Latest comment: 7 years ago47 comments21 people in discussion
The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
After yesterday's error on my part, this still lingers and so I will attempt a more-thorough summary of the discussion. The most foundational point raised below is whether this RfC even complies with the standards for writing an RfC question. The RfC in this case asks one general, open-ended question and one specific one (and the first question is close to the two examples given of "bad questions"). The writing requests for comment essay cautions that RfC questions should be "as specific as possible." The first question is therefore not well-phrased, perhaps, but neither is it clearly outside the bounds of policy. I am not therefore prepared to completely reject the RfC nor the effort of the editors that have contributed below. The practical effect of posting a poorly-phrased, non-specific RfC question, however, is that the responses are not constrained or specific. This is evident below and complicates easy summary of the RfC outcome. Taking the two presented questions in reverse order, what can be said is that there is a consensus that the section in question should retain the POV tags. There is also a rough consensus that the section is one or more of WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, or WP:COATRACK but exactly how it is violative of policy and which specific remedies should be put in place for those concerns requires further focused discussion. (non-admin closure) Eggishorn(talk)(contrib)19:00, 19 July 2017 (UTC)
NPOV concerns are justified - After glancing at this section, I think the content may be OK, but the way the content is presented is probably not. I don't think this should be its own section, and the section title is not appropriate. Ideally this section would be moved to a subsection called "Presidential authority" under the Domestic Policy subsection. NickCT (talk) 16:38, 15 May 2017 (UTC)
Thank you Janweh64 for that change to the title, the orignial was mine and I was not happy with it, but that is certainly an improvement.Mozzie (talk) 07:41, 29 May 2017 (UTC)
* Support – Trump is literally Hitler reincarnate. Ever compared his birth date with Hitler's suicide? — JFGtalk03:40, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
May I remind you that Trump is a BLP. To liken him to a foul, racist, murderous dictator who is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people, is pretty disgusting. Your unfunny view has the potential to upset a large amount of people who are still affected by the aftermath of what Hitler did, but who also support Trump. What could be conceived from this is that you also believe that those who support him also support the idea of mass genocide and hate. I'll give you a chance to alter your comment first before I do. CassiantoTalk04:39, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
@Cassianto: I was obviously making fun of the constant smearing of Donald Trump, who happens to be the legitimately elected president of the USA. Those who call him authoritarian inform their readers and listeners more about their own state of mind than about his. Comment stricken. — JFGtalk07:40, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
Fine, but that kind of irony isn't conveyed as well over text and could violate our BLP policy, whether it was a joke or otherwise. Thanks for the strike and for you're explanation here. CassiantoTalk08:10, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
Oppose – This section is a highly POV collection of innuendo and overblown fearmongering. Sources calling Trump authoritarian are just opinions, and a lot of them are speculative to boot ("what might go wrong if he turns authoritarian"), hence not encyclopedic. Not everything the press prints is fit for Wikipedia. We have core policies against this: NPOV, BLP, UNDUE, INDISCRIMINATE, et al. Or how about basic decency and respect for the office? — JFGtalk07:40, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
Wasn't aware that "respect for the office" is a Wikipedia policy. Anyway, have you considered that it is precisely "basic decency and respect for the office" (as opposed the person in it) that motivates the scholars and analysts to write these analyses? Unlike... nevermind.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:15, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
POV and criticism - and really WP:OFFTOPIC because the section is not describing his presidential actions and policies, it's just giving a WP:SOAPBOX space to outside opinions or criticism or politically-motivated posturing WP:POV. I'll point out the precedent in describing all other presidencies (see Category:United States presidential administrations) is about factually describing the domestic and foreign policies and major events. Delete the section. Markbassett (talk) 23:50, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
Obviously not -- the topic is the acts and policies of the administration, so a generic collection of statements randomly asserting something not involving such is clearly WP:OFFTOPIC. These do not even identify ANY actions or policies involved or even say whether it is actual or just notional concern, it's just a vague collection of statements with no basis. Markbassett (talk) 21:11, 19 May 2017 (UTC)
These statements, which are actually NOT "generic" if you bother to read the sources, nor are they "random", nor "vague", actually DO "identify" actions and policies of the administration. You are critiquing (and basing your !vote on) something you IMAGINE, not what what actually IS. Adjust accordingly.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:42, 29 May 2017 (UTC)
The text presented in the article was generic, and is the only topic of discussion here. In particular it was not naming any executive order, appointment, treaty, policy statement, military action, or anything else that is an part of a Presidency and so nothing applicable to the topic 'Presidency of'. This article is not for remarks about the person and personality, as imagined by various professors, it is for the office and conduct of that Presidency in actual reality, with any comments to those things in their section -- strucured by the aspects of the office, and not by the caegories of opiions about the man. A generic collection of views thinking "Authoritarian" with not even a connection shown to reality simply does not suit. Markbassett (talk) 00:50, 2 June 2017 (UTC)
Undue. The language isn't terrible, but this is terribly undue emphasis. There are so, so many heavily covered aspects to the Trump presidency and so, so many different heavily covered criticisms. Why does this one get a top-level section while other aspects (say, his dishonesty, his divisiveness, his temperament) don't their own sections anywhere? This content belongs in Public image of Donald Trump, similar to Public image of Barack Obama. Limited bits and pieces of this content might belong in Presidency of Donald Trump#Foreign Policy as well. (I am not watching this page, so please ping me if you want my attention.) --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 00:18, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
Dr. Fleischman I agree that this doesn't deserve its own top level section, how can we remedy that. Should the other criticisms get coverage as well? How can we cover these criticisms in an NPOV way? Are they more notable than criticisms of other presidents?Mozzie (talk) 07:48, 29 May 2017 (UTC)
Section is fine. It's well sourced, the sources are reliable, the sources are notable and not a single person has been able to articulate what exactly is "POV" or "SYNTH" about it. An assertion is not an argument. Neither is WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT. Back up your statements or stop wasting people's time.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:15, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
NPOV concerns are justified — As becoming obvious after consideration this section is not appropriate in this way. It is based mostly on opinions and or outlooks. Content of such kind, in case there is a need for it, should be included as suggested by Dr. Fleischman. Keeping a system in the editing of articles of the same kind is key. --Joobo (talk) 09:09, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
The section is perfectly neutral and given due weight (in fact it should probably be given even more weight). This is an extremely important aspect of Trump's rule, closely related to all the other scandals that have engulfed the US government in chaos since he assumed the office, and it is extensively covered in reliable sources. The complaining about it from certain editors here is just about WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT. --Tataral (talk) 14:24, 17 May 2017 (UTC)
Yes, NPOV concerns are justified. I looked at articles about other US Presidents, ones who could reasonably be assessed with authoritarian tendencies and I found no other sections titled like this. Maybe, if other articles about presidents had similar sections, this might be justified with Trump. Even so, I believe that is a stretch at this point, as I too see this section as inappropriate as aptly described by others.Horst59 (talk) 03:41, 19 May 2017 (UTC)
Other presidents have similar sections when there is a (relatively) common opinion on them that rose to the level of being worth covering. For instance, John Adams has an [of Monarchism] section. --Aquillion (talk) 06:05, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
I did see that section on Adams. I do not think it reads as authoritarian tendencies as much as a comment about his possible philosophical positions. Authoritarian tendencies are not expressed and only lightly implied. At least that is my reading. FDR does have a brief mention of such implied tendencies in a section under criticism. Jackson has no such language such as authoritarian tendencies expressed while there are criticisms integrated into related sections such as the nullification crisis or Indian removal policies. There they are referred to as a source of controversy. That is why I see a dedicated section on Trump -- or any president -- as biased when labeled authoritarian tendencies. Perhaps, this type of section could be edited into other presidents, but I don't think that would be helpful, either. They seem appropriate as is, and the Trump article needs this type of editing. Horst59 (talk) 17:03, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
Oppose. This section needs a rewrite. It appears to be a violation of many of the policies and guidelines listed previously, but also WP:SPECULATION. I would also qualify it as WP:PROPAGANDA, in the sense that is biased, unbalanced towards the negative, and largely subjective. Still, 'authoritarian' is not just an opinion such as 'good' or 'bad'; it is wholly suitable for the article if it is presented in an encyclopædic manner. Best, Alt3no:Discuss — 18:30, 28 May 2017 (UTC)
Unsure This article certainly reads as NPOV, but is it? I am sincerely unsure. WP:NPOV says neutrality means carefully and critically analyzing a variety of reliable sources and then attempting to convey to the reader the information contained in them fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without editorial bias. Can we find a variety of reliable sources on this issue that would make it non biased, or does this generally fairly represent reliable sources? Regarding WP:BLP Trump is a public figure. The policy states that In the case of public figures, there will be a multitude of reliable published sources, and BLPs should simply document what these sources say. If an allegation or incident is noteworthy, relevant, and well documented, it belongs in the article—even if it is negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it. This content is noteworthy, relevant and well documented. The policy is clear. It belongs in the article.Mozzie (talk) 08:04, 29 May 2017 (UTC)
