Talk:Martin Bell

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Martin Bell article.
Please sign and date your posts by typing four tildes (~~~~). Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Ask questions, get answers. This is not a forum for general discussion about the article's subject.	Be polite Assume good faith No personal attacks Be welcoming	Article policies No original research Neutral point of view Verifiability

This article is within the scope of the following WikiProjects:

WikiProject Biography     (Rated Start-Class) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page. Biography Portal Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ] This article is supported by the Politics and government work group. This article is supported by the Arts and Entertainment work group. WikiProject Television      (Rated Start-Class) WikiProject Television     (Rated Start-Class) Television Portal This article is part of WikiProject Television, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to television programs and related subjects on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale. Mid This article has been rated as Mid-Importance on the importance scale. Assessment comments This article has been rated for quality and/or importance but has no comments yet. If appropriate, please review the article and then leave comments here to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article and what work it will need. WikiProject BBC      (Rated Start-Class) This article is within the scope of WikiProject BBC, an attempt to better organise information in articles related to the BBC. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page where you can join us as a member. You can also visit the BBC Portal. Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the assessment scale. (Add assessment comments) High This article has been rated as high-importance within the BBC WikiProject. Tasks for WikiProject BBC: Here are some tasks you can do: Merge: Suggested merge of Criticism of the BBC into BBC controversies (Discuss) Cleanup: Newsnight, BBC Prime, BBC Two Northern Ireland Expand: All 10 start-class BBC articles with Top importance - see here, BBC Lifestyle Stubs: Stub-Class BBC articles Update: BBC Portal NPOV: Criticism of the BBC (See comments) Other: Ensure all our articles have the talk page template added to their talk pages. Add free use images for biographical articles. Add infoboxes to the BBC articles without infoboxes. Get our new task force on BBC Sitcoms going. Add references to Goa Mix (see assessment) and Coat of arms of the BBC. WikiProject United Kingdom      (Rated Start-Class) This article is within the scope of WikiProject United Kingdom, an attempt to better organise information in articles related to the United Kingdom. For more information, visit the project page. Start This article has been rated as Start-class on the quality scale. Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the importance scale.

Contents 1 European Parliament election, 2004 2 Result 3 General Election, 2005 4 National Service 5 Career with BBC 6 Rwanda

[edit] European Parliament election, 2004

He is standing for the European Parliament in the June 2004 elections, as an independent candidate in the UK's eastern region.

and did he win? or lose? Iain 11:31, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Result

No, he didn't get elected ("Winning" is an odd concept in multi-member regional constituencies!). -- Arwel 13:12, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] General Election, 2005

Shame he didn't win, especially in Brentwood, we could do without Pickles being MP here. --El Zilcho 20:32, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

I hope you're not implying that Mr Pickles should move to become MP in Bradford?Phase4 21:21, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] National Service

Since October 2005[1], this article has asserted that "He failed to obtain a commission on his national service and served out his time as a[n] acting corporal."

1. Why do we mention this? It does not seem at all notable to me.
2. Do we have a source for it?

Cheers, CWC(talk) 18:15, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Two x "s" in commission!Phase4 22:12, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

And I cut-and-pasted that from the article! The old "pressed Delete when the cursor wasn't where you thought it was" trick, hey? Bah. ;-] Cheers, CWC(talk) 00:27, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Career with BBC

According to Oliver Kamm [2],

Here is a small example concerning my family, and that I cite because I therefore know the subject and it illustrates what I'm talking about. It would be difficult to name an African country that has suffered war in the last 40 years and whose travails have not been reported by Martin Bell for the BBC. One of those countries, however, is Rwanda. Wikipedia's entry for Martin, sure enough, cites prominently his journalism from that country - a body of work that no one has seen because it doesn't exist. It's the type of small error - something that might have happened, but didn't - that no amateur editor would feel sufficiently strongly about to check, or sure about to delete. Inevitably, given Wikipedia's reach and unwarranted use even by serious newspapers, that factoid will make its way into profiles and, one day, obituaries of the man.

Worth checking, too, some of the other places from which he's said to reported?

NotSaussure 16:16, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

His profile on the BBC lists Rwanda as a country he has reported from, whether the BBC profile is correct or not is another matter... Oldelpaso 17:04, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

After a bit of detective work, mention of Rwanda is made in the first version of this article [3] from July 2003. By using archive.org's Wayback Machine, the BBC page has existed since at least February 2003. Doesn't look like Wikipedia generated that fact. Still dont know whether its true though! Oldelpaso 17:22, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rwanda

Criticism of inclusion at this blog http://oliverkamm.typepad.com/blog/2007/04/jeremiads_about.html Removed Rwanda for lack of citation.--80.6.163.58 17:50, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Which act rather proves what a load of cobblers Kamm's argument is. Twospoonfuls 22:10, 26 April 2007 (UTC)