Talk:Bernadette Meehan: Difference between revisions

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{{tq|She was recalled to the NSC to oversee the planning for President Obama’s historic trip to Havana, Cuba.}} is also weird, according to the source she was not hired to oversee the planning but to help plan the trip. [[User:Polygnotus|Polygnotus]] ([[User talk:Polygnotus|talk]]) 10:58, 19 December 2025 (UTC)

{{tq|She was recalled to the NSC to oversee the planning for President Obama’s historic trip to Havana, Cuba.}} is also weird, according to the source she was not hired to oversee the planning but to help plan the trip. [[User:Polygnotus|Polygnotus]] ([[User talk:Polygnotus|talk]]) 10:58, 19 December 2025 (UTC)

:It now says {{tq|Meehan was enlisted by Ben Rhodes to help plan Barack Obama’s visit to Cuba.}} – which is fine as far as it goes. I think we should mention that she remained as a senior advisor until X date, if that can be supported. All the best: ”[[User:Rich Farmbrough|Rich]] [[User talk:Rich Farmbrough|Farmbrough]]”<small> 13:26, 19 December 2025 (UTC).<br /></small>

:It now says {{tq|Meehan was enlisted by Ben Rhodes to help plan Barack Obama’s visit to Cuba.}} – which is fine as far as it goes. I think we should mention that she remained as a senior advisor until X date, if that can be supported. All the best: ”[[User:Rich Farmbrough|Rich]] [[User talk:Rich Farmbrough|Farmbrough]]”<small> 13:26, 19 December 2025 (UTC).<br /></small>

::Problem is, she was never a senior advisor to the president. These [[Senior_Advisor_to_the_President_of_the_United_States#Senior_advisors_to_Barack_Obama|people were]]. [[User:Polygnotus|Polygnotus]] ([[User talk:Polygnotus|talk]]) 13:32, 19 December 2025 (UTC)

::Problem is, she was never a senior advisor to the president. These [[Senior_Advisor_to_the_President_of_the_United_States#Senior_advisors_to_Barack_Obama|people were]]. [[User:Polygnotus|Polygnotus]] ([[User talk:Polygnotus|talk]]) 13:32, 19 December 2025 (UTC)

