Talk:John O'Neill (political activist)

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Untitled

Dropped:

After Kerry lost the election, O'Neill, proud to have helped defeat Kerry, slipped away into obsucrity.

That seems a bit premature. Ellsworth 23:30, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Dropped:

After Kerry was defeated, O'Neill, stating in the 11/15/04 issue of TIME, said he was proud to help defeat Kerry. He returned to private life and Swift Boat slipped into obsucrity.

This still seems premature. Could someone explain how that statement can be made with any certainty 3 weeks after the election? Ellsworth 21:42, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Could not link to "Texas Lawyer" articles, but here are excerpts:

1990 Texas Lawyer, February 19, 1990

February 19, 1990 Correction Appended

SECTION: Pg. 4

HEADLINE: Malpractice Victory Yields Contempt Charge; O'Quinn Faces Probe By Federal Grievance Panel

BYLINE: BY MARK BALLARD

BODY:

[...]

The jurors ... did note what one called "an underlying tension" among the lawyers.

They also described the lawyers on both sides as "arrogant" and "abrasive."

[...]

Hittner on Nov. 16 hauled in lawyers from both sides for a disciplinary hearing. He complained of the venomous personal attacks each side made against the other in pretrial motions and in briefs from the underlying suit.

He then filed contempt charges against three lawyers -- Bristow; O'Quinn's co-counsel, Houston solo practitioner Robert N. Hinton; and Porter & Clements partner John O'Neil of Houston, who represented the plaintiffs in the securities fraud class action underlying the malpractice suit.

In his Feb. 7 order, Hittner again criticized "the counterproductive war of words" in pleadings written by the three. But Hittner said Hinton's explanations and Bristow's apology persuaded him to dismiss the contempt charges.

[...]

CORRECTION-DATE: February 26, 1990

CORRECTION: Because of a reporting error, a story on page 4 of the Feb. 19, 1990, Texas Lawyer, "Malpractice Victory Yields Contempt Charge," incorrectly stated that U.S. District Judge David Hittner charged three lawyers with contempt for their actions in a legal malpractice trial and held a Nov. 16 show cause hearing on the charges. The lawyers were Daryl Bristow of Houston's Miller, Bristow & Brown; Houston solo practitioner Robert N. Hinton; and Porter & Clements partner John O'Neill of Houston.

Hittner had instead accused the three lawyers of violating the Texas Code of Professional Responsibility, but at the Nov. 16 hearing decided to wait until after trial before ruling on any violations of the code. Hittner later decided not to pursue any sanctions against the lawyers.

Violations of ethics, while subject to judicial discipline through a show cause hearing, are not classified as contemptible under 18 U.S.C. §401 (1982), the federal contempt of court statute.

--EECEE 02:10, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Edits for Accuracy

I have edited back to prior versions throughout, where O'Neill's statements are credited as fact. For example, no one knows for sure who he actually voted for, or whether he actually turned down requests for interviews - the only record is that he has said so. In addition, as he had not been accused of voting for Gore or Perot, to say he "admited" to voting for them is rather misleading. I believe it is most accurate in all these to simply say that he stated these things.

Second, there is no dispute that O'Neill said he planned to return to private life after the election. There is also no dispute that he has since made several public appearances, and given interviews. For example:[1] [2] [3]

Finally, the Disnfopedia article linked at this site may contain opinions, but that doesn't mean it's an opinionated article.

--EECEE 19:58, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Right, I only changed the wording to opinionated to get rid of OldRight's wording of it as: "A bias profile from the left-wing website Disinfopedia", and without starting a stupid edit war. I wasn't completely awake, I realize "Opinionated" is not the right word. Your other changes also seem pretty sound. -- Consumed Crustacean | Talk | 00:46, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)
- Yes, quite an interesting edit history lately, isn't there? Hope I didn't sound too critical. --EECEE 04:26, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm confused about the line about Kerry and "breaching the free fire zone." I think the accusation is that free fire zones existed at all, and that it is against the Geneva conventions to have a free fire zone. Is there an error here? --Sirkeg 20:48, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

To anonymous poster, re April 2 edits:

Hi. Thanks for your contributions. However, there were several comments that amounted to editorializing - such as the characterizations of Kerry's testimony, "when [sic] deliberate or not... created an impression that he had witnessed many of these atrocities first-hand ... . Kerry could not offer a single atrocity viewed personally" .... etc. Other examples: " ...anyone who knows Houston would be very wary to trust any additional claim" .... ""contributions 'missed' by the mainstream media" ... etc. These really amount to personal observations that don't belong in a NPOV (non-point of view) article; while the characterizations of Kerry testimony might be arguments referenced with appropriate links in a John Kerry article, they really don't further an understanding of John O'Neill.

It is always best to simply state objectively provable fact, with links where possible. A good rule of thumb is that if opinions are presented, they are those expressed by individuals important to the article - ie, "O'Neill stated ..." - and they are helpful to the article, not just to bolster a personal POV.

Also, it's troublesome to present something as fact if there is no back up info to support it. Hence, "O'Neill has stated that his grandfather was an admiral" etc. Same problem with saying so and so believed such and such without a backup source to support it.

As a matter of fact, I think there are plenty of places where there should be links to support statements attributed to O'Neill or others. So if anybody can provide more links... all the better.

Hope this helps. --68.164.89.195 21:44, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Re edit of Kinneyboy's (?) statement that O'Neill asked Kerry to cite war crimes and Kerry couldn't. If you check the debate transcript you will see that Kerry did respond when the question of war crimes, came up, even the question of whether he witnessed any.

http://horse.he.net/~swiftpow/index.php?topic=KerryONeill

http://www.swiftvets.com/staticpages/index.php?page=Debate2

In addition, this article isn't really a replay of the debate and the different exchanges that took place (that would take an article itself). Rather, it seems sufficient to give a general statement about O'Neill's position in the debate. --EECEE 06:12, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This bio should be edited to 4-5 paragraphs. Why is this bio so long in comparison to that of Jerome Corsi co-author of Unfit for Command? O'Neill and Corsi were mere footnotes in the 2004 campaign (Rathergate was more important, IMHO). Much of the controversy about the authors and the political ads is addressed in Swift Boat Veterans For Truth.

Well, the Rathergate article looks like it's longer than the others, that's for sure. [4]

What parts of this article would you suggest editing out? For instance, his legal career seems rather peripheral to the events that put him in the public eye, but some people evidently thought it was important enough to include - maybe in an attempt to give a more rounded picture of the guy.

I'd guess his bio is longer than Corsi's because he's been a public figure since 1971, and has made a lot more public appearances than Jerome Corsi. At least with respect to the 2004 election.

By the way, O'Neill denies Corsi is the coauthor of UFC, remember? See SBVT and Corsi articles. --EECEE 06:44, 11 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

To Anthoi69: I deleted your signatures and timestamps that somehow ended up in the text and did some reformatting.

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