Talk:Family of Secrets

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NPOV disputed?[edit]

The 11/14 banner refers to discussion here, but there is none.
Bn (talk) 12:27, 11 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Yes there should be a discussion. @DrFleischman: tagged the article as not reflecting book reviews. Can he elaborate? Coretheapple (talk) 17:26, 11 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

My apologies. I added the tag because the "Reviews" section doesn't appear balanced and reflective of the sources. Firedoglake should not be placed much more prominently than more accepted and better known sources such as the LA Times and WaPo. And those sources just plain slam the book, but this isn't effectively communicated in our coverage. The Observer source isn't exactly a book review, but it almost comes out and calls the author a conspiracy theorist, and that's not reflected in our coverage. Finally, the San Diego Union-Tribune quote is a misquote; most of it is actually Baker's own words being quoted rather than the reviewer's. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:14, 11 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Clearly that section needs to be scrutinized. Coretheapple (talk) 18:20, 11 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

In fact, the new Boston magazine article Bn added today says, "Family of Secrets was trounced by the mainstream media." Granted, it follows with a couple of positive reactions. But this balance is clearly not reflected in our own article. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 18:26, 11 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

That assessment can and should be utilized as a general statement about the media reception of the book. Coretheapple (talk) 18:30, 11 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The entire paragraph from which that quote was extracted:
Family of Secrets was trounced by the mainstream media: “There are more crutches in these pages,” wrote the Washington Post, “than in the grotto at Lourdes.” And yet it’s an impressive feat of reporting, its pages filled with constellations of intriguing and often troubling facts. Baker’s editor, Peter Ginna, told the New York Observer in 2009, “I worked at Oxford University Press for 10 years and published several Pulitzer Prize–winning historians, and I have not published any book that was more extensively documented and more impeccably footnoted than this one.” Gore Vidal called it “one of the most important books of the past 10 years.”
Since we don't want to give undue weight to one side of what the reporter wrote (NB, this was not a review of the book), we should quote both sides or none at all. I'll try including both sides now. Bn (talk) 00:05, 11 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Evidently the POV issue with the review section was giving insufficient weight to the Washington Post and LA Times, which was negative, while providing a lengthy exposition of the view of the reviewer for a non-notable columnist of a small town newspaper in West Virginia. Coretheapple (talk) 20:19, 12 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've edited the article so as to describe what the book actually says, as reported by reviewers and not by Wikipedia editors, and to fairly reflect the reviews, which were negative, indeed, scathing. The article, as originally written, was a mess and it was quite a chore to determine just how much of a mess it was. I have to say, with all candor, that if I had seen the article in its original state[1] I probably would have nominated it for speedy deletion as unambiguous promotion. Coretheapple (talk) 14:02, 15 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

NPOV Help Needed[edit]

See Talk:Russ_Baker#NPOV_Help_Needed.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Bn (talk • contribs) 23:42, 27 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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Reader's critique of Wikipedia article[edit]

There has been some expansion of the article since I last read it in 2018. However I offer the following comments on what appeared at that time in 2018 to be an extremely biased article/review. 12-09-2019

Having some familiarity with the book Family of Secrets by Russ Baker (I read it over a long period between 2018 and 2019 and discussed it with a colleague), I am disturbed by the tone of the article in Wikipedia. I am not sure why there should even be an article on this book, as opposed to an article devoted to Russ Baker and perhaps some of his writing or theories. But what we have in the present Wikipedia article is a smackdown of Baker's research without a cogent presentation of what the book is about, and a selection of disparaging reviews from reviewers who, it seems obvious to me, found the book's allegations and conclusions to be simply inadmissible given their closed minds and institutional allegiances. We do indeed have a vast amount of crime in this country coming from its elites, turning on interlocking relationships among intelligence personnel, drug runners, financial criminals, and so on, which is difficult to unearth precisely because the elites have their minions in positions of influence at the major media, which then turn a blind eye. To unravel these things is in the public interest, but people in power thwart independent reporters' attempts, very often labeling them "conspiracy theorists" in an attempt to discredit them and render them harmless. Obviously there ARE conspiracies that operate in the margins and under the radar because the perpetrators are part of the establishment and can largely avoid discovery and accountability. Suffice it to say that Russ Baker attempts to make sense of what he finds, and this book despite whatever shortcomings it may have, exposes some very interesting information about members of the Bush family, and no handwaving from prejudiced reviewers is going to make that go away. 70.36.145.2 (talk) 07:49, 10 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

NPOV Noticeboard[edit]

Russ Baker has argued on his website (and presumably as an IP in Talk:Russ Baker) that Wikipedia editors have cherry-picked sources to negatively describe his journalistic approach and his book Family of Secrets. I have opened a discussion at Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard#Russ Baker to address these complaints. -Location (talk) 16:57, 7 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

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