Talk:Maureen Dowd

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Malber (talk | contribs) at 15:18, 2 March 2006 (→‎Liberal tag). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Removal of example of irreverence

I re-included "for example, referring to Donald Rumsfeld as 'Rummy'." because I felt it was important for the reader to get a quick sense of Dowd's writing style. It doesn't seem POV to me, and there can certainly be no disagreement with the underlying sentiment that she is in fact a rather flip writer (not that this is a good or a bad thing). Meelar (talk) 02:12, May 4, 2005 (UTC)

Another example could be her almost constant reference to the president as "W." breaking from the Times standard of using Mr. Bush.--malber 15:04, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

her marital status?

yes, i'm curious about his seemingly obvious fact.

She is single and has mentioned this in her column a few times. I do think the article is somewhat POV in general. She's not as liberal as the article makes it sound. I won't edit unless I come up with specific examples.

Ghost Writing for Dowd

Rumors of investigation at New York Times regarding Carl Hulse of the DC bureau ghost-writing political columns for Maureen Dowd. Haven't seen documentation yet. Anyone know the inside information?

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POV check

I've added the POV check to help balance out the article which is currently far from neutral. --Viriditas | Talk 01:12, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It seems distinctly neutral to me. Positive: She won a pulitzer. Negative: Accusations (not assertions) of misrepresentation of quotes. Coining of 'dowdify' is a fact. Her allegedly irreverent tone is presented as a negative or a positive, depending on your outlook. I don't think there's anyway to NPOV the given information. However, if you can add some more information which you think will make for a more balanced article, then go ahead. RMoloney 10:56, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with RMoloney, the version posted right now seems to have achieved NPOV. I admittedly did not go back and look at all the changes that have happened since the version that was POV flagged. Can anyone cite a good reason why the POV tag should stay?--Isotope23 18:30, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

W most of the Wikipedia articles on current politically active people, either the first sentence, or at the very least the first paragraph, identifies their political affiliations. This one does not and Ms Dowd most definitely has a strong leaning and a very loud voice.


Who has identified Dowd as a "liberal"? What is a "liberal" anyways? Has she identified herself as one? Dowd has written "Bushworld," an unflattering portrait of the president; but that does not immediately mean that she is a supporter of whatever Bush is against. When Dowd was lambasting Pres. Clinton on a weekly basis, did that make her a conservative?

You're not going to be able to slip in the "liberal" label without some justification. --Rookkey 00:13, 16 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Rookkey. Her lack of official political affiliation, her criticisms of Clinton, etc. mean that there is no NPOV way of summarising her politics in one phrase. Someone who is familiar with her writings (I'm not) may like to summarise her stance on some issues (Iraq, abortion, etc.) so a reader can get an idea of her politics. RMoloney 00:30, 16 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Check Maureen Dowd's column for January 27, 2005. She identifies herself as a member of the "liberal media elite". She does it for humor, but my interpretation is she's pretty clear in her own mind where her politics lie. YMMD

"I'm herewith resigning as a member of the liberal media elite. I'm joining up with the conservative media elite. They get paid better." --Maureen Dowd, column from January 27, 2005 with obvious sarcasm
I think the liberal tag should stay.--malber 15:12, 2 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I agree w Malber - others in Wikipedia are identified w political labels. Consistency(?).

This is absolutely ridiculous. A political trend to label those that criticize the current administration as "liberals" is no reason to include it in an encyclopedia article. When she identified herself as the "liberal media elite", she was making fun of just that. Political labels, when they do appear on wikipedia follow the format:

"A commentator with a conservative point of view, ..." (Limbaugh) "... with a predominantly liberal point of view." (Franken)

Neither of these appears in the first sentence, and anybody familiar with her work knows that this cannot be said about Dowd. Throwing in "liberal columnist" in the first sentence describing her is absurd. --Andreyf 08:04, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

71.193.3.242: You have edited this article 7 times now, labeling Dowd as "radical" and "liberal". Each has been reverted by different people. From your history, it is obvious that you are making political statements all over. Please keep your opinions your own, as this kind of input is not welcome and only hurts wikipedia. Please stop. --Andrey 08:31, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

OK, you win. But IMHO the lack of consistency is equally damaging.

I think we could do without the sarcastic comment under her photo from the recent article "What's a woman to do?". In fact, the photo should probably be removed as well. But I'll leave this to someone closer to the prose.

It could have been much worse.--malber 14:30, 7 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

194.215.75.17 Ann Coulter has skinnier legs than Dowd..

I'm just trying to adapt to the anglo american american dilemma discussion [1].

Links to reviews of "Are Men Necessary" were removed for several reaons. First, the links that were included were all skewed in the same direction. Second, the book has been reviewed by thousands of critics, some favorable and some not. By including links to only a few of the reviewers, those reviewers are given more weight than others. Thus, it could be construed that Wiki is endorsing the opinions of some critics but not others.

I reversed this since I do believe that all sides are represented here. Whether the book is good or excellent, the methodology is what is being analysed. Of course, Dowd never claimed to have done a serious research so it's ok to say that her "methods" are unscientific. I invite other to make a decision. Mhym 03:34, 30 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]


The book "Are Men Necessary?" is a personal commentary. The deleted links only pointed to the opinions of critics, not established facts, concerning the subject of this article and her work. The link to the publisher did offer a factual synopsis of the book thus I have restored it.

The work is an opinion essay. It does not cite any sources. Thus, other critical examination is highly appropriate. --malber 04:52, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

WHAT!?

The bar photo of Dowd contains this description: "Maureen Dowd performs copious research before writing each column." Huh? What does this have to do with the photo?! What evidence is there that her research is copious? She has been caught making severe mistakes several times in her writing, and, as noted in this peice, she is notorious for using ellipses to make a quote give a different message than the original speaker/writer intended. So, this is my case for deleting this description: A. It has NOTHING to do with the photo and 2. It is NOT backed up with any other experts or fellow journalists asserting the fact, just the statement its self.

WAIT A SECOND! LOL! Is the person who said that the description was sarcastic, is this the same one? If so, LOL! That IS funny!

she is "close" to William Safire

what is the point of the sentence saying she is "allegedly close" to William Safire? it might as well just come out and say they are having an affair. better yet, i don't think speculating on who is having sex with who should be part of encyclopedia entries unless there is some basis for it.

in that case could we just say they are good friends? i don't know how anyone else reads it, but i took the phrase "allegedly close" as implying an affair. since she has said that she is good friends with him, there is definitely no need for the word "allegedly". i won't make any changes unless people agree with me. RonMexico 19:03, 2 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
If she has stated this in her column, these artilces should be cited as references for this remark. --malber 19:36, 2 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Criticism

The part of this section that deals with the criticism of Are Men Necessary? should be tightened up. I feel that the reactions of other journalists and pundits are extrememly relevant. We have plenty of referrences, but this section should say more than "See review article..." or "See so-and-so's take here...." This is asking the reader to go somewhere else for the content when these responses can be paraphrased here and referenced with inline citations or footnotes. --malber 13:24, 30 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The list of references was moved to the reference section.


I posted three links to criticisms of Maureen's work: "Are men necessary." Two of the links were critical of the book. One of them was in defense of the book. They were deleted with the only explanation, "non-notable criticism." That does not seem a valid reason to delete the comments. I am replacing the content deleted, and invite discussion of the subject.

For future ease of reference, here is the content in question: Dowd's book entitled Are Men Necessary? was regarded by some as anti-male, and self-obsessed. See e.g. http://fredoneverything.net/Maureen2.shtml ; http://www.john-ross.net/maureen.htm In response to the second article, Salon columnist Rebecca Traister published an article defending Dowd's book. http://www.salon.com/mwt/broadsheet/2005/11/28/expiration_date/index.htm Nathaniel

Liberal tag

Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh are all labelled as "conservative" in the first paragraph of their articles, while Maureen Dowd (and Molly Ivins, Frank Rich, Krugman) are not labelled as "liberal". Why is this? WBcoleman 09:38, 27 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This has already been addressed on this discussion page. Just because Maureen Dowd loathes George W. Bush doesn't make her a "liberal". She despises Bill Clinton and relentlessly attacked him in print for years...does that automatically make her a "conservative"? And Coulter, Malkin, Hannity, and Limbaugh are undeniably and proudly conservative, and therefore should be described in that way.Hal Raglan 20:52, 1 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

hear hear!Kiwidude 03:17, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"both conservative and liberal sources" implies that all book reviewers fall into one of these two convenient categories. take out the "both"

Her writing is undeniably polemic. The sources makes reference to particular publications which are known or implied to have a political slant either left or right (e.g. Village Voice vs. The Wall Street Journal). The phrase is there to state that criticisms from both sides of the political spectrum were generally negative and wasn't necessarily bias from a political perspective. -- Malber (talk · contribs) 15:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In Australia

Maureen Dowd is currently in Australia, promoting her book. She is quoted in both the Melbourne and Sydney broadsheets as saying she's looking for an Aussie bloke. Remarks that, at the age of 20, she fell in love with an Aussie expat while in Dublin. Thought this is an interesting take on her personality. (--previous unsigned comment by 202.44.183.77 (talk · contribs))

I wouldn't take it too seriously. For the most part, Americans are enamored of Australian culture (see "Myths and contradictions" section), and it sounds like she's just being friendly. —Viriditas | Talk 02:49, 1 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
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