I just removed an unsourced sentence stating “She was wounded in Baghdad, by a rocket fired by an Iran-backed militia.” A quick internet search didn’t turn anything up for this, but given that it would have been 2006/2007 a deeper search might be required. Sam Walton (talk) 14:49, 9 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I can’t find any sources that are not wikiclones, even when searching for related words like artillery, strike, injured et cetera.
I assume they are referring to the Mahdi Army (that article needs a rewrite) or Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq or Kata’ib Hezbollah. Polygnotus (talk) 02:23, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Samwalton9: In this edit an alleged source is provided for the claim: Rhodes, Ben (2018). The World As It Is. Penguin Random House. p. 229. ISBN 9780525509356.. Polygnotus (talk) 02:49, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I did find a pdf of that book and it doesn’t appear to support the claim. And Ben Rhodes is not a source that is independent from Meehan.[1] Polygnotus (talk) 02:54, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Gael – Fall 2015 contains an interview with her on page 8: On a beautiful spring day in May 2007 I was caught in a barrage of incoming rocket fire from Sadr City. Unable to reach a shelter in time, I suffered a concussion and permanent hearing damage from the blast wave. so it was so incredibly minor that there is probably no independent source for this claim. Sadr City is a suburb of Baghdad. Polygnotus (talk) 03:12, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It shouldn’t have been removed. Viriditas (talk) 03:29, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Viriditas You created your account 21 years ago, you don’t need me to explain to you how we should deal with controversial unsourced claims on BLPs. Polygnotus (talk) 03:31, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Your description does not appear to match the problem. Viriditas (talk) 03:32, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Viriditas I am not sure what you mean. We remove unsourced and badly sourced claims from BLPs all the time. And then we put them back with a reliable source if possible. If that is not possible we may consider using ABOUTSELF. But you know all that already. I haven’t been able to find a reliable source so far. Maybe you have more luck on Google? If not, do you think it qualifies as an WP:ABOUTSELF claim? Polygnotus (talk) 03:42, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Polygnotus Thanks for doing this digging and finding those sources. I don’t feel strongly about this but even though The Gael source is primary, being an interview, I think it would be OK to include a brief mention of her having hearing damage as a result of a rocket blast. That seems noteworthy information even if we can’t find a good secondary source for it right now.
@Viriditas As Polygnotus says above, I removed this because it was a significant claim in a BLP, and had no source, per Wikipedia policy. This is the process working as intended. Sam Walton (talk) 18:01, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We must demand high quality sources for each claim on every article, but especially on BLPs and articles about medical stuff because of the potential to do harm. WP:BLP explains: Wikipedia must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high-quality, reliable sources.
I am not gonna check source text integrity in articles about Czechoslovakian trains during the Cold War, idgaf, but when dealing with a BLP subject, WMF CEO or not, we have to be extra careful.
So far I haven’t found any reliable secondary sources, and I would feel more comfortable with a secondary source. I’ll take another look. Polygnotus (talk) 20:31, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It is annoying. Everything points to it being very plausible, various Iran-backed factions (the Mahdi Army or other unspecified Shia extremists) did attack the Green Zone using mortars and rockets during that time. I can’t find a specific date, just May 2007. NBC confirms that such attacks happened Wednesday was the third straight day that the U.S.-controlled area in central Baghdad — home to the U.S. and British embassies and thousands of American troops — was hit by rockets or mortars says an article published on May 3, 2007. But I can’t find any reliable external source that mentions what happened to Meehan. So I think we may possibly be able to write that she said it, and use her interview as a source for that claim, but we can’t reintroduce the text that was removed. Although we probably shouldn’t if no non-primary sources have even mentioned it. Unless someone else has more luck finding reliable non-primary sources? Polygnotus (talk) 20:59, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Weird that it isn’t mentioned when she describes what she did there.[2] Polygnotus (talk) 13:00, 19 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I moved this bit of the article to the talkpage: She survived a kidnapping and physical assault by armed men in Bogotá in April 2006. Two of the perpetrators were arrested and sentenced to ten years in jail, while two perpetrators were never found.[1][2]

Being driven around and forced to use ATMs is not really a kidnapping in the conventional sense, is it? They allegedly rode around for 2 hours. Also, according to El Tiempo the sentences were reduced to 5 years. And while one source does claim there were 4 in total, neither source seems to confirm that 2 alleged kidnappers were never found. It was an alleged paseo millonario aka Express kidnapping. And saying that someone survived a physical assault is weird when there was no intention to kill the alleged victim. According to the sources it sounds like wearing a very expensive Baume et Mercier watch (average selling price of between US$2,000 and US$7,000) in Bogotá may be a bad idea, and you’d expect Foreign Service officers to be aware of that. Polygnotus (talk) 01:57, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure why you removed this. Viriditas (talk) 03:16, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

See above. RS that discuss Meehan don’t seem to focus on this alleged event, although searching is complicated because of how much Google sucks these days. Polygnotus (talk) 03:54, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This appears to be unclear but what I mean with kidnapping in the conventional sense has two elements, the kid and the napping. So what I think of when I hear that word is something like the Lindbergh kidnapping where a baby was stolen, a ransom letter was received/found, and 3 months later the baby was found. This is (obviously) not the same as an adult taking a taxi who then drives the victim to multiple ATMs to withdraw money. So while it may fit the legal definition, it is not what I think of when I hear/read that word.
My point is that reliable sources that discuss Meehan don’t seem to mention it. I believe we should follow whatever reliable sources do. If RS that discuss Meehan mostly focus on this incident, so should we. If RS do not, then neither should we. Polygnotus (talk) 04:36, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Also sucks if you get robbed by some muppet and then it gets equal attention in your bio as you working on/in foreign policy and diplomacy for years. Polygnotus (talk) 16:27, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think this is noteworthy information and should be included, but we could avoid the term ‘kidnapping’ if it’s not appropriate. Sam Walton (talk) 18:02, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I agreed with you when I first noticed the removal, but after doing some searching I couldn’t find any English-language material discussing this on my own, so I don’t think we’re actually losing much of importance by excluding this detail. It must have been relatively minor, otherwise it would’ve seen more coverage. Nothing about it in Newspapers.com, either. MediaKyle (talk) 18:12, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

