Vicky Petty

You have hit two nails on the head, Robert. The first is that Wikipedia is ruled not according to principles per se, but according to editors who make it up as they go along. The second and much more perceptive criticism you level is that infractions will be ignored "unless there is some disruption." The true meaning of the latter point is that an administrator can and will ignore clear infractions by an editor whose point of view he happens to agree with. And not only is their, by definition, none of the impartiality that would result from a strict application of rules such as the no more than three reversals per article per editor per day policy, there is even a page entitled Too long, didn't read, which editors use to justify their not reading comprehensive evidence of a pattern of misconduct when not to do so is somehow convenient to them. The administration of wikipedia is a uniquely hypocritical self-perpetuating oligarchy, rife with favoritism and 'governed' by non-objective rules which allow an administrator to justify both A and not A in the same way, and at the same time. Unless there is some disruption.

I recently came across the claim on Wikipedia that Ayn Rand believed that government was a "necessary evil" and that she identified it in those words. But I am absolutely sure that she never said any such thing, and I remember her saying that government could not be described as evil, since in its proper form it is a good thing. I figured this forum would be a good place to ask if anyone knows where she made the statement that it is not a "necessary evil."

How does Wikipedia report a record midterm defeat for the Democrats on their front page? "In the United States midterm elections, the Democratic Party retains a majority in the Senate, while the Republican Party (its House leader John Boehner pictured) wins a majority of seats in the House of Representatives."

It may be of some interest to those who are agnostic about the leanings of Wikipedia to see what article they have chosen to run on the eve of the most notable US midterm elections in the last century: Today's featured article The United States Senate election in California, 1950 followed a campaign characterized by accusations and name-calling. Republican Richard Nixon defeated Democrat Helen Gahagan Douglas, after Democratic incumbent Sheridan Downey withdrew during the primary election campaign. Nixon won the Republican primary and Douglas the Democratic contest, with each also finishing third in the other party's contest. A contentious Democratic primary race left the party divided, and Democrats were slow to rally to Douglas—some even endorsed Nixon. The Korean War broke out only days after the primaries, and both Nixon and Douglas contended that the other had often voted with leftist New York Congressman Vito Marcantonio to the detriment of national security. Nixon's attacks were far more effective, and he won the election by almost 20 percentage points, carrying 53 of California's 58 counties and all metropolitan areas. The campaign gave rise to two memorable political nicknames: "the Pink Lady" for Douglas and "Tricky Dick" for Nixon. (more...)

Wikipedia is rife with cliques of leftists, anti-Americans, anti-Israelis, pro-Palestinians, pro-Marxists, environmentalists, and more. Administrators and Arbitrators (the highest authority) who freeze articles and ban users are a self-nominating class, usually academics. There was a recent major scandal where it was known to dozens of administrators that one of their own was using two separate accounts in violation of policy. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-10-05/Law_affair) When this became revealed to the general population, one Arbitrator resigned his arbitratorship, but did not resign his administrator position. No other editors resigned their positions: A case was opened to sanction editors who took this position of explicitly disavowing their own policies. A majority vote to punish these self-excusing and hypocritical editors could not be achieved. Not one of these editors lost their status as enforcers of the rules. Policy decisions and edits are supposed to be based upon neutral positions. Neutral is regularly defined politically correct, progressive and Anti-American. Discussions of what news items appear on the front page regularly revolve around the need to take America down a peg. The editor "Metricmike, an British expat, regularly changes measures in feet and miles in articles about American subjects to meters and kilometers, contrary to the policy to honor local usage, because Americans are stupid and should realize that metrics is superior. He is not admonished or stopped. The title of the article The Bronx was changed to Bronx by an administrator, in violation of the policy which holds that names of cities like The Hague, given usage, should include the article, and even though a vote of editors was six to five in favor of not changing the article's name. The reason? "Apparently there is some regional pride going into the efforts to keep "The" in the title." The user Soman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Soman is a paid editor who solely contributes articles on Marxist entities. He has created 3329 articles about various communist subjects. Paid editing is a violation of policy. This editor is treated as a preferred customer. Edits made to articles such as Al Gore and United Nations introducing referenced and neutrally worded critical information are reversed by dedicated cliques within seconds. Edits removing flat out personal attacks and reports of rumors about living people such as Sarah Palin are reversed, even though the report of mere allegations(such as the rumor that Palin's baby Trig was really her daughter's) is considered unencyclopedic and potentially libelous. And when organizations with a politically incorrect viewpoint offer courses to teach people to edit wikipedia according to its rules, leftist editors advise each other and take preemptive actions to counter the threat. Wikipedia is effectively part of the Dan Rather - Jayson Blair axis.