Talk:Center for Public Integrity

message: also: libel lawsuits brought against.
Other things to be covered yet, maybe: Center staffer fired after caught plagiarizing.
: I gave this topic a shot. Not sure if it's exhaustive, but there's some stuff in the history section now. Gabby Fest 03:57, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks done to me. Gabby Fest 01:15, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

text: Conflict of interest. Center founder's failure to disclose to readers/members/funders marriage to longtime Washington lobbyist.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.111.132.87 (talk) 14:44, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  There's certainly sourcing on the web to back you up, but I'm honestly not sure how to work it into this article. Are there examples of criticism that could be added? Because, if not, I wonder if it's not just more biographical stuff about Lewis himself. So I only added your find to his biography wiki entry []. Did I make the right call? Gabby Fest (talk) 06:18, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

text:  You mean Fox, the well known right-wing propaganda outlet? Jhobson1 (talk) 18:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

text:  Bull! O'Reilly is a registered Republican, and a well-documented liar. Jhobson1 (talk) 18:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Things That Could Be Added

message: why so  much detail on Soros? this article is about CPI. It doesnt even mention how much Soroshas donated. 
:I think the article does document a number of contributions by Soros-led foundations.
::I don't know when this criticism was registered, but I also see the Soros-related grants registered (See the citations at "OSI"). Gabby Fest 01:15, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The stuff about Soros is here because certain conservatives like to claim that a link with Soros means that it's tainted.  That's the only reason. Jhobson1 (talk) 18:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

text: I do see one criticism cited ("The Center for Public Integrity...snicker snicker") in the middle of the Soros section. KevinTapani 02:19, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, the criticism section strikes me as POV--donors are cited as if the criticisms were cited; the criticisms are in fact inferences from whoever composed that text--that because an institution has "progressive" funders it is necessarily bias. I'm not huge fan of Soros, as it happens, but that doesn't mean I can support a deceptively structured critc section of an institution's chosen to fund.Benzocane 17:00, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I have attempted to address these concerns by lining up a number of sources that I think support the assertion that the Center is, to some notable degree, criticized for taking money from Soros-related foundations and other sources that critics view as politically liberal. I'm unsure whether these criticisms actually add up to "bias," but I think we're getting closer to a point where people can consider the criticisms and make up their own minds. What do you think? Gabby Fest 02:15, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Of course the "criticisms" are biased.  If they weren't, they wouldn't be here. Jhobson1 (talk) 18:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: The "Criticism" Section

message: The Center for Public Integrity (CPI) is a US-based nonprofit investigative journalism organization whose stated mission is "to reveal abuses of power, corruption and dereliction of duty by powerful public and private institutions in order to cause them to operate with honesty, integrity, accountability and to put the public interest first."
Thoughts on that? I think it would address the weasel word problem and more accurately reflect the organization's stated mission. Safehaven86 (talk) 17:56, 8 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggested re-wording of lede

message: This article has a high level of detail of financial data up to 2005. In my opinion, such a high level of detail is not necessary for the article. I think that links to CPI's web page should suffice (rather than listing all of the foundation supporters, for example). Currently, this info seems to be cluttering up the article rather than providing helpful, up-to-date info. The article could also be updated with data from the past 7 years, but that would just make the article more cluttered. I would recommend synthesizing the current information on the page with more up to date financial info, and then presenting that on the page in a couple of sentences, rather than charts/exhaustive listings. Thoughts on that? Thanks. Safehaven86 (talk) 05:59, 10 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Thoughts on financial data

message: A recent addition to this article cites two Media Research Center web postings as evidence that CPI was criticized for collaborating on a t.v. documentary. I am not convinced that MRC is a stand-alone reliable source here. And the cited posts are more sensational and accusatory than reporting oriented. Besides, the criticism leveled by MRC is of the documentary itself–the fact that CPI was criticized by MRC for being involved (along with PBS), is implicit, I suppose. But it mostly seems like criticism of Frontline/PBS, and Soros-bashing MRC doesn't seem reliable in this instance. Anyway, I edited the addition to try to make it more NPOV, but I think its presence on the page is still lending undue weight. Thoughts on this? Thanks. Safehaven86 (talk) 21:03, 6 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Media Research Center

message: First of all, let me acknowledge that I work at the Center for Public Integrity. I have made only one editing change ever to this article and that dealt with a short-lived name change to iWatchNews. I'm completely new to editing in Wikipedia.
::Can you find a source that notes the end of the iWatchNews project? Right now we have a source announcing the roll-out of iWatchNews. We can't remove that source and the information it verifies unless we can provide another source negating the information. Otherwise, we're just taking your word for it. Even though I have no doubt that you're right, we need to provide an encyclopedic source. Safehaven86 (talk) 04:35, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Here's a source: https://twitter.com/iWatch. And you can simply go to www.iWatchNews.org and see that it no longer exists.Dh journalist (talk) 10:47, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: These sources may be inaccurate (in your opinion), but are they verifiable? The Los Angeles Times is generally considered to be a verifiable source, given that it engages in industry standard fact-checking for its articles. The Philadelphia Inquirer and Associated Press stories are good sources as well–and they add information and nuance to the article, and the way we can now describe CPI given the variety of available sources. We can say "CPI has been described as liberal, independent, nonpartisan, etc." (Update: I added additional sourced descriptors to the lead). Safehaven86 (talk) 04:35, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Associated Press are reporting on the same story on the same day as the cited sources that got it wrong. The Associated Press quoted someone from the Center in its story, while the LA Times did not. The story from the LA Times shows no independent verification of its information. Reporters make errors all the time, even at big newspapers. Just because a reporter in 1996 made an error in describing CPI -- a NYT editorial repeated it the next day -- does not make it reasonable for that error to become part of our description in an encyclopedia. If the LA Times mistakenly reported that Richard Nixon was a Democrat, it would not be reasonable to include in Nixon's biography that "some have described him as a Democrat." He was not.Dh journalist (talk) 10:59, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: CPI is routinely described as liberal, left-leaning, and progressive. The LA Times and NYT articles are certainly not the only time this has happened. If the LA Times and NYT descriptions were truly factual errors, would they have not been corrected by now? See this Huffington Post  piece from this February and this Fox News article  from 2011. Describing someone as a Republican when they are a Democrat is a factual error, yes, and likely to be corrected in whichever outlet it is published. But a group can be nonpartisan and be widely perceived as having ideological leanings (not Republican or Democrat), but left, right, etc. That appears to be the case with CPI. Safehaven86 (talk) 20:29, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not true that CPI is "routinely described as liberal, left-leaning and progressive." Virtually the only sources that use these labels are opinion writers, and even then, typically they are columnists/bloggers/advocacy groups trying to discredit a story with an ad hominem smear. These sources generally do not have any standards for accuracy or fairness. You also cannot discount the fact that some writers may be drawing their information from inaccurate reporting on Wikipedia itself. You imply that these labels are well thought out and researched, but I've shown that the precise sources cited are in reality factual errors, which have either been corrected or contradicted in subsequent coverage by the same source. Under Wikipedia guidelines, the burden is on the person adding or restoring information to show that the information is true. It is not.Dh journalist (talk) 18:06, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

text: We can't know if the New York Times piece is "merely echoing" the LA times piece. We know that the NYT is generally considered a reliable source. Safehaven86 (talk) 04:35, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: It makes mistakes too. Wikipedia acknowledges in its guidelines that errors shouldn't be left in articles just because they appear in verifiable sources. The obvious question is if the NYT fact checked this, where did it get its information? What is the proof that CPI is liberal other than an error in the LA Times?Dh journalist (talk) 11:05, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

text: In a more recent analysis in 2006 and again in 2007, the Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting group characterized us as "centrist," contradicting their earlier classification, which was in error.http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/cost-effectiveness-2007-09.pdf In its most recent report, FAIR finally realized that we didn't even belong in its analysis because we are NOT a think tank and never were. http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/think-tank-spectrum-revisited/Dh journalist (talk) 18:32, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

text: Ok, this information goes into the section on how CPI describes itself.Safehaven86 (talk) 04:35, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

text: I agree that this sentence violates Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy and I will edit it. (Update: I removed it). Safehaven86 (talk) 04:35, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you.Dh journalist (talk) 11:02, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

text: I will take a look at this. If the piece isn't directly about CPI, it could be a case of WP:COATRACK. (Update: you're right, this whole section is about Bill Moyers and not CPI. I removed it) Safehaven86 (talk) 04:49, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

text: Thank you for noting your association with CPI. Please familiarize yourself with the Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide. You were right to suggest that you should not directly edit the article ("Do not directly edit articles about yourself, your organization, your clients, or your competitors" is one COI guideline). I see that you have made some recent edits to the article, and I am going to revert those. Things should be hashed out on the talk page, and once consensus is reached, another editor will be able to make the relevant edits to the page. I think it would also be helpful if you read Wikipedia:Verifiability, not truth. See the section on "But I know the truth!" The standard for the inclusion of information in Wikipedia is that the information is verifiable via a reliable source (see Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources). You likely know many things about CPI that are true, but unless they can be verified with a reliable source, these facts do not meet the standard for inclusion in the article. We have to go off of what is verified in reliable sources (and preferably not primary sources, such as the organization's own website. I will address your specific concerns with the article, item by item, in a moment after I revert your previous edits. Thank you, and let me know if you have any more questions. Safehaven86 (talk) 04:22, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ideology