain's "Peace in our time", for example). While I suspect the quotes currently selected for Rumsfeld are part of a subtle hatchet job, he did say them and they are of interest. I guess the counter-balance is to find some more positive/brilliant quotes. -- M4-10 18:51, 8 May 2004 (UTC)
Excellent page, well done to all concerned. -- bodnotbod 13:54, May 9, 2004 (UTC)
This page is has a decidedly "anti-Rumsfeld" lean which should be obvious, even to the casual observer. --JR
Abugraib was unacceptable-- but was a war-crime only in the eyes of a rabid Lefty.
Saddam Hussein committed REAL torture, how come you don't talk about that?
More lies from the Left, that's why.
128.138.96.17 03:37, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
Rumsfeld is a war criminal. How come the article doesn't mention this? -- 24.200.35.253 23:54, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
There's far too much detail about Abu Ghraib in here IMO. The stuff about what he knew, when, doesn't need to be here especially considering that it's all breaking news changing day by day anyway. Especially considering that there is almost no other info about his military campaigns. There wasn't even any mention that he ran the Iraq War at all until I just added it. Mdchachi| Talk 15:55, 11 May 2004 (UTC)
For what I have understood, "war criminal" is a legal notion. Rumsfeld has not yet been trialed and found guilty of being a war criminal. Casting a moral judgement is one thing, legal matters are another. Rama 16:42, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
still, Abu Ghraib was a big thing, and at least deserves plenty of attention.
AndrewAL
22:29, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
On June 17, 2004, Rumsfeld admitted during a news conference that he had personally ordered two prisoners to be concealled from the International Committee of the Red Cross, one at Camp Cropper, at the instigation of CIA chief George Tenet - in apparent violation of the Geneva Convention.
Where is the evidence that this violated the Geneva Convention? Who was the prisoner and do we know if the Geneva Convention applied in his case, i.e., was he a legal combatant captured wearing the uniform of a signatory nation? Because if he wasn't, the Geneva Convention explicity states he would not be protected under the Geneva Convention. TimShell 08:45, 12 Sep 2004 (UTC)
"Persons protected by the Convention are those who, at a given moment and in any manner whatsoever, find themselves, in case of a conflict or occupation, in the hands of a Party to the conflict or Occupying Power of which they are not nationals." -Part 1, Article 4, GCIV
Kevin Baas | talk 17:38, 2004 Oct 5 (UTC)
Perhaps the 'Articles' section should provide some sort of disclaimer or notification that some of the articles linked to are POV. - Fogger 22:10, 7 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Is it just me, but there is no mention of his military service, considered for both John Kerry, and President Bush there are extensive sections, shouldn't there be even a basic mention of Rumsfeld's Service in the US Navy? PPGMD
Mr Rumsfelds' Naval survice was "truncated". Therefore the original mention of "three Calander years of Navy service". It seems that he, Mr. Rumsfeld wast TAD on an U.S. Army Post. His personal actions toward a "femail U.S. Army person" was not appreciated. A complaint was made and Mr. Rumsfeld was then in "hac" for his personal actions to the young U.S.Army person. Should this complaint have gone to Courts Marshal, it was likely tolead to a conviction! So he used his influence and exited the Navy quietly through the side door. My source was a serving Army Person from that Army Base. I find no reason to believe that he lied or had anything to gain by such a disclosure. S// G.E. Anderson USMC Serial :1054898 FMF Korea 1950/51
Mmmh. Perhaps you don't care, but you've just violated Wikipedia's policy against personnal attacks. Remember that repeat violations will get you blocked, or banned altogether.
As for the rest, I will not answer to personal attacks that try to bring in irrelevant factors to the issue at hand. David.Monniaux 15:56, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I was about to make a similar remark, but David beat me to it. Perhaps we might want to focus on the discussion and let othe factors aside. Rama 16:04, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Keetoowah, why do I get the felling that you are just some angry person who hates people??? ps. watching an angry investment banker argue with a genius is fun.
The two tables, located near the end of this article (Preceeded By) are quite confusing. Can someone who understands the intent improve the organisation? -- Philopedia 30 June 2005 10:11 (UTC) Wow what a childish non-debate. You should probably grow-up and cut France a break, they gave you the STATUE OF LIBERTY, be nice or they might take it back!
If I'm not mistaken, Donald Rumsfeld was a professor at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School during the late 70s. If correct, this ought to be taken up under privat career. Can anyone confirm. -- Philopedia 30 June 2005 10:11 (UTC)
His biography on defenselink.mil fails to mention that. If he dropped out of law school and doesn't have a PhD, it's safe to say that he was probably never a professor at Princeton.
What is the second from last quote in the list:
"...or the people who attacked the United States in New York, shot down the plane over Pennsylvania and attacked the Pentagon" (a possible slip up refering to the September 11, 2001 attacks [2])"
...supposed to mean. Am I, the reader, to believe that this is some kind of evidence of the truth of a wacko conspiracy proving the government actually shot down the plane and that the statement wasn't a simple gaffe in the same vein as when people inadvertently refer to the "9-11 WTC 'bombing'"? The quote is obviously simply one of Rummy's many phrasing flubs and is entirely non-notable. I will remove if there is no counter argument. -- Deglr6328 07:22, 3 October 2005 (UTC)
Counter argument: Should be kept as evidence of his verbal incompetence.
That's hardly a relevant argument. It was a mistake.
And the word "possible" clearly shows it was the author's intent to troll
I did a little cleaning up and and added a "Controversy" section. Can't believe there wasn't one before. BTW, major kudos to whoever is maintaining this page. Palm_Dogg 04:17, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
I am a registered independent, supported the Iraq War, and I am no fan of Rumsfeld. The Iraq War was controversial from the start, and Abu Ghraib is a sub-controversy of the same. Both deserve mention here, because Rumsfeld is a key figure in both. However, both deserve their own pages and details of Rumsfeld’s involvement and criticisms belong on those pages, specially sense no completely objective analysis is still possible.
One organization that tries to find a court to accuse Rumsfeld as a war criminal doesn't make a significant controversy. Such an item would belong in a book long biography. Mentioning it here is an attempt by his detractors to legitimize their accusations, where no court will. Its mere mention here is biased. It would be more appropriate to mention it an the Abu Ghraib page. User:IndependentThinker 00:16, 25 October 2005 (UTC)
why is his wife the former Joyce Pierson? is Pierson her maiden name? was she married before? to whom?
if it's her first marriage then maybe Joyce nee Pierson??? Wikipedia must have a style rule for this. But former sounds like she changed bodies
I was bemused by it as well, but took it as a synonym for 'late' as in deceased. Can someone who knows what was meant by it please clarify that sentence. Far Canal 06:45, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
FYI, it does not mean "late" as in "deceased." It's just an older way of giving her maiden name, commonly used in the United States until the '80's or so. The idea was that before she was married, her "public" name was Joyce Pierson, and after marriage, it was Mrs. Donald Rumsfeld. If you were sending her mail, you'd have addressed the mail to Mrs. Donald Rumsfeld. References to her in a newspaper or magazine article would have been likely to have included a sentence informing readers that Mrs. Rumsfeld was "the former Joyce Pierson." You don't see this type of writing very much any more (if at all), and Wikipedia may well have a style rule on the subject.
