Talk:Steele dossier

Cohen in Prague

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/white-house/article208870264.html BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 00:55, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Mueller has evidence Cohen was in Prague in 2016, confirming part of dossier

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/white-house/article208870264.html

Seems important.Casprings (talk) 01:06, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Having a private meeting regarding pay off to a hacker is totally ridiculous. Hackers always remain anonymous and have been taking payment in bitcoin.Phmoreno (talk) 01:30, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Phmoreno, try to avoid WP:FORUM. We're discussing RS coverage relevant to a major charge in this article.

My initial impulse when I found and posted the link above was to warn to be cautious and wait for more RS coverage, per NOTNEWS, but now this is blowing up all over the news. TV and major sources are covering it because of its significance. I haven't checked Fox News. They are probably playing something with panda bears and ignoring the story, or, since everyone else is covering it, they'll smother it in spin. A search finds no current coverage from them.

Cohen was very vehement in his denials. To keep your search relevant to this article, use at least these search terms: michael cohen prague dossier. Have fun and bring back what you find from the major RS. Also, this is still too early for content changes, but we may be able to add something very soon. McClatchy is a very RS, but we also need the most major sources, like New York Times, Washington Post, Guardian, BBC. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 02:57, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Reuters is mentioning McClatchy's report. That's big, as they are international. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:01, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

This is obviously significant and relevant, and should be covered in this article. More sources:

• Why the question of whether Michael Cohen visited Prague is massively important for Donald Trump, Vox
• Mueller can prove Cohen made secret trip to Prague before the election: report, The Hill
• Michael Cohen Has Been Under Criminal Investigation for Months, Feds Reveal, The Daily Beast

- MrX 🖋 11:23, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Trump Attorney Lied About Prague Trip, Mueller Investigation Reveals, as New Evidence Comes to Light, Newsweek

Sources: Mueller has evidence Cohen was in Prague in 2016, confirming part of dossier, McClatchy

• "If Cohen met with Russians and hackers in Prague as described in the dossier, it would provide perhaps the most compelling evidence to date that the Russians and Trump campaign aides were collaborating."

I'm still a bit concerned that The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and BBC haven't mentioned this, AFAIK. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:40, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm sure they will within the next 24-48 hours. We can wait until one or both of them pick it up.- MrX 🖋 17:05, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

RECENTISM...and here I am again agreeing with MrX...we should know something soon. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:20, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

...and agreeing with me. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:48, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Now covered by The Washington Post: Michael Cohen’s visiting Prague would be a huge development in the Russia investigation, as well as several other news orgs.- MrX 🖋 20:01, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Quote: "But this contradiction between a clear allegation from the Steele dossier and the assertion that it wasn’t true by Cohen and Trump helped drive the idea that the dossier was broadly discredited shortly after its release. Pick out the Prague trip and nothing that follows could have happened. Put the Prague trip back into the mix? A lot of the other parts of that allegation now become possible. What’s more, it undermines the credibility of those who insisted that the claim was completely without merit." -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:57, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

A renewed denial: Trump lawyer Michael Cohen denies traveling to Prague, CBS News -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:48, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

• Special counsel has evidence Michael Cohen travelled to Prague-McClatchy, The New York Times (duplication of Reuters) -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 22:06, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

I accept that there is WP:NORUSH but we do not need to wait for New York Times, Washington Post, Guardian, BBC etc or any other "major source". If something is reliably sourced then feel free to include it straight away. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 22:21, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

I have no objection to adding material now. The story will probably evolve quite a bit starting on Monday.- MrX 🖋 23:38, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

• Mueller has evidence Michael Cohen traveled to Prague, report claims, The Guardian -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 00:33, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

Multiple RS are needed for such an extraordinary claim. While it may well be true, we still have our obligations to NPOV, NOTNEWS and RECENTISM. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:46, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

Source list, with refs

Main article: Michael Cohen (lawyer)

Feel free to add more sources to the bottom and I'll format the references. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 02:55, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

• Sources: Mueller has evidence Cohen was in Prague in 2016, confirming part of dossier, McClatchy

• Special counsel has evidence Michael Cohen traveled to Prague: McClatchy, Reuters

• Michael Cohen’s visiting Prague would be a huge development in the Russia investigation, The Washington Post

• Special counsel has evidence Michael Cohen travelled to Prague-McClatchy, The New York Times (duplication of Reuters)

• Mueller has evidence Michael Cohen traveled to Prague, report claims, The Guardian (duplication of Reuters)

• Why the question of whether Michael Cohen visited Prague is massively important for Donald Trump, Vox

• Mueller can prove Cohen made secret trip to Prague before the election: report, The Hill

