Talk:Václav Klaus/Archive 1

Untitled

Ad recent edit (15:57, 7 Feb 2004 edit)

- change the wording, which is propably quite bad english, but I'd not like to see complete rv

1. even mainstream right-wing media call many his recent move populistic
   In presidential elections Klas declared he would change his style as a president and he would be "president of all". In practice it means at least for domestic public Klaus is no longer free market evangelist, instead he's visiting small villages, shaking hands with anybody who is eager to see live president. He says things which public wants to hear, as measured by polls. (In cotrast to Havel, who was prominent critic of his nation.)
   To popularity gain, not only such serious topis as war or EU are contributing. Leading commercial TV Nova with >50% market share had policy of attacking Vaclav Havel by any means possible at every occasion. In contrast Nova is more than friendly towards Klaus, broadcasting his New Year speech, and even somethink like regular "hour with Mr. President" (and servant journalist) was proposed. File:Http://www.hrad.cz/img/u/prezident cr/foto klaus.jpg
2. critics of Klaus
   Previous article wording may suggest he was criticized mostly from some anti-capitalist or anti-liberal positions. At least now serious critics focuse on the thesis that "free market" by Klaus was "free market without law". There is a famous Klaus quote meaning something like "now we switch off the light, state property will find its owners, and then we switch the light on again".
3. 1997 government crisis
   It should be noted why lost PM post in 1997. Scanal with party financing was similar in scope to that of German Helmut Kohl and CDU. Whole two paragraphs are devoted to that scanad on Kohl page.

So, IMO, if 1997 scandal and government crises was completely omitted in Klaus pages, article was concealing importat thing, in another words pro-Klaus biased. (Compare- Kohl would certainly also prefer to omit financial scandal from his biograpy.)

(by User:Wikimol, 17:07, 7 Feb 2004 UTC, than wikinewbie, unlogged, unsigned] (signature added Wikimol 21:31, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC))

---

Comment on the Václav Klaus entry - Looks to me like a Klaus propaganda

Comment on the Václav Klaus entry - Looks to me like a Klaus propaganda, you should research better. He is far more than 'controversial', the scandals that forced him from power as PM, the crooks he openly supports...
IMO there should be subsection "Controversy of Klaus" or so with all scandals, strange friends, failures as prime minister etc listed, with info how reliable for NPOV each item is.

(by User:80.218.59.177 20:38, 2 Aug 2004 , unsigned)

Vaclav Klaus is not as controversial as the person tried to claim. Wikipedia reflects the knowledge and opinions of its users. It is plausible that there exist people who believe various conspiratory theories that Klaus was guilty in various scandals, but because these people are not able to use Wikipedia and write meaningful statements about their wild speculations, these wild speculations don't appear on this page. Vaclav Klaus is currently one of the most popular Czech politicians - and the most popular political arm defined by the constitution. He was responsible for the economic transformation of Czechoslovakia, and - not surprisingly - the people who were not successful or those who expected the Velvet Revolution to make the Czech society even more communist than it was before - obviously these people were inventing complaints. This era is gone; Klaus has less serious responsibilities today, the anti-Klaus people are just gone, they have lost all the battles they wanted to fight, and in my opinion they are not relevant enough to be described at Wikipedia. History will forget about them, but history certainly won't forget Klaus. --Lumidek 15:08, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

His involvment in the party funding scandal is not a conspiratory theory, it was so.
jvano

What about adding section "A Controversial Figure" section into the article? NPOV means all sides are fairly represented and now it feels much as Klaus propaganda. It could be put here first for review and to have trail and later moved to main page. Pavel Vozenilek

Yes, agree, this entry looks to me like a Klaus propaganda, too.
From time to time some less biased info appear on this page, only to get deleted... Is it you Lumidek?
Good idea, Pavel! So, I've added an NPOV remark - OK? --Wiki-vr 14:04, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Vaclav Klaus of German descent?

Is Vaclav Klaus of German descent? Is the answer is positive, is he a Sudeten German? Meursault2004 20:33, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

No. He tells his descendants come from a Czech village. German sounding names are quite frequent in Czech Republic. Some people claim his parents moved into todays Czech Republic from Galizia, before WW2, and their family name was Pruzhinski.

In Czechia, there is no one of 'pure' blood. Since ages, this pot in the middle of Eastern Europe got people coming in from all around. Before WW2 Czechs, Germans, Hungarians, Jews, Poles, Roma, Slovaks, Ruthenians/Ukrainians lived in Czechoslovakia, before WW1 the kingdom of Bohemia (included Moravia and part of Silesia - today called Czechia) was part of Austria-Hungary, in the middle ages, Italians, French among many other also came in... --Wiki-vr 14:11, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Vandalism and spam

IMO the terms vandalism and spam should be used in their general Wikipedia meaning. Offensive remarks pushing some point of view are not vandalism since their purpose is not to damage the Wikipedia; of course sometimes they deserve deletion, but vandalism should not be given as a reason. Similarly, not every link someone dislikes is spam - link to a newspaper article obviously is not spam, since its purpose is not advertizing or PR. This refers to two recent edits. --Georgius 09:30, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Acting president Spidla

Are you sure that Spidla was acting president? Because Czech constitution has no term "actin president". When Czech Republic does not have any president then some authorities are assigned to Prime Minister and Chair of parliament while other authorities remains unassigned.

I think that more clean is to write that preceding president was Vaclav Havel.

--Petr.adamek 23:12, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

It had happened quite often throughout history of Czechoslovakia and Czech Republic and all other "acting" persons are mentioned in infoboxes. It may be possible find better word (or add description but this feels as nitpicking). Pavel Vozenilek 00:42, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Czechoslovakian presidents: 1918–1935: Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk (1850–1937) 1935–1948: Edvard Beneš (1884–1948) Prezidenti v období rozpadu státu, jejichž prezidentství bylo v souvislosti s tím později anulováno: 1938–1939: Emil Hácha (1872–1945) 1939–1945: Emil Hácha, tzv. státní prezident 1939–1945: Jozef Tiso (1887–1947), prezident Slovenského státu (po té co přijal mnichovskou dohodu a abdikoval, byl Edvard Beneš v letech 1938–1945 v exilu) 1948–1953: Klement Gottwald (1896–1953) 1953–1957: Antonín Zápotocký (1884–1957) 1957–1968: Antonín Novotný (1904–1975) 1968–1975: Ludvík Svoboda (1895–1979) 1975–1989: Gustáv Husák (1913–1991) 1989–1992: Václav Havel (* 1936) Špidla wasnt president he was Premier of Czech repulbic —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.102.158.112 (talk) 11:50, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Interview by Fund

If there's an actual consensus that the interview by Fund is actually worthless by folks who better understand Klaus' life and career than I do, I've got no problem with it, but I would note that the article at the moment isn't particularly rooted in source materials, the interview appeared in a journal (with an ideological orientation similar to Klaus' own, for better or worse) with a fairly wide circulation, and contains information that isn't in the entry itself. It is of some age, though (it's from June 1990), and I'm not emotionally wedded to it being part of the entry. I'll just note that I don't personally find the interview "worthless" and leave it to the consensus beyond that.Adbarnhart 18:24, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

The adjective "worthless" is a bit harsh, I would keep it there and wait till somebody finds a better one. However, I agree with Pavel Vozenilek that is it merely a chit-chat (V.K. was 48 years old, date can be calculated :-) JanSuchy 22:18, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

That's probably a fair enough assessment. Pavel Vozenilek suggested on my talk page that there's an enormous amount out there on the man and that this particular interview doesn't stand out. That could very well be the case, but we only have the three external links (only two in English), and they're all of an official nature, in some measure. I think the page would benefit from identifying at least a small handful of sources that would help round things out a little would go a long way to strengthening the effectiveness of the page. In any event, I've not restored the link to the interview; I think perhaps someone with greater expertise can sort out what source materials will work best here. Adbarnhart 08:02, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Weasel words tag

I added the tag, since there are quite a few parts which clearly contain too much spin and the section as a whole doesn't represent IMHO a NPOW. For example (but not only) the 2nd paragraph of this section. Also some other controversial statements in this section would benefit from references. Rgilnitram 05:46, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Isn't the article a bit biased ?

(by Vonkad 12:28, 18 January 2007 (UTC)) The whole article is IMHO a bit biased against Klaus. I don't see any outright lies, but some things aren't reported fairly.

(1) The fact that people call him "Mr. professor", is quite normal. Academic titles generally play an important role in the Czech society.

(2) I do not understand the (repetitive) notes on corruption. Especially I don't remember having seen any proofs about his corruption.

(3) The remarks on the economic reform being unsuccesful are biased. The Czech Republic is doing reasonably, relatively to the rest of the Central and Eastern European countries. Apart (maybe) for Slovenia, I don't see any significantly better performing countries in the region.

The whole thing makes an impression of Klaus as an arrogant populist. He is definitely considered to be one by some part of the Czech society, but note that it is not a majority opinion. It is not even the typical opinion of more educated, more well-off etc. people. A healthy share of the Czech intellectual and other elite supports him.

(2) I agree

(3) I agree, yet this is much more difficult to clear out. There are certainly critics of the transition process form communistic to a capitalist organisation. There were at the begging of the process, as there were mainly two ways how to do it - the fast and the slow one. The slow one was taken e.g. by Hungary, we took the fast one. I think that now most of ecnomists see, that fast transition has proven to be better. Nowadays, most critics critiseze (a) banking system and (b) insufficient law protection. We may or may not agree with this, but it should be mentioned in the article. On the other hand, without any doubt, it should be mentioned also, that there are ecnomists, who see the transition as a succes. In fact, as Czech rep is doing reasonably well in the region, I think most economists would agree that the transition was succesfull. Some say it could be more succesfull. But I remember my ecnonomics prof from France told us, that in the 80th, Czechoslovakua was less developped than other countries in the region (Hungary, Poland, even Romania), and in the 90th, Czech rep became without any doubt economicly one of the top countries in the region.

Article should certeanly reflect this, even thought it may be difficult to find citations, sources etc. --Ptds (talk) 14:26, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

What about the millions he stole through the privatisations in the 1990s, which he then said had been made on the US stock market (from a Czceh public servant's salary)? His corruption should be emphasised more here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.168.56.18 (talk) 16:01, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I haven´t ever heard about this, I think it is a myth. Till you give us any proof, it shouldn´t be considered valid. BTW, politicians in Czech rep. have to show a confession (statement) of property (wealth). I am not sure, wheter it involves the prezident, but I think, I have seen it somewhere. So this could probably clear any uncertainty.

--Ptds (talk) 14:26, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Bias

I agree.

Whether or not the people editing this agree with Klaus is irrelevant, IMO.

The page needs to convey information about him and his political career in an impartial, encyclopedic manner.

I also think his opinions on the relative merit of global warming are worth mentioning.

To wit,

http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/02/vclav-klaus-about-ipcc-panel.html Ruthfulbarbarity 21:59, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree that Klaus' stated opinions on Global Warming/Environmental policy are notable. In satisfying WP:RS and therefore WP:V, however, blogs are typically not accepted as sources. I would however vouch for this blog source as seeming to have the same text as the text posted as a "Flash" on the Drudge Report (accessed 19:30 EST). The link is here, but these flash pages don't typically stay at that URL for long. I think Drudge is mainstream enough to be considered a notable/reliable source, at least until someone else finds a static URL. DickClarkMises 00:37, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Dear Fellow Wikipedians, I admire Drudge Report but don't you think that if Drudge Report cites my blog page as the source of the text and the translation, Wikipedia should respect that the source of this info is not Drudge Report but rather my blog? ;-) Alternatively, you can link to the original Czech pages with the interview but it would be less useful to English readers. Thanks for your consideration, All the best, Lubos Motl --Lumidek 03:17, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I would note only that Drudge Report seems to be citing the same source as the blog in question, not the blog itself. DickClarkMises 07:22, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I think that there is some confusion here. The Flash article [1] cites, at the bottom, a page of my blog (motls.blogspot.com) as the source of the translation. Best wishes, Lubos --140.247.123.226 02:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Quite Negative!

I can understand if some people don't like him, but Klaus's job approval sits at 82% in the Czech Republic (http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/02/vclav-klaus-about-ipcc-panel.html) and this article hardly reflects this. Present positive aspects of the man as well as negative aspects. 70.16.18.49 02:12, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

The article was negative due to a rather active group of his opponents. It's impossible to regulate these things. I have reformulated some of the statements to reduce the obvious negative bias in them while trying to preserve all the content (including the arguably redundant content that was introduced and twisted by some of the critics). It was a non-trivial amount of work, so please don't revert it. It would be good if non-Czech editors helped to optimize the grammar and style and reformulate the remaining negatively sounding/biased sentences whenever it's clear how a neutral editor would express the same idea. It would also be a good idea to revert future changes whose only purpose is to introduce bad mood and/or personal accusations into the article. Thanks for your collaboration, Lubos --Lumidek 00:43, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh, this is much better than the previous article. I have two minor points: (1) the article mentions Milos Zeman and others to have recently started respecting Klaus. I'd say that Zeman and Klaus always respected each other. They just very strongly disagreed. Unfortunately, I don't have a quote right now, but I remeber reading expressions of mutual respect in their books from the end of the nineties (2) Shouldn't a definition of "Opposition agreement" be added ? Something like: a public written contract of ODS and CSSD, where ODS pledged to support the CSSD government in the confidence vote, but was not bound to support any laws send by the minority goverment to the parliament. For this support ODS got centrain positions in public administration and firms in public ownership. (Vonkad 16:03, 3 April 2007 (UTC))

Trivia

Hi, I removed the trivia section about the CNN bloopers. While amusing and well referenced, I don't think it belongs to this entry (perhaps to an entry about CNN). It doesn't document anything VK did or any criticism by others, it is just a slip of a tongue. It happens in the broadcast media all the time (sadly). However, if you still feel it is a piece of relevant information, feel free to revert it back. Martin 216.165.126.11 10:07, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Biased opening

The second sentence begins, "A delusional free market oriented economist and a relic of the Cold War,..." This is so biased. Even if he is exactly this, it can be stated so much more effectively, "Klaus is a self-assured, yet very much out of the mainstream, free market-oriented economist. Much of his current ideology is deeply influenced by his time living under communism. He is criticized as remaining too firmly rooted in the past -- a relic of the Cold War...." Hmm. That actually is good enough for me, and I don't think it changes the meaning of what anyone has up now. Gregconquest 14:46, 12 November 2007 (UTC)