why was he given it. And following the swine flu discussion it comes out of the blue
sub-section proposed:
Some critics say Rumsfelds conduct in the morning of 9/11 might be inadequate to the duties of a secretary of defense. The allegations reach from `criminal negligence` to complicity and cover his duties as a political leader and as a military commander. [3]
The criticism to the transition of the military and society (mentioned above, see chapter `G.W. Bush Administration) was to be expected. So Andrew Krepinevich, Executive Director, before the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities testified already in 1999 "One may conclude that, in the absence of a strong external shock to the United States—a latter-day “Pearl Harbor” of sorts—surmounting the barriers to transformation will likely prove a long, arduous process." [4]
`The expression `Pearl Harbor´was used by Rumsfeld himself too 9.August 2001: “Rumsfeld further gave the game way by warning of the "increasing vulnerability of the US" to a "Pearl Harbor in space". [5]
As Bob Woodward informed us in "America's Chaotic Road to War" (Washington Post), "Bush tries to keep a daily diary of his thoughts and observations. That night, he dictated: "The Pearl Harbor of the 21st century took place today." [6]
In the morning of 9/11 Rumsfeld did not what his critics judge as being adequate to "the Pearl Harbor of the 21st century". Documents show that Rumsfeld got the information about the ongoing hijackings and that he then decided to take his breakfast with Wolfowitz and Senator Cox. [7]
So he was not present in the `war room´(National Command Center, about 300 feet from his office), he did not confer with his generals, with the FAA, with NORAD. Critics point out that he did not care for the scrambling of the jet fighters of Andrews Airforce Base, 10 miles away from the Pentagon. This missing of direct information of interceptors doing the so-called àir policing´ added up to the lack of information by his staff caused by his absense.
So no decisions were taken by him untill about 10:30. When Bush -25 minutes after getting the information "America is under attack" finally spoke to the press at 9:30, Rumsfeld still had breakfast with Senator Cox. [8]
Defenders of Rumsfeld argue
- he was not informed about the hijackings. (This is not true proven by fact, logic and law.)
- he was not responsible: as a political leader he had not to care for military duties (This is false again. If the standard operational procedures to scramble fighter jets fail it is the job of the superiors to ask why. In case of a `normal´ hijacking Rumsfeld would have to take decisions about release of prisoners, sending money, saving atomic plants, phoning Castro or whatever. Together with the president and vice-president or alone. His first duty is to be well informed in general and especially by the inspection of the hijacked plane by `his´ interceptors.)
- it was a police job to care for hijackings or a military job on low, local level (completely wrong: how could anybody know that the attacks were not the preliminaries of an all out war ?)
- he was misjudging the situation ( like the statement of Wolfowitz "There didn't seem to be much to do about it immediately" [9] .But the opportunities to act otherwise are already pointed out. A misjudgement of a leader in this position by being not informed can be called criminal negligence)
- he was so shocked and unprepared that he could not act appropiately to the crisis (the MASCAL plan [10] shows how exactly Pentagon officials were prepared. The PENREN Pentagon Renovation ptrogramme was to be finished five days later for the wedge where AA77 plugged in. Hundreds of firefighters, police, paramedics and camerateams knew exactly what to do after the first impact, without having any foreknowledge about hijackings. Hundreds of millions of TV watchers knew already that the situation is critical and asked if the impacts must happen completely unhindered. `Jumpers´ knew what to do. They chose death when Rumsfeld chose breakfast.)
- he did not know how to react since the impacts of the four planes were so fast.
( This statement implies a thought from the aftersight: the knowledge of the attacks ending with Unuted 93. How could any commander know that ? At least after Andy Card stated “Amaerica is under attack” the plausibility check was done that hijacked planes – 3 at that time – impact into symbols of the U.S.A. –2 at that time. But should we not assume that the staff of Bush and the Pentagon officials had no foreknowledge that there was no more attack was to come ? How did they know: that`s all ?)
Critics and defenders both agree that the skies over the U.S.A. were full with interceptors in the afternoon and the following days. But this is not the subject of this argument.
I want to add that Rumsfeld didn't sign the cards for dead soldiers families in Iraq and that he had a machine do it. I don't know if I can find it considering this was 1-2 years ago and briefly showed on the news. Can someone find and add it?
JJstroker 03:06, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
Is there ANY basis for this claim? I can't find confirmation of it anywhere... ka1iban 21:47, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
That's exactly why it's controversial..
Project2501a
23:59, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
Interestingly evcen the discussion is vandalized. But whoever does it: you will never stop the information: ANDREWS AFB is existing 10 miles from Washington. 2 squarons of fighters there. 2 fighters have ben in QRA mission (24h a day alert, ready to scramble within 10 minutes). And RUMSFELD KNOWS THAT AND DID NOTHING to ask why the SOP to scramble these fighters failed.
Besoides: even unarmed fikghtes would have been able to provide informations. If they got scrambled. 84.159.87.12 19:35, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
I thought it was rather relevant that on 9/11, Secretary Rumsfeld was helping to carry injured people out of the Pentagon. It's the most important recent event in our country. Shouldn't what he did on that day be included?
Isn't this the full text of the quote? the tail end of the phrase "not with the army you WISH you had" was removed a few days ago, but I believe he said all of it. A Google search or two could confirm it... ka1iban 16:54, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
---
Actually, I don't need to...I just restored it to how it was before.
It appears that the page has been vandalized. I have put up a little notice.
Some mention of the rumsfeld doctrine needs to be made, to refrence the page refering to it --maximusnukeage
I reverted the image to an earlier version. The white background just doesn't go along with the whitespace on the page. -- Jiang, Talk 06:25, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)
The Kissinger quote isn't in the cited source. Could somebody try to clarify it, or find a better source?
No "edit war"? Good. I had the impression before. Now I will follow most of your advice. In my opinion the so-called "neutral" sentences like "Some critics have also argued that Rumsfeld" sound like bad jokes in comparison to what must be said. But "no war" - so I will rewrite it. About two days from now. This was me
84.159.92.83
17:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
And I will agree not to post in "career" - but I am not at all convinced not to do it. It is the top and turning point of his career. So I urgently ask you to open a section "9/11 - just for now as a part of the section "controversies". Have a nice weekend." "
I agree. Took out the vandalism allegation here. Posted a new version under `controversies`. Know that it is hard stuff - and I am very much looking forward what defenders might say and argue. It is me again 84.159.84.217 10:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC) Have a good day and please post the section as son as possible. I do not find more neutralty than I put in. Defenders can only argue more when they see the allegations and the quotes. ---
Five days later now. I offered my 9/11 section here in the `discussion`and nobody discusses it. I see no edits. So I understand that I can post it into the article without being vandalized again.
Thank you for the flowers. i do not fear any discussion and edits. Especially I hope that information about the subject flourishes. If aspects get another note - why not ? The only thing which makes me feel uneasy is getting erased. This day and this man are too important not to shade a light on it.
Thank you for your offer to help in registration. If it gets necessary I will adress it.
