Talk:Christine Todd Whitman

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Biography Portal
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ]
This article is supported by the Politics and government work group.
Flag of New Jersey
NJ Portal

Christine Todd Whitman is part of WikiProject New Jersey, an effort to create, expand, and improve New Jersey–related articles to Wikipedia feature-quality standard.

Bulletin: The next New York City meetup is Sunday June 1st.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the quality scale.
High This article has been rated as high-importance on the importance scale.

I've been hoping someone would write details of the frisking incident here. Thank you to all who worked on it. I've never seen the picture in COLOR before. WTF was she thinking?! Kingturtle 19:13, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The original picture was color, the AP wire picture was black and white. Whatever she was thinking, she got away with it, and Sherron Rolax has now grown up to be a convicted felon. --Hcheney 19:23, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)
You make it sound like it was her fault Sherron Rolax grew up to be a felon. I always liked Christie, too bad she is no longer in politics. -- Perl guy 06:49, Jun 12, 2004 (UTC)
I assure you that if a 16 year old from the suburbs was hanging around in North Camden at night, he was only there for gang or drug related activity. He had prison coming for him even if Christie stayed at Drumthwacket that night. I think she may still have the chance to become a Senator... even though the Dems brought Lautenberg back from the dead, that doesn't mean he'll live forever. --"DICK" CHENEY 16:46, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] NPOV problems

This article is really negative. It needs allot of balance and more information anyway. I'll be back later to improve it. I hope others participate. Arminius 21:34, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I think I've addressed the neutrality problem, if you agree please remove the NPOV template :) - Jord 15:46, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry to say this, but if it's really negative, there's probably a good reason. By the time Whitman left office she was extremely unpopular among Republicans as well as Democrats, and she burned her last bridges at the EPA. Many people will never forgive her for the EPA covering up the toxicity of the air around Ground Zero. She has a new book coming out, about moderates in the GOP, maybe you can talk about that. --JamesB3 22:59, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't typically this biased. This needs to be more informative than negative. Even the article on Hitler isn't this bad. --[User:Darrinrasberry|Darrinrasberry]] 21:45, Feb. 15th, 2006

[edit] The frisking photo

I think that the discussion of the "frisking photo" misses the point. The big issue at the time, as discussed at length in the newspapers, was really not whether the young man's civil rights were violated. The courts determined that they were not. The issue was that the then-governor was depicted smiling while frisking this suspected criminal, as part of a ride-along with the police. You cannot see the smile in the photo as it appears in the article, but you can see it (barely) in the slightly larger version that you get when you click on the photo. The smile was much more clearly visible in the versions printed in the newspapers at the time. That was the problem. It was not a legal problem, it was a p.r. problem, and an issue of inappropriate behavior. The governor was involved in a law enforcement operation, and leaving aside whether that was appropriate in the first place, the issue was that she was not taking what she was doing seriously. It was a joke to her. Let's have some fun frisking this guy on the streets of Camden at night. Unless my memory deceives me, that is what caused the furor.

I have therefore added in that she was smiling at the appropriate place in both this article and the Sherron Rolax article, and have posted this note in the Talk page for both articles. Neutron 03:15, 10 November 2005 (UTC)


You say: "The courts determined that they were not." You mean the 16-year-old's rights weren't violated? Actually, the appeals court indicated that they probably were violated.

After all, once the police had made sure he wasn't carrying anything, there was no conceivable justification for the search by Whitman except the need for a Photo Opportunity.

The reason the suit failed was that the kid had waited too long to sue. Not that he wasn't wronged. He was.

Whitman should have known better. Just imagine if someone had done the very same thing to her son. Do you think she would have found that acceptable? Of course not. So this wasn't either.Thefactis (talk) 04:33, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Partial Birth Abortion

There should be an entire section of her veto. (I am not up to it right now so maybe someone else can give it a try). I knew she did veto the ban but I did not know until today the legislature overrode her veto. That is a big deal and all the details of the fight should be in here. This is a cutting edge issue. -- mccommas

[edit] Financial complicity in WTC collapse aftermath

A major section of text claiming that Whitman's financial dealings contributed to her failures in the aftermath of the WTC, was removed and placed here:

Some have wondered if the finances of her and her husband may have influenced her decision to refuse to call an environmental emergency after 9/11. Whitman is a major stockholder in Citigroup, whose insurance subsidiary Travelers Insurance faced millions of dollars in medical claims after the attacks; her husband managed hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of Citigroup assets. Whitman was also heavily invested in the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owned the World Trade Center and was the principal liable party for damages and claims. However, no proof that her financial holdings influenced her decisions has surfaced.

Not only is no source provided for any of these allegations, it's worded as gossip, e.g., "Some have wondered..." Who wondered? Is there any proof of such a claim? Even the concluding sentence that "no proof... has surfaced" is in the classic "when did you stop beating your wife" attack mode that is impossible to address. Furthermore, it's hard to understand what it means to be "heavily invested in the" PANY&NJ, when it is a bi-state public agency, not a public corporation. Unless some more definitive documentation of a claim is made it should not be reinserted. Alansohn 19:42, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] September 19 edits

I removed/edited a lot of suspect claims, as per Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons. I felt that using the picture featuring Sherron Rolax as one of two images in the article was inappropriate because he has such a highly negative connotation; it's equivalent to the article on GWB having an image from the whitehouse.gov and the Mission accomplished pic.

I'm happy to discuss any of the particular changes I made; mostly I just tried to remove statements that were biased and unsourced. Doctofunk 05:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] State pension soundeness

I was around when she failed to fund state pensions and replaced them with ious. I thought it was scandalously irresponsible because state workers would be counting on them. I also though that it was abberant behavior for state governors. Apparently the NYtimes article says that it has continued so I needed to supply that information. Either her successors have followed her lead or she is just like all other governors in pension irresponsibility. If others know about the state pension soundness and funding of other states during her time and after, it may be helpful as a comparison. thx. Chivista 13:14, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Pension funding is serious, not fluff

This is a ticking fiscal problem that Corzine is failing to fix now. Chivista 19:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Environmental Progress

"Under her environmental leadership as governor, the number of days New Jersey violated the federal one-hour air quality standard for ground level ozone dropped from 45 in 1988 to 4 in 2000."

This is factually true but the wording makes it sound like Whitman was wholly responsible. However, much of the change was driven by the 1990 Amendments to the Clean Air Act.


EPA tenure at Agency


I had thought I was submitting a possible new part to the article on her leaving EPA and suddenly it appeared as the new material telling of the change from new info in the WASHINGTONPOST dot-com article - - Should I backtrack and delete the sentences? Thanks for advice on next steps! Timothy Shaw

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/cheney/chapters/leaving_no_tracks/index.html

It was Cheney's insistence on easing air pollution controls, not the personal reasons she cited at the time, that led Christine Todd Whitman to resign as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, she said in an interview that provides the most detailed account so far of her departure.

Timothyjshaw 13:05, 27 June 2007 (UTC)timothyjshaw

        • Question****

I have searched for her sons name and occupation but have not been able to find it. can someone contribute this information?


[edit] Quotes

I have deleted the following quote:

"It is time for Republican moderates to assert plainly and forcefully that this is our party too, that we not only have a place, but a voice - and not just a voice, but a vision - a vision that is true to the historic principles of our party and our nation.[1]

I have added the following quote:

”Nuclear energy is one of the safest, low cost and most efficient energy sources . . . Nuclear plants in the United States are built with exacting standards that include redundant safety systems to protect public health, as well as ensure plants are able to continue operating in the most severe weather circumstances.” [2]

The deleted quote was not found at the reference given, and is blandly political. But many readers interested in nuclear power will find the added quote eye-opening. Nuclear power is being increasingly debated among environmentalists, with the issue very much in doubt among them. Whitman is pro-nuclear, and people should know this about her.Eye.earth 17:39, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

It's fine that you deleted the quote that links to mypartytoo. I'm not sure what you mean about blatantly partisan, though. She did say it, and it's obviously core to her beliefs. Regardless, I see absolutely no point to including the nuclear energy quote. Within the first two paragraphs, it is stated that Whitman is pro-nuclear energy. The quote that you have included is non-notable, it merely describes nuclear power, not even her opinion, and could easily have been printed in a textbook. Maybe it belongs on the nuclear energy page, but it doesn't belong here.Athene cunicularia 18:32, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I didn't write "blatently [sic] partisan". I wrote "blandly political". But in any case it didn’t have a good reference-source.

The nuclear quote IS her opinion, and for anyone well-versed in nuclear power it is a really remarkable one. As for it easily appearing in a textbook, I’m sure Whitman would be delighted to hear you say so.

Whitman and those who agree with her presumably would want the quote included (and why would they not?). But those disagreeing with her would also want it included, knowing it would attract critical notice from readers familiar with Price-Anderson. It seems the only people who could want it deleted are those innocent enough to imagine the quote “non-notable” or repetitive. But it isn’t repetitive either – it shows that Whitman is prepared to state her support on the record. It buttresses her co-chairmanship of the CASEnergy Coalition. Eye.earth 23:30, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I still don't see it. Why is it surprising that Whitman supports nuclear power? What information does her statement contain that isn't already widely assumed to be true about nuclear power? And why does the quote need to be there, if the information is in the second paragraph, already "buttressing" the CASEnergy Coaliton information. As for your [sic], I have no idea what you're [sic]ing. Did I spell "blatant" incorrectly? I do, however, sincerely apologize for completely mis-reading "blandly political" as "blatantly partisan."Athene cunicularia 01:15, 21 September 2007 (UTC)


We're even: I [sic]'d my own typo.

I think you’re taking a proprietorial approach to this article. Since space isn’t an issue like it would be on paper, and the quote isn’t offensive per se, or irrelevantly off-topic, it should stay if a dispute about keeping it in exists. This is Wikipedia, not Encyclopedia Britannica. Why tweak a house of cards in a hurricane? But at least you don’t seem to be trying to save Whitman the embarrassment of being quoted – that would be intolerable. It sounds to me as if you actually believe the quote to be a boringly accurate description of nuclear power. It’s not. There are some good books about nuclear power out there. I recommend two: “The Careless Atom”, by Sheldon Novick. It’s old, but the physics doesn’t change (nor does the underlying technology); and (this should give you pause) “We Almost Lost Detroit”. Eye.earth 20:12, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

It's quite possible that I do have a sense of ownership of this article. I do see what you're saying, and in fact, we probably even see eye to eye on nuclear power. It just seems to me that there should be plenty of better quotes in her op-ed, instead of something that doesn't really reveal anything about nuclear power, or her personality, or her (delusion?) or whatever. I mean, to me, even "How do we fuel our lives without compromising our environment? The answer - nuclear energy," says more about what she's thinking and how she defines "compromising our environment," etc.Athene cunicularia 13:35, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ed Rollins controversy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Rollins#1993_Gubernatorial_Campaign

I don't see any mention of this in the article. Why? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.121.19.215 (talk) 23:00, 15 December 2007 (UTC)