A NYT source was used that does not appear to support the claim made in the article. I removed it:

She was recalled to the NSC to oversee the planning for President Obama’s historic trip to Havana, Cuba. According to The New York Times, her appointment to this position reflected the importance the President put on the trip and the complicated nature of planning the visit.[1] She then remained at the White House as a Senior Advisor to President Obama until January 2017.

This content was added by user Dcphilo in this edit. The good news is that it gives an alleged source for the claim about the rocket, but the bad news is that this appears to be another COI editor who may or may not have been paid. Polygnotus (talk) 02:48, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Don’t see any reason to remove it. Viriditas (talk) 03:17, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Viriditas Have you read the NYT article? Does it support the claim made in the article? Can you quote the sentence that does? Polygnotus (talk) 03:27, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I will be happy to when I get home later tonight. Meanwhile, you should probably stop deleting stuff at this point. Viriditas (talk) 03:32, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Viriditas The source says:
Mr. Rhodes enlisted Bernadette Meehan, a former National Security Council spokeswoman and Foreign Service officer, who left the White House in June, to return to the West Wing to help plan the trip, reflecting the complexity of the task and the importance Mr. Obama places on bringing it off smoothly.
So the implication that Obama directly appointed her is false. Or at least unsupported by the source. Polygnotus (talk) 03:40, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Connecting her appointment to “the importance the President put on the trip” gives the impression, intended or otherwise, that it was Obama who appointed or personally selected her; but the source says some guy called Rhodes did that, so that is a WP:SYNTH problem: do not combine different parts of one source to state or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by the source.. Polygnotus (talk) 08:01, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We might hypothesise a discussion between Rhodes and Obama, or that no such discussion took place. However neither our text nor the reference say or directly imply this. Arguably removing any mention of Rhodes might be claimed to bias towards it being a direct recruitment by Obama, but that’s pretty thin gruel. I would have no opposition to mentioning that Rhodes recruited her, if it’s seen as necessary. More important might be putting the last part (importance and complexity) in NYT’s voice. All the best: Rich Farmbrough 21:37, 18 December 2025 (UTC).[reply]

It sounded very much like Obama screaming: “We need our top agent on this case! Bring me Meehan!” but reality is not like the movies. Polygnotus (talk) 13:23, 19 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

She then remained at the White House as a Senior Advisor to President Obama until January 2017. was not supported by a source, and is incorrect. She was a Senior Advisor at the National Security Council, not a Senior Advisor to the President, a very big difference. See Senior Advisor to the President of the United States#Senior advisors to Barack Obama. See https://2021-2025.state.gov/meehan-bernadette-m-republic-of-chile-july-2021/ She was also Special Assistant to the President, a third-level position described over at Executive Office of the President of the United States#Organization.

She was recalled to the NSC to oversee the planning for President Obama’s historic trip to Havana, Cuba. is also weird, according to the source she was not hired to oversee the planning but to help plan the trip. Polygnotus (talk) 10:58, 19 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It now says Meehan was enlisted by Ben Rhodes to help plan Barack Obama’s visit to Cuba. – which is fine as far as it goes. I think we should mention that she remained as a senior advisor until X date, if that can be supported. All the best: Rich Farmbrough 13:26, 19 December 2025 (UTC).[reply]

Problem is, she was never a senior advisor to the president. These people were. She was a senior advisor to the NSC from January 2016 to January 2017. Polygnotus (talk) 13:32, 19 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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