Talk:Stephen F. Cohen

message: This content has been complained about at the blpnoticeboard so I havbe looked at it , done a goole search and decided it looks a bit perhaps false = a medal withj his own picture on it" ? Please cite and replace if you are able - Youreallycan 09:23, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  uncited and disputed 

message: I also can't find this book and the isbn is not correct = please cite and replace = imo it is part of the above post and could well be false = Youreallycan 09:40, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm pretty sure this is satire/hoax material, perhaps by a very bored student. I don't think there will be a cite. JFHJr (㊟) 02:10, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  disputed book content 

message: There was no NATO's expansion. We Eastern Europeans forced NATO to accept us.Xx236 (talk) 14:32, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:   NATO's eastward expansion 

message: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/jun/10/stephen-cohen-survivors-gulag-stalin-review Xx236 (talk) 06:22, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cohen's bizarre indulgence towards Putin 

message: To the above gentleman describing himself as Xx236, here is Paul Craig Roberts' bio from the back cover of his book "The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism": "Paul Craig Roberts is a former Reagan administration Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, and former associate and columnist for the Wall Street Journal. He has testified before committees of Congress on 30 occasions, and held academic appointments in six universities, including Stanford and Georgetown. Dr. Roberts was awarded the US Treasury's Meritorious Service Award for 'outstanding contributions to the formulation of US economic policy." To describe Dr. Roberts as a "media personality" can only display willful mendacity or callow ignorance. Neither has any place in Wikipedia. Gunnermanz (talk) 14:26, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  False Characterization of Paul Craig Roberts 

message: We Central and Eastern Europeans have joined the NATO, it's our problem, not US-Russia only. Fortunately the USA isn't able to divide the world with Russia according to Cohen's imperialistic dreams.Xx236 (talk) 07:35, 10 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: The sentences you deleted summarise some of Cohen's published arguments in the field he specialises in. They're in paragraph which begins with the words "Stephen Cohen maintains". We're presenting facts about Cohen's position — the things Cohen says may indeed be questionable, but it's a matter of fact that he has said those things. The wording could be tweaked to make the attribution even clearer. But just pulling the material out goes against WP:PRESERVE.Kalidasa 777 (talk) 23:01, 11 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not sure this is correct summary. For example, title to 2nd source reads as "The cold war never really ended: Russia's continuing instability and weapons of mass destruction, combined with Washington's triumphalist foreign policies and US/NATO military buildup, are creating an even more dangerous situation". This is something more or less logical, but not exactly what is now written on the page. In addition, where he tells that Russian "military potential inherited from the USSR was still fully intact"? If he tells it, that's fine, but I would not expect someone be so much incompetent. My very best wishes (talk) 23:55, 11 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Any inaccuracies in the summary can be addressed one by one. But let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater by deleting the whole passage.Kalidasa 777 (talk) 00:52, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: P.S. I think you're right about the "fully intact". His point is not exactly that, but rather that Russia still possesses weapons of mass destruction. I've just done an edit to fix that.Kalidasa 777 (talk) 01:06, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Here is the problem. You are trying to write your own summary of views by Cohen using his publications, which are primary sources. Instead, you should use publications by other authors about Cohen (those are secondary sources) and briefly summarize their views about work by Cohen. Given that such secondary sources about Cohen exist, this should not be a problem. My very best wishes (talk) 01:43, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: The way the page currently treats Cohen's argument about US-Russia relations is analogous to summarising the plot of a novel, with cites to passages in the novel itself — something mentioned in WP:PRIMARY as an example of acceptable use of a primary text.  Kalidasa 777 (talk) 02:06, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: How come? The policy tells: Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. A primary source may only be used on Wikipedia to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge.. What you have written is actually your interpretation of views by Cohen and therefore WP:OR. Why would not you use other sources about work by Cohen that are currently included as refs? Because their interpretation will differ from your interpretation? Please note that all other sections of this page use secondary sources for referencing, and rightly so. My very best wishes (talk) 02:19, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: If we say Cohen has criticised the USA for triumphalism in relation to Russia, do you call that interpretation? Or is it a straightforward statement of fact that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge. Seems to me it's a statement of fact — anyone can go to the article cited, and see whether in fact Cohen says that or not. See also WP:NOTOR. Kalidasa 777 (talk) 02:40, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I can see that you are trying to make a fair summary of views by Cohen based on his own publications on this particular subject you are interested in. However, what exactly should be written about the person in the BLP and how this should be written depends on secondary sources published about this person, and there are so many of them. Consider this good article, for example. This is a typical publication about him written by a professional journalist who knows the subject. That's how Cohen is generally viewed in press. Such publications should be used for writing per WP:NPOV. Will it differ from something you are trying to write? Yes, it will. That's why BLP pages should be based on secondary sources about the person whenever possible. My very best wishes (talk) 04:55, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: The summary of Cohen's views on US-Russia relations is not my own, I only contributed a few tweaks. This is not just a subject of interest to one or two WP editors. The NY Times article which you've linked to confirms that Cohen's statements in that area have been widely noticed and hotly debated. That particular article doesn't focus on what Cohen actually said, it is about his offer to fund a research program of the Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies, and the subsequent argument within the Association. I'd agree that our article would be improved by adding more sources. The fact that Cohen has been called "Putin's American toady" by Julia Ioffe in the New Republic (which the NY Times article quotes) is probably worth mentioning too. Kalidasa 777 (talk) 00:39, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

text: Cohen uses a 18 century map ignoring the existence of Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania. We did invite NATO, even if the NATO was reluctant. Xx236 (talk) 09:57, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

text: Irena Lasota is a writer and social activist, let's quote her opinion about Cohen's ideas.Xx236 (talk) 09:59, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: What source are you talking about? BTW, Cohen published a lot of books on Russian history and has a lot of opinion pieces here. Summarizing his views by a wikipedian based on his own publications would be very difficult and obviously WP:OR. This is not mentioning of simple facts (such as he was born in ...), but reviewing his work, which we are not suppose to do. My very best wishes (talk) 13:52, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd agree that the article shouldn't be based only on Cohen's own publications. We can and should also try to make fair summaries of what other writers say about Cohen. Kalidasa 777 (talk) 00:48, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not telling that your summary of views by Cohen in section "US-Russia relations" is wrong, but here is main idea of this - as formulated in secondary sources: he tells that US forced Russia to attack Ukraine. This should be probably clarified. My very best wishes (talk) 13:21, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Which secondary sources are you summarising, Wishes? (The summary of Cohen's views on US-Russia relations is not my own, by the way. Crossswords did a lot of it. I only contributed a few tweaks.) Kalidasa 777 (talk) 21:50, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: "Ukraine had been on Washington’s agenda for a very, very long time; it is a matter of public record. It was to that that Putin reacted. It was to the fear that the new government in Kiev, which overthrew the elected government, had NATO backing and its next move would be toward Crimea and the Russian naval base there" . OK, that would also be something disputable. My point is simple: one should use references to secondary sources about work by Cohen, not his own work (as it is currently done in the section). My very best wishes (talk) 15:46, 14 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text:  A very good idea. Cohen's opinions without the secondary filters would make him prone to a lot of BLP issues.--Lute88 (talk) 15:54, 14 May 2016 (UTC)

text:  Thank you for the link to the Dan Kovalik article. I agree it's a good source to use. Then again it consists largely of long quotes from Cohen, interspersed with commentary. So it's partly "primary" (by Cohen) and partly "secondary" (about Cohen). See also WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD. Kalidasa 777 (talk) 21:20, 14 May 2016 (UTC)

