Talk:Jerry Kilgore (politician)

I'm the one who made the changes because I live in Kilgore's "neighborhood." -Amit

I have deleted the following about the Anti-Tax Movenment: "which has roots in the "Massive Resistance" against racial integration of public schools and other facilities in the 1960's." While this may be true, placing it here implies that Mr. Kilgore is opposed to racial integration of schools, etc., and this is not the case. Danny 17:09, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

here's how the "Massive Resistance" change is being depicted elsewhere.

Date: Mon, 3 Oct 2005 16:16:00 -0400 From: (anonymized) <anonymized@anonymized.com> Subject: TOOLS: wikipedia

I did an interesting story today for the paper on a bio on Wikipedia. Virginia is about to elect a governor, and as you can imagine tensions are high. Somebody discovered a bio of one of the candidates (the Republican) on Wikipedia that linked his name to a group that "had its origins" in Massive Resistance. Massive Resistance was an official state policy in Virginia in the aftermath of the 1954 SCOTUS decision on school desegregation. It was a repugnant policy that was overturned in 1959 by SCOTUS.

Once we brought it to the attention of the candidate's campaign, they got on the phone to Wikipedia and had it removed within about 30 minutes. Of course the whole thing started a pissing match between the Dems and the GOPs as to what it all meant. But the bottom line for me was reenforcement of the fact that Wikipedia by its very nature is not very credible.

-<anonymized>, who kinda enjoyed setting the fox into the hen house today ...

Too bad they feel that way. The comment wasn't fair and it was weeded out. In fact, our willingness to correct ourselves like that should indicate the credibility of Wikipedia. Danny 22:35, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, but as the reporter is apparently predisposed to disparage Wikipedia, that's not how it will be depicted in the news article. Watch for it on Thursday. I am more troubled by the idea that a political operative feels that the way to correct what he perceives as misinformation is to exert pressure on Wikipedia rather than simply correcting it himself. I hope any future "phone calls" are used as opportunities for disabusing them of this notion. That is, we should make clear that Wikipedia will gladly correct errors of fact, but refuses to be manipulated into removing unflattering truths. - Nunh-huh 23:14, 3 October 2005 (UTC) P.S. I think it would be a good idea that when edits are made in response to contacts from outside Wikipedia, that that be noted in their edit summaries. (Not that that's been established to be the case here...) - Nunh-huh 23:19, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Some comments--if the reporter is predisposed to disparage Wikipedia, that is what that reporter will do, regardless. His article, however, is not about Wikipedia but about Kilgore. It is therefore important that the facts in the article be accurate and NPOV. Insinuating that Kilgore is opposed to racial integration is hardly NPOV. In fact, it is poor reporting. As for what happened, the Wikipedia office is inundated with calls from people challenging facts in articles. We received a phone call, and I discussed it with the gentleman in an amicable manner. I agreed that the change should be made and did so. Never was there any threat nor did anyone "exert pressure," as you describe it. I am not quite sure why you put phone calls in parentheses, but that is exactly what it was. In effect, I was simply making it clear that Wikipedia will correct errors of fact and of insinuation. It was not manipulated. The "unflattering truth" was an irrelevant factoid placed in a certain context to disparage an individual. I am sorry that the removal of the sentence may have removed the basis of the journalist's claims, but when you are a journalist, you really should check your sources. Danny 00:17, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

You misunderstand, I think, the focus of what will be being printed. It is an article on Wikipedia's unreliability. The journalist did indeed check his source, and found it wanting. (On the other matter, since phone calls from politicians are per se coercive - representing a veiled threat to use influence or political power - I think it is best to be transparent when responding to them, even when the changes suggested are justified. (E.g.: "factual error corrected in response to phone call from Jerry Kilgore's re-election campaign"). - Nunh-huh 01:20, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

NPOV, accuracy

I have tagged this as NPOV and reverted some blatant POV pushing. Also whoever asserted that Kilgore will become the next Barney needs to find a reliable source. --StevenL 23:36, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

I am concerned about the neutrality of this article on Jerry Kilgore, a 2005 candidate for Governor. Half of the page is about negative criticism on his campaign. However, his apponent and the victor of the 2005 Virginia Gubernatorial Race, Tim Kaine, has nothing but positive things on his article. I think that either someone should add criticism to Governor Kaine's page, or Kilgore's overlydramatic criticism should be scaled down.--Ramcgl 17:52, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Election results

Here they are: http://www.sbe.vipnet.org/ 24.54.208.177 03:27, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

2006

Can someone research whether Kilgore will be running against Congressman Rick Boucher (D-VA-9th). I had heard it and it should be added if its so.

Gubernatorial Plan Section

There's no citation for the Gubernatorial Plan section of the article, and it's rather vague. I'm going to remove it, but if someone can back it up and rewrite it as more of a campaign platform section, feel free. ~~jag~~