Section unquestionably abides by NPOV and BLP. The content is well-cited and (given the high profile and quality of many of the sources, and the fact that they discuss it directly and in depth) clearly worth covering. There is some room to argue over how best to portray them or the precise tone that ought to be used, but BLP allows for well-cited, high-profile criticism, which this indisputably is; and NPOV requires it. In particular, the chief objection seems to be that "these are opinions" (with some smattering of "these are just political opinions!"); however, that is irrelevant. Opinions, when they are well-cited, widely-held, and held by relevant people, absolutely do belong in an article - in particular, the opinions of historians and scholars are important to summarize when discussing political topics. There is some room to discuss exactly how to summarize or weight them, but the implicit argument that they could be omitted entirely (or that NPOV would allow such a thing, let alone encourage it) is baseless. --Aquillion (talk) 06:05, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
Section is a negative editorial against Trump and coatrack. The section is just an excuse to quote as many liberal college professors as possible to make the argument that Trump is the next Hitler. It is undue weight. The whole topic could be covered in one or two sentence, tops, and incorporated into another topic. It is full of speculation and propaganda and the-sky-is-falling comments from professors from places like Berkeley and Harvard. Trim it down and incorporate it into another area.--SlackerDelphi (talk) 11:06, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
WRONG! On May 15th, one of supporters of the biased section cited an article from the Independent (See the Trump is Hitler article here!) that called Trump Hitler and a Fascist. The editor that cited that article is (Janweh64). The article literally starts with the premise that a Yale professor is saying that Trump is Hitler. The first sentence of the article used to support this ludicrous section is: "Donald Trump has been compared to Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin by a professor at America's distinguished Yale University." So, you are wrong, of course. But please note Alt. Eno your off topic comment did prove the point that the article is full of references to college professors that are one fry short of a happy meal. Do we really need an section that all it does is collect the deranged thoughts of Trump is Hitler college professors? We have other places for the speculation and the conspiracy BS. Trim it down and move it to those areas.--SlackerDelphi (talk) 15:20, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
Oppose, as a section title, it makes Wikipedia look not NPOV. However, strongly recommend working relevant material into other sections, as events and facts, rather than this section cobbled together of commentary. Sagecandor (talk) 20:12, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
RfC is procedurally invalid - an RfC is supposed to make a specific proposal (i.e., "add/delete X" or "change X to Y"), not ask a generic question ("Does this abide by X?"). In other words, if there is a problem, the we need a remedy, not just a diagnosis. If the question is "should this entire section be deleted?" then I would certainly oppose that. However, I am open to reworking the content and perhaps disbursing it to other parts of the article. The closing administrator should direct editors to make a specific proposal, and take no further particular action at this time. As to BLP, I see no meaningful BLP issues here since the material is cited and attributed to academics, and the person concerned is the world's most public figure. (Discussions can be had about wording and weight, but these are editorial and style issues, not BLP concerns). Neutralitytalk20:24, 31 May 2017 (UTC)
Comment Summoned by bot. I agree with Neutrality above that this RfC is problematic as insufficiently specific. Also the section in question does not exist at this time. Coretheapple (talk) 14:29, 5 June 2017 (UTC)
Remove the offending section. Just junk. The bulk here seems to feel both POV and Criticism tags are appropriate, plus Synth and some elements of OFFTOPIC or BALANCE and SOAPBOX and one of invalid RFC. p.s. Much the same content is now with the title changed to "Political Ideology". Markbassett (talk) 00:33, 2 June 2017 (UTC)
Leave the NPOV tag as the section needs work. I changed the heading to political ideology because I think it gives a better focus for the article. However I have not changed the content due to lack of time. Previous discussions of NPOV, coatrack, synth, offtopic, soapbox and essay are claimed repeatedly, but have not been demonstrated against the actual content of the policies. Also, this is not a vote (WP:DEMOCRACY). Several commentors have noted that this content has is relevant to the topic and well referenced using reliable sources, although all note that it needs improvement.203.219.159.201 (talk) 00:04, 3 June 2017 (UTC)
unspecific opinions and elevated above due weight is self-demonstrated. Professor blah dislike simply is not widely reported so fails BALASP. Lack of any other POV fails NPOV. Just a space to gather such fails COATRACK and just is doing SOAPBOX ranting. These are not from a single source or speaking to a single event so fail SYNTH ... it just looks like a google on authoritarian trump. On top of that it's just got no real content value --a casual reader can gather that some unknowns on .edu dislike him, but this is hardly news or informative. Markbassett (talk) 03:55, 10 June 2017 (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.
Reince Priebus
Latest comment: 7 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Okay wouldn't it be better to have his WH Chief of Staff just as 2017 in the infox and not 2017-2017? I mean it's just a thought. P.J. (talk) 20:33, 31 July 2017 (UTC)
Adding an infobox to the article
Latest comment: 7 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Doesn't make much sense: this template explains how a government is structured, it is not supposed to apply to an individual administration. Documentation of the template says:
This template is for pages on the structures of presidential governments in some countries, and only on the structure.
Latest comment: 7 years ago15 comments4 people in discussion
Hi. I added an image to Immigration. It could have gone into Environment and Energy. I am not completely happy with the current placement which really needs an image of people to make sense. The border wall seems to cross sections and maybe someone else here will know how to handle the issue of endangered wildlfe. The caption's source is a good start and quick read. Wherever it winds up could hatnote-link to Environmental policy of the Donald Trump administration where I found room to write a new section. -SusanLesch (talk) 20:49, 3 August 2017 (UTC)
Interesting bit of info, but the whole area is already jammed full of pictures, makes it look out of place. Perhaps just adding the text to Environment and Energy. PackMecEng (talk) 23:45, 3 August 2017 (UTC)
The lives of 100 species is a good deal more than an "interesting bit of info." Google News lists multiple articles published just today or this week. This belongs in its own section. I'm sorry but I can't tack it onto the Environment and Energy section because it is a totally different topic in an already overloaded area. I will have to write it and propose it here, maybe tomorrow.
By the way, @PackMecEng: why doesn't somebody straighten out all the images in this article? Wikipedia has a long term practice of alternating images left and right. It isn't hard to do and will improve the viewability of every image. See WP:STACKING. -SusanLesch (talk) 03:18, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
I would, but I am not very good at working with pictures on here. What kind of section would you be looking at? Kind of a combo of immigration and environment? PackMecEng (talk) 13:05, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
Hi. Just an acknowledgement that this administration wants a "border wall" that is at odds with the creatures who live there. I note that the image tutorial says that alternating right/left makes problems for readers with very low resolution (I guess netbooks are even lower resolution than a phone) but the result is still readable. That being the only caveat combined with not having any complaints in 10 years seems enough to go ahead with positioning the images. I can try after we resolve the wildlife issue. Thanks for your reply. -SusanLesch (talk) 13:57, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
The border wall that Trump promised during his campaign threatens the lives of about 100 species, many already endangered. Such animals include the jaguar, ocelot, the Sonoran pronghorn antelope, and the Mexican wolf. A tiny pygmy owl and the Quino checkerspot butterfly both fly lower than the wall. According to Scott Egan of Rice University, a wall can create a population bottleneck, increase inbreeding, and cut off natural migration routes as well as range expansion.[1][2]
Paul Ryan, Speaker of the House, supports Trump's plan for a border wall, and the House of Representatives passed $1.6 billion to fund it. The U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) plans to build the 32 miles of border wall Trump called for in his 2018 budget using the Real ID Act to avoid the years-long process of producing an environmental impact study. Reuters said, "The Real ID Act also allows the secretary of Homeland Security to exempt CBP from adhering to the Endangered Species Act" which would otherwise prohibit construction in a wildlife refuge.[3]
^Greenwald, Noah; et al. (May 2017). "A Wall In the Wild"(PDF). Center for Biological Diversity. Retrieved August 3, 2017. {{cite news}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)
I am not sure about the Paul Ryan part, seems tangential. I like the section title, I'm sure there are other things with his polices that could be added after this as well. PackMecEng (talk) 23:50, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
The border wall threatens the lives of about 100 species, many already endangered, including the jaguar, ocelot, the Sonoran pronghorn antelope, and the Mexican wolf. A tiny pygmy owl and the Quino checkerspot butterfly both fly lower than the proposed wall which is 18 to 30 feet.[1]
References
^Greenwald, Noah; et al. (May 2017). "A Wall In the Wild"(PDF). Center for Biological Diversity. Retrieved August 3, 2017. {{cite news}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)
^Greenwald, Noah; et al. (May 2017). "A Wall In the Wild"(PDF). Center for Biological Diversity. Retrieved August 3, 2017. {{cite news}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)
Susan, I think your proposed one-sentence additions to those two articles are just fine. JFG, speaking as someone who lives near the San Diego/Tijuana border, the problem here isn't the wildlife; it's the wild life! --MelanieN (talk) 22:29, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
Without naming names, this edit removed agreed upon sentence in the section on Environment and energy. I agree the addition of overruling NAS was important however I strongly disagree with removing previously agreed upon text (and without any indication in the edit summary). -SusanLesch (talk) 15:31, 3 September 2017 (UTC)
Salary
Latest comment: 7 years ago53 comments12 people in discussion
Salary One of Trump's campaign promises was that he would not accept a presidential salary. In keeping with this pledge, Trump donated the entirety of his first two quarterly salaries as president to government agencies.[1]
Personally I see no reason to delete it and believe it should be restored, but in keeping with the Discretionary Sanctions I am bringing it here for discussion. I think this is an interesting and relevant fact. And hey, we're constantly quoting Politifact when they call him a liar - can't we for once quote him when they find him telling the truth? --MelanieN (talk) 20:08, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