I have removed the following content:
The first paragraph uses weasel words to attribute a viewpoint to nebulous 'critics'. Please provide a credible and verifiable source for these claims. The second sentence is also an uncited claim.
This paragraph also attributes a viewpoint to nebulous 'critics'. It also presses a point of view in referring to Rumsfeld as "taking his breakfast", which none of the official sources describe.
Again, nebulous 'critics'. "so-called" air policing. These are opinions which must be sourced.
All the sources cited on the "alternative theory" site [16] seem to indicate that the breakfast with Cox ended sometime between 9am and 9:30am, if it matters. Most of that "research" seems to be a whole lot of confirmation bias.
What's left appears to be verifiable, though may need some grammar work. KWH 08:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
So my friens- what kind of discussion is this ? You REMOVE the whole text instead of asking me to prove this or that word, this or that allegation. Do you call such behaviour a discussion ? Imagine you would silence me in a public discussion and then, here in the private, "explain" why you silenced me ....
I expect YOU now to restore the text - I did my best several times. You are urged now to integrate what YOU demanded to know. "Weasel words", because YOU do not know, because YOU do not read the quotations. So here is the nebulous critic No.1: "Paul Hellyer, former National Defense Minister of Canada:... Why did the President just sit in the schoolroom when he heard the news? Why did he not acknowledge that he already knew what was going on? As a former Minister of National Defense, when the news came out I had to wonder. Why did airplanes fly around for an hour and a half without interceptors being scrambled from Andrews [Air Force Base]? Is it Andrews right next to the capitol?" [17]
Oh I see my friend- you trust "official sources" only. This is a so-called `circulus viciosus´ since "official sources" are not very eager to feed controversies in Wikipedia. But to make you happy I have an official one: "At 9 a.m. EDT Tuesday, as a hijacked Boeing 767 slammed into the World Trade Center, I was in the Pentagon in the private dining room of the Secretary of Defense. Don Rumsfeld, the Secretary, and Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Secretary, and I were discussing how to win votes for the Bush defense plan that is now pending in the House and Senate." [18] I must admit that I do not know hat they had, coffe or tea. There is no official source for that. I only know: they are not sitting in the "war room" nor in an office but in the morning in the private dinig room. If you believe private dining rooms are command centers I cannot help you any more. But you ask for "weasily critics" again. Her is no 2. Mr. Meacher was minister in the Blair government. "The war on terror is a bogus" he writes, and read what he writes about the missing jet fighters: [19]
And again from me: I will add some more "nebulous critics" later. But what you call "opinion" is fact. You spread your opinions here. A fact is: there were no fighter jets from Andrews AFB. How shall I prove something which nobody has seen in the air? If your opinion is that there were jet fighters please be so kind and tell us which interceptors were there to saveguard Washington D.C. And about "air policing": it is a NATO terminus technicus. If you do not know what it is - although the word explains itself and although the AFBs having interceptors to be scrambled can were discussed in teh internet it is YOUR problem. Now I am going to stop arguing. First I want the artile to be restored, if you want with edits and the above quotes. But do not try to censor "controversies" by eliminating them and launch meta-discussions. I do not fear the discussion, as you see. But the subject of discussion must be existent. Be aware that YOU showed that YOU are not informed and that I try to fill in the needed informations. Ask me, no problem. But do not remove informations which were unknown to you. The sources "seem to indicate" ? Is this the kind of quote you prefer ? You do not quote anything, it is just a pure allegation. in comparison I quote her Mr. Cox: "...and I were discussing how to win votes for the Bush defense plan that is now pending in the House and Senate. When minutes later, the Pentagon itself was hit..." As you may notice there is no remark that indicate that he stopped discussion before the "minutes later"-event. As you said "if it matters" For sure it does not matter even if you were right. Especially it does not matter as a cause to remove all the work I have done. Be ashamed. That matters. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.159.94.197 ( talk • contribs)
Please note that it is incredibly confusing for you to interject your comments within my message, as I can hardly even tell who's talking. I have copied them above, probably mostly intact.
I won't respond to your individual points as they have nothing to do with Wikipedia's goals, and I think I have been clear in pointing out the problems with the text. Please read Wikipedia's policies on Verifiability and Neutral point of view. These are some of Wikipedia's core policies and are non-negotiable. You are very welcome and encouraged to contribute to Wikipedia if you follow these and other policies and guidelines. If you disagree with these policies and don't feel that your writing should be subject to them, then you are at the wrong place. KWH 06:51, 15 March 2006 (UTC) ---
"If you disagree with these policies " nice try. I like that. Obviously for everybody it is you who disagrees with Wikipedia. It is you who tries to prevent any information about the two hours when Rumsfeld had to act as a secretary of defense. Wikipedia readers would like to know about Rumsfeld. Even IF YOU were right in your judgement about what I wrote (you are not, and the above controvery about vandalism shows that people agree that my words are according to Wikipedia rules)
So EVEN IF you were right and my work must be banned:
your position would be a lot stronger if you could provide an alternative version what Rumsfel did to protect America.
You are unable to do that. You just try to censor the Wikipedia article. That is all. it is obvious. More in the next days. it will have consequences.
(BTW: no problem with the edition of my answers as you did it. Good edits and good discussion: no problem. We cann all improve. ) This was me again 84.159.122.234 15:31, 15 March 2006 (UTC) :-))
---
So many words to camouflage your censorship. If I would follow you I would say "Rumsfeld sat in his dining room with Cox and Wolfowitz together" - which is of no interest and meaning at all.
Notice: I do not say once: "R. is an evil man" like you try to insinuate in your newspaper example. I point out the MEANING of sitting in the dining room without further assessment. The MEANING is only deductable by showing the duties and opportunities of a secretary of defense. The comparison may be judged this or that way (critics-defenders).
Without both informations (dining - no interceptors) nobody can ever understand what Rumsfelds role was on 9/11. You should decide if you make the proposal to send me into the nirwana of another article or that you have no problems to write about Rumsfeld on the monring of 9/11.
For sure the subject needs to be placed HERE. It is about Rumsfeld. He sat on his hands - without any speculation. It is fact. You cannot deny it. So you try to censor what others here already agreed to. More about that later. —This unsigned comment was added by 84.159.83.226 ( talk • contribs) .
. Not too late for Happy Hour !
My offers to vandals and Censors
Answer a simple question first (yes/no): Is it important to know what the secretary of defense did on 9/11 to defend his country ?
If you answer YES, it is definetly necessary to put it into this encyclopdia
- restore my entry uncensored - restore my entry and edit it - make your own account what Rumsfeld did in these srucial hours
If you answer NO, these hours are of no interst for anybody
- remove the words of Armstrong about his first steps on the moon. They are only some words of an unimportant pilot some decades ago, and they lasted less than a minute. - Prepare for an edit war until the “Donald Rumsfeld” must be closed or - Let a third party decide what to do. Wikipedia community has wisdom enough to understand that it is impossible to hide that rumsfeld was sitting on his hands that morning. 84.159.119.16
Sec. Clarke - Well, the terrible moment was actually earlier at about 8:40, 8:45 when we realized a plane and then a second plane had hit the World Trade Center. And immediately the crisis management process started up. A couple of us had gone into the secretary's office, Secretary Rumsfeld's office, to alert him to that, tell him that the crisis management process was starting up. He wanted to make a few phone calls. So a few of us headed across the hallway to an area called the National Military Command Center. He stayed in his office. We were in these rooms maybe 200 feet away where we felt the concussion. We immediately knew it was something bad. We weren't sure what. When it first happened, we didn't know what it was. But again, all the wheels were in motion. Everybody was doing what they were supposed to be doing.
The secretary was in his office, really not that far away from the side of the building that got hit by the plane. He and another person immediately ran down the hallway and went outside and helped some of the people, some of the casualties getting off the stretchers, etc.
I 84.159.113.94 13:07, 20 March 2006 (UTC) took the quote, edited it a bit, and posted it in full length. It would be nice if you add the source of that quote, and I will add the source of the Bush quote.
I knew it would be possible to come together since I made my six proposals. Long live Wikipedia ! Mr. Admin:
Whatever you believe, if you love Mr. Rumsfeld or not, nobody cares. You stop vandalism. Okay. You look for a good impression of the wikipedia information. Okay.
But even if you were a Republican, if you were a Rumsfeldian I do not understand why you take out any information what Rumsfeld did on 9/11. It was the only day in his entire life when he could prove his abilities as secretary of DEFENSE (not “attack”). The crucial two hours of terror he did not do anything. That is a proven fact. And you sort it out.
WHY?
answer (A-E):
A) “Where is this proof”? Look for “Articles”.
B) “"nothing" in the hours following 911?” This is a wrong question because obviously I was not talking about the FOLLOWING hours but about the hours WHEN 9/11 occurred. And so it is obvious too that the issue is not NOTHING he did but “nothing about 9/11”
C) “he didn't do what you thought he should have done” This allegation makes the issue a personal problem between me and Rumsfeld. Which it is not. To make it cristal clear: What did you think he should have done? What does anybody think he should have done? I am so free to state: everybody expects the man responsible fpr defense to defend. Which includes: - go to the war room - confer with your generals, FBI, FAA, NORAD about the situation to get a picture - ask for the interseptors especially of Andrews AFB (“Where are they ? Why are they not been scrambled?” and so on) - make first decisions
D) conclusion “Wouldn't it be more accurate to say …” No, not at all. It is a fact that the two hours existed. If you do not want me to fill the description of this period of time feel free to do it yourself. YOU TELL US what he did when you have better information. My guess is you cannot tell the public that these two hours were not crucial in world history. Additionally you cannot find other information than that which I tried to provide.
E) So my question stands: WHY ? Why are you blocking ANY information about what Rumsfeld did in these hours ?
Yes . ka1iban, I like that edition very much now. It is to the point, written by a native speaker, concise. Just okay. The only thing I wanted is that these hours in his life are mentioned. Now every reader who is interested may go on, read more, conclude this or that - but he knows where Rumsfeld was and what he did. Tht`s all. Finish. Thank you. 84.159.113.94 20:57, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
This Text was removed: "Within 60 minutes of American Airlines Flight 11 striking the World Trade Center, Rumsfeld raised the defense condition signaling of the United States offensive readiness-to DefCon 3, the highest it had been since the Arab-Israeli war in 1973. [20] " Norad actions can not be pointed back to Rumsfeld. And even if the statement was true it was much too late. Remeber Andy Card saying "America is under attack" at 9:05.
Additionally: hijackings without any impacts in towers are under NORAD and Rumsfeld duties too. So the timeline for their failure begins at 8:13.
84.159.105.190
07:59, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
his text has again been removed:
I see that as soon as this text was added to the article, it appeared shortly thereafter on the cited site www.medienanalyse-international.de. I don't believe that this is coincidence, and shows that the site in question is a personal website which should not be used as a source per our policies and guidelines on verifiability and reliable sources. It appears that our policy on no original research and advertisement may also apply. It is believed that the events in question are (nominally) truly described (though the interpretation is subjective), but if this is to be included as a "controversy" then the existence of the controversy and interpretation must be shown by a citation which meets our standards. I was unable to find such a citation. KWH 06:11, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
1. The issue is: What did the secretary of defense do to defend his country. Nothing else, nothing less.
2. The issue is NOT this or that website allegedly "in question" and not that you are "unable" to do this or that.
3. The above text was widely agreed, it was the fith version after a long discussion. It was not at all my text, I am 84.159.124.241
4. Instead of adding information about what Rumsfeld did to defend his country you remove it. This is against all sense of Wikipedia. If you try to rely on Wikipedia rules try to understand them first.
5.What you are "unable" to find is widely described in the internet. I add two more sources to the text which are widely known and reliable. Do not dare to censor them again. Feel free to argue how Rumsfeld defended the U.S.A. in the morning of 9/11 when America was attacked.
And what do we read written by you:
“I've removed”
“I feel I'm justified.”
“If you don't like”
“hell, I hate the bastard”
“But this isn't the place to try and slander him or argue whether or not he did enough on 9/11.”
Exactly. I never used the word “enough”. My simple demand is an account what he DID on 9/11. Any judgement if this was ENOUGH can be done by the readers. I do not , NOT AT ALL , need any refernce to critics who say this or that. It was you who wanted to make the text neutral by mentioning critics. Instead of just telling: “Rumsfeld made some phone calls, R. met Senator Cox in the dining room, R. did not confer in the National Command Center, R. did not order the interceptors.”
“It's an online reference resource.”
YESYESYES ! When you want critics in the text then I offer you my favotite one. When you said it is not enough I offered you some more (and left out the italian, german, frendch websites). But again: I would prfer the pure facts without ANY reference to critics, without ANY judgement.
“going to be editing so much. “
I do not want to edit “so much”. I want a simple account what Rumsfeld did on 9/11 in the morning between 8:15 and 11:00. It is as if I were asking Wikipedia to give an account what a certain Neill Armstrong did when setting foot on the moon.
It is about the reliability of Wikipedia. Nobody cares if you hate bastards or if you are quoted and quoting or not. BTW, I am sure the website which you hate so much gets enough attention without Wikipedia, I must not advocate it.
The issue is Wikipedia and a fill account of Rumsfeld in the Rumsfeld section. It is not your guts and not me. 84.159.119.144 08:12, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
If the "I am done" means that you refraine from censoring the article and remove the version nr.6, it is okay and we save a lot of time. Feel free to add more information - but do not remove because of every-day-changing causes. I will keep an eye on it. It is my obstinacy, btw.
I think we should have a little more on his congressional career. What committees did he serve on? Did he vote for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, for example, etc. -- Blue387 08:58, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
Other people without an academic background in any subject that would suit them for work as Secretary of Defense have fulfilled their responsibilities adequately. However, Rumsfeld has been very active in pushing his own strategic decisions on the Joint Chiefs. Is there anything in his academic background that would have prepared him for performing this function? The article does not even say what his undergraduate major was, and it seems his only post-grad work was a brief stint in law school. P0M 00:16, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
I like the layout of the table, which details the reasons given by the six Generals as to why they would like Mr. Rumfeld to go. Very professional indeed! Wallie 13:22, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
it may be 'professional' (an odd characterization for an open-source pseudo-encyclopedia, but i digress), however it takes up an inordinate amount of space merely to reproduce seven quotes. it should be trimmed into a conventional list of quotes. it will take up less space. Anastrophe 07:15, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
an encyclopedia is supposed to be a clear, concise, NPOV source of information. not a current events depository. relative to his long career, the table betrays its bias/POV basis. it's a huge table created to display prominently exactly seven quotes. why? because it's a hot political topic....right now. in the scheme of history, and probably his legacy, compared to the descriptions of his past history and legacy, it's an absurd inflation of a current tempest. as it stands, i converted it to plain formatting of quotes, reducing to one the number of quotes attributed to easy person, and while it did reduce the space consumed, it's still way overblown - again, when taken against the overall entry of a political figure with a long career. it's called 'balance', and it's not there yet, by any stretch. Anastrophe 15:17, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I wanted to add this but I don't understand the table formatting. Wesley Clark is actually General #7 to come out in support of Rumsfeld's resignation, giving us 8 total. Can someone add Clark to the list? See here for details.- csloat 21:28, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
table removed. took up too much space for seven quotes. Anastrophe 07:37, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Salvador Option
Can you get back to Senator Kucinich on the
iraqi death squads thing? Thanks,
Okthen
16:01, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
This section should be removed or moved to Ray Mcgovern's own page becouse of its irrevelence to donald rumsfeld, and its obvios non-NPOV -- MadDogCrog 05:38, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
If it's news than let the researcher get the info from the newspaper. This is an Encyclopedia, ya, add the whole interview, and the interview on This Week that Mr. Mcgovern referenced-- MadDogCrog 08:39, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
The McGovern exchange was covered in all the national media and has remained an issue since then. It is notable and has been picked up in subsequent calls for his resignation. Homey 19:02, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
This area also seems to be a violation of of the Wikipedia NPOV. Either have republicans praise for Mr. Rumsfeld added, and also Praise from retired generals added . Even then I dont think they really belong. These sections should be deleted or moved to there own page.-- MadDogCrog 05:53, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Mr. Rumsfeld has been asked these same questions by the media a hundred times before, and has respoded to them with the same answers he gave Mr. McGovern. nothing new! And no security doing there job does not bother me, It's not Illegal for disrupters and protesters to get kicked outside, Then they can stand on there soapbox somewhere else if they want to. And the media can make there choice too . Mr Mcgovern was respectfull and so he was treated with respect. so again, Small footnote in Rumsfelds life (not a chapter). Raphael1 your bias shows in your comments. And I am not going to beat this dog till It's dead! So I will let it lie for now.--
MadDogCrog
08:13, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Though my political views probably come closer to Raphael1, I must agree with MadDogCrog's point on the relevance of the McGovern interview. It reads like a blog entry and it degrades the WP article as such. A more appropriate article for that info would be
Criticism_of_the_Iraq_War. That would also be a more appropriate place for the quotes from the generals. The Rumsfeld article would more appropriately mention the wide ranging criticism of the conduct of the war and link to it.--
Mikebrand
18:22, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Surely this isn't the only article in which a transcript is quoted. I don't see how a verbatim transcript of a brief exchange makes the article look like a blog entry given that no opinion has been added. 19:05, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
== Moved from Rumsfeld page (Needs review) The omission is obvious. Facts, witnesses, sources and especially logic say: Andrews AFB provides QRA (Quick Reaction Alert, the highest state of alert) for Washington D.C. QRA as part of air-policing is a NATO SOP, measurable in minutes (less than 15 minutes untill take-off).
"Within minutes of the attack American forces around the world were put on one of their highest states of alert - Defcon 3, just two notches short of all-out war - and F-16s from Andrews Air Force Base were in the air over Washington DC." [24]
The capital of the U.S.A., home of Pentagon, White House, Congress, Airforce #1 being protected from Cape Cod is ridiculous and simply not true. (/Needs review)
Somebody introduced a quote concerning the fighter jets and abilities/responsibilities on 9/11. By relying on the 9/11 commission he wants to let it appear as if Andrews AFB in Washington was NOT responsible for the airspace over Washington and as if Rumsfeld had no choice to adress the AFB in his very neighbourhood.
The impression is wrong. Andrew AFB WAs responsible AND had fighter jets in highest state of alarm. The colleague who always cuts out my comment concerning that fact may come here to discuss it. He may ask for more proof, he may improve my English, he may make proposals. Whatever. But do not remove facts which contradict the "official" legend only because the 9/11commission said so or so. The commission is wrong as it is in the case of "able danger" and dozens of other issues. 84.159.105.89 06:21, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
All this arguing over a few airplanes at Andrews - cf. NAS Oceana, which has more squadrons than Andrews has aircraft! Hopalong1
it was PoV and VERY anti-semitic.
In the Private career section:
I think I cleaned that up correctly. In doing the clean-up I tried to verify the information — but I could not! Any pointers that lead to citations would be welcome. -- Charles Gaudette 01:24, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I think for most people it goes with out saying that "Rummy" is not suitable for Wikipedia articles. It does appear on the Nixion Tapes. Elsewhere on the Intrernet and print media it is used either derogatory, or in levity, or both. Led "I'm a dude" Zeppelin321295 added "Rummy" to the lead identifier, I am reverting it back. I think, anyone placing "Rummy" — outside of a verifiable quote — should present their argument for including it on this Talk page first. -- Charles Gaudette 17:29, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The above was removed by someone else, I just wanted to make sure it was on the talk page. If someone can find reliable citations, it can go back in the encyclopedia article. If it was revealed under the Freedom of Information Act, then citing shouldn't be a problem. -- Charles Gaudette 17:16, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
This was posted by IP 85.146.85.61 (19:18, 26 July 2006), and it needs citation:
This might even just belong on the Aspartame article. Please find a reliable source ... and FDA paper online? Then give a persuasive rational for placing it in the Donald Rumsfeld article, here, on this Talk page first. -- Charles Gaudette 07:13, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
Hello Charles,
That was my ip address. I'm new to editing Wiki. Excuse the silly username ;-) ... That will become apparent when I start some fresh articles about DIY. Now on to the subject of Donald Rumsfeld.
I've spent several hours researching the internet to verify and find better sources for the text I added after reading several websites on Rumsfeld and aspartame. Boy, are good referenes hard to find... The actual report from the FDA, I could not find anywhere. After spending a few hours, I'm pretty much convinced it is not available anywhere online. I have however found an article that uses the correct references to the report in question:
I found another link to a clear timeline showing the start of the investigation and when Skinner 'left the building': http://www.taxtyranny.ca/images/HTML/Aspartame/Articles/Preapproval.doc (scroll down to "On January 10, 1977, FDA Chief Counsel Richard Merrill")
Again, no direct online links to the referenced documents, but I assume that the many references to files of the Congressional Records and of the U.S. Senate is as good as any reference... I read on the wiki pages that in these cases, the reference should point to the webpage where the relevant references were found (instead of only mentioning the relevant references themselves).
