Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert Preston (military lawyer)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. John254 16:23, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Robert Preston (military lawyer)

Robert Preston (military lawyer) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Non-notable Air Force officer. Corvus cornix 20:17, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

• Keep. Seems fairly notable within the context of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. Needs citations, but plenty are available. -Hit bull, win steak^(Moo!) 20:24, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
• Keep, military lawyer involved in some of the most significant (for good or ill) military proceedings in a generation, and externally notable for refusal to participate. --Dhartung | Talk 23:15, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
• Keep as notable lawyer: there seem to be plenty of reliable sources available. Jakew 23:50, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Military-related deletions. -- Carom 00:26, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
• Keep -- If notability means anything, then this guy is, IMO, a highly notable whistleblower. Geo Swan 01:06, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

• I believe highly might be overstating it a bit, but I'd class him as being past-the-post by a hair's breadth, as it were. After all, I understand you've made articles for all the detainees whose names have been made public, after all? I would argue that any of those people who were not shown to have major terrorist ties would be less notable than Mr Preston here. --Agamemnon2 22:41, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

• Comment -- any chance the nominator could return here and offer a fuller explanation for the nomination? Geo Swan 01:06, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Sure. He's non-notable. Corvus cornix 04:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
    • I am going to ask you, a second time, to give a fuller, more meaningful, explanation. Geo Swan 04:31, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
      • There is nothing in the article which says what makes him notable. He's an Air Force JAG, doing his job. Lots of people do their jobs. Corvus cornix 18:48, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
        • The C-i-C also does his job, or at least what he and his advisors think is his job. Personally, I'd like a rule to let a bot eliminate any afd comment that contains the phrase "just another" or "just does" :) DGG (talk) 20:36, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
          • Awesome example of assuming good faith. Corvus cornix 23:12, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
            • Alternatively, you could think of it as DGG voicing his or her opinion about how to automate Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions#Just not notable. Not to put too fine a point on it, but your original nomination, and your initial comment, both flouted the recommendations in WP:ATA. And while WP:ATA is just an essay, not a policy, please allow me to ask you to consider, whether you think nominating articles for deletion, without making an attempt to offer a reasoned argument, shows good faith to those wikipedians who expect the discussions in {{afd}} to be based on reasoned arguments?
            • Cheers! Geo Swan 09:41, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
              • Failure to indicate a subject's notability is, technically, a CSD candidate, plus the subject of the article HIMSELF blanked the page. I brought it to AfD instead of flagging it for speedy deletion because I was attempting to assume good faith and to get further eyes to look it over. Attacking a nominator is no way to discuss the issue at hand. Stick to the article and its subject, don't make attacks on the nominator. Corvus cornix 16:47, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
                • I am going to respond to your points in turn, numbering them for clarity.
                  1. You are correct, policy does state that every article should contain an explicit claim of notability, and that if it is absent the article is eligible for speedy deletion. Practically no articles contain this explicit claim.
                  2. Someone who might be the real Robert Preston, military lawyer, blanked the page. If the page blanker really is Robert Presont they have my sympathy if they don't wish to have an article about themselves. But, if I understand policy correctly, this is not a valid argument for nomination for deletion, so long as the article itself fully complies with policy.
                  3. I am very glad to read that it iss your intent to show good faith.
                  4. I am very sorry to read that you interpreted my comment as an attack. That was not my intent. Let me know, specifically, what aspect of my comment you felt was an attack. I think it is important to acknowledge when we make mistakes. But I will be hard to convince if you consider requests for reasoned arguments an attack. It is important, IMO, that participants in the deletion fora give real thought to their comments, and can offer reasoned arguments -- particularly the original nominators.
                  5. As for the proper "way to discuss the issue at hand"... I made not one, not two, but three, very civil requests before you summoned up the energy to offer any kind of substantive explanation at all. Let me phrase this in the mildest way I can. How much energy should the other participants in an {{afd}} have to make to get the nominator to offer reasoned arguments?
                • Is the lack of an explicit claim of notability your current justification for deletion?

                  "Unremarkable people, groups, companies and web content. An article about a real person, group of people, band, club, company, or web content that does not assert the importance or significance of its subject. If controversial, or if there has been a previous deletion discussion that resulted in the article being kept, list the article at Articles for deletion instead."