text:  I've added a couple of sentences about Cohen's comments re Crimea, based on the source suggested by Wishes.Kalidasa 777 (talk) 06:10, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Here's the problem, Kalidasa: you haven't done anything other than make a tiny tweak to the "US-Russia relations" section, and that was still WP:OR as it is Cohen's own articles being used and analysed by you. That also falls afoul of WP:NOTPROMOTION. This is a WP:BLP, not a regurgitation of the bits of Cohen's opinions you think a really terrific and want to share with the world. On top of this, all you've done with the Kovalik article is to create a piece of WP:SYNTH to tack onto the previous OR journalism you introduced in the first paragraph of the section. I suggest that you find a couple more secondary sources describing what they think of Cohen's opinions on relations with Russia, or scrap the section. You seem to be using PRIMARYNOTBAD as a cover-all defence when you need to read WP:USINGPRIMARY carefully, most particularly the section on You are allowed to use primary sources... carefully... --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:22, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: The first paragraph in the US-Russia relations section is not by me, Iryna. It was mainly written by Crossswords. Is it inappropriate in the biography of a public intellectual to say something about his public statements (terrific or otherwise) in the field he specialises in? I think the paragraph as it stands does "use primary sources... carefully", as allowed by WP:USINGPRIMARY. Any educated person can verify that Cohen has said these things. I agree with you that the paragraph can be improved by addition of more secondary sources. Kalidasa 777 (talk) 05:54, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: In the long run, it doesn't actually matter who wrote it: the fact stands that it needs to be better sourced (as does the content on his work on the Soviet Union). At the moment we have two 'nothing much of anything' sections, and I'm not sure of how to best handle this. I always prefer to hold off on tagging sections for better sources, expansion, etc. because, unless sources are chased up quickly, tags like that hang around for years looking like badges of shame. I'm just going to try to have a think on the presentation without disrupting the flow of content. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 06:17, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

text: in the field he specialises in Cohen specialises in prising Bukharin and his wife, certainly not in Eastern Europe politics. We have in Poland ignorants who write about the USA but I don't quote them as specialists, the same please don't come here with US ignorance about the outside world.Xx236 (talk) 06:04, 23 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  citing NATO 's eastward expansion as evidence 

message: The section now reads:
"Cohen participated in a Munk Debate in Toronto, Canada over the proposal "Be it resolved the West should engage not isolate Russia…" He and Vladimir Posner argued in favor of engagement, while Anne Applebaum and Garry Kasparov argued against. Prior the debate, 58 percent of the audience were in favor of engaging with Russia and 42 percent against. After the debate, 52 percent of the audience agreed with Applebaum and Kasparov, and 48 percent with Cohen and Posner.[17]"
The language is obscure and difficult to follow. The section should be changed to designate the the two positions clearly and consistently. ---Dagme (talk) 20:47, 19 December 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: How is it 'obscure', and how do you propose to 'expand' the positions without turning it into WP:UNDUE and WP:COATRACK? --Iryna Harpy (talk) 22:19, 19 December 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Munk Debate 

message: My friends, let us remember that debates are not rigorous forensic means of establishing facts. In these debates, Professor Cohen is not up against fellow scholars subject to the same academic rigor. Rather, he is up against aggressive journalists employed by and therefore dependent for their livelihood on a tiny number of collectivist media organizations (called 'corporations') which are not organized as democracies but as oligarchies. If a debate is to be considered as 'evidence' of Cohen's perfidy, then it should be balanced by a similar debate conducted in Russia. I suspect the results would be different. 
Why do none of these comments and indeed none of the content of this text address Cohen's basic point: The expansion of NATO and US actions to threaten Russia are making conflict between the two powers not less but more likely, and any such conflict may quickly escalate into a nuclear exchange that will destroy the human species? 
Let us set aside that fact that respect scholars have concluded that the United States and other Western countries are now oligarchies, that is to say, plutocracies, which are increasingly international rather than national in character (meaning that many members of the US elite are not even native born Americans owing to American immigration law (dual citizenship - which TR described as a 'self-evident absurdity.').
Cohen's point in simple language is that you may hate Russia, you may love Russia. You may be from Czech or Poland or Cuba or Serbia or Ukraine or New Zealand or wherever but you and your family will _surely_ die if Russia and America go to war. 
This, in so any words, is Cohen's point, and it is being supported by the dreaded clock of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (https://thebulletin.org/timeline). There is nothing of this dreadful warning here. Gunnermanz (talk) 10:51, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Debates are not Scientific or Forensic Studies 

