Talk:George Galloway

I have made significant changes to this page as I believe it was very good but could have been more neutral.

Galloway is a controversial but very interesting figure, so I suspect there may be some heated discussion about George, as I believe he enters the twilight of his colourful career.

-- User:210.50.217.13 22:15, 23 Oct 2003

You did some good work there. Although you're free to continue editing anonymously, it's helpful if you get a wikipedia account - this makes it easier for other wikipedians to contact you.

I have a couple of suggested improvements - I'm not just pasting them in myself as I'm having some difficult wording them properly. If someone can finish my sentences in an NPOV way, I'd be grateful:

• "Galloway's supporters say he is a traditional left-winger". I think we're qualifying this a bit too hard - I doubt anyone would say George wasn't from the left wing of the party. Perhaps it should just say "Hailing firmly from the left of the party, he is a voluble..." ?

I think "unreconstructed" is the perfect term. Frankly, I think whomever put in that "his supporters say" thing (an anon IP) was being overly-NPOV. I doubt even Tommy Sheridan would call George anything other than left wing. -- Finlay McWalter 23:57, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)

• wrt Mariam: "token" is slightly POV. I'm sure george would say "symbolic", but that's too far the other way. Is there a word between the two? Or perhaps we just nuke the word altogether, and say "a single child" ?

"a single child" is better, I think GrahamN 00:11, 3 Nov 2003 (UTC)

• we should mention that George did have some notable support for his "trial". The current wording kind of implies he's entirely a voice in the wilderness, which isn't entirely true.

-- Finlay McWalter 22:57, 23 Oct 2003 (UTC)

GrahamN resolved the "left-wing" issue to "unreconstructed", which is perfect. I already put in the thing about Tony Benn supporting him. If anyone has an idea about "token" I'm still open to suggestions. -- Finlay McWalter 23:52, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I know I'm going to get some stick (at least from non-brits, thinking it's POV) for inserting the Gorgeous George part, but do a google for "Gorgeous George Galloway" - it's far from a figment of my imagination. -- Finlay McWalter 23:08, 23 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I added stuff in about his threatening to sue the Labour Party, but I didn't put in the reason (because I don't know it). As "it's not fair!" isn't legal cause, I figure it's either some kind of breach of contract or employment-rights thing, but I dunno. Then again, George is more fond of threatening to sue than he is of actually suing, and I'm beginning to wonder if each individual threat is itself encyclopedic. Anyway, if anyone knows the actual legal "causus" he intends to sue for, could you update the page accordingly. -- Finlay McWalter 19:05, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)

In an interview with John Humphreys for BBC Radio 4's On The Ropes programme, he said: "I met Saddam Husein twice, exactly the same number of times as Donald Rumsfeld met him. Donald Rumsfeld met him to sell him guns and gas. I met him to try and bring war and suffering in Iraq to a close." I got that from an audio file avalible *here. I think it should be included but I don't know how it would fit in with the rest of the text.

He also said much the same thing during his appearance on Have I Got News For You. Saul Taylor 07:26, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Neutrality

This article, started by an anonymous, is more like a verdict than an encyclopedia entry. His "Political views" are condensed to what the editors think is useful to defame him, starting "He is an unreconstructed left-winger." I very much doubt that any serious encyclopedia would start writing about a politician with a section "Early and Persoanl Life" including a statement about vanity and Kenzo suits. It is clearly not neutral to write "Although he was cleared of dishonesty, he paid back £1,720 after an audit identified a lack of controls." The whole article is written in a Limbaugh style. Get-back-world-respect 22:58, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

That may be, but please don't go deleting bits of articles you don't like. If you think something makes an unsubstanciated claim, please post on the talk page first, requesting cites. If those aren't forthcoming in a few days, then it's reasonable to edit out the obviously outlying claims. As it is, you've removed the "victory to the intifada" thing, which George is well known for saying. Here, after about one minutes searching, is a typical transcript of one of his speeches [1]. I've heard him say it myself, in the flesh. I know it, and the Arafat/Lenin bit, look like they were inserted by smearmonkering rightwingers, but that doesn't mean it's necessarily false. Please be more respectful of other people's hard work, rather than just zapping stuff. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 23:08, 15 Apr 2004 (UTC)

On neutrality

I felt the article was rather heavily slanted against George Galloway when I did my rewrite, but kept true to the wikipedia policy of not deleting info. However I did write the complained about phrase about Galloway's conduct as Chief Exec of War on Want. I do defend that as a neutral statement. The War on Want episode is important in the context of George Galloway's probity with money. To say that he was cleared of dishonesty would imply that the result was a complete exoneration that the funds in his expenses account were used entirely above board, and that was not quite the case. Essentially what was going on was that War on Want did not bother to look into his expenses account so long as the general funding was looking OK, which it was. When they did look in to it, they found that they really ought to have stopped him spending the money on some of the things he was spending it on.

Galloway's personal liking for nice suits is relevant to his political life because it has affected his perception. He has been quoted, I know not whether accurately, as saying that he needs at least £150,000 a year to survive as a political figure. This has persuaded the SWP to drop their campaign for "a worker's MP on a worker's wage" in the case of Respect.

Perhaps someone could come back with proposed redrafting and justification rather than just stick a disputed message up and remove bits they don't like. Personally I think the political views section was written by an American and ought to be redrafted by a Briton.Dbiv 00:13, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I really didn't think it was too far from NPOV (and is markedly more charitable to GG than is much of the british press). Some of the stuff might seem more inflamatory to north american readers that it will to a british reader (perhaps that's why GBWR thinks its such a hatchet job). Here calling someone an admirer of Lenin really isn't much of an insult, whereas in the states in particular it mostly reads like "evil babyeating monster". I really don't doubt that GG is an admirer of Lenin, say, nor that he would at all deny it, nor that he would think that a big deal, nor that lots of other people wouldn't think it a big deal either. Perhaps the article's big issue is that it's controversy controvery controversy (although unlike GBRW, I think GG mostly comes out of the thing with very little of the thrown mud sticking). The thing is that GG is really a rather minor MP - he's never been a minister, surely never will be one, isn't the leader of a significant faction, hasn't sponsored any private members bills or anything interesting like that. So there really isn't all that much of "encyclopedic" content to write about him, other than all the exciting controversy stuff. And because GG knew he'd never be a minister (or whatever) he plainly never felt the need to bite his tongue, so there's lots of juicy soundbites from him. I'm sure there's several labour MPs of broadly similar views as GG, but they've mostly kept their heads down, while GG (who surely likes being on telly a lot) certainly hasn't. I think the Malkovitch part is rather beside the point, but other than that it's what one would reasonably expect. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 00:27, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I just re-read the "political views" section, and I think it's a fairly accurate summary. Again, it might come off to a non-brit as being rather pejorative, but I don't think that for a british (non-Daily Mail-reading) visitor it would seem that way at all. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 00:41, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)