In this document named 'Preapproval' we learn that on July 1, 1977, U.S. Attorney Samuel Skinner left his job to work for the G.D. Searle law firm Sidley & Austin. And he's not alone: Skinner was replaced with Assistant U.S. Attorney William Conlon, who let the Statute of Limitations run out on the aspartame charges. Fifteen months later, Conlon accepted a job with the law firm representing G.D. Searle, Sidley & Austin. How on earth do two US Attorney's change jobs to go work for the law firm that represents the company under investigation? Or is it all just innuendo?
Please take your time to read several pages of the document about the period 1977-1985 in which Rumsfeld is CEO/President/Chairman of Searle. It's along read, but worthwhile. Apart from two US Attorneys leaving or failing to act at a crucial time, there are many more examples of very strong pressure in favour of getting aspartame to market. I'll cut and paste a small number of the pieces that I feel are relevant here:
As said before, Rumsfeld was hired by Searle in the beginning of 1977. One of the attorneys (Jim Turner, also mentioned in the above document) involved had a meeting with Rumsfeld and several scientists of Searle. Listen to the interview at: http://www.soundandfury.tv/pages.rumsfeld2.html
He tells how Rumsfeld took on the issue of getting Aspartame on the market: from a political point of view, not a medical one. The 'science' and 'investigation' done so far were heavily(!) flawed and the results that were reported to the FDA had been tampered with: some information was withheld and some of it was impossible to be true (mice in the experiment dying but reappearing later on in the results, alive and well). Rumsfeld was not interested in facts. He was just there to get the job done, so to speak.
So there is no question in my mind that Rumsfeld has used his (political) power to push aspartame to the market. I doubt it could have been done without him, or someone with the same large amount of influence.
Nobody can 'prove' that Rumsfeld as CEO of Searle was directly behind the career change of Skinner or that of the replacing U.S. Attorney, Conlon. I leave that to the reader to decide.
So, after reading a lot of info about the history of aspartame, the way in which Rumsfeld approached the problems of Searle and lead the company and after reading the current version of the wiki page, I decided to edit the page. As it already mentioned the following text
I decided to provide an example of the statement in the form of Skinner. I initially thought this whole story qualified to be mentioned in the chapter called 'Controversies' ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rumsfeld#Controversies), but then decided against a large edit of the Rumsfeld page and chose to simply add the example of Skinner. One could also 'move it' to the aspartame page, but what's the point in that? It concerns a major part of Rumsfeld's career.
My small addition about Skinner's career change is factual and verifiable. Without mentioning names, it was already mentioned in the version before my edit. So I see no reason not to re-edit it into the Rumsfeld page. -- DIY Freak 01:18, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Cheers, Hans.
See, the problem with this paragraph, to me, is that it seems POV while trying to pretend it's not POV... does that make sense? It's like it presents data in such a way that the reader has to come to the conclusion that the writer intended, instead of just putting the facts on the table and not drawing any inferences from them. It's an accumulation of paragraphs like these that make articles hopelessly slanted to one side. Is there a name for what I'm talking about? - Vontafeijos 13:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
See my response to Charles above. -- DIY Freak 01:18, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Diy Freak
First; 30 years later, Aspartame is safe. Second; the political and lobby effort from the sugar industry and its industry states was enormous, and was filled with just as much bad political backroom politics and backbiting. Just my $0.02!
Your editing had nothing about Rumsfeld's involvement in your edits accusations! Just innuendo! Sorry Diy Freak, but that was a poor edit. But I commend your hard work and research. Please see why your edit seems so POV in the Rumsfeld Article. That Information would possibly belong in the Aspartame article, I believe.
There are already so many POV trolls editing and protecting poor content in these articles. They just don’t have a clue how they are ruining Wikipedia as a reliable research tool. Which also is turning good editors away. Good Luck.
Vontafeijos
That I think would be called sophism. And Wiki is full of sophistic content! By the highly educated, and sophisticated. Pun intended. (Wikiophistic), (Wikifiction), ( Wikiflexure), ok I had my fun! The higher education system of most the planet is an infective virus! I am just a simple caveman with a simple mind.-- MadDogCrog 10:30, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Hi guys,
let's stay open and friendly, ok? I'm not a 'Sophist' and certainly not a troll. You are very quick to mention terms like these, since I've only been around for a few days... I'm not even American, neither do I have any affiliation with political parties either in the USA or my homeland. So I'm not going through the Wikipedia with an agenda, like some seem to be doing. I know... I could be Elvis Presley for all you know, but let's assume that I have good intentions. I think that is one of Wikipedia's principles/rules, isn't it?
MadDogCrog, The term 'sophism' has very little to do with higher education, which isn't all that bad or laughable as you seem to think.
Vontafeijos, "First; 30 years later, Aspartame is safe." See the Aspartame page and the history of 'testing' that was referenced in my previous post. I can only form a 'POV' on it, as I'm unable to verify medical claims or facts, so I see no point in discussing it.
But the main issue is... Please point out exactly where in my edit of the Rumsfelt page I introduce innuendo or POV to the Rumsfeld page. AFAIK, I'm only providing one example of the information already stated there. In other words, how can that be objectional?
Charles asked for citation. I believe I have found the proper references: files of the Congressional Records and of the U.S. Senate. Since my edit only consists of an example, I'd be happy to simply change the entire edit into: "for example, U.S. Attorney Samuel Skinner.", including one if the references above. Personally I, as a reader, would find it more useful to have a bit more background info instead of just a name coming out of nothing. That is why my original edit is a few lines instead of one name.
Now... If you guys feel that mentioning a name as an example is still too controversial, I, again, suggest we move the mentioning of aspartame to the 'Controversies' chapter. Still, why would you insist on that now instead of having it done in the past? Afterall, the information was already in there long before I added the example to it.
As for my previous lengthy post in this talk section concerning the aspartame timeline, I agree that most, if not all of it would probably fit better in the aspartame article. If I have time, I'll try to fit it in there if there is a need for it. The page seems to be pretty much up to date as it is now.
I've spent quite a bit of time on this. Please show me the same respect and consider the suggestions I have made. -- DIY Freak 23:14, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
So far no response from either Vontafeijos or MadDogCrog. Disappointing.
Charles, have you had time to think more about this to continue the discussion? -- DIY Freak 16:24, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone know why refs are showing up more than once? I can't figure it out. Rlevse 00:36, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Can those persons who have a distaste for Rumsfeld's being please refrain from vandalism in the main page. It ill becomes those of us who disagree with his politics to resort to statements such as 'RUMSFELD IS A WAR CRIMINAL'. Arguable, but belongs on the discussion page with accompanied facts. -- The Three Jays 01:01, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Scribner removed a section I rewrote on the controversy over whether Rumsfeld came into office wanting to invade Iraq. His reason for removing the section was that the source said "If these notes are accurate," which seems ham-handed to me: the section clearly stated that the comment was from notes. Certainly this controversy needs to be expressed in some form in the article. I'm reinstating the section, trying to better emphasize the incomplete nature of the information. If others have ideas on how to better represent the "hell-bent on war" accusation, go for it. But it does need to be in the article. !melquiades 19:06, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
Speculation would be, "The notes say X, therefore Rumsfeld planned to attack Iraq on Sep 11." The article was careful not to say any such thing — which is more than I can say for many of Rumsfeld's critics. The article did not speculate on the meaning of the notes; instead, it quoted them as they stand and characterized the debate surrounding them, I think accurately.
