Talk:Mir-Hossein Mousavi/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Cite error

I can't understand how to solve it. Will someone explain? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ali Nazifpour (talk • contribs) 18:13, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

in the "Premiership" section it says he is "well-remembered" this would be better stated as "well-regarded" because remembered implies that he is not longer living —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.245.47.21 (talk) 17:49, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Errors in the Infobox

In his time the president was "Ali Khamenei", not the current president "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad"; and also the leader was "Ayatollah Khomeini", not the current leader "Ali Khamenei". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.139.117.48 (talk) 04:54, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Media censorship

The campaign faced censorship several times,

"Yase no" یاس نو newspaper which was considered to be a newspaper of the reformists camp close to former president Mohammad Khatami, has been banned from printing and distribution 17th of may.

Facebook which became a part of his alternative media movement for supporters was banned 24th of may due to rise of his online media attention. But the government didnt have a clear announcement on this issue, and the ban was abolished 2 days later.

There have been no clear positioning of the governmental authorities on this issue, they try to keep silence, the "ILNA" news agency even announced that this filtering is going to be nullified soon. The reaction in Mr Mousavi and Karroubi's (the other reformist candidate) camp was a very sharp condemnation, telling the "ministry of Culture and Islamic guidance" that these illegitimate actions are not going to help them to keep back the flood. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mammadsadeghi (talk • contribs) 04:38, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Albanian Wikipedia

Please, add a link to the Albanian version of the article: sq:Mir Hosein Musavi.--Getoar TX (talk) 08:40, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Reverted this page to yesterday's version

Large edits were done to this page that seem to violate BLP. Several editors had come to try to improve the language, but since no other edits were done on this page, I simply reverted to the version before. I'm not sure what the wikipedia policy is for that sort of procedure. If there is a "correct" way to correctly undo a series of edits it would be good to know.

In regard to the nature of the changes, please note that biographies of living persons WP:BLP establishes higher than normal requirements for citations. Dispariging or critical remarks are probably best discussed on this talk page before adding them to the main article. In that fashion, other editors may be able to suggest better language and/or provide guidance on handling sensitive matters. Jeff Carr (talk) 19:01, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Restoration

Jeff Carr, please do not undo all the changes and revisions that have been done by many people to restore the older biased version which was directly copied of of Mousavi's website. The revisions have citations. Please respect peoples' hard work. Mass editing and deletion of large amounts of cited text is not reasonable.Your own mass deletion by undoing certainly violates BLP. If there is something wrong with the addition please mention the problem so we could fix it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amir mousavi (talk • contribs) 19:08, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Sure, let's talk about them here. Jeff Carr (talk) 19:14, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

It was best to revert them all due to BLP as too many of your changes where unsourced. Also potentially negative comments on living persons is very strict so it's best to be careful. Other editors had commented on the potential POV of your comments. It's probably best to work out some wording on the talk page since you seem to know the details here well. I'd suggest you post potentially controversial content on the talk page, then ask for input, then add it to the main page after there is some discussion. Jeff Carr (talk) 19:17, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Jeff, All my revisions were sourced and cited, while the version that you keep reverting to is not sourced and like I said is directly copied of his website. Please instead of undoing the entire article point out whatever that is not sourced or you think might violate policies, and Ill be more than glad to help fix it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amir mousavi (talk • contribs) 19:24, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

This article is terrible

So far, all we have about his life before becoming prime minister is that he was born in 1941 and that he was a student under the Shah's regime (the whole of the Shah's regime? Was he a 38 year old student in 1979?). The intro mentions that he was minister of foreign affairs before 1981, but it is unclear when and for how long. Nor is his tenure as prime minister discussed in any detail - there's a few disconnected facts, and then we move on to some confused discussion of the 90s which talks about Mehdi Karroubi without any context and makes little sense to anyone who doesn't already know the story. Could somebody who a) knows something about this; b) is fluent in written English; and c) actually has some idea of how to present context and explain this to people who don't have background knowledge about him please fix the article? I'd have thought that, since he's been in the news for some months now, the article would be better than this. john k (talk) 20:24, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

John, the initial article seemed to biased towards serving a propaganda for Mousavi's campaign, and like you said it was not rich in content. Karroubi was another candidate in the recent elections, he is a member and supporter of the same political party as Mousavi. please let me know if you have any questions about the situation.I did remove some out of the context facts about KarroubiAmir mousavi (talk) 21:04, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree, it's pretty badly written and sourced. Some of the links to other wikipedia pages don't even back up stuff said in this article (1988 massacre link goes to a page about Khomeini's initiating it, etc.) Bleh. -98.154.249.46 (talk) 02:12, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Biased

The Election section is very biased since it was copied directly from Mousavi's website, I have made a few changes with citations. There still remain lines that are biased in favor of Mousavi's campaign.

And one of the quotations was deleted by a user stating it was 30 years old,the quotation was clearly from 1981, please do not delete without illegitimate reason. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amir mousavi (talk • contribs) 18:31, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Heh, Freudian slip: "do not delete without illegitimate reason" == "do not delete for any legitimate reason"?

Destynova 02:33, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Restoration

Kurdo and IranianGuy please do not restore to the biased previous version, discuss any problems here, and let editors do the editing. please stop removing sourced quotations(calling them 30 years old is not a legitimate reason for removal, it still portrays his history of foreign policy. Again, do not restore please discuss here, and let the editors do the clean up.Amir mousavi (talk) 17:33, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Unsourced comments

No source was provided for the statement that Ahmadinejad "in 2005 called the Holocaust a myth". A link was provided to the FOX News website which simply stated the same thing, also unsourced. Jiminezwaldorf (talk) 03:46, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

• Cp.: http://www.google.de/search?q=Ahmadinejad+holocaust+a+myth —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.69.249.219 (talk) 22:30, 14 June 2009 (UTC)
• This is one of the most widely sourced claims about Ahmadinejad. While wikipedia's sources may not be great on this, it's pretty easy to find reliable sources for him repeatedly saying this or similar. -98.154.249.46 (talk) 02:10, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Once again, why do people say "it's widely sourced" and then refuse to actually insert one?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_and_Israel

That's a somewhat comprehensive listing of his Israel-related comments. I'm guessing the allusion to "2005, myth, etc." is from the 2005 Muslim Summit when he (supposedly) said he "doesn't accept the claim" that "Hitler burned millions of Jews and put them in concentration camps".

I qualify that with "supposedly" because many of the Google hits are inconsistent and give different locations, dates and translations for the remarks.

http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/crs/rs22569.pdf says it was delivered at a Tehran speech titled "A World Without Zionism" while attributing "Today, they have created a myth in the name of the Holocaust and consider it to be above God, religion and the prophets" to the Muslim Summit speech. The first quote seems to be outright Holocaust Revision (not complete denial if he's debating the numbers while acknowledging it occurred) and would fit that criteria more than the other which seems more like a statement on Israel's use of the Holocaust in its national identity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.50.39.29 (talk) 01:23, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

NPOV

This article is highly slanted, and looks more like political propaganda. Among the offending lines:

• [...] incredibly respected and praised by many Iranians across the political spectrum [...]
• His strong commitment to Social Justice and Equality is well-known and is regarded to be at the core of his political ideology [...]
• [His bid] has been since welcomed by many Iranians who still recall his time as Prime Minister.
• [...] has been immensely welcomed by Trade Unions, Labour associations, grassroot activists on both sides of the political aisle [...]

And so on. It seems that these changes were introduced by 136.148.109.150. Orzetto (talk) 14:46, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

In such cases, you need to add POV-section and not NPOV for the whole article! Tag was changed for time being. By the way, try to express yourself with respect. Regards Parvazbato59 (talk) 18:55, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

The text seems to be written by a pro-Mousavi author. I will try to find some sources that have a more neutral point of view, then will update it based on those. --Ebright82 (talk) 08:03, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Since the article has not been revised can an editor please add an NPOV tag to the section in question. The election is coming up and this article is in major need of revision. Lazlo holyfeld (talk) 20:54, 26 May 2009 (UTC)Lazlo Holyfeld

It seems all of the `offending' lines cited above have since be rewritten, and I'm inclined to say that the article is relatively okay. I propose removing the NPOV tag, and will do so later today or tomorrow if no one complains here. --ScottMorrison (talk) 17:10, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Oops, it seems this isn't the active NPOV discussion. See the bottom of the talk page for more recent complaints. I might just delete this section of the talk page to avoid confusion. --ScottMorrison (talk) 17:12, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

NPOV tag added

Current version is extremely problematic in term of NPOV as it contains too many peacock phrases and generally reads as a puff piece on Mousavi. I say this as someone who is very much sympathetic to his current complaints about the recent election so this is not a political point in the slightest, but this POV problem does need to be addressed. It seems there is an ongoing content dispute here (and perhaps some edit warring) and I may try and take a look at the overall issues if and when I get a chance. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:29, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

This article is hilariously bad. It's basically hagiography of the worst kind. I'm awaiting the section on Mousavi's ability to walk on water. It will doubtless arrive long before we see a word on his neoliberal politics. Grace Note (talk) 23:19, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I've tried to slightly improve matters with this edit, which largely was a removal of some over-the-top plaudits for Moussavi, most of which were uncited, and some of which were also repetitive. This article still has a long way to go but I think it's a bit less "hilariously bad" (sorry, I do hate ruining good jokes) then it was awhile ago. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 05:01, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Okay, these edits look pretty good. Any objections to me removing the NPOV tag? If someone else who thought it was terrible before, but okay now, wants to remove it, go ahead. --ScottMorrison (talk) 17:20, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

2009 presidential election fraud in Iran

Except that there is no reliable source for this claim. Before the election, Ahmadinejad was leading in polls by a greater than 2-1 ratio*, according to the only reputable source we have, the Terror Free Tomorrow poll conducted by the Washington DC think tank, the New America Foundation. The officially announced results are less than a 2-1 ratio. Therefore, in all likelihood, Ahmadinejad did genuinely win the election. The over-voting that occurred in some cities has been happening in Iran for the past many elections, due to people voting in one region and then traveling to another region and voting again, as well as by using identification of deceased persons. This over-voting favours no particular candidate, except whichever genuinely has the more popular support, as supporters of all candidates participate in this action.
*http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE55E3RO20090615 (talk) 17:24, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

According Mousavi's supporters and based on reliable sources, Mousavi was the true winner in 2009 presidential election and Iranian were quite shocked by the results announced by the government officials. Mousavi rejected the result as rigged and urged his supporters to resist a government of "lies and dictatorship." . "I'm warning that I won't surrender to this manipulation," said a statement on Mousavi's Web site. "The outcome of what we've seen from the performance of officials ... is nothing but shaking the pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran's sacred system and governance of lies and dictatorship," it added.

Mousavi warned "people won't respect those who take power through fraud." The headline on one of his Web sites read: "I won't give in to this dangerous manipulation." Mousavi appealed directly to Khamenei to intervene and stop what he said were violations of the law. Khamenei, who is not elected, holds ultimate political authority in Iran and controls all major policy decisions.

Supporters of Mousavi clashed with police forces in the heart of Iran's capital Saturday, pelting them with rocks and setting fires in the worst unrest in Tehran in a decade. They accused the hard-line president of using fraud to steal election victory from his reformist rival.Later on the unrest spread to other major cities of Iran. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nan20092009 (talk • contribs) 01:32, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Right-wing?

Yes, I realize "right-wing" / "left-wing" is sometimes a rather meaningless description, but what I found strange is that according to this, he has support from unions, which I would generally consider to be "left-wing" politics. So does he have other views that outweigh his union support? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.19.168.209 (talk) 05:35, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

During the first years after the revolution he was among the left wing of religious groups. His policies during those years have been leaning toward socialism. This was one of attacks on him, that he has not changed his views and he still believes in government control of economy. He has rejected this repeatedly and has said that privatization should go on and completed rapidly. But it seems that he still opposes full free market. Note: after revolution, left communist parties clashed with government and became banned, after those few first years, left means left wing of religious groups in contrast to say right wing of religious groups like Motalafe who are Bazaris (Merchants). 128.100.5.143 (talk) 02:13, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

It depends on whether you mean "left" in the Western sense (Marxist, Anarchist, Socialist) or in the Iranian sense (slightly in favor of increased women's rights within a rigid theocratic structure, somewhat approving of a free press as long as it doesn't breed dissension or revolt.) He'd be at home in the U.S. Republican party, but compared to the hardest of hardliners in Iran he could be considered "liberal". Any discussion of him being "socialist" is so laughable I can't even bring myself to discuss it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.50.39.29 (talk) 01:05, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I wish people thought a little before using the word socialist. You make it sound like somehow conservative theocratic socialism is oxymoronic. "Stupid americans" :-) --ScottMorrison (talk) 17:24, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Prime Minister (1981-1989)

One of the contentious details of critics of Mousavi seems to revolve around events that happened in the 1980s. The wording below was suggested to capture this criticism, but it needs some help to be more neutral. There are 5 claims that need to be looked at separately.

Mousavi's socialist ideology became very apparent during the 1980s when he initiated Islamic Socialist policies such as subsidized food coupons, oil coupons and converting private enterprises into government controlled entities.

Mr. Mousavi was involved with the mass-executions of 1980-81, as well as the summer 1988 executions of over 30,000 political prisoners, who were then buried in mass graves.

Two years after the revolution (1981), he was nominated as the Prime Minister by Khomeini.

He was responsible, as head of the Council of Cultural Revolution, for shutting down the entire university system for four years.

Starting in 1988, on the orders of Khomeini, a council was formed, with Mousavi as a member, to revise the regime's constitution to drastically increase the powers of the supreme leader.

I'm unfamiliar with the history or accuracy of these claims. It appears that the 1988 executions of Iranian political prisoners is well sourced, however the connection to Mousavi is not clear to me. It appears that it's a conclusion due to his position as the prime minister. If there is well sourced criticism of his administrations handling or role in the events then perhaps an appropriate approach would be:

As the Prime Minister, Mousavi was also the head of the Council of Cultural Revolution. Critics of Mousavi contend he was responsible for shutting down the entire university system for four years.

and/or

Critics of Mousavi argue that his administration was responsible for the 1988 executions of Iranian political prisoners.

It would probably be helpful to have the guidance of editors that have detailed experience in WP:BLP matters to provide guidance on how high of a standard references must hold. Jeff Carr (talk) 17:53, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

In further response to 1988 executions, at the time: Ruhollah Khomeini was the supreme ruler, Ali Khamenei was the president and Mousavi was the PM. If Mousavi is accused of some role, the actual power of the PM in iran should be clarified here. Jeff Carr (talk) 18:18, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

According to the Iranian constitution, The Iranian judiciary is in charge of prisons, executions , etc, and the head of the judiciary is appointed by [The Supreme Leader of Iran]] , and takers his orders from him. So these are false accusation, It was Khomeini who ordered the executions, this is well-documented [1], the Prime Minister or the President have never had any power or control over the judiciary. --Kurdo777 (talk) 04:29, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

All this stuff should really be sorted out. I came to WP to try and learn something about this guy's past, but find his 8-years as Prime Minister reduced to 3, vague sentences. "his handling of Iran's economy" - How did he handle it? When? Why? "his leadership during the 'Iran-Iraq War'" - Links to a WP article on the war that doesn't mention his name, or even the office of the PM once, so specifically How was he a leader? "and his efforts to end...isolation" any examples of these efforts? This isn't helping me to understand the news of the day at all. 69.183.35.241 (talk) 17:47, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

According to NewsMax or LiveLeak

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=84c_1245115785 says he started Hezbollah and there are many links that discuss concerns about his involvement in 1988 massacres. 69.21.248.100 (talk) 02:47, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

According to Foreign Policy magazine here:

"Indeed, anyone believing Mousavi would be the one to unclench the Iranian fist for a hand-in-hand partnership of peace with the United States is guilty of wishful thinking. It was Mousavi, after all, who was at the center of the Iran hostage crisis and remains complicit in an operation he commended as "the beginning of the second stage of our revolution." And it was Mousavi who was the protégé of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini (chief architect of the Iranian Revolution and founder of theocratic Iran), a former member of Hezbollah's leadership council, sworn enemy of Israel, and a prime minister under whose watch thousands of political prisoners were massacred in 1988. And finally, it was Mousavi who initiated Iran's nuclear program in the 1980s and likely would be intent on carrying through Iran's nuclear ambitions, the foremost issue central to any improvement in relations with the West." Stellarkid (talk) 02:53, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

The issue is being discussed at Talk:Mir-Hossein_Mousavi#A_Founding_Member_of_Hizballah in detail. NewsMax is a partisan neo-conservative sensationalist website (see NewsMax#Controversial_and_incorrect_articles), it can't used as a source for such claims, on the biography of a living person. --Kurdo777 (talk) 04:16, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

The formating on the two posts above is confusing. Stellarkid is re-posting something from Foreign Policy not NewsMax. Jeff Carr (talk) 10:37, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean by the formatting being confusing, but the Liveleak post referenced first is a reprint of a Newsmax article, which is what Kurdo777 is referring to. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 00:25, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Mass Edits?

Why is it that a few nights ago this page was much longer and more detailed and now it's just a few wishy-washy paragraphs? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.130.182.82 (talk) 04:51, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Mass Killings

Someone has trashed the page.

They took out the parts about how Mousavi ordered the mass killings of some 30,000 dissidents during the war!!!

someone with a high rank please correct this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.155.49.3 (talk) 01:18, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

That sort of information would need very good sourcing, please provide some sources here if you have them and the change you are interested in making can be discussed. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 01:41, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Very, very good sourcing, indeed. Its a WP:BLP after all. - Arcayne (^{cast a spell}) 02:17, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Of course. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 04:07, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

I added an edit mentioning criticism of Mousavi for remaining silent regarding the massacre; I also included a cite to an article in Al-Arabiya for this. This was removed entirely, without explanation. Why? If nothing else it would seem that the summary execution of thousands of political prisoners would be a notable event that occurred during Mousavi's tenure, and one that visitors to Wikipedia would want to know about. So why has it been deleted from this article? Fumoses (talk) 03:38, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

I've added a couple of sourced items re the massacres as well as some other brief, sourced info re his career from 1979-89. Let's see how long they stay up! Someone needs to remove all the unsourced stuff, and to do something meaningful about the Iran-Iraq war--losing several hundred thousand citizens in armed conflict is the kind of thing prime ministers get judged on.Kalebeul (talk) 15:12, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

You can not use, and put together, cherry-picked 20-year old newspaper items/interviews/quotes to editorialize a page, and advance a position about the subject, doing so is a violation of two of our main polices, WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH. --Kurdo777 (talk) 16:38, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

This is absurd. Is there going to be no mention at all of the fact that thousands of political prisoners were killed under Mousavi's premiership in this article? The sources were well-established and reputable ones such as Time Magazine - and the age of the articles should hardly matter, as dozens of biographical articles on Wikipedia necessarily cite contemporary, rather than current sources for the events they describe. I fail to see how the recently deleted material is in violation of the policies you've mentioned. - Fumoses (talk) 19:46, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Read those policies carefully, so that you'll understand how. You seem to be under the assumption that the role of prime minster in Iran's political system during the 80's, was similar to the role of prime minsters in other countries. That's just not the case. Constitutionality, the prime minster was the fourth highest-ranked official , whose powers were limited to economy and civil society. The prime minster had no power or control over police, military, judiciary, prisons, executions, etc. The issue of 1988 executions of Iranian political prisoners is well-documented, and it took place under Khomeini's leadership, and by his direct orders, Mousavi had no part in it. As a matter of fact, Mousavi resigned from his post within days of that event (the resignation was rejected by Khomeini), and retired from polices a few months later. --Kurdo777 (talk) 22:31, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Iran-Iraq War?

It seems like this would be a major event during Mousavi's political career, but as it stands this article contains only a passing mention of the war (and the mention that "some analysts" have praised his leadership). What did that leadership consist of? What was his role in the war? Did he help bring it to an end, was he more hawkish, did he actually have much of a say at all given the amount of power wielded by Khomeini? We should really have more information here. - Fumoses (talk) 20:08, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

It means civil and economic leadership. Constitutionally, the prime minster, as the fourth highest ranked official within the Iranian political system, had no power or control over the armed forces. --Kurdo777 (talk) 20:53, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Then this should be noted in the article. As it stands it's both vague and misleading. --Fumoses (talk) 03:58, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Mass removal of sourced material by Kurdo777

Kurdo777 has just made a dozen edits removing reliable sourced material and leaving the article as it was before: predominantly unsourced and representing POVs. Specifics:

• He removed a substantial body of sourced information from reliable primary sources (NY Times, Time, The Age, BBC, El País) regarding Mousavi's role vis a vis the Iran government in the early 80s, alleged responsibility for human rights abuses, suggested relationship with Shi'a terrorism, and role during the Rushdie affair on the grounds that "some of these issues were already discussed on talk, you t use newspaper clips like this, it's a violation of WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH". I fail to see any violation of Wikipedia policy, and the fact that issues are discussed on talk doesn't make them per se ineligible for mention in articles.
• The assertion in Baktiari (1996) that Khamenei and Mousavi are brothers in law is he says "a rumor, not true". That does not constitute a sourced refutation.
• He has removed the claim that as newspaper editor Mousavi "mounted a relentless assault on" Banisadr, claiming it is "NPOVing". Baktiari 1996, the source, wrote: "Through his newspaper, Musavi had launched a relentless campaign against Bani-Sadr, portraying him as 'pro-American' during the hostage crisis." His weakening of this to Musavi being a mere "opponent" is unsourced and unjustified.
• His justification for removal of the section "His ascent to the premiership in October 1981 "marked not only a total victory for the fundamentalists in their quest of power consolidation but also a victory for the maktabis," a faction which sought and achieved clerical dominance of state power with the purported aim of benefitting the downtrodden. Baktiari (1996), p.81." is that it "m selective quote from Baktiari, it's undue weight". This is not a selective quote, as reading of the source shows: it is Baktiari's broad view of the establishment of a new order in the course of 1981. Its removal is unjustified.
• He has removed the Expand-section tag from the Early life and career (ie -1981) section on the grounds that "the section is large enough". This is unjustified: Mousavi was a major figure in the establishment of the Islamic Republic.
• He has removed the Expand-section tag from the Prime Minister section without saying why. This is remarkable for many reasons, not least of which is that the section contains no discussion of the Iran-Iraq war which dominated Mousavi's term in office.

I propose restoring the article to the version prior to his interventions and working constructively to expand and improve it. Kalebeul (talk) 19:48, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I strongly second this. As it is, the section on Mousavi's premiership excludes any information regarding the state of human rights in Iran during the 80s, which is a fairly notable omission. If there weren't any available sources on this, that would be one thing, but there are plenty, and it's a notable subject. Omitting such information essentially whitewashes the article's subject and leaves the whole thing incredibly slanted.

I appreciate the material Kurdo777 added on Mousavi's rise to the premiership, but Kalebeul's contributions should be restored and integrated into the section. - Fumoses (talk) 20:01, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I already explained to you above. You can not use, and put together, cherry-picked 20-year old newspaper items/interviews/quotes to editorialize a page, and advance a position about the subject, doing so is a violation of two of our main polices, WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH. Kalebeul's constructive contributions" were kept, the parts that violated those two polices, and other polices associated with WP:BLP were removed. The Wikipedia community will not allow the biography of a living person, to to turn into an attack page. If you don't like the subject, perhaps you should write an opinion piece or a blog entry about him, Wikipedia is not a soapbox. --Kurdo777 (talk) 20:35, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I see cherry-picking of outdated newspaper items/interviews/quotes to push a certain POV. We have many new secondary sources that can be used instead. I agree with Kordu that old version violated WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH.--Where is my vote? (talk) 21:03, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

The only "cherry-picking" going on is being done by people like Kurdo777, who apparently only want to include flattering information about this subject in order to push a political agenda. WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH were not violated by Kalebul's edits, and Kurdo777's removal of them is unjustified. I feel that a higher-level editor should be called in at this point to prevent further edit warring. -Fumoses (talk) 04:05, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