• • • • • • • • • I am glad responding to you made me go and look up the exact wording. A lot of my contributions are to controversial topics. I bend over backwards to comply with WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, and WP:VER. My contributions hardly ever get serious challenges over their neutrality. This last year or so my contributions have been getting an increasing number of challenges over the notability of the topic. As with your nomination challengers assert that the topic itself it not notable, as if the NN assertion were obvious, and did not require any actual explanation.
                • I grew increasingly frustrated with the assertions of A7, and concluded that A7 may be useful for vanity articles, or patent nonsense, but were inappropriate for controversial topics. For controversial topics the judgement call as to whether a controversial topic is notable is too subjective, too vulnerable to the personal bias of the person making the judgment call. I was unaware, until I re-read the policy, in order to respond to you, that the policy explicitly states A7 should not be used when the subject is controversial.
                • Whistleblowers whose leaked memos receive worldwide coverage, and trigger important policy changes are controversial. A7 doesn't apply.
                • Cheers! Geo Swan 20:04, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

                  <move back to the left> please allow me to ask you to consider, whether you think nominating articles for deletion, without making an attempt to offer a reasoned argument, shows good faith to those wikipedians who expect the discussions in {{afd}} to be based on reasoned arguments? reads like a personal attack, to me. Corvus cornix 23:09, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

                  • I'll repeat, it was not my intention to trigger the feeling you were being attacked.
                  • I am moving my reply to your concern over my tact to my talk page. Geo Swan 00:29, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

        • I too have a couple of problems with the "just doing his job" interpretation.
          • Was his boss, the guy who promised that the commission members would be handpicked so they would be sure to convict, and who promised that all the exculpatory evidence would be classified so the defense team couldn't learn of it, just "doing his job?"
          • Three of the officers wrote letters of complaint, and a bunch of their colleagues didn't. Were the colleagues who didn't write letters of complaint just "doing their job"?
        • I think you are totally incorrect and that what the three whistleblowers did was exceptional.
        • The Guantanamo military commissions run have undergone massive revisions twice, not once. The change in the military commissions pre-Military Commissions Act and post-Military Commissions Act is less extreme than the revisions that occurred shortly following the drafting of the letters of complaint. Did the letters trigger most of those changes? I don't know. You don't know. And even if we thought we did know WP:NPOV and WP:NOR would prevent us adding our conclusion to the article. But, IMO, the wikipedia's readers deserve coverage of material that would be helpful to them in their own speculations. Geo Swan 20:49, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Guantanamo Bay detainment camp-related deletions. —Geo Swan 01:06, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
• Merge to Guantanamo Bay detention camp and delete - there really doesn't seem to be any more to him than the leaked email - a footnote in the proceedings and not, in my opinion, worthy of an article of his own. Bigdaddy1981 05:09, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Have you looked at Guantanamo Bay detention camp recently? That article is already too long, unfocussed, and attempting to cover too many sub-topics. I don't think introducing another sub-topic s good idea.
  • FWIW I don't think merging with Guantanamo military commissions is a good idea either. That article too is in need of being spun off into smaller articles.
  • Cheers! Geo Swan 20:47, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Comment - yes its a mess, but I don't see this as a stand alone article; there is such little detail and I don't see how more can be added. Bigdaddy1981 00:39, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Im not sure that there is much more to this (and, incidentally the John Carr articles) that isnt already stated (brefly) in the Guantanamo military commission article - unless an editor proposes to create an article on the requests for transfer for all the lawyers I think deleting this is the best bet. Bigdaddy1981 08:22, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Comment -- One of my frustrations with the wikipedia is that there are wikipedians with vastly different underlying design philosophies for the wikipedia's future growth, but there is no meaningful debate. Instead of discussing the underlying design philosophies, people vote for the deletion of articles that don't fit in with their person vision of the wikipedia.

• In my opinion there are both very strong technical and esthetic reasons to prefer buidling the wikipedia from small focussed articles, as much as possible. I am willing to explain why, in detail, here, or on one of our talk pages.
• I would love to read your reasoning as to why this article is too small.
• I would love to read why you like big omnibus articles.
• Cheers! Geo Swan 09:41, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

• Keep He is notable. 70.21.254.188 18:58, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.