On sourcing: CBS obtained the notes and published them in the article in question, so they seem to be the best source we have. Note that secondary sources are not only allowed, but preferred: "In general, Wikipedia articles should not depend on primary sources but rather on reliable secondary sources who have made careful use of the primary-source material." ( WP:RS) That would be the CBS article, I believe. Or is does investigative journalism fall under special rules?
In any case, this needs to be addressed in some form in the article. Rumsfeld is often charged with coming to power with an agenda for invading Iraq, and this conversation is frequently cited in that debate. The article needs to address it, preferably by pointing out the incompleteness of the information on the conversation in question. The omission serves nobody. !melquiades 00:08, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Is he lying about his age? 1932 is a very long time ago. -- Soothsaya 09:02, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
I`d like to know who cut out this :
It is a rich information, comprehensive and all documented. So why take it out?
What is the source linking this to Rumsfeld? Pgc512 16:45, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
The "Calls for resignation" section was deleted because some editors did not think it was notable enough that a number of retired Generals publicly called for his resignation (something that has never before happened in US history). Now that the main newspapers of America's servicemen and women is also openly calling for his resignation, isn't it about time Wikipedia acknowledged the significance of this fact? Here's the editorial.-- csloat 08:43, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
No need to call for it, he just quit
Where is this being reported?
TacoDeposit
18:00, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
People won't top editing the article long enough to make a change! Let's state - his term isn't over yet - he has only announced plans to step down. He will do so when (and if, given a new congress) his replacement is confirmed. - Patstuart (talk) (contribs) 18:29, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Your're correct; Just to add, had Rumsfeld's resignation been immediate, I believe the Deputy Secy of Defence would have assumed the duties (as Acting Secy of Defence, until the Senate confirmed the Secy of Defence nominee). GoodDay 19:34, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
I added a small clause saying that it was months of criticism that effected Rumsfeld's decision to resign. Of course it was also the mental stress of the job (he would have been longest serving sec of def in a month). I added the clause because the section above about the Army Times article makes it seem like that is the only reason he resigned when in actuallity it was months of criticism from the public and Senators (ie. Clinton) for mainly not listening to his Generals and not providing enough troops to Iraq. REscano 22:19, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Please stop editing the word "Terrorists" to the generic "Men". Like it or not, they are both war-criminals, and terrorists. Using the generic terms implies that they were civilians. We're getting like, 10 vandalizations a minute, lets SP this mother already. Piuro 18:45, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
This needs much expansion, especially for Rumsfeld's first term of Secretary of Defense. This was the immediate post-Vietnam period and a hugely important time for the US military. At the moment, the "swine flu" episode gets double the text coverage of the post-Vietnam military reforms (which also may be key to why Rumsfeld was given the highest civilian award for his service in this period), and the insinuating/"suggestive" text about the mysterious scientist death gets almost as much prominence (claim about Rumsfeld's involvement in "response" comes across as possible OR too). The section current reads as if Rumsfeld did this sinister coverup and then this swine flu screwup and my god! he was awarded the highest honour despite this!. This section is too small and out of balance. (No, I am not a Republican or a conservative or even American) Bwithh 18:48, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
This article needs to be locked until further notice. I just took some nonsense out of it. Check the history. can you clean up the resignation part of the article if you are going to lock it and keep people from removing POV 69.140.73.128 20:03, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Hi, newbie here, just want to correct a typo:
>>ABB is a European engineering giant based in Zürich, Switzerland; formed through the merger >>between ASEA of Sweden and Brown Boweri of Switzerland.
That should read "Brown Boveri" of Switzerland (v, not w).
Nick
can someone tell me what rumsfelds religious faith is? Keltik31 22:02, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
just thought with a name ending in "feld" he may be jewish.
Keltik31
22:32, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
The introduction should begin defining what Rumsfeld is, the secretary of defense. The fact that he submitted his resignation is important, but not the defining factor of who this person is. I've changed the intro to reflect this. -- ZimZalaBim ( talk) 23:43, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
CNN just said Rumsfeld's resignation letter was accepted by Bush yesterday - November 7th, 2006 - CNN reported this specifically as a response to the question of when Rumsfeld actually steps down Bwithh 03:16, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
Well he isn't secretary anymore, and someone who is unblocked from editing needs to change that. It still says till present. Superbowlbound 22:08, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
He is still technically the secretary. He has resigned, but won't officially leave office until Robert Gates get confirmed. Until then, he's still in. Slinky317 12:06, 9 November 2006
This is true; however, someone has changed the sidebar stating that he served UNTIL November 9, 2006. The fact is that he will serve until a replacement (Gates?) has been confirmed by the Senate...—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 72.161.211.215 ( talk • contribs) .
We've fixed it multiple times, and we've embedded huge comments in the article begging people to leave it alone...the editors who insist on changing it are in a huge hurry to edit the article, don't look at the surrounding comments, or God knows what. I just fixed it for probably the 10th time. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 21:03, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
I am just concerned about protection of the article that currently appears on the main page in "in the news section". With featured articles on the main page there is a recomandation not to protect them so that new users can actually try the whole of Wikipedia. Is it not the same with other articles on the main page. I know the vandalsim is heavy right now, but still it always is with articles that appear on the main page. -- Jan.Smolik 21:59, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
It seems that the article could be cleaned up to flow more chronologically. For example, the part dealing with ABB and North Korea, which deals with an event from 1990 to 2001, is followed by his Reagan years, 1983-1984. Any one else agree? LinuxSneaker 01:51, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Rumsfeld was not Chairman Emeritus of the Carlyle Group from 1989-2005. Frank Carlucci was.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 67.113.229.219 ( talk • contribs) .
I removed this anon edit. It occured just before the page was sprotected so I guess it snuck through. From a brief look throught the edit history, this anon had made numerous reverted edits, most apparently not backed up by reliable sources and which appeared to violate NPOV. This particular edit is similar, without sources (disputed by who? etc) and is probably not NPOV either (to what end - are you implying they have sinister motives in saying they were tortured). Also, it doesn't make much sense in context of the paragraph either. As far as I can tell, the case is still ongoing and we don't mention it has been settled... Nil Einne 04:35, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
I readded some coments which were removed by an AOL proxy anon here, hopefully by accident. As there had been no new sub-headed comments, I simply added them to the bottom Nil Einne 12:39, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
The article said Evanston, three sources I found indicated Chicago, none Evanston. Anyone who can argue with thiw with could be my guest. And the reference to his previous generatoion German source was very POV and should not be as a source for geneology - put in in the later criticism of the man! -- Dumarest 22:43, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Well this is interesting. This AP bio says he was born in Evanston:
A NYTimes article from Saturday November 13, 1971 (which I can't provide a link for as it requires TimesSelect membership) says he was born in Chicago and attended New Trier High School in "suburban Evanston".
