Talk:United States/Archive 1

message: Great job to everyone who labored on the new version of the USofA article. It looks great! --mav 00:16 Jul 29, 2002 (PDT)
: Thanks, though I hope some actual Americans will step in to add to my texts, some of it is pretty lame, I think. This leaves the problem of the naming of the article though - should it be at United States or not? Jeronimo
::Yes it should -- There is no reason why the USofA gets to be at its full name when every other country is listed at its conventional short form. I will make the move it nobody objects. However, this will require me to first delete the redirect page United States so nobody freak out. --mav
::: Just to remind: the links to all the "subpages" and CIA stuff should also be changed if you do make the change. I promise I won't freak out (c: Jeronimo 00:27 Jul 29, 2002 (PDT)
----
I haven't yet moved the CIA intro or gov / pages because I don't know what to name these. How do the gov CIA pages relate to the "politics of" sub articles? --mav
:I would imagine that the "Government" and "Transnational Issues" sections would sort of fit under "Politics of". --Brion VIBBER
: As for the introduction page, this is what was usually put on the main country page. Since - I think - we have a good replacement for that, there's no need to keep it. As for the government; this should be covered at Politics of the United States I think.
: I myself am not sure about the former "Transnational Issues", now, "Foreign relations". Isn't this something to put at History and/or Politics? Jeronimo 00:59 Jul 29, 2002 (PDT)
----
Can somebody fix this page?  It spans the entire page and fills the right margin so you can't get to the links on the right column. -- Zoe
:Seems okay to me. I'm using Mozilla 1.1beta at 800X600 on Windows 98SE, what browser, OS and resolution are you using? Bryan Derksen
::I'm using IE 6.0.2 and Windows Me.  It fills the entire page.  How do I do a screen shot?  -- Zoe
::Same problem with W98/MSIE6/800x600/Cologne Blue skin.
::Links are floating over the text because of both the picture width and the data table, but I believe that if the first sentences could be closed into a new table of fixed width (thinner and higher), normal wide text (as large as the picture) could follow readably below the end of right links. 
::Now, what width should this table have to be readable in every configuration? Would it be better to move the picture to a separate page?gianfranco
The issue here is that the table is way I mean way too fat. We shouldn't try to fix this by HTMLing the text -- we need to fix the table. --mav
:I tried to remove the picture, and it works now. IMHO, that image should be reduced in width or moved to a separate page. --Gianfranco
:I tried to replace the original picture with a .png one large 580 (136kb), and I hope it works well with a 640x480 resolution too (please, let us know), then I tried a .jpg one, still large 580 but 110kb less (19kb). Of course, the .jpg one is evidently less precise. In case this width is agreed, which format would it be better to use? --Gianfranco
::If a jpeg has text in it, or other sharp lines, the quality factor should be at least 88 to prevent sand. (If your jpeg editor uses quantization tables directly, ask me.) -phma
::the following was compressed at 60/255 ratio: see. How is it now? --Gianfranco
I restored the cellpadding of the table, since that makes the table readable, I also made the table width smaller again by improving the size of the cells that hold the images. The width is not determined by the national motto row, maybe it can be put in two rows (using <BR>)? Jeronimo 04:04 Aug 6, 2002 (PDT)
I've restored it somewhat since most of the article was now in italic and the table looked chaotic. I don't know how it looks now on the problematic browser, but please let's not save changes that are obviously just tests. -Scipius
:It looks fine now.  Thank you all very much! -- Zoe
----
Minor nit; I find it more natural in general to proceed from west to east (as north to south, left to right, top to bottom), so I would prefer listing the time zones, which are inherently related to physical areas on the Earth's surface, as "UTC-10 to UTC-5" rather than "UTC-5 to UTC-10". Am I a crazy person for this? --Brion VIBBER
----
Hey, I don't really care if you want to make the table less clear. But Demographics is much better than Demography. It's great that's what the template has, but the template should be changed. Consistency isn't as important as quality. --The Cunctator
And you are the final arbitrator of quality? I don't recall electing you to that position. I do recall that several of us voted on this very issue and decided to go with "demography". I'm a native English speaker too and to my ears there is nothing wrong with "demography" at all. You are more than welcome to put this to another vote but please stop changing these types of things unilaterally. --mav
:I agree with The Conctator in this matter -- not that he is the final arbitrator of quality, but that this issue should be revisited and reconsidered.  "Demography" is the study of demographics; the information currently listed under "Demography" is not about demography at all, it is demographics.  The only reason I can imagine for the current mistake is that "Demography" rhymes with "Economy" (sort of).  It is interesting that these words are not really parallel -- Dempography is the study of demographics, and Economics is the study of the economy.  It makes sense to head a section "economy," but the real parallel would be to follow this with "demographics," not "Demography."  We might as well change "Economy" to "Economics" -- that wouldn't make sense, nor does "Demography."
