Talk:Donald Trump/Archive 92

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Change of wording in intro

What do you think of editing the sentence about controversial and false statements to this-

"many of his public statements during and since the campaign were controversial or false conspiracy theories."Hoponpop69 (talk) 19:39, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Honestly, I think the existing wording is fine, although "Virtually everything that dribbled out of his pie hole was a blatant lie" would be something I'd agree to. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:18, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, but no. It's very important that the "false statements" material be well sourced to Reliable Sources, and Reliable Sources have repeatedly said "false" without adding "conspiracy theories". Besides, a lot of his falsehoods are not conspiracy theories, they are simply assertions that are untrue - misstating facts, rather than pushing any agenda or spreading any theory. --MelanieN (talk) 20:26, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

A longer conditional is naturally occurring less often so has less WP:WEIGHT. And besides, the existing words seem OK and it was already hard to get to. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 00:03, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

NYT anonymous op-ed

Don't think this can be used anywhere, at least at this time. But, I can't remember anything like this in the past: [1] O3000 (talk) 20:45, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Interesting read, basically a we are the deep state situation. Agreed not sure we could use it, but neat. PackMecEng (talk) 20:50, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Interesting, and well worth using up one of my (carefully rationed) views of the NYT. But you're right, I don't see anyplace on Wikipedia where we can use it. For those who don't want to spend that carefully hoarded NYT view: the anonymous author is described as a senior official in the Trump administration, describing how they and their colleagues work behind the scenes to keep Donald Trump's worst ideas and impulses from going into effect. --MelanieN (talk) 20:54, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

I have always disliked the word unprecedented as it is overused at an unprecedented rate. But, akin to your effort to spend carefully hoarded NYT views, I’ll use my hoarded nonuse of the word to say this is unprecedented. In a week or so, this may be usable in the presidency article. O3000 (talk) 00:22, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

O3000 - CNN's Stelter said "almost unprecedented". I do not know what he felt was "almost", but would guess the last few administrations leakers and mudslingers. Though the precedent is usually to resign in protest first and then tell-all, not the other way around. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 23:08, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Much as I dislike the word unprecedented, I dislike more modifiers to absolutes. Which is why I dislike the word in the first place. The concepts of leak vs. resign are, fortunately, beyond our paygrade. Cheers. O3000 (talk) 23:17, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

First of all, LOL "deep state" situation! So funny that people think it is an actual thing that exists. Second, I think the only way this op-ed is going to get used in this article is if the author is "outed" somehow; however, that doesn't preclude its use in other articles. At the very least, it corroborates much of what has been said by other Trump officials, both on and off the record, and confirms what many people have been thinking about Trump anyway. -- Scjessey (talk) 01:25, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Not useful for statements of fact. PackMecEng (talk) 01:28, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

The lowest point in Death Valley is 279 feet below sea level. Clearly, California is the deep state folks must be talking about. O3000 (talk) 01:32, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Ha! Yup exactly what I meant! PackMecEng (talk) 01:36, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Definitely not useful for this article. Doubtful it's useful in a Trump administration article. – Muboshgu (talk) 01:34, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

WP:OFFTOPIC for this article -- it's not an official act and not a major event faced by the Presidency. The closest match I can think of would be Protests against Donald Trump, and it really does not seem a protest, more of a publicity stunt along the lines of Donald Trump baby balloon. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 23:12, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

• We cannot use the op-ed itself for statements of fact (outside of the bare minimum that it happened, and even that, if we had no other sources, would risk WP:SYNTH issues.) However, we do have secondary sources now. Many, many secondary sources, most of which are not themselves op-eds and which can therefore be cited for statements of fact. When such secondary sources take an op-ed, place it in context, and draw conclusions from it, we can report those conclusions. This is how we handle eg. Trump's tweets - there are only limited things we can do by citing them directly, but we can cite WP:RS, non-opinion reporting on them for statements of fact. So if we have a bunch of reporting saying "this means such-and-such", we can put that in the article (although if it's contested between sources we might want to use in-line citations.) --Aquillion (talk) 23:17, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

This looks extremely notable to me and the general content of the article and the White House response should be mentioned. This is already international news. Casprings (talk) 01:35, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

• Timeline of the Trump presidency, 2018 Q3 - easily fits in here starship.paint ~ KO 02:22, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Even if the op-ed isn't notable, Trump's response to it certainly is. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:30, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Has Trump made a response other than his completely normal use of Twitter? power~enwiki (π, ν) 15:38, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Okay it can go in the timeline article. But it's not really that relevant to him as a person. It doesn't tell us anything we don't already know. – Muboshgu (talk) 15:43, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