message: I came upon the following quote which did not accurately represent the cited source:
::In 2015, the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES) backed out of a fellowship deal that would bear Cohen's name after some ASEEES members objected to it on the grounds that Cohen is a "mouthpiece for a mass murderer" (referring to Vladimir Putin). Even the scholars who supported Cohen expressed hope that in the future, Cohen's views on the Ukraine conflict would move in the direction of "more richness, complexity, and believability.""Stephen Cohen, Preeminent Scholar, Now Seen As Putin Apologist", RFE/RL, 6 May 2015
# If one looks at the source they will discover that it was not the ASEEES that backed out of the fellowship deal as claimed here, but that "Cohen and his wife, the American magazine publisher Katrina vanden Heuvel, pulled their offer of several hundred thousand dollars for the grant after members of the U.S.-based organization objected to having his name attached to the prize" (emphasis added).  
# It is also stated that the objections of the members were on the grounds that "Cohen is a "mouthpiece for a mass murderer"". This gives the erroneous impression that all members who objected endorsed this exact phrasing. This is not the case. The cited article mentions that a "handful of scholars voiced their objections" and then quotes one of those members, Lynn Lubamersky, who made the statement about the "mouthpiece for a mass murdered". 
# Similarly, the last sentence seems to erroneously suggest that what Sanbord wrote in his open letter represents all other scholars who signed the letter in support of Cohen, which is not the case.
# Apart from the misrepresentation of the source, the information is also outdated. In fact in May 2015 the board of ASEEES issued a statement which included the following: "Considering the totality of the circumstances, the Board voted, by a substantial majority, to express its regret for the resolution made at the November 20, 2014 meeting to request that the donors consider a name change to the fellowship. In a second vote, the Board resolved by nearly unanimous majority to express its commitment to accept the Cohen-Tucker Fellowship as named, should the gift be re-offered. (emphasis added)"
# Following from the previous point it seems that the fellowship agreement was not cancelled after all. Indeed it features in ASEEES website as of 2017.
Kkostagiannis (talk) 18:07, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Misrepresented source 

message: @ — wrt to your reversion of my:
In his book War with Russia? (released November 27, 2018), notes that "At least one [U.S.-Soviet summit] seems to have been sabotaged. The third Eisenhower-Khrushchev meeting, scheduled for Paris in 1960, was aborted by the Soviet shoot-down of a US U-2 spy plane sent, some think, by 'deep state' foes of detente."
How is that WP:OR? Explain. Humanengr (talk) 16:52, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: You need to provide THIRD PARTY sources.--Galassi (talk) 15:18, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text:  Point to specific policy text. Humanengr (talk) 15:43, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

text: It is not OR for an article to use a brief quotation from a primary source written by the person the article is about to show an opinion held by that person. That is permitted under policy, and Wikipedia has many such articles which conform to that policy. See primary source for policy detail. DonFB (talk) 21:39, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  How is this OR?? 

message: moving criticisms from Views §; they currently comprise nearly 1/2 of that §, which seems inappropriate for a § nominally devoted to Cohen's views.
@ … thoughts? Do you want to give it a try or shall I? Humanengr (talk) 01:41, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I would say (agree) that such a section should be called Criticism, which seems an appropriate heading for text about intellectual disputes, rather than Controversy, a term that could imply wrongdoing, which is not what's happening. If you'd like to do it, that's ok with me. DonFB (talk) 01:59, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reinstate 'Controversy' § as 'Criticism' § by 

message: James Kirchick's Daily Beast "Meet the Anti-Semites, Truthers, and Alaska Pol at D.C.’s Pro-Putin Soiree" is written in crude language and un-befitting WP. I can elaborate, that should be enough to remove it. Humanengr (talk) 02:34, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see a problem. DonFB (talk) 04:39, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  BLP issues in Criticisms § 

message: The phrase "Rebel fighters in the east" refers to rebel fighters in the east of what? 173.88.246.138 (talk) 07:27, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  "rebel fighters in the east" 

message: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/18/books/stephen-cohen-dead.html
The cause of death was lung cancer. Can someone add this? MikaelaArsenault (talk) 08:44, 19 September 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: done Humanengr (talk) 08:53, 19 September 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Was Cohen a smoker? 173.88.246.138 (talk) 18:10, 28 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  COD 

message: ref. # 29 should -- I'd think!!! -- be finessed and replaced with their source, no?- why use a 2nd-hand reference for no reason?.. - (note the "per The Chronicle of Higher Education" which is the second half of the sentence in the article.) ELSchissel (talk) 01:53, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with you, ref. #29 should be updated as it is reflected in the second portion of the sentence. Jurisdicta (talk) 01:04, 21 September 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  ThinkProgress reference