• Michael Cohen Has Been Under Criminal Investigation for Months, Feds Reveal, The Daily Beast

• Trump Attorney Lied About Prague Trip, Mueller Investigation Reveals, as New Evidence Comes to Light, Newsweek

• Michael Cohen, Once the President’s Trusted Fixer, Emerges as His Greatest Liability, Mother Jones

• Mueller may have evidence corroborating a key dossier allegation about Michael Cohen and Russian collusion, Business Insider

Renewed denial

• Trump lawyer Michael Cohen denies traveling to Prague, CBS News

• Trump's personal lawyer denies report of Prague meeting with Russians during campaign, Politico

• Trump lawyer Cohen denies media report of Prague trip, Reuters

Sources

Why did Mueller refer the case to an entirely different law enforcement agency? See Real Clear Politics, the NYTimes, and WaPo. There is still too much up in the air, which makes it speculation; therefore, noncompliant with NOTNEWS and RECENTISM. ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:36, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

The Cohen connection: Next steps

I would like to begin working on text about the Cohen connection as discussed above. Currently, it looks like it would best fit under DNC email hack, leaks, and misinformation, but I'm wondering if it should have its own section, and if so, where?- MrX 🖋 15:06, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure how it could fit there. Is it a different allegation from the dossier which has been discussed in RS, or are you suggesting enlarging the existing content there? Otherwise, maybe the "Denials of specific claims" section? There we have content which is related to the allegations, but not appropriate for addition to the allegations section. Depending on how that section grows, we may end up having to give it a better name or splitting some content off into a new section.

We could even create a section for a cast of characters and put/move relevant content there.

Go ahead and start developing something. That will make the decision easier. Don't let the existing format force the content or cramp your style. You're good at this. Let the RS dictate the content, and we can fit it in somewhere. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:20, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

OK.- MrX 🖋 15:22, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

First draft

Michael Cohen's office, home, and hotel were raided by FBI agents acting under a federal search warrant in mid-April 2018. A few days later, McClatchy reported that Robert Mueller's investigators were in possession of evidence that Cohen travelled to Prague in August or September 2016, which would bolster similar claims in 3 of the dossier's 17 reports. According to McClatchy's confidential sources, Cohen travelled to Prague via Germany, a passage which would not have required use of a passport. In reaction, Cohen denied having ever been to Prague, as he had done in his January 2017 denial following the dossier's release.

Sources

Thoughts?- MrX 🖋 16:11, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Nice work. Let's see what others think, and also about placement. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:20, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

WP:NOTCRYSTALBALL - at least wait until after today's hearing. Read the CBS Report. And here is another from NYTimes. ^{Atsme📞📧} 17:34, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Nothing in the text above predicts or projects any outcome, or other future event. If you're going to cite policy, at least demonstrate a scintilla of understanding of what the policy actually says.- MrX 🖋 17:54, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Pinging Casprings and Emir of Wikipedia for their comments on the proposed text.- MrX 🖋 18:31, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

• Comment. I'm uncertain what the source is for "3 of the dossier's 17 reports". Offhand, this seems to be a WP:SYN claim, that should be backed up with a direct citation. Sławomir Biały (talk) 18:46, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
  • We don't need to wait for a hearing if we have reliable sources, but I would also like to know the source for the claim about "3 of the dossier's 17 reports". We are not some OR scoreboard for if this dossier is right or not. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:16, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

@Sławomir Biały: Third paragraph of the Washington Post article.- MrX 🖋 19:23, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

...and Emir of Wikipedia - MrX 🖋 19:24, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

I think the WaPo source should be moved up to maintain source-content integrity. The second sentence does not strictly require three sources, so I would leave the WaPo off that. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:28, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Thanks for highlighting that. The source has the disclaimer "but we hasten to note that these allegations have not been confirmed by The Washington Post." I think we need to be careful with how we word this, but something along the lines of your draft should be included. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:31, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that was the intention of "... which would...". I guess we could add "if true", although I think it's implicit in the current wording.- MrX 🖋 19:37, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

I think that would be an improvement. Sławomir Biały (talk) 22:27, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Well, this got interesting. More interesting, I mean.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:18, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, another piece of the puzzle falls into place. - MrX 🖋 19:20, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

What you're saying in essence when you say "puzzle" is that instead of writing an encyclopedic article, you are hoping all pieces will form a puzzle which is SYNTH and OR using RS as pieces to the puzzle. Not good. ^{Atsme📞📧} 16:23, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Spot on, Atsme. That's exactly what's going on here: editors acting like detectives or investigative reporters. Which is the very definition of OR and SYNTH. Which is most certainly against policy. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 16:30, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

instead of writing an encyclopedic article, you are hoping… Atsme, please assume GF and avoid casting aspersions. O3000 (talk) 17:09, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

In all the hilarious Hannity hoopla, it's been over looked that the judge rejected Cohen's lawyers' restraining order [2].Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:28, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

• MrX, just for completeness, here is what we already have on this subject in the "Denials of specific claims" section:

On April 13, 2018, McClatchy reported that the Mueller investigation had evidence that Cohen visited Prague in August or early September 2016 by traveling through Germany. The following day, Cohen again denied he has "ever been to Prague".

Maybe some can be salvaged and merged or not. Your "first draft" above might be a good replacement. It covers the subject more thoroughly. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 02:37, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Sources

Mueller's spokesperson warned about what some in the media have been publishing: [3] “What I have been telling all reporters is that many stories about our investigation have been inaccurate,” the Mueller spokesperson said." What other sources say about the statement: Business Insider, Daily Caller. Good advice. ^{Atsme📞📧} 12:09, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Maybe Mueller's spokesperson was referring to stories (tales?) in The Washington Times, The Daily Caller, and Business Insider. That would actually make some sense.- MrX 🖋 12:27, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

 Done - I have incorporated the proposed text with the requested modifications.- MrX 🖋 12:21, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Actually, I'm of the mind that this addition is noncompliant with NOTNEWS & RECENTISM. Other editors have questioned it as too soon...and that tells me you need consensus - not just 2 editors making such decisions. ^{Atsme📞📧} 12:54, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

NOTE: CNN report indicates that the Cohen raid had nothing to do with the Trump-Russia probe. There's also the Stormy storm. Adding this info now as an attempt to validate the Steele dossier is speculation. There are also sources that warn about misinformation. If anything, the probe will lead to financial inproprieties, which has nothing to do with the Steele dossier or Russia. Wait until something is confirmed. ^{Atsme📞📧} 13:11, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

That the raid was ostensibly for another purpose is irrelevant. Other editors suggested that it was too soon when it was too soon. Given the increasing, highly reliable sources, too soon is so yesterday. It should not have been removed. O3000 (talk) 13:18, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

I disagree, and have already cited the relevant PAGs. It is rather far-fetched speculation at best. And it's based on what evidence...a primary source that claims Mueller has proof? There is nothing I can find that verifies Mueller has ever released any information about his investigation. This over-inflated article appears more like an attempt to justify the unsubstantiated allegations in the dossier. Worse yet, nothing of substance has been confirmed about the raid, and no one knows why Mueller handed over the Cohen investigation to NY prosecutors. The fact that it is not part of the Mueller probe into Trump-Russia collusion speaks volumes. Sorry, but my perception of this article is that it's one big conspiracy theory because it is based on unsubstantiated allegations, speculation and rumor. Trump has not been charged with anything except "guilt by association". ^{Atsme📞📧} 14:13, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

I have to say Atsme, this does look like you're the only one with problem with this material. We have shown numerous sources which highlight the relevance of the Cohen raid with this subject. Pack your PAGs and get onboard. This train is leaving the station! 🚂 - MrX 🖋 14:35, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

I have to say that Atsme is not the only one with a problem over the proposed content. I see WP:OR and a lot of WP:SYNTH happening here along with tone and specific syntax that leads a reader to a conclusion. That's not writing an encyclopedia, that's writing biased news story. We aren't news and we don't parrot news agencies just because they said something. When will the agenda-driven anti-Trump editors start applying some common sense at these articles and write truly encyclopedic content, is what I'm wondering. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 14:43, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

MrX, per my comment above about the methodology used in creating this article, I am trying to decide how best to handle it in light of the multiple policy vios of OR & SYNTH. Rather than disturb the "nest", I will simply suggest that the project will be better served with the Cohen information included somewhere else - perhaps his BLP if you think it won't be removed because of the questionable sources. What you're attempting to do here is "piece together the puzzle" you spoke about above, and that is not how encyclopedia's are built. That is how conspiracy theories are proven. You also need to keep in mind that NPOV cannot be superceded by editor consensus. ^{Atsme📞📧} 16:30, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Ah, yes, the "methodology used in creating this article". That has been explained in painstaking detail, so don't speculate about it. Really, some of your previous speculations have been outright alternative facts, and ignored the written and detailed description. The "puzzle" is composed of the pieces found in RS. We do not know what the picture will end up looking like, so all we can do is find puzzle pieces (RS which deal with the subject), and document them. This is not the creation of the puzzle, but the documentation of the pieces. The final puzzle picture will be known much better when the investigation provides even more pieces, and we will faithfully document them. There may or may not end up being a harmonious picture. I actually doubt it.

In the mean time, we do not concern ourselves with the final picture, especially based on any of our preconceived notions or political leanings, and we ALL have them. I repeat, we don't now what it will look like. The only way we can even connect pieces is when the RS do the synthesis for us, and they often do. Fortunately we can place some pieces in immediate proximity to each other, because they are on the same topic, and RS place them there, but often that's as far as we are allowed to go.

Using a puzzle to illustrate this is somewhat useful, but also misleading, because some of our pieces are malleable, based on following events. They literally change shape to accommodate better understanding, and that's why Wikipedia's articles are supposed to be updated. We do not, ever, wait for the picture to be fully formed before we start documenting the pieces. We begin to document the pieces as they arrive. (BTW, this "puzzle" talk has no resemblance to any previous description about the "methodology used in creating this article".)

If there has been any improper synthesis or OR, provide specific examples at the time you mention it. NEVER speak of SYNTH or OR without specific and fixable examples. This vague mention of acronyms is unhelpful and proves nothing. When you wave policy flags, provide specific examples at the time, otherwise they are just your way of saying IDONTLIKEIT, and we ignore it. Seriously. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:41, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Seeking consensus to restore challenged content

I really thought we had consensus, but I would like to formalize it in light of Atsme's challenge of the material.

Cohen's office, home, and hotel were raided by FBI agents acting under a federal search warrant in mid-April 2018. A few days later, McClatchy reported that Mueller investigation was in possession of evidence that Cohen travelled to Prague in August or September 2016. If true, the report bolsters similar claims in 3 of the dossier's 17 reports. According to McClatchy's confidential sources, Cohen travelled to Prague via Germany, a passage which would not have required use of a passport. In reaction, Cohen denied having ever been to Prague, as he had done in his January 2017 denial following the dossier's release.

Sources

 Question: Should this content be in the article? Pinging recent editors BullRangifer, Sławomir Biały, Volunteer Marek, Emir of Wikipedia, Objective3000, and Casprings. - MrX 🖋 14:29, 17 April 2018 (UTC) Adding a few more - Politrukki, Factchecker atyourservice ^{Atsme📞📧} 15:16, 17 April 2018 (UTC) We shan't forget Mr Ernie and SPECIFICO- MrX 🖋 15:46, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Support

1. Support per my arguments throughout this section. Recentism is not a policy, and WP:NOTNEWS does not apply because this is not routine coverage.- MrX 🖋 14:29, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
2. Support - Significant coverage in RS. Relevant to the article as it supports claims in multiple parts of the oft challenged dossier. Neutrally stated – includes Cohen denials. All the bases are covered. O3000 (talk) 14:45, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

   Include but eliminate the first sentence (about the raid) and eliminate "a few days later", replacing it with "On April 13, 2018". The current paragraph implies a connection between the raid and the information, and that is not justified. The sources don’t make that connection, and neither should we. In fact I heard one of the reporters who broke this story interviewed on TV last night, and he said they have been gathering information about this for several months. --MelanieN (talk) 15:07, 17 April 2018 (UTC) Changing my mind, see discussion.

   MelanieN. The connection is explicitly made by some of the sources (Reuters, 6th graf; CBS News) in that the raid resulted, at least in part, from a referral from Mueller. My wording is not intended to establish cause and effect, but the two events do have a close temporal relationship noted by several sources.- MrX 🖋 15:43, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

   Yes, the Cohen raid resulted from a referral from Mueller. That has nothing to do with what we are talking about here: we are discussing the report that Cohen went to Prague. When we say the report came out a few days after the raid, we are implying that the report is based on some information seized in the Cohen raid. That appears to be incorrect. (In fact I don't think prosecutors have even looked at any of that information yet; they are still arguing about attorney client privilege.) We should remove any mention of the Cohen raid from this item about Cohen going to Prague. --MelanieN (talk) 16:53, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

   MelanieN is right about the raid. It is unnecessary to mention it here. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:44, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

3. Include how can this be excluded, after all the discussion on this page about whether parts of the Dossier have been corroborated by other evidence? Significant and well-sourced and relevant. SPECIFICO talk 15:52, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
4. Support. Some of the reasons for exclusion are nonsensical. WP:TOOSOON is about whether to have an article about a subject, not whether to discuss recent news in relation to a developing story. WP:NOTNEWS actually undercuts exclusion arguments: "As Wikipedia is not a paper source, editors are encouraged to include current and up-to-date information within its coverage, and to develop stand-alone articles on significant current events." The exceptions listed clearly do not apply here. It is significant that the dossier alleges a trip to Prague, that Cohen has denied this allegation to the House intelligence committe, and that news reports allege that Mueller has evidence contradicting Cohen's account. Sławomir Biały (talk) 16:20, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

   I disagree with the position on exclusion based on BLