Talk:Colin Powell Resigns as U.S. Secretary of State, Rice Likely Successor/Review

This article has been submitted for review by the Wikinews community. The review period is currently a minimum of 8 hours for regular articles and 4 hours for urgent stories. An article needs to find consensus - no objections - in the following categories in order to be accepted for publication. See also Wikinews:Article stages#Review for information on what constitutes a valid objection.

Is the article neutral?

All factual claims need to be attributed or sourced. On-topic information which is relevant to the article should be added. Off-topic information should NOT be added to "balance out" an article.

• yep. Lyellin 17:41, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Is the article accurate and have sources been cited?

All facts should be verifiable. Factual claims which are attributed to a person or group, but considered false by another person or group can remain in the article as long as the controversy is accurately represented.

The article is accurate, but the sources were not strictly primary sources. I have added links to the briefing Powell made regarding his resignation and the copy of his letter made available by the State Department. It may be worth going through the briefing and raising some of the queries mentioned therein in this article prior to publication. --BenM 05:19, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The article is inaccurate or misleading as its use of words like "replacement", "chosen" and "successor" for Rice and Gonzales implies that they will automatically be filling the post. In fact this is not certain. Rice and Gonzales are currently only nominees, and must first be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. See google news searches for "gonzales confirmation" or "rice confirmation". -- en:User:KeithTyler

Is the current version better in this regard?--Eloquence

Looks good to me, there's a clear trail of where reports regarding Rice's appointment has come from (Reuters citing senior BushCo types). Even if someone else (e.g. Wolfowitz) gets the job, the statement is still valid because we're only reporting what some officials are tipping. --BenM 16:56, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Better now. Lyellin 17:41, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The article assumed that other Bush administration officials were "hawkish" - a term that implies an aggressive desire for war and/or exploitation. Better to cite a source which holds this view. It's a matter of considerable dispute whether Bush et al. actually favored or desired war -- or just felt it was a last resort and were reluctant. Despite countless hours of research -- including reading insider books like Misunderestimated by Bill Sammon, I've been unable to find any proof that ANYONE on the Bush team preferred war over diplomacy. If we can find evidence of this, this would not flip us from unsure to sure - but from unsure to NEUTRAL. That is, we should say that some sources indicate the Bush team preferred diplomacy, while other sources indicate that some of them wanted war all along.

Note that it is primarily US Democrats and other anti-Bush advocates who pro mate the POV that Bush et al. wanted war all along. Unless Wikinews is planning to adopt an anti-Bush POV as its official policy, I hope to nip this sort of thing in the bud. We should be neutral, or this project will fail. Ed Poor 15:51, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Is the article legal?

Does the article violate any laws of the state of Florida in the United States? Specifically, does it violate other people's copyright, in text or images? Please make sure that no images have been directly copied from a non-free source without permission, and that any brief text quoted from a non-free source is attributed accurately. Use Google News and Google Search and pick individual phrases from the article to verify this.

• Seems to be. Lyellin 17:41, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Does the article comply with our policies and guidelines?

Aside from the above categories, does the article comply with Wikinews:Content guide and Wikinews:Style guide?'

The style guide specifies past tense, but the article makes heavy use of present perfect ("has resigned", "has been chosen"). - en:User:KeithTyler

Present perfect seems acceptable to me. I've amended the style guide accordingly. What do you think?--Eloquence 16:49, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think it's alright. First paragraph is a little shaky though. Lyellin 17:41, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Is the article comprehensive?

Relevant information on the topic should be included, while keeping in mind timeliness. Given that an almost infinite amount can be said about any topic, objections in this category carry less weight than those in other categories.

• Yes. Lyellin 17:41, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)