:I was not involved in the past discussion.  But my understanding is that Wikipedia is an ongoing process.  I do not think this means that we should constantly be changing conventions, but I do think it is reasonable to revisit this one. Slrubenstein
Well reasoned and stated. You have convinced me with a few brief words that could not otherwise be done by unilateral changes. I second the call for a revote on this issue. --mav
:I discussed my actions on Talk:WikiProject Countries. Voting is a bad way of handling things--it's only necessary in the real world because there aren't better ways of dealing with things, as there is with a Wiki, which is simply editing. --The Cunctator
----
While Cunctator is right about "simply editing" in many cases, I must point out that discussing and gaining consensus also has a value. People are more willing to do heavy lifting when they opinion has been heard and considered. For large projects, we need many hands.
Now, for Tolkien's stuff I did not seek consensus. I just decided on a plan and spent several hours editing everything into the way I wanted it. I could do that because (a) I know something about the topic and (b) I type fast. But I don't know enough about geography.
So I'd like a consensus to emerge, yielding a set of formulas I can follow whenever I get time to help. --Ed Poor
----
"Consistency" is not a goal in its own right.  It helps serve real goals like readability and accuracy, because it helps to ensure that all the topics are covered for each subject, and that they are presented in an order that is proven to be helpful.  But individual articles will have differences, and that's OK.  If countries with a long and detailed history have a slightly different-looking history section from new small countries, that's fine.  Authors should do whatever makes a good article for that subject.  As for "demographics", I have to go with correctness over consensus.  Again, consensus is a useful thing that helps serve our goals sometimes, but it is not a goal in itself.  Correctness is.  --LDC
: Yeh, I (KQ) cast my vote to follow the format at WikiProject Countries, but I think LDC is right on this one.  (I should have looked them up earlier):  here's this from dictionary.com:
::demography n. The study of the characteristics of human populations, such as size, growth, density, distribution, and vital statistics.
::demographics n. (used with a plural verb)  The characteristics of human populations and population segments, especially when used to identify consumer markets: The demographics of the Southwest indicate a growing population of older consumers.
=== Headings ===
And what about the headings? I really, really liked the previous method better. It's just a matter of taste of course, and it looks like we're linking to history instead of history of the United States here. Jeronimo
I'm a bit confused. How does History of the United States look like a link to history? --The Cunctator
: I'm sorry, I looked wrongly. However, I do now have the objection that "History of the United States" as a section heading is pretty redundant. There's no "External links for (Topic X)" heading either. A "History" only title indeed suggests it's a link to History. Also, it is not clear that the text there is only a summary - people may be urged to add lots of stuff to it, while that is not the intention. The previous form was much clearer in that aspect. Although it's mostly cosmetic, I think it's a good thing to try and use one consistent "look-and-feel" for all country pages, and I'm for putting back the old form of section headings. Jeronimo
Also Cunc please stop changing the headings -- having the heading titles also as links is not an improvement. We want to emphasize that what is contained on this page is a mere summary of what is at the link -- thus the format that was agreed on. --mav
:Having "Main article:" is not an improvement either. There are better ways of indicating a summary. And the policy of even having summaries at all, instead of just links to the appropriate entries, is somewhat counter to the general Wikipedia approach. I'm working on a discussion of it at Talk:WikiProject_Countries right now. And it's "Cunc". --The Cunctator
Mav, I prefer the separate heading and link as well, but I'm not sure about the usage "Main" article.  This article is the "main" one, in the sense of being central and most comprehensive.  Those others I would called "Detailed article" or "Expanded article", I think.  --LDC
:Good point. I will think of a better way to do this. --mav
I think The Cunctator is on the right track with having the headings remain unlinked and having a See: [X of United States] link at the end of each section summary. I will experiment with this general format later to see if it can be improved. I would also like to thank The Cunctator for turning the history summary into a real summary -- people were adding to that section as if it were the history of article. --mav
I just want you to know I think the linked headings are better (see Spetember 11, 2001 Terrorist Attack for an example), and think the See is a fallback to something necessary in paper but not here (m:Wiki is not paper). But I also try to compromise. --The Cunctator
---------
Are you sure the motto of the US is "In God We Trust"? I thought it was "E Pluribus Unum." - Montréalais
---------
The national motto is "In God We Trust", by Act of Congress July 30, 1956.  "E Pluribus Unum" is the motto on the Great Seal, which involves a link with heraldry.