How is this noteworthy in any way commensurate with the office, the powers, the actions and achievements of POTUS? There are hundreds of equally as significant actions by every president that never even make it to public attention. And I certainly don't see why we would try to find an example of something he said that was not a lie! What is that about? Anyway his critics will call this self-serving and cite it as an example of something done just for promotion rather than charitable intent. Charity is generally not advertised and promoted in campaign rallies. It's not as if it's an example to all the other politicians to donate their salaries. That's already been done by many. And then of course there are those who will use this bit as the start of a long list of the opposite -- things done to enrich himself and his family that dwarf the pittance of a salary he donates. It's a high bar for anything to be noteworthy about the administration of an American President. Do we have ongoing discussion, reporting, or comment as to the significance of this in multiple prominent RS? The important information about an world leader will readily meet that standard. SPECIFICOtalk20:52, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
We already do have an extensive section on his real and potential conflicts of interest. IMO it is useful to leaven that by pointing out that at least he isn't taking a taxpayer-funded salary. RE: "That's already been done by many": Not very many. I believe some wealthy members of the Kennedy Administration were known as "dollar-a-year men". Reading that article, I find only two previous presidents who refused a salary: Hoover and Kennedy. A few more recent public servants included governors Schwarzenegger and Romney. According to that article, Trump wanted to go dollar-a-year but was told he couldn't refuse his salary for legal reasons. Anyhow, this is an interesting and unusual aspect of his presidency, IMO clearly notable. I'll see about more sources to prove it. --MelanieN (talk) 21:26, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
Well, how many do you need? The first page of a Google search shows articles about this from CNN, Time, The Hill, the Washington Post, USA Today, Fox News, Fortune, and Business Insider. The second page shows The New York Times, Huffington Post, NPR - that's just singling out the Independent Reliable Sources. I think the point has been made: this is a notable feature of his presidency. --MelanieN (talk) 21:32, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
Thanks, MelanieN. I couldn't have put it better, and have nothing to add to your analysis, except to reiterate that the text proposed is merely a single sentence and to clarify that I added "Salary" as a subsection of "Ethics" (which seemed like the best place for it).TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 21:42, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
Please review my comments here. I reverted it and explained why it is trivia at best, personal not professional, and belongs nowhere in this article. SPECIFICOtalk00:02, 9 September 2017 (UTC)
Melanie, what do you think is interesting about this? There are thousands of sources we could find on virtually anything from the hour he tweets to the size of his fingers. He's a wealthy guy who pays constant attention to his public image. Let's say the after-tax value of his paycheck is worth $200,000 a year and his net worth is $2 billion. So that's giving 1/10,000 of his wealth. Let's say the average WP editor is worth $1 million. So it's as if the average WP editor donated $100 to charity. And that's not accounting for the diminishing marginal utility of savings or of the PR and electoral benefit he derived from announcing it. You know he could have done it w/o announcing it or he could have done it quietly as, e.g. former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg did when he donated a huge multiple of his mayoral pay -- hundreds of millions of dollars to NYC civic causes -- without very much fanfare and certainly not any public boast. Finding a dozen references to any presidential action is no problem. It takes more than that to establish noteworthiness to an encyclopedic account of his administration. Maybe you could slip it in his bio. It's not clear what impact this has on the topic of this article, his presidency. What is the significance of this action for the governmental factors of his Presidency? SPECIFICOtalk22:52, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
What do you think of the "Cost of Trips" section? It's not as if Trump can help it that he owns a lot of properties that are very expensive/burdensome for the Secret Service to secure and has a large family making frequent international trips to protect, but our article depicts this reality as a major scandal. To be clear, I have no problem with the existence of a paragraph or two on this topic due to its continuing coverage in RS (e.g., [11], [12], [13]), but our article needs to have a consistent standard about what is trivial or UNDUE to avoid arbitrary deletions of content based on editor's subjective feelings. Longer term, if the "Costs of Trips" material remains intact, it probably should not be as a subsection of "First 100 days."TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 23:51, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
It doesn't have to be closed by an "impartial" or uninvolved person; it wasn't a formal RfC or anything. Anyhow the trend here seems pretty clear: four people (counting the IP) think it belongs in the article; SPECIFICO, alone, argues for its removal. SPECIFICO's arguments are: that it is UNDUE and trivia; that there needs to be reporting on this in "multiple prominent RS," which I provided easily and in volume; and that this isn't really very much money for him, which is true (and Original Research) but in no way wipes out the significant press coverage of this topic. This degree of coverage certainly seems deserving of a small two-sentence mention. --MelanieN (talk) 00:03, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
MelanieN, the "closer" is a recent SPA in this difficult topic area. With an UNDUE bit of biographical, not governmental or administrative, trivia being insinuated into this article, the precipitous declaration of a winning vote (!really, can't make this stuff up!) was inappropriate. Chill out and let others comment. This is nonsense in an article about a presidential administration. As if Abe Lincoln Presidency had something about what kind of RR car he liked best. What does this silly bit of nonsense tell you about Trunp's Presidency (subject of this article) other than that he made what appears to be a payment of a minimal sum of money publicly announced in a way to reinforce his longstanding and dubious narrative that he's extraordinarily wealthy. SPECIFICOtalk02:39, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
"Precipitous"? The discussion has been open for five days. "Let others comment"? I always hope for others to comment, but we went for four days there without anyone saying anything. At some point (often 7 days) we need to conclude that everyone who was going to say something has had a chance to say it. As for your straw men examples like "Abe Lincoln's rail car preference", if that subject had gotten the kind of coverage that this one has, we might have said something about it. You love to dismiss this heavily covered subject as a "silly bit of nonsense," but that is your opinion, and it is apparently not shared by the Reliable Sources whose lead we follow in deciding what to cover. That is the issue you keep ignoring: you may think this is silly and trivial, but Reliable Sources have thought it was worth reporting. --MelanieN (talk) 04:02, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Melanie, if you feel like disparaging me please join the crowd on my user talk page where I always enjoy folks venting. Meanwhile, let's stick to the article text and sources here and focus on policy-based argument. There are millions of news articles about POTUS on all sorts of stuff, so the issue is due WP:WEIGHT and NPOV. Any mention of this would need to reflect the mainstream coverage of it. The coverage (aside from primary-sourced puffery) ranged from skepticism to scorn, citing this as an example of what sources apparently believed was POTUS' tendency to self-promotion, disingenuous gestures and other unfortunate traits. If you feel strongly that this needs to be part of this article about his Presidency (once again, not his bio) then please review the coverage and all the critical remarks in RS reporting and commentary so that you can propose an NPOV text that's fair and balanced. That would be more constructive than obstinate denial of the policy-based problems and would get us to some content that might meet WP norms. SPECIFICOtalk11:47, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Generally, we cover things that happened during the campaign in the Campaign article, and things that happened during his presidency in the Presidency article. --MelanieN (talk) 04:04, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Keep it. Short mention is appropriate. Why Presidents aren't required to accept it is beyond me. By refusing it he can claim to not be employed by the people and has free hands to do as he pleases. Oh! That's what he does anyway... -- BullRangifer (talk) 04:28, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Keep - As long as we can also say he makes millions and millions of dollars from the US taxpayer by forcing the Secret Service and White House staff to rent parts of his own properties (Mar-a-Lago, Trump Tower, Bedminster et al) to the Secret Service and White House staff so he can stay in them, instead of at the already-paid-for Camp David retreat. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:43, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
I think that would be a separate issue to his salary. We should not say that is in any way related to his salary unless multiple reliable sources have made the link. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 12:55, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
As far as I can see our article doesn't currently have a paragraph about the payments his properties get from the Secret Service and other government agencies when he travels, or about the rent dispute with the Secret Service. I would have no objection to adding a well-sourced paragraph about those issues to the "conflicts of interest" subsection, if someone can propose one.--MelanieN (talk) 16:10, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
There are policy-based issues that should guide us here. RS reporting on this bring in several factors. That this is what they call Trump's typical self-promotion, that he is allocating his payments to the same departments from which he pursues budget cuts on the order of 100 times the size of his payments, that other officials made similar payments quietly and without seeking public attention. Some brief summary of those widespread critical and contextualizing remarks need to be included, per NPOV. And I am still not hearing why this is a significant (not notable, guys - if it were notable it would get its own article) fact about Trump's presidency. Why does it belong here rather than in his bio, where we would expect to see discussion of his charitable activities and the degree of his completeness and candor referring to them. SPECIFICOtalk15:38, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Our article currently contains a very large section - seven paragraphs - about Trump's conflicts of interest, including details about multiple lawsuits (which are nowhere near as widely reported as these donations), and many quotes from commentators disparaging his ethical situation. To also include a small, neutral, two-sentence paragraph about these widely-reported donations does not seem excessive, especially when WP:BALANCEd against our extensive negative coverage about his ethical situation. So I have trouble understanding why you are opposing this so passionately.
As for what article to put it in: The main biographical article cannot possibly go into this level of depth; that is why there are so many spinoff articles, including this one. These are issues that are arising during his presidency and specifically because he is president. This is the appropriate article to put them in (unless someone wants to spin off a whole separate article about his conflicts of interest). --MelanieN (talk) 16:10, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
What does this have to do with conflicts of interest? Nothing, insofar as I can tell. MelanieN, it almost sounds as if you're saying we'll balance nice things with nasty things. But that's not what we do. We first determine what are the items of lasting encyclopedic significance and then we present the weight of mainstream narrative with significant alternative or dissenting narratives to the extent they appear in RS or represent the opinions of qualified commentators. This donation bit has nothing to do with COI that I can see. He's not donating to the Dept. of Interior to plant trees outside his home or anything. My sense of RS reporting, if you don't double-count all the news outlet that repeated his self-serving press releases within a day or two, is that there's only skeptical and nullifying discussion among sources that thought it important enough even to comment on after the initial primary statement was summarized. There are literally thousands of administrative actions reported by RS -- they are law enforcement decisions, environmental and other regulatory decisions, and foreign policy decisions -- that are so vastly more significant than this that it's hard to conceive of this contrived "charity" bit (is the US Gov't a charity?) as being a noteworthy event in a relatively brief encyclopedia article about an American Presidency. SPECIFICOtalk17:03, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Keep – A notable presidential factoid, unusual for other presidents and widely covered in RS. We don't need to advertise this donation as Trump does, but we don't need to deliberately hide it either. Let's uphold the WP:Neutrality pillar. — JFGtalk17:07, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Please do not misuse the word "notable" in a WP editing context. Please review my comments on this thread and explain how you feel that NEUTRALITY requies this. And please review RS reporting on the subject and state what you believe to be a balanced proportionate NPOV treatment of this subject. Thanks. Repetition doesn't advance the discussion. Responsive interaction will get us to consensus. SPECIFICOtalk18:05, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Please google "Trump salary charity" -- I think that's NPOV enuf for our purposes here. Now see what comes up. Let's get a 2-3 sentence NPOV mention, if anyone still insists this is a noteworthy fact of his Presidential Administration. Thanks. SPECIFICOtalk19:17, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
LOL! I did, and of course no RS were found. I then searched for "Trump salary" charity and found plenty.
1st quarter: $78,333 to National Park Service, Antietam battlefield restoration. (His proposed budget would cut about $1.5 billion from the budget for the Department of Interior, which operates the National Park Service.)
2nd quarter: $100,000 to Department of Education. (He still wants to cut $9.2 billion from its budget.)
NPOV text Thank you @BullRangifer:. I still think this is UNDUE but per the above, I have written a brief NPOV version if there is still any editor who wishes to see this in the article. We can add the citations from among the many that give this account.
In a televised interview during the 2016 campaign, Trump stated that, if elected, he would accept no salary as President. This violates Article 2 of the US Constitution, which requires the president to receive a salary while in office. However, in the first two quarters of his presidency, Trump announced that he had made donations to the Departments of the Interior and Education in a total amount of $178,000. The move was criticized as having been a publicity stunt, and press accounts pointed out that Trump had at the same time called for funding cuts of over $10 billion for the programs of those two departments.
As I said, the best course IMO would be to drop this idea or consider whether there's some other article to which it is actually germane. SPECIFICOtalk14:36, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
We already have a brief neutral version: the one at the head of this discussion, which you removed from the article but most discussants here want restored. You are free to continue to propose your new version and see if anyone accepts it, but I would at least like to suggest you remove the sentence "This violates Article 2 of the US Constitution, which requires the president to receive a salary while in office." That is irrelevant and immaterial as the lawyers say, because he IS accepting his salary as required, so he is not violating the Constitution as your version implies. How about trimming that to "In a televised interview during the 2016 campaign, Trump stated that, if elected, he would accept no salary as President. For the first two quarters of his presidency, Trump made donations to the Departments of the Interior and Education in a total amount of $178,000, equivalent to his salary for those quarters." This is not to suggest that I agree with your version - I don't - but just in an attempt to make it a little more factual. --MelanieN (talk) 20:08, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
I am puzzled as to why you'd reiterate that the reverted version is "neutral" when I explained the contrary and one other editor has found RS that present it quite differently. In fact, @BullRangifer: and I tried to apply policy and -- I could be wrong on this -- seem to be the only ones who actually surveyed RS to reflect what they say about this. Now, there may also be many sources that just briefly say how he donated his salary. Especially local news stations and regional press. Examining those, we find that nearly all come within a day or two of the announcements and appear to reflect routine reprinting of government press releases and agency statements such as we find on hundreds of topics every day -- for example the menus, fashions, and floral arrays at State Dinners]. The longer articles or the ones written by papers' own reporters or columnists almost all are critical or disparaging.
The bit about the emoluments clause is to pick up on the initial comment in this thread, which cites Trump's own statement. It's also one of the things that RS cite in their reactions to this. I did omit some other frequent press comments, which while also rather on the negative side, did not relate directly to the donations but more to the writers' broader views of Trump's character. It's no more "factual" to omit the fact of Article 2 of the Constitution, but your suggestion is noted and who knows, maybe it will be adopted as consensus emerges. SPECIFICOtalk21:11, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
SPECIFICO, to state the obvious, you have still not provided any of the sources that you say you are basing your above commentary on. It appears that you have already determined what the truth must be, and are now asking others to do the work for you.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 21:17, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
This topic, with it currently having 8-1 consensus now after inviting more people to voice their input, I think consensus is firmly in favor of its inclusion. 70.44.154.16 (talk) 21:52, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
I agree, 8-2. And that applies to the sentences as originally in the article, listed at the top of this section. No one has shown any inclination toward SPECIFICO's proposed rewording. BullRangifer proposes adding the information about Trump's proposed budget cuts to the same departments. We could put our consensus version back into the article, and then decide whether to add the "budget cut" information. --MelanieN (talk) 04:35, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
Actually I don't think the budget cuts part is necessary. That's why I put it in parentheses. I'll note this above, too, by striking that part. -- BullRangifer (talk) 05:06, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
I don't want to close this because I was the one that started it, but I do think it is ready to be closed. There hasn't been a new comment in this thread for three days. --MelanieN (talk) 23:31, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
I agree, and I say this a day later heh. Since majority rules and there hasn't been any new comments (Minus yours) in now four days, I see no reason not to add the section. 70.44.154.16 (talk) 23:58, 19 September 2017 (UTC)
SPECIFICO, what was your rationale for reverting when this material was added to the article? That you don't think IPs are allowed to implement consensus? (WP:IPs are people too). That you didn't like the conclusion that an 8-2 majority can be regarded as a consensus? That you think there might be more commentary forthcoming here, even though you already listed the discussion at multiple talk pages and got a strong response, all of it in favor of inclusion - and no new opinions have been added in four days? I recused myself from closing this, but I think you ought to recuse yourself also. --MelanieN (talk) 03:00, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
Did you read my edit summaries both times? S-P-A. Not IP. IP SPA with a short history -- and the problem is that there's a lot of detail on this thread that was ignored in the reinsertion of that editor's previous unhelpful insertion. This can be stated in a balanced, compete, succinct, NPOV way as reflected in this lengthy and constructive discussion. Recuse myself??? Did I jump in and close it? Why discuss me doing something I already did? I expect a closer, if we call it that, to reflect the entire discussion, not just to jerk the same bad text back in place. I'm sure we all expect that. BTW "dontlike" is a smear and it's beneath you to use that. It's typically used by battleground editors to project their nonsense on more temperate participants here, and indiscriminate use of it only encourages such abuses. SPECIFICOtalk03:11, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
If the closer concludes that the consensus of this discussion is to restore the initial text - what you call the "same bad text" - then yes, we would need to respect that. I didn't see much support here for any different text. --MelanieN (talk) 03:15, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
This was not an RfC with 2 alternative texts up for an up or down vote. The simple version was challenged. The thread developed a range of deeper and more contextually profiled aspects to the naive text that was reverted. An SPA reinserting its preferred version ignoring all the possible improvements doesn't advance anything. Now I suppose I could have added to and amended the restored bad version. Or somebody else can write something that's better than what was removed. Either way, the SPA's version will not survive because it's weak and unencyclopedic. SPECIFICOtalk03:24, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
And of course, it would be fine if you believe that the original language was the highest and best possible text for this bit of rank abject, tortured trivia. But then, it would help if you'd refute this thread's several arguments to the contrary so as to solidify your stance. SPECIFICOtalk03:37, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
Latest comment: 7 years ago17 comments6 people in discussion
I haven't reviewed this article as I would a GAC or FAC, but as a result of consensus issues, I have read a couple of sections. I feel rather strongly that the Potential conflicts of interest section is noncompliant with NPOV, fails WP:UNDUE and is not even applicable to the Presidency. The office of the president is exempt from COI laws; therefore, to have an entire UNDUE section about potential conflicts is clearly noncompliant with NPOV. Also keep in mind that it also fails WP:NOT as it applies to WP:NOT#JOURNALISMOriginal reporting, and that is without getting into WP:BIASED RS that dominate the citations in this article. The Comey segment fails NPOV and UNDUE as well. Show me where, in Presidency of Bill Clinton, there is even any mention of him firing FBI Director Jeff Sessions or the controversy surrounding that firing. There's not even a segment about Bill Clinton's impeachment. Don't you think it will be difficult to convince our readers that WP isn't biased when comparing the two articles? That alone supports my concerns over NPOV in this article. Much of it reads like condemnation, some filled with disproportionate, sometimes irrelevant opinionated news purposely designed to denigrate rather than provide factual information that is compliant with NPOV, WP:Weight and WP:Balance, not taking into account WP:BLP, et al. There has not been any consideration given to the fact that biased sources dominate. A WP article was even used as a source. The NYTimes, WaPo, Politico, and CNN dominate this article. I've noticed that several conservative sources have been dismissed as unreliable at WP:RSN. Where is the list of reliable conservative sources? NPOV clearly states (my bold underline): An article should not give undue weight to minor aspects of its subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject. For example, discussion of isolated events, criticisms, or news reports about a subject may be verifiable and impartial, but still disproportionate to their overall significance to the article topic. This is a concern especially in relation to recent events that may be in the news. I'm ok with resolving the issues one section at a time, so let's start with the most glaring noncompliant section, Potential conflicts of interest. It needs to be deleted in its entirety, and replaced with a paragraph explaining some concerns have been raised, and cite it with inline text attribution to a RS and balanced by explaining why the office of the president is exempt, citing the law. Atsme📞📧17:27, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
Pardon me, but that's nonsense. Moreover the section makes no legal claim -- it talks about "potential conflicts of interest" in terms that are robustly supported by mainstream RS discussion of the Trump presidency. If you want to pursue this, I predict you will hit a dead end after a lot of wasted effort. SPECIFICOtalk17:48, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
Just curious...do you think perhaps the best place to gauge reception and arguments for or against would be to add RS information to the Presidency of Bill Clinton re: the firing of FBI Director Sessions, and provide more information about his impeachment? Do you think such information would be as readily accepted as what is being added here per your argument? Atsme📞📧17:54, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
Dear Curious, I'm pretty sure I have no idea what you're talking about, but my advice is -- in your American vernacular -- "go for it" (signed) Clueless.😵 SPECIFICOtalk17:58, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
BTW, it's quite possible that the mainstream is "biased against Trump" as he's never received a majority approval either in the election or in any subsequent polling. Moreover his core -- the ones who still support him -- are not typically among those who shape the mainstream narrative on such things. However, Wikipedia is a tool of the mainstream. We fervently strive to present significant minority views in proportion to their incidence on Earth, but with Trump's ratings on character and other metrics related to COI at historically low levels, it's very likely that nothing very flattering is going to be presented here. Policy-based concerns are easier to adjudicate, but mere accusations of bias, when stated from a minority or fringe POV, are pretty well quashed by WP site policy. We present the consensus view of the real world, not necessarily of the assembled editors on any given article. SPECIFICOtalk
I'm a pragmatist, and facts tell me the man was elected President despite MSM's polling which was clearly out of touch with "mainstream", so forgive me for not extending a great deal of credibility to MSM as being representative of "mainstream". I'd like to think WP has risen above MSM's decline because the polls show that 84% of voters don't know what to believe online, and 65% believe there is a lot of fake news in the mainstream media. I would think some of those people are WP readers and contributors. I'm here to help build an encyclopedia not a mainstream newspaper. I don't see very much info in the subsection potential coi that we can call "encyclopedic", especially considering the office of the president is exempt from COI law - I imagine that also includes "potential COI", 🤔. The facts tell us voters in the US don't take MSM seriously, and it concerns me that you're saying "Wikipedia is a tool of the mainstream". If that truly is the case, we should be listening closer to what got Trump elected as it more closely represents mainstream. Provide only the facts, please - keep the ethics, the morality, the pc, the censorship, and all the soapbox POV criticisms that are noncompliant with NPOV out of WP. When something in an article is challenged, policy prevails. Atsme📞📧20:05, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
Atsme, you forgot the bit about the dead folks, undocumented immigrants, and space alien voter fraud that made it look like Trump only got 46% of the vote. 🙈 SPECIFICOtalk21:18, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
I know this is an Other Stuff Exists argument, but since you have raised it several times I will answer it: Show me where, in Presidency of Bill Clinton, there is even any mention of him firing FBI Director Jeff Sessions or the controversy surrounding that firing. You mean William Sessions, and it wasn't all that controversial, and he was fired for ethics violations. (That's according to the link you provided.) Note the lack of an article called Dismissal of William Sessions. But you could add a sentence to the "First term" section of the Clinton article, if you think it's important. There's not even a segment about Bill Clinton's impeachment. Incorrect. The impeachment is mentioned in the lede and given several paragraphs in the "Second term" section. So there is no UNDUE comparison which I think is why you brought that up. As for your argument that the President can't have conflicts of interest because he is exempt from most COI laws, that's irrelevant: Congress could use non-criminal conflicts of interest as grounds for impeachment, if it so chose, so COI is a valid issue to discuss WRT presidents. Anyhow that is Original Research. There has been a tremendous volume of reporting on this issue by independent reliable sources, so it is appropriate for us to reflect that coverage here, per policy. --MelanieN (talk) 20:30, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
I struck the name Jeff - apologies for transposing names. It appears that my interpretation of UNDUE and "segment" differs greatly from yours. I'm of the mind the UNDUE issues in this article are quite obvious, which is why I used the comparison. The Clinton article is a better model to use as a base for gauging WP:NPOV, WP:WEIGHT and WP:BALANCE, and I will add that the way the controversial firing of Sessions, and it was highly controversial (unlike your impression that "it wasn't all that controversial"), was not presented at all in the article VS the way the Comey firing in this article was presented clearly makes it UNDUE. Worse yet, the mention of Clinton's impeachment comprises 2 sentences in the lead of the Clinton article, and 2 sentences in the section titled "Second term". The word (or form of it) "impeach" was mentioned 7 times total. There were only 339 words written about the entire incident that led to it in the section "Second Term" VS 7 full paragraphs (850 words) in Trump's "potential COI" subsection, and he's only been in office 8 mos. The use of WP:OSE is certainly valid in this instance as it relates to NPOV and UNDUE. Our readers should be getting far more encyclopedic information than what they're getting with the inclusion of "potential coi" and all the hooplah about The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming. Facts, please. WP policy dictates that we are not a crystal ball and certainly not a newspaper, even though some may think we are if they're coming here for "breaking news." Atsme📞📧00:01, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
Well, we certainly have different definitions of "controversial" - and especially "highly controversial". Your first link ("controversial") doesn't suggest that the firing was objected to by anyone except Sessions himself. In your second link ("highly controversial"), I do find a tiny bit of controversy at the very end of the article: one senator saying the firing was a "potentially worrisome precedent," and one House member speaking out strongly against it. But "Most other congressional reaction was more positive." Our article William S. Sessions doesn't suggest that the firing caused any controversy. And note that the story of his firing was back in the news last May (just Google William Sessions fired by Clinton); those 2017 articles do say it was the first time an FBI director was fired, but there's no hint of any public outcry against it. So I see no reason why you couldn't say in the Clinton article that he fired Sessions, and that it was the first time an FBI Director had been fired, but you'd have to do a lot of digging to find any evidence that it caused controversy - so much so that I think it would be undue cherry-picking to say so. I realize this is off topic for the current article, but you keep trying to say the cases are similar so you can compare the way we treat them. But they aren't at all comparable. The dismissal of Sessions got a public yawn. The dismissal of Comey touched off a firestorm at the time which continues to this day - including a federal investigation into whether it was obstruction of justice. --MelanieN (talk) 00:35, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
Trump did not obstruct according to Dershowitz. The concern now is if Comey broke the law, and whether or not he will have to testify again now that it's known that he may have exonerated Clinton before investigating her and lied under oath. Yes, our interpretations are much different. Thank you for sharing your views. The weekend is upon us! Atsme📞📧02:07, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
I propose we drop this unrelated discussion and get back to talking about the "potential conflicts of interest" section in this article. If I understand you correctly, you think it is UNDUE and unfair and biased for us to have such a section, and you seem to imply that it only exists because of Wikipedia editor bias - that you think we do not report negative stuff about Democrats, only Republicans. Let's examine that notion. Let's look at something comparable from the other side of the aisle - something that is current or recent, but involves a Democrat. Let's compare our coverage about Trump's "potential conflicts of interest" with the coverage given to Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server. We have an entire article Hillary Clinton email controversy, plus large sections at Hillary Clinton and Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, 2016, and a paragraph at United States presidential election, 2016; probably others too that I missed. My point is, we do have massive coverage over something negative about a Democrat. Do I think it's too much? No, I think it is DUE - because it reflects the massive coverage given to the subject by Reliable Sources. By the same token, I think our one section in one article about Trump's possible conflicts of interest is DUE; it reflects the moderate coverage given to it by Reliable Sources. The difference in our coverage is not due to right vs. left; it's due to following Wikipedia policy, giving things weight according to the prominence and importance given to them by Reliable Sources. Bottom line, our section is appropriate and should remain. --MelanieN (talk) 04:26, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
However the question of whether it is neutral to call them conflict of interests despite the president being exempt from such laws needs to be considered. If reliable sources call it this then we must think of the best way for to balance it being due, neutral, verifiable, and true. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 10:00, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
Thank you, Emir. I'm trying to demonstrate a NPOV issue and how other articles are handled properly, and all I'm getting is a Republican vs Democrat line of bull. It has nothing to do with political affiliation and everything to do with how certain information is presented. As for the contention over RS, it happens to be RS that have demonstrated the bias in sources, and PEW research has provided polling that indicates a large majority of Americans do not trust MSM. What we're dealing with now are a few editors who claim every conservative source is unreliable while all left leaning sources are but it's clear such a conclusion is based on POV and opinion not factual information. There have been multiple discussions at RSN and many of the same people keep claiming the same things over and over again, and those with the boldest replies and like-minded views seem to think they are correct and everyone else is wrong. Regardless, consensus does not overrule policy, and the latter appears to be the single most important argument subject to Wikipedia:DIDNTHEARTHAT. Potential conflicts of interest are UNDUE when real conflicts of interest are not even at issue but the argument to keep as I see it is based on speculation of impeachment. Loan me that crystal ball. Wow! We have speculation filling the article while actual impeachment of a presidency earned NPOV treatment. I've already cited the policy that applies to newspaper article speculation but again DIDNTHEARTHAT. WP:NOT tells us how such information is to be treated but that is not what is happening as a result of what appears to be political bias and that has to stop. What we need is for editors to leave their political biases at login and join in neutral collaboration, which may not necessarily be with all like-minded editors, but that's how WP is supposed to operate in order to acheive neutrality. Atsme📞📧10:46, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
Adding 2 sources that support my position - Snopes and CNBC. Look at the section Relationship with the media and tell me if you see anything...anything at all in that section you consider NPOV considering the two sources I just linked. Atsme📞📧11:23, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
This Republican vs Democrat line is definitely incorrect due to the unique nature of Trump. Conservative source should be held to the same standards as they always are, but we shouldn't however shove an unreliable one in just because we have too few opinions. I think some people need to read WP:CRYSTALBALL. Political bias shouldn't be present and we should remain neutral.
Your first article does have a point, but have to we have with what we are given.
Regarding the second source which is about a study from Harvard I think doesn't support any point in regards to "conflict of interest". It just says that coverage was negative, but not that it was unwarranted. I think that WP:NEUTRALSOURCE can be generalized to sources with a negative tone. However this source could be useful if we mention the media coverage of Trump and/or his presidency. Yes, I know that might be a bit meta, but as long as we don't branch into WP:OR I'm fine with it. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 16:53, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
What, um... what in the world do either of these two sources - Snopes or CNBC - have to do with the issue at hand? Is anything that is discussed in the Snopes article for example, part of this Wikipedia article? No? Then what's the point? Volunteer Marek 07:35, 24 September 2017 (UTC)
Neutrality tag - accusations of bigotry
Latest comment: 7 years ago16 comments7 people in discussion
I was moving some text and noticed the accusations of bigotry section has a Neutrality tag but had not started the TALK section to discuss the concerns.
So, here is the section to facilitate the record of details and discussion. Please indicate what neutrality concerns folks have for this section. Please refrain from rote denialism and such, and Thank any for refraining. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 00:35, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
I was surprised to even see we have such a section, because there is an RfC going on right now at Talk:Donald Trump#RfC: Accusations of bigotry about whether to have such a section. These articles can tend to blur in my mind so I was wondering why we have a section here while discussion is ongoing - I guess I'm spending too much time on this stuff. Anyhow I would suggest that the outcome of that RfC might be helpful in deciding what to do with the section here. Personally if it was up to me I would delete the section entirely and put the various issues like white supremacy and anti-Muslim elsewhere in the article. --MelanieN (talk) 23:22, 21 September 2017 (UTC)
I agree with MelanieN. "Bigot" is an evaluation or a conclusion, but an encyclopedia can give a more detailed account rather than highlight a broad label such as that. SPECIFICOtalk23:35, 21 September 2017 (UTC)
On 23 September, the RFC at the main Trump article closed, with no consensus to include a section regarding accusations of Trump's bigotry (racism, antisemitism, sexism, Islamophobia). Since that RFC got broader community input than any discussion about it here, I agree with Melanie that we should delete the section entirely and put the various issues like white supremacy and anti-Muslim elsewhere in the article. Or we could keep that section and add a section like "Accusations that Trump is trying to make America great again", but my preference would be to have neither section because they reek of opinion. Anythingyouwant (talk) 18:36, 24 September 2017 (UTC)
Nuke the section. The recent Charlottesville event which motivated this section can be briefly summarized elsewhere. — JFGtalk21:12, 24 September 2017 (UTC)
MelanieN - well, the RFC Talk:Donald Trump#RfC: Accusations of bigotry closed with no consensus but a skew to oppose having such a section, the RFC being too broad or vague focus without wording for it being part of the concerns. I think I'll try resolving it by moving Charlottesville paragraph up to the Domestic section as event and presidential actions. By dropping the lead of opinions that he is bigoted and ending remarks about cartoons, plus the section label "Bigotry", I think it reasonable to also drop the Neutrality tag. (Objections to the sources I will leave as an exercise to those who disliked them.) Cheers Markbassett (talk) 00:13, 27 September 2017 (UTC)
Nice job mainstreaming the Charlottesvill/white supremacy section into the article. One comment: that section contains an entire paragraph devoted to the cover-art of several magazines linking Trump to the KKK. I think that paragraph is undue, basically just name-calling under the guise of journalism, and I am going to remove it ("challenging through reversion" as the DS put it). Let's discuss here whether it or something like it should be restored to the article. --MelanieN (talk) 16:07, 27 September 2017 (UTC)
Okay. Also, in the header, could you please change "White supremacy and Charlottesville rally" to "White supremacists and Charlottesville rally". That way it doesn't sound like the section is about his white supremacy. Anythingyouwant (talk) 16:34, 27 September 2017 (UTC)
Washington Free Beacon published tweets by grant recipient
I disagree with this edit. The removed information shows that The Washington Free Beacon published tweets by a grant recipient who called for overthrowing the 2016 presidential election. The removed material provided in-text attribution as well. I don't see the problem. Additionally, the preceding sentence gave the incorrect impression that the administration cancelled the whole Countering Violent Extremism Task Force. Regarding alleged undue weight, I'd be glad to include sources that describe the tweets differently, but there are no such sources AFAIK; per WP:NPOV, "the passage should not be worded in any way that makes it appear to be contested" if it has not been contested. Moreover, the Free Beacon seems very reliable for purposes of not publishing forged tweets. Anythingyouwant (talk) 03:09, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
This passage that Anythingyouwant actually added to the article was "...tweets that the Washington Free Beaconcharacterized as..." (bolding is my emphasis), which is not quite what this user says above. In fact, this article talk page version is arguably worse, as Anythingyouwant now states "a grant recipient who called for overthrowing the 2016 presidential election", a plain assertion. Using an unreliable source to state that a person is guilty of a federal crime should be considered quite a WP:BLP violation.
If other editors would like to review the Free Beacon link, it is in the article history. In it, the person in question tweeted things such as "Anyone else still clinging to the hope that some crazy twist of fate will still happen in the next 6 days to make the world right again?", "And as rulers, our first order of business is to remove you from office before you destroy us", and so on. Inflammatory, sure, but not a literal declaration of a coup or assassination. The Free Beacon is interpreting the remarks as treasonous, but they are not a reliable source, thus this should not appear in the article. By Anythingyouwant's own admission, xe wants to balance a perceived "incorrect impression". That impression is their own opinion, only. TheValeyard (talk) 03:52, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
Here is the Free Beacon article. I'd be satisfied if we simply quote some of the tweets without mentioning how the Free Beacon characterized them. Like this one from November 19, 2016: "@realDonaldTrump fuck you, asshole". Sounds like a great grant request!🙂 Or this one from January 21, 2017: "our first order of business is to remove you from office before you destroy us. #notmypresident". Plus (as I said above), we need to correct the misimpression that Trump cancelled the Countering Violent Extremism Task Force or stopped making grants under that program; after all, the cited Politico article says Trump was restarting that 10 million dollar program, not cancelling it. Anythingyouwant (talk) 04:15, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
You know - I think we should delete the entire paragraph. It's about funding for one organization. It's hardly a significant event in his presidency, and not particularly enlightening about his relations with white supremacists. Or we could replace it with something like this: "The Department of Homeland Security temporarily halted grants from the Countering Violent Extremism Task Force for review. Grants were resumed after dropping one organization, "Life After Hate", from the program." Cited to Politico as above. I don't see any need to go into why the group was dropped - which is a matter of speculation anyhow. --MelanieN (talk) 17:29, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
Yeah, I would support removing that paragraph from the subsection on white nationalism, unless someone can point to a reliable source saying that the grant was pulled because of the grantee's opposition to white nationalism, rather than because the grantee said "fuck you, asshole" to the grantor (among other things). Per WP:Preserve, this topic can be adequately covered at the Christian Picciolini BLP, and/or at Countering Violent Extremism Task Force. Anythingyouwant (talk) 18:03, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
I'm going to remove it. Open to discussion/consensus about whether to restore it, or insert some other version about this issue somewhere in the article. --MelanieN (talk) 17:42, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
Politicization of the Department of Justice
Latest comment: 7 years ago10 comments5 people in discussion
I don't see that this topic is now clearly identified and covered in the article. A neutral search points to this unusual activity in the Trump Presidency.
[14]SPECIFICOtalk13:55, 15 September 2017 (UTC)
I assume you're referring to the White House calls to prosecute Comey? I wouldn't go so far as to call this politicization of the DOJ (that would be the GWBush administration, with their overt screening of potential U.S. Attorney candidates and DOJ hires to make sure they had the right political views before hiring), but I do agree it's a failure to respect DOJ's independence. (Some sources have described it as an unprecedented attempt by the president to dictate to DOJ, but I doubt if it's actually unprecedented.) I have seen this incident described as possible obstruction of justice, i.e., attempting to intimidate a witness, and maybe that would be a better topic to mention it under. Where were you thinking it should go? --MelanieN (talk) 23:48, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
You may be onto something, provided there is balance per articles like this one with full disclosure and some evidence to validate the claims per NPOV. For example, authoritive articles on politicization should include information from articles like this because it can no longer be considered WP:RECENTISM - the politicization claims are supported by the ruling of SCOTUS rather than being more of the same allegations from biased news publications. Atsme📞📧 16:27, 20 September 201°7 (UTC)
@MelanieN: - I think this is relatively too small to mention, since Google is showing me about 150 Million hits for President Trump and only 300 K when politicization and DOJ are added, with significant amount of that being about Obama politicization or Bush politicization. But I will correct your views above with material previously Talked at Dissmisal of Comey -- DOJ is not independent, it is normally accorded some distance but is part of the Executive branch that the President runs; and that it is normal for political appointees to be vetted and that they may be dismissed with no cause required. In any case, politics and justice just seems a perennial item - said about Obama, about Bush - and not particularly notable compared to the historical cases for Reagan, for Nixon, for Lincoln re Merryman , and for Jackson. Cheers. Markbassett (talk) 22:23, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
I haven't agreed with anything yet, and I haven't seen this covered as a topic in the Reliable Sources I read. So I'm inclined to agree with you. But if Atsme wants to propose some kind of wording, let's see what it says and evaluate it on its merits. --MelanieN (talk) 22:36, 20 September 2017 (UTC)
I reviewed several of the Presidency of... articles in an effort to find consistency or mention of DOJ politicization and haven't found much of anything, not even in the way of section titles. Nothing goes beyond justifiable dismissals, allegations and inuendos by detractors and MSM sensationalism. The standalone articles about Comey's firing, the Russian investigations, Special Councel Mueller, former AG Loretta Lynch, AG Jeff Sessions et al is probably where politicization belongs considering it's allegedly the DOJ that's being politicized, but I'm having a hard time justifying its inclusion here, especially something one could consider unprecedented politicization. A president really can't force anyone in the DOJ to do anything they aren't willing to do as we've discovered with former AG Sally Yates who (wrongfully) defied an Executive Order. The firing of Comey was also justified according to an AP report that was published in US News. After I read this OIG special report, which comes complete with graphs, it made me think that a standalone article covering a much broader spectrum would better serve our readers than singling out the Trump administration as being unprecendented in that regard. Atsme📞📧05:30, 21 September 2017 (UTC)
Maybe because previous presidents didn't politicize the DOJ or at least not to this extent, hmmmmmm? You can't really compare this to other "Presidency of..." articles literally like you're doing because every presidency is different, so OBVIOUSLY different kind of information will be included. Volunteer Marek 02:53, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
The main difference I've noticed is that a president's political affiliation appears to be the decided factor in what determines NPOV, balance and undue and to what extent published scandals and speculation will be included in the article. It's a style of writing that became most notable after Bill Clinton's administration, and with the onslaught of tv pundits and internet news. Atsme📞📧01:05, 30 September 2017 (UTC)
Latest comment: 7 years ago15 comments6 people in discussion
Section looks pretty POV with most of it is sourced to a editorial by the Washington Post here as part of their "The Debrief" which describes itself as "An occasional series offering a reporter’s insights". Which is not suitable for negative information on a WP:BLP. Looks like it was inserted by User:Snooganssnooganshere, challenged by revision by User:SMP0328.here, and then reinserted by Snooganssnoogans without discussion here which violates discretionary sanctions that are on this article. PackMecEng (talk) 02:05, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
This is the version I was working on when I was edit conflicted. The text is thoroughly sourced, accurate and generally in line with RS coverage:
In August 2017, Hurricane Harvey caused unprecedented and catastrophic flooding in southeastern Texas. Trump's response to the storm focused primarily on the awe of the storm and talking favorably about his administration's response instead of providing helpful information or offering sympathy to the victims of the hurricane.[1][2] The Houston Chronicle also noted that Trump "did not interact with storm victims or dwell long on their misery,"[3] and the Associated Press wrote, "Trump missed clear opportunities to strike a sympathetic note for multitudes who are suffering. The president did not mention those who died in the storm or those forced from their homes by its floodwaters. And he basked in the attention of cheering supporters outside the fire station where officials briefed him on the recovery."[2] Amid record-setting rainfall in Houston, Trump promoted Sheriff David Clarke's book.[1] Trump visited Corpus Christi, Texas on 29 August, and spoke for a few minutes where he praised his own administration, the work of Texas Senators Ted Cruz and John Cornyn and Texas Governor Greg Abbott, and boasted about the crowd size.[1][4][5][6]Politico wrote that during his visit, "the president didn’t meet a single storm victim, see an inch of rain or get near a flooded street."[4]
The part about Arpaio definitely belongs, as RS bring it up when they talk about the response of the Trump administration to the disaster. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 02:40, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
The Arpaio part is already mentioned elsewhere in the article. I wouldn't have a problem with you removing it from there and adding to the hurricane section since I do agree most RS tie it more to the hurricane. Again though the main problem with the section is the Washington Post article since it is an editorial. PackMecEng (talk) 02:44, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
Arpaio belongs both in Harvey response and as its own paragraph under 'Criminal Justice' ('Law and Order' or what the relevant section may be) where the context and ramifications of the pardon can be separately written up. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 02:49, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
How about "The Friday before hurricane Harvey hit Texas, Trump pardoned Joe Arpaio, calming "he timed it to attract maximum attention as television viewers were glued to storm coverage" [16]." PackMecEng (talk) 03:08, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
He pardoned Arpaio in the middle of the Hurricane (or when it was hitting) as far as I know, but otherwise I agree with the proposed text. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 11:29, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
You are correct it was same day. I just looked into it, I was mistaken. The hurricane made landfall at 10pm on the 25th. [17]. Ill update the sentence and reinsert. PackMecEng (talk) 13:04, 30 August 2017 (UTC)
This proposed version is way, way TMI, dwelling over and over on the negative comments about his reaction. IMO what we now have in the article is just right: It mentions the Arpaio thing, it says he praised his administration and the crowd size, and it includes the "didn't meet a single victim" quote. In other words, Arpaio plus the last two sentences of this proposal. It also mentions his charity donation, which was widely covered. That's enough. I favor keeping what we have now and not expanding it as proposed above. There is a second paragraph in the article, about a trivial short-lived feud with reporters, which I think should be deleted. In fact I will delete it, and we can talk about that here as well. --MelanieN (talk) 20:23, 8 September 2017 (UTC)
Will fix typo "On August 28, 2017, Hurricane Harvey made landfall; on the same day Trump announced his pardon of Joe Arpaio." ... This should be Friday August 25, and Harvey made landfall that night. I will update and add wikilink and a bit about the hurricane. Markbassett (talk) 04:36, 30 September 2017 (UTC)
Authoritarianism section
Latest comment: 7 years ago21 comments7 people in discussion
Split off the "foreign affairs" subsection, move it to the section on foreign policy, and expand and rewrite to focus more on his praise for Putin (which has received by far the most coverage of anything in the foreign affairs section and deserves more than a sentence. Notably, a lot of the coverage is non-opinion, which is what the section needs.) That aspect is both legitimately unusual and has heavy coverage across the political spectrum.
The other part is more difficult; I'd suggest splitting it into three parts that can then include more than just criticism:
First, Trump grappling with checks and balances or criticizing the system - possibly also include his attacks on Congressional Republicans here (again, something unusual that attracted a lot of coverage.)
Second, move the media bit into the existing "relationship with the media" section, and expand into a larger section on Trump's efforts to expand libel laws or otherwise go after his critics, which (again) is something we can find non-opinion coverage of.
Finally, a section for "rule of law", which can include both Trump's own rhetoric on it and the existing criticism from that section regarding Arpaio or the constitutional crisis.
This keeps essentially all the material (which is well-sourced), but organizes it in a less inflammatory way, without a big "authoritarian" header, and allows us to balance it with non-opinion coverage or even (eg. in the rule of law section) with Trump's own positions on these topics. --Aquillion (talk) 15:01, 25 September 2017 (UTC)
I think this kind of approach - eliminate the "authoritarian" section and move the material into other areas - is a good one. Might "rule of law" and "criticizing the system" and "attacks on Congress," and maybe "allegations of obstruction of justice", be combined in a section called "Constitutional issues"? Or is that almost as inflammatory as the current title? --MelanieN (talk) 15:20, 25 September 2017 (UTC)
Agree with the approach, and I would tone it down with the opinion pieces. Any editor can find well-sourced opinions of Trump's character leaning one way or the other, that doesn't make them encyclopedic. Agree with Aquillion that we should focus on issues that have been widely covered by fact-based reporting. All hypothetical scenarios such as "OMG, what if Trump does [insert random dictatorial action]?" should be mercilessly edited out unless and until the Trump administration actually takes such feared dictatorial actions. — JFGtalk22:36, 25 September 2017 (UTC)
With our current system of checks and balances in the US - a Constitutional republic governed by the rule of law - surely you don't really believe a sitting US president would be able to pull-off a dictatorial or authoritarian action. It takes every resource a president can muster just to protect the homeland by imposing a simple travel ban to/from countries known for recruiting terrorists. The US is not Venezuela, Cuba, the Ukraine or other socialistic/communistic country where such actions are a reality. Please don't fall for the media hype and propaganda. It doesn't belong in our encyclopedia. Stick with PAGs and we'll all be just fine. Atsme📞📧22:58, 25 September 2017 (UTC)
Delete -- Spreading Neutrality-tagged material throughout the article seems a poor idea. I'd suggest instead delete as it seems WP:OFFTOPIC general voicing of suspicions and negative opinions about motives rather than a being at a factual item of Presidency or about some role of President of the United States. Already have subsections mentioning Media, Comey, Arapaio, etcetera -- and any comments about those should be at those sections in due WP:WEIGHT and NPOV WP:BALANCE. This seems just a collection of interjected motive claims above their due WP:WEIGHT and without WP:BALASP. Also -- spreading the material around would seem to require also replicating the neutrality tag wherever it goes to avoid the move being just a way to avoid the tag, and I think keeping the dispute to a narrow area is preferable. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 23:51, 26 September 2017 (UTC)
Delete - noncompliant with NPOV. You reverted my removal of that noncompliant section Marek. This article is protected by DS in case you forgot. Atsme📞📧00:58, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
Yes, it's under DS so why are you violating the sanction? The text has been in here for awhile, there was an RfC on it, by removing it unilaterally YOU broke the sanction. You have some chutzpah to then try and turn it around on others. Volunteer Marek 02:48, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
Look guys, before you start it with the whole let's-vote-because-we-can-get-numbers-even-if-we-violate-Wikipedia-policy !votes, please start a proper RfC. Or perhaps an attempt at discussion of how the section could be improved rather than removed/white-washed because it hurts somebody's feelings. Start an RfC. Volunteer Marek 02:50, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
So, I put the tag back into the section... only to be accused of it being a revert! By Anythingyouwant. And he's using the fact that I put back the tag to try and get me sanctioned. Seriously. At any rate, if someone wants to remove the tag again, of course I don't have a problem with that. I'm not gonna do it because no matter if I remove it or add it or just look at it funny Anythingyouwant and Atsme are gonna go running to some admin whining and pleading to get me blocked. Or hell, maybe I will do it, since me putting it back is being called "edit warring". Volunteer Marek 13:15, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
VM, I'm not going to indulge you any further over your strawman argument. I suggest you read this section in its entirety and stop the nonsense because it doesn't matter how many RfCs you hold, consensus does not override policy, and it is quite clear that section is a BLP violation because it is noncompliant with NPOV - what do you think POV tags are telling you? JFG, MelanieN, Markbassett and I have all weighed in, and you are the one creating disruption here. There is no question that it is "one or more of WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, or WP:COATRACK." My contention is that it's all three and that is why TNT was the correct solution. You reverted it and that was not the correct thing to do. If you believe it needs further discussion, you do not revert rather you come here to the TP and discuss FIRST. End of story. Atsme📞📧14:25, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
It's not a strawman argument. It's not a BLP policy violation. You do not have consensus. We did have an RfC and there were multiple editors who thought the section should stay (it was no consensus either way). The section is well sourced and notable. WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT is NOT Wikipedia policy. It is not NPOV (well sourced), it is not UNDUE (prominent coverage), it is not COATRACK (of what exactly?). You're just throwing out random Wikipedia policies willy nilly to make excuses for your own personal prejudices. Reverting your disruptive edit - since it was unilatral and did not have consensus - was indeed proper. In fact, your unilateral removal was a violation of DS. You then tried to get cute and pretended that the ondoing of your DS violation was a DS violation. You have a tendency to do that a lot - falsely accuse others of what you yourself are guilty of. There's only so many times, and so many editors that that will work with. Volunteer Marek 15:14, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
Also, you running to Samsara to whine for sanctions against me is extremely bad faithed. If you thought my edit violated DS you could've asked MelanieD right here. You could've asked a different admin. You could've brought it to WP:AE. You didn't. Instead you tried (are trying) to specifically get an admin that you know I had a dispute with in recent past to intervene on your behalf. That is a textbook example of WP:BATTLEGROUND and bad faith. Please clean up your act, you've been warned about this type of behavior several times before. Volunteer Marek 15:15, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
Gandydancer, I was trying to keep it short and did not go into detail about a policy every editor should know - Wikipedia:Consensus#Levels_of_consensus - so I'll simply quote it for clarity (my bold underline): Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale. For instance, unless they can convince the broader community that such action is right, participants in a WikiProject cannot decide that some generally accepted policy or guideline does not apply to articles within its scope. Hope that helps. Atsme📞📧16:53, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
Sorry, Gandy - I'm at a loss over what you're talking about. Please provide the diff or quote the part you are referring to so I can properly address it. Atsme📞📧19:52, 29 September 2017 (UTC)
— JFG talk 08:26, 18 May 2017 (UTC)
United States
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— JFG talk 22:02, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
-- BullRangifer (talk) 04:28, 13 September 2017 (UTC)
Just curious...do you think perhaps the best place to gauge reception and arguments for or against would be to add RS information to the Presidency of Bill Clinton re: the firing of FBI Director Sessions, and provide more information about his impeachment? Do you think such information would be as readily accepted as what is being added here per your argument? Atsme📞📧 17:54, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