What "flattering information" did I include about this subject? WP:AGF, will you? I am an established editor, It's WP:SPAs like you and Kalebeul, who are trying to turn this biography of a living person into an attack page. WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH were indeed violated, as were WP:UNDUE, WP:COATRACK and WP:BLP in general. Let me quote for you the applicable and relevant parts of those policies: "All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors"...."Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation"...."Do not make analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about information found in a primary source"...."Do not put together information from multiple sources to reach a conclusion that is not stated explicitly by any of the sources."..."Editors should not make the mistake of thinking that if A is published by a reliable source, and B is published by a reliable source, then A and B can be joined together in an article to reach conclusion C. This would be a synthesis of published material that advances a new position, and that constitutes original research"..."Neutrality requires views to be represented without bias"...."Just as giving undue weight to a viewpoint is not neutral, so is giving undue weight to other verifiable and sourced statements. An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject"..."Coatrack articles can be created purposefully to promote a particular bias, and they can accidentally evolve through excessive focus on one aspect of the subject"..."When a biography of a living person is a coatrack, it is a problem that requires immediate action"..."Often the main tool of a coatrack article is fact picking. Instead of finding a balanced set of information about the subject, a coatrack goes out of its way to find facts that support a particular bias. A common fact picking device is listing great amounts of individual peoples' quotes criticizing of the nominal subject, while expending little or no effort mentioning that the criticism comes from a small fraction of people. That small fraction thus gets a soapbox that is far larger than reality warrants"..."Editors must take particular care adding biographical material about a living person to any Wikipedia page. Such material requires a high degree of sensitivity, and must adhere strictly to all applicable laws in the United States and to all of our content policies".--Kurdo777 (talk) 09:09, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Kurdo, the information Kalebul included wasn't in violation of any of the policies you've cited. You want to remove information about notable historic events that occurred during Mousavi's tenure, and only leave statements like "Mousavi gained a reputation for 'being honest, humble and a supporter of the masses'" behind. That leaves a slanted article, and one that's of less use to Wikipedia's readers. You may object to those edits being present in the article for your own ideological reasons, but they are facts, and well-sourced facts, and they belong in this article. -Fumoses (talk) 13:27, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Kalebul's edits were in clear violation of all the policies I've cited, and mostly relied on primary sources, even Kalebul, himself, has confessed, in his comment above, that he had used primary sources. If you refuse to understand and follow Wikipedia policy, I can't help you. I am, however, warning you to stop making personal accusations, and only "comment on content, not on the contributor", per our policy on WP:NPA. --Kurdo777 (talk) 13:42, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Kalebul's edits were not clearly in violation of any policy. Time Magazine is not a primary source, and age of source materials shouldn't matter - reliability of sources should. I'm going to ask one of the higher-ups to deal with this, because I don't see any other way of avoiding an edit war. -Fumoses (talk) 17:43, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

The solution to "cherry picking old articles" isn't to remove everything and put in modern articles, but to examine the reliability of the sources, regardless of age, and include all viewpoints. Both sides of the edit-war are not doing that. Also, the age of a source has nothing at all to do with it's reliability (and as a side note, Newsmax would not be in any sort of reliable category). -98.154.249.46 (talk) 14:01, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Kurdo is right on this. We are not writing an essay here, old interviews and new wires are considered PRIMARY SOURCES, and can't be cited per those policies Kurdo has quoted--Where is my vote? (talk) 14:15, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Time Magazine is not a primary source. It seems clear you either don't understand Wikipedia policy, don't understand what a "primary source" is, or are being deliberately obtuse here. -Fumoses (talk) 17:43, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

A 20-year old news item from Time Magazine, was used in conjunction with another 20-year old news item about Khomeini that makes no mention of Mousavi, to make an editorial point and reach a conclusion. That's a clear case of synthesizing or essay-writing as another editor pointed out, and therefore a violation of WP:SYNTH. --Kurdo777 (talk) 18:53, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Zionist link?

Can someone find the Arab News article that shows Mousavi is being controlled and paid by the Zionist entity? Should update the page to reflect this. 76.226.153.135 (talk) 03:25, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

~~u mad brosef~~? TallNapoleon (talk) 03:37, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Maybe you are mistaken - It is my understanding that wikipedia is for verified facts from reliable sources, not crazy bullshit conspiracy theories. --86.137.152.136 (talk) 20:04, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

For obvious reasons, it's not even worth it to discuss the suggestion from 76.226.153.135, so I would recommend that everyone just disengage and not respond further here. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 20:33, 22 June 2009 (UTC)