I agree it can go in the timeline. This turned out to be a much bigger deal than I expected on reading it. I was surprised it caused such a ruckus because, as Scjessey points out, it has been obvious for a long time that something like this was going on - simply because Trump will often announce a new policy or direction via Twitter, but somehow it never actually gets implemented. Maybe the reason for the uproar (his anger described as "volcanic") is that he hadn't noticed that quiet deep-sixing of some of his announcements and proposals. --MelanieN (talk) 21:56, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

• Well that didn't take long I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration. PackMecEng (talk) 19:43, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

You've got to be kidding. We have long had a tendency here to make a new article out of every Trump headline, but this is ridiculous. However, it will probably be no use AFDing it. They always get kept. --MelanieN (talk) 21:58, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

There is far too much written and kept, but sometimes silly ones like Covfefe do get deleted. Err... or get folded into another article at least. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 22:59, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

How about we wait and see after a few news cycles have passed whether it was just a flash in the pan or something worth keeping? – Muboshgu (talk) 22:57, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

That's the funny thing about this presidency. There's a notable event/scandal/outrage in every news cycle. It's exhausting, but really it should all be covered. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:09, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

The more I'm thinking about this, the 25th amendment trial balloon being floated, and the response it has gotten, is probably enough for this to deserve its own article. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:35, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

At this point I think it's clear that it has enough coverage to be mentioned, but it probably doesn't need a huge amount - one sentence or so would be enough (possibly worked into a larger sentence or paragraph summarizing concerns about his competence or about the perception that he is essentially a puppet.) It does have a spot in this article, since it focuses on Trump's personal competence directly and how much he actually does as president (things that are central to his personal reputation and biography, as an individual) but as I said above we will need to look at the WP:RS non-opinion secondary sources reporting on and summarizing the op-ed, and then we'll have to weigh their WP:DUE weight. --Aquillion (talk) 23:18, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Aquillion At this point, a lot of the RS is chaotic criticism of the letter and production -- "Deep State" (Fox), "Coward" (Ted Lieu, D-Ca), “To ensure that Democrats win in the fall”, self aggrandizing treachery caliming to be 'noble staffers', "RIP journalism" - the op-ed versus regular journalists, barely OK in BBC "Trump op-ed in New York Times passes the key tests", Atlantic "more dangerous turmoil", does not warrent coverage (not a lot of new here), "Why Democratic Strategists Are Slamming the Anonymous Trump Op-Ed", "Democrats aren't buying anonymous Trump official's claim to an internal 'resistance': 'You’re complicit'", ... Its a mess. Markbassett (talk) 23:33, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Markbassett, at this point, I disagree with most of what you just posted – but agree with your conclusion anyhow. I’d wait a few days. But, I think this should and will be added to some DJT articles at some point. I just find it hard to believe this will quickly fade. O3000 (talk) 00:20, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Objective3000 - try looking at some of the many items touted as major or significant in the last year... not many are talked about in the last month. Even with 24/7 and internet, there is only so much bandwidth and the market keeps wanting to all pile on story du jour ... and then want something else the next week. It would perhaps be good to prune down to the stories that have proven more durable ... but I think folks would object to deleting anything, anything at all... Cheers Markbassett (talk) 01:01, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

And that's why I agree to a delay, as is my common stance. I just think this is one that will outlast the news cycle. We'll see.O3000 (talk) 01:14, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict)@Aquillion: I think Objective3000 is correct overall as well, give it some time to marinate and then see if there is any there there or if it just the next flash in the pan controversy. PackMecEng (talk) 01:16, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Interesting discussion at the new article's talk page: to expand it from being about one op-ed to being about resistance to Trump from within his administration. There has been plenty of reporting on this before the op-ed came out; I cited six references there just for starters. At this point there is no agreement to do it, much less what to call it. --MelanieN (talk) 05:36, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

? Linking items by perceived similarity sounds like a WP:SYNTH. Markbassett (talk) 00:01, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

It would depend on the specifics. Aggregating together a number of sources which make similar observations is not only appropriate, it is a cornerstone of forging neutral content. Such activities only stray into SYNTH territory where an editor arrives at (and relays in Wikipedia's voice) an assertion which cannot itself be found in any one of those sources alone, but is instead deduced by the editor by combining predicates from multiple sources. That does not seem to be at all what MelanieN was talking about, however. Instead she seems to be merely contemplating expanding the scope of coverage, which is a different matter, and one that would have to be resolved through a WEIGHT analysis. Snow ^{let's rap} 18:46, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Snow Rise - think it would need a RS to connect the items or it falls into WP:SYNTH of combining material from multiple sources that would reach or imply what none of them do. Think that at the moment though you are right the WEIGHT of #resistance is by itself, and the WEIGHT for the letter is by itself, as two separate topics. There may be some making a comparison, perhaps saying not connected, but such linkage would seem tiny so more a footnote of a solo article than a cause for merger. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 00:40, 12 September 2018 (UTC)