I think we can definitely say he was born in Cook County, Illinois. I'm inclined to stick with Chicago as that's what his official DoD and Congressional bios say. -- Jim Douglas (talk) (contribs) 23:55, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Hart Seely in today's (Fr Nov 10 2006) LA Times: "Of course, ex-dentists and off-season lawn-care experts will spend the next 30 years warring over Rumsfeld's rightful Wikipedia entry." Rather condescending for someone whose main claim to fame is the challenging scholarly project of adding line breaks to Rumsfeld's press conference transcripts and presenting them as haiku. Definitely some warring in this talk section but who is the ex-dentist and who is the lawn-care expert? David Watson 23:41, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Someone put him under Worst Supporting Actor Razzie. Probably vandalism. Someone should remove it. -- 66.218.13.156 03:27, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Military/Industry history WikiProject
I removed this line from the awards section: Royal Order of the Intare, awarded by King Kigeli V of Rwanda. [1]
I am not sure if Rumsfeld was a founder of the PNAC as stated in the Clinton Years section. It is true that he cosigned a letter, but I have heard Kristol on a Colbert Report show distancing himself from Rumsfeld stating that Rumbsfeld was never a part of the PNAC.
I rewrote and re-referenced the swine flu section (the previous reference used did not mention Rumsfeld at all). I'm having trouble finding authoritative, substantive sources showing that Rumsfeld should take a major part of the blame for the decision. I found a single book source which recounts the accusation but not convincingly (comes across as rumour/insinuation, and does not provide sources). I will look further to see if there's any substance to this or if this should be removed entirely Bwithh 23:30, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
"and stands to become the longest-serving Secretary of Defense if he remains until December."
This quote is not true since Robert McNamara was the longest serving Secretary of Defense serving from January 21st 1961 until February 29th 1968, which is seven years and one month, and by December Donald Rumsfeld will have served from January 20th 2001 until December 2006 which would only be five years and 11 months. So Robert McNamara would still be the longest serving Secretary of Defense. Also, Casper Weinberger would be the second longest serving Secretary of Defense serving from January 21st 1981 until November 23rd 1987, which would be six years and 10 months. So to correct the quote you would say that by December Donald Rumsfeld will become the third longest serving Secretary of Defense. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mkluge ( talk • contribs) 00:32, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Per [31], he will remain in the office until the official swearing-in ceremony. The date for that has not yet (as of Dec 6) been announced. Who knows, maybe it will be after December 29? I know lots of folks want him gone, myself included, (heck, they've already started taking his pictures down at the Pentagon [32]), but let's not jump the gun in the encyclopedia. A little decorum, perhaps?
I'll change the page back. 216.46.98.249 23:49, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
On 911 Rumsfeld said: " Go massive. Sweep it all up. Things related and not. He also said: "Judge whether good enough hit S.H." (Saddam Hussein)… I've noticed that his misconduct on that day was pointed before… I'm not sure why this isn't reflected in the article? Lovelight 23:10, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
Silly rabit: news organizations don't "take positions". They report things! If there was a survey done, then cite that! Otherwise, you are being confused and imprecise. Capisce? —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCO ( talk • contribs) 23:35, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
I disagree with the wording. It is an overly simplistic (and sort of jarringly off) way of stating something. My point is that news organizations don't make judgements or issue opinions as entities. They don't make proclomations. They're not really actors or even historians. They are reporters. And they're not monolithic. For instance if one story or editorial or what have you says something, than it is not like a press release of the entire organization's opinion.
Also (different point) if you actually go to the references, you will see that even the original statements, themselves, are more nuanced. The BBC peice says "probably", not "the" most controversial. And the the ABC peice is even more caveated, saying "possibly" most controversial.
Third different point: Also, if you want to actually think about the issue, ITSELF, look into McNamara and the intense culture clash that his "wiz kids" had with the uniformed military in the 60s as well as the much more notable protest from the nation overall to the VN war as opposed to recent mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Also, I don't have living memory of it, but there were some big fiascos with some of the early DoDers (one of them even having "the revolt of the Admirals").
I'll think about putting something up, that at least expresses the main concept more fairly. However, I'm not sure I will. Wikipedia is so geared to edit wars and meme building. Also, it does NOT generally have the quality that I expect from real quality written articles (in writing or logic). TCO ( talk) 17:03, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
It's an improvement. Still think it gives too much of a "the orginazation states" when it's really some guy wrote a profile and it says (and maybe we find some other profile that doesn't say, etc.) I mean it's not like a survey of historians was done. Or of the newsroom. It's just some profile writer. Not even as good as an individual historian. That said, I agree that Rumsfeld has been controversial. (Although it's amazing that we always rate the most recent as the most notable.) Any way, no biggie. —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCO ( talk • contribs) 00:00, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
I listed two other times when there was SIGNIFICANT dispute between the military and the civilian DOD leadership over it. Also the social protest was much higher during the VN war than recently. TCO ( talk) 14:21, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
Even if you hate the guy and don't care about objectivity, it's actually counterproductive to writes stuff like this:
"Astroturf Generals In 2008 the New York Times reported that Rumsfeld responded to the Generals Revolt by using a number of high ranking retired members of the Military as puppets."
The whole article has too much the tone of a college dorm room writing an argument. This is not something that you would see in Brittanica or a real magazine or newspaper article. The word choiceage and just lack of giving the subject of the biography some dispassion is eVIDENT. People coming to this and reading it WILL SEE IT. So all you're really doing is writing articles amongst yourselves to express and crystalize and evaluation. Rather than a description. TCO ( talk) 13:47, 20 July 2008 (UTC)
Honestly, all you people aren't paying attention to the evolution of news media these days. News outlets are decidedly slanted in our time. Note that news outlets endorse candidates. Note Fixed News (oops, I meant Fox News is slanted right (no matter what they say) and all of the NBC nets are decidedly left. I could go on with the Washington Post and the New York Times. They all pick sides. The article, as I see it, presents facts with quotes and factual information. If the writer has a dog in the hunt, it's almost impossible these days to keep that dog from barking. It's just the way it is. But to say that the news media is objective is a fairy tale and no longer applies to American news media. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cleavetoo ( talk • contribs) 05:16, 17 September 2008 (UTC)
How notable are these, they seem like political theater? The German case was dismissed as soon as it got in front of the judge. I would like to remove all but a sentence or two about these lawsuits. Any objections? CENSEI ( talk) 16:19, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
Since there seems to be some opposition to removing this section, would anybody object to a content fork? We can create a separate article called "Lawsuits against Donald Rumsfeld" where we could move the overwhelming majority of the section, so that the article retains a sense of proportion as to his accomplishments without Wikipedia losing material. RayAYang ( talk) 06:57, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Donald Rumsfeld/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Caution - Not neutral.
Repetitive mentioning that "He had not served in combat". Pictures that show him shake hands with Saddam and other negative leaders. -- No mention of him personally donating $250,000 for a 911 monument. No mention of his numerous flights to Iraq, and Afghanistan, going to front line units on visits and putting himself at risk. No mention of him being an instructor pilot in the USN. -- All positives are ‘minimized’ rhetorically while all negative aspects are coincidentally emphasized. That is poor objective writing. This article is subtly biased. |
Last edited at 07:48, 2 October 2006 (UTC). Substituted at 20:26, 3 May 2016 (UTC)