The fourth verse of "The Star-Spangled Banner" includes "Then conquer we must/When our cause it is just/And this be our motto, 'In God is our trust'.  And the Star-Spangled Banner in triumph shall wave/O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave."
--GABaker
------
Someone please move this article back to its correct location. There is no country called the United States. The country in question is called the United States of America. If you persist in this ridiculousness, I insist you move the Netherlands to Holland (I grew up in a community of Dutch immigrants and no one ever refered to the country as the Netherlands always Holland so obviously it is the conventional form of the name) and Mexico to the United States or to United States of Mexico, and the United Kingdom, Great Britain and Northern Ireland etc. all back to England where they belong. This is anti-American bias again. In short the name of the country is America, the form of government is United States, just as Germany is a Federal Republic and Mexico a United States.  Rmhermen 16:49 Dec 10, 2002 (UTC)
:Of course there's a country called the United States. It is located immediately south of Canada, as you will find out if you ask any English-speaking Canadian, practically none of whom call it "America" or anything else but the United States or US. Besides, the CIA World Factbook gives the name United States as the title of its article on the country in question. I think that's a pretty ostentatious way for a country to be called something.
:Furthermore, your other examples are incoherent. Holland and England are poor choices not because they are not common use, but because "Holland" is factually not identical to the Netherlands, and "England" is not identical to the United Kingdom, as any Scottish, Welsh, or Northern Irish person will tell you. However, there is no English-language account under which "United States" is different from the United States of America. - Montréalais
Charlie Chaplin is English.  -- Zoe
-----
The US article is not entirely in accordance to the template of WikiProject Countries. For instance, there is no "Holidays" section. I know that Holidays in the US is a somewhat vague matter, but there does in fact exist a list of federal holidays, which is the closest parallell to offical holidays of other countries. There is a clearly defined list in the culture pages, but that obvisouly seems to serve another, more cultural purpose. It even lists April Fool's Day as a holiday(!) Finally, someone going to the US looking for a list of holidays, expecting to see one (as (s)he would expect from the Wikipedia template), will be disappointed. -- Egil 08:41 Apr 17, 2003 (UTC)
:Egil, I took a look at the guidelines and it does appear that holidays has its own section. I believe that the current holiday list is too long to be included in its entirety. How about:
:# add a new section to the United States page called Holidays. List the top 10 holidays. 
:# Have a main article called Holidays in the United States, containing the more extensive list.
:# Remove the existing list from the Culture of the United States.
:I'd like to avoid having duplicate lists of the same thing. I'm still not sure how best to split the list, but as I said earlier, I believe its current form is too long for the main page. Sfmontyo
-----
My edit of April 17 is intended to include more or less neutral factual information regarding capitalism, social class and its effect on politics. I got sidetracked a bit on European immigration and on writing an essay on support of political parties. There is a typo supprort which can be corrected when someone makes a new edit. Fred Bauder 13:07 Apr 17, 2003 (UTC)
-----
====Territories====
Can someone add information about actual or fomer territories not included in a state that belongs or has belonged to the USA ?? (apart of what appears in the page ): 
*The Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands
*Outer Continental Shelf Lands defined in the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act
*Canal Zone
:The only part of the Trust still a territory is already on the list. The outer continental shelf lands are underwater and I think the Canal Zone went back to Panama with the Canal in 1999. This isn't the page to list former territories; that should go on the history page. Rmhermen 23:30 May 12, 2003 (UTC)
::So, I suggest include this information in a section of History_of_the_United_States, like proposed in Talk:History_of_the_United_States. This History of Territory Composition of the U.S.A. it´s very interesting (i.e., some  Acts have references to nowadays or historical territories).
----
Why is this page at United States rather than United States of America? Wouldn't the latter make more sense? Looking at What Links Here, it seems most pages link to United States of America anyway. -- Timwi 00:40 13 Jun 2003 (UTC)
:For the same reason why our article on the former US president is at Bill Clinton and not the pompous William Jefferson Clinton. See Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names). Oh and look at at "What links here" again - the vast majority of links to this page link via United States and the "What links here" function craps out after the first couple thousand links so that page does not have all the links in it. --mav
: If this is the case, the article should reside at the ultimately lazy U.S. (note the lack of periods in the abbr.).  It is a problem that the article does not reside at United States of America, because while the former is a valid redirect, if I am lazy and type "united states of america" (lowercase as here) in the search field and hit "Go" I do not reach this, the primary article, but rather Demographics of the United States.  Hmm. Ed Cormany 00:01 25 Jun 2003 (UTC)
:: Not anymore now :) -- Timwi 22:22 25 Jun 2003 (UTC)
::? What are you talking about? It works for me fine. And US is too ambiguous for a page title so that example is a straw man. IMO, it shouldn't even be a redirect but that would break too many links. Page titles are always a compromise between formality, ambiguity and common usage. Oh and "United States" is more common than just "US" just as "United Kingdom" is more common than "UK" in anything but the most informal of writing. Wikipedia is neither formal or informal and our page titles should reflect this. --mav
----
===E Pluribus Unum is still a national motto===
"On July 30, 1956 a law was passed stating that "the national motto of the United States is hereby declared to be 'In God we trust'." (70 Stat. 732. 36 U.S. Code 186). The House Judiciary Committee recognized that the phrase E Pluribus Unum had also received wide usage in the United States, and the joint resolution did not repeal or prohibit its use as a national motto. In 1963 the Department of State took the following position: "'In God we trust'" is the motto of the United States. It seems to the Department, nevertheless, that there is ample basis both in history and I law for calling 'E Pluribus Unum' a motto of the United States." The Congress has used both." http://www.usscouts.org/flag/sealmotto.html --Jiang 23:23 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)
------[Mike]
National Economy
The U.S, lost 2.6 million jobs since March 2001, 26 months ago, and the U.S. needs 100,000 new jobs per month -just to keep up with the population. There is now a deficit of five million jobs. 
Yet, consumer spending continues. One explanation may be Jobless benefits, for up to a year and people, savings and home refinancing. But, home refinancing may have ended since interest rates have reached a near minimum.
------
Should Education in the United States be added to list of topics? -- Steinsky 01:34, 30 Aug 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Naming of Entry 

message: "On July 30, 1956 a law was passed stating that "the national motto of the United States is hereby declared to be 'In God we trust'." (70 Stat. 732. 36 U.S. Code 186). The House Judiciary Committee recognized that the phrase E Pluribus Unum had also received wide usage in the United States, and the joint resolution did not repeal or prohibit its use as a national motto. In 1963 the Department of State took the following position: "'In God we trust'" is the motto of the United States. It seems to the Department, nevertheless, that there is ample basis both in history and I law for calling 'E Pluribus Unum' a motto of the United States." The Congress has used both." http://www.usscouts.org/flag/sealmotto.html --Jiang 23:23 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)
------[Mike]
National Economy
The U.S, lost 2.6 million jobs since March 2001, 26 months ago, and the U.S. needs 100,000 new jobs per month -just to keep up with the population. There is now a deficit of five million jobs. 
Yet, consumer spending continues. One explanation may be Jobless benefits, for up to a year and people, savings and home refinancing. But, home refinancing may have ended since interest rates have reached a near minimum.
------
Should Education in the United States be added to list of topics? -- Steinsky 01:34, 30 Aug 2003 (UTC)
thread_title: E Pluribus Unum is still ''a'' national motto

message: Why is this protected?
To be added: link to County (United States). - Patrick 11:40, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: Repeated vandalism by the same person. The person seems to have given up against his repeated ban, so I will unprotect. Andre Engels 11:51, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)

text: Some other admin apparently beat me to it :-0 Andre Engels 11:52, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, both of you. - Patrick 12:03, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why is this protected? - To be added.