Talk:Alan Dershowitz/GA1

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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GA Review

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Reviewer: TheEpicGhosty (talk · contribs) 00:47, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

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Well formatted, NPOV, well sourced. Should be passed through.

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose, spelling, and grammar): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

   Meets high standards for encyclopedic coverage of the subject matter.

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (reference section): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR): d (copyvio and plagiarism):

   It is very well-sourced.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

   It covers a wide array of topics, subjects, and related matters.

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

   Despite the loaded subject matter, the article is able to keep a neutral point of view.

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

   Disagreements are being sorted out through the talk page.

6. It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free content have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

   Good use of images.

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   A very good article, don't know why it hasn't been reviewed yet.

Further comments

Comment- Not the reviewer, but I see some bare urls in the references that I think should be addressed. Knope7 (talk) 20:05, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• I just looked over this again after I started to make review comments a few weeks back. I found then, as I still see now, some quality issues. Though the content looks mostly alright, I think we all recognize this isn’t an article for 'innocent mistakes. I would suggest a community assessment for the benefit of getting multiple eyes on it, but as such a prominent article I feel it will attract comments from multiple users anyway, and have put it up for 2nd opinion/additional reviews based on this. Hope all is good Kingsif (talk) 15:07, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Sources

• As mentioned, some bare urls:

• https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/30/us/politics/dershowitz-trump-impeachment.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
• https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/28/politics/dershowitz-2016-trump-corruption-kfile/index.html

• His son Elon's birth date and job is sourced to IMDb, surely there's something else for it?

• Dershowitz' own film roles are also sourced to IMDb, again, he's famous enough that there will either be other mentions or its not notable enough for this

• Failed verification for "Dershowitz Exposed: What if a Harvard Student Did This? February 8, 2003. Finkelstein, Norman"
• The lead's part on his most notable cases is cited to his profile on HuffPost, which looks like he wrote it? Is there a slightly more reliable source for this opinion of his work?
• Any sources of dubious reliability seem to be those authored by the subject himself, generally sourcing quotes and his opinions.
• Plenty reliable sources, but based on the failed verification I would want to do a better check
• Some quotations are unreferenced, I assume the next ref is the one that supports it. Kingsif (talk) 14:43, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Images

• All appropriately licensed and free
• Used well in article
• No other illustration Kingsif (talk) 14:45, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Lead

• About the right length
• There are refs for things that don't seem like they need them - not controversial and should be included in body. Some of the things, of course, do need refs (also note the ref issue mentioned above)
• Lead well written and comprehensive of article content Kingsif (talk) 15:10, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Body

Early life

Some more trivial info, but well written

Education

Compact, well written. Perhaps more details on university if available?

Legal and teaching career

• Is the camp counselor mention more apt for early life section or not?
• Needs an update on Julian Assange
• Progression of legal career could be more detailed, it reads like an overview
• Should the notable cases not be a subsection?

Notable cases

• Some of the details are more trivial, rather than about the trial
• Need more refs in von Bülow
• The Glemp part is generally unclear, on Dershowitz' involvement, what the case was, etc.
• Same with Barnicle
• The OJ section is more or less a link and a quote, some more detail on his involvement would be needed
• More about Epstein and Weinstein, too
• Trump impeachment part is weaker in style/phrasing than the rest of the article - probably its newness. A rewrite would help, especially with the part like He stated his motivation was that he was opposed to the impeachment saying. But it's got a fair amount of detail. Kingsif (talk) 15:28, 19 March 2020 (UTC)
• The but in 2016 he stated that he would cancel his party membership... part reads a little strange - the use of 'but', in particular, since it suggests he did something against membership, when all he did was make a comment. Needs rewording.
• Any reason for using United States presidential election of 2016 when it's not known as that?
• Either wikilink rescission or use a more accessible word. Or both.
• The structure of the comments on Trump is strange: In a single paragraph after the 'not to impeach Trump, but he's corrupt' part is However, Dershowitz said that Trump's alleged disclosure of classified information to Russia is "the most serious charge ever made against a sitting president". Dershowitz has received some criticism from liberals and praise from conservatives for his comments on these issues The second sentence doesn't follow the first at all, and the first sentence could also be incorporated into the part before.
  • Everything that comes after that paragraph is not well established, seem tangential to the Trump topic, and read like they've been added at the end without trying to match style.
• I assume "moving father left" is a typo, but if that's what the source says, it needs a [sic] or correction.
• Needs a source for Joe Biden quotation.
• At the same time, he is on record as stating that both the Palestinian leadership and the Palestinian people supported a genocidal war, and revere a figure, Amin al-Husseini, probably because, in Dershowitz's view, the latter actively participated in the Holocaust. In addition, he has criticized President Barack Obama on his foreign policy stance toward Israel after the United States abstained from voting on the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334, which condemned Israel for building Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory. This needs some rewriting for style, clarification, grammar.
• The part In his 2015 book, The Case Against the Iran Deal, Dershowitz argues that the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, has urged the Iranian military "to have two nuclear bombs ready to go off in January 2005 or you're not Muslims". On February 29, 2012, Dershowitz filed an amicus brief in support of delisting the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK) from the State Department list of foreign terrorist organization. also has the problem of the sentences not relating to each other.
  • Also need to wikilink Amicus brief, and change 'organization' to 'organizations'
• Civilian casualties doesn't mention the Middle East, not appropriate for section
• The Harvard-MIT divestment petition part has elements of storytelling, especially the rhetoric use of Dershowitz' quotation in narrative
• The 2nd Amendment part needs to either ditch the quotation or incorporate it; embed it or introduce it, but just putting a random quote on the end of a paragraph is not how to write.
  • The same with the Animal rights part.
• The entire Takings Clause, 5th and 14th Amendments (business law) part is near-illegible jargon. Please put it in non-specialist terms, also please update it.
• Need to better incorporate the quotation "I will prove without any doubt that she is lying about me. She is going to end up in prison."
• Only need to link Boies once.
• Any updates on Giuffre/Boies?
• I'm also not sure how TV appearances relate to awards?
• Needs better sourcing for family
• Some minor neutrality concerns for the contentious topics mentioned in the article, especially given how dividing a figure Dershowitz is. However, nothing too serious and, in this, nothing that appropriate phrasing can't fix.
• Sections/parts are fine unless otherwise noted

@Wikieditor19920: This is my review, I'm putting this on hold for a week. Kingsif (talk) 21:20, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the in-depth review. I'll get to working on the above-noted issues this week. Wikieditor19920 (talk) 21:51, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Closing as fail: no edits or comments for over a week, though the nominator had time to get into arguments on related pages... Kingsif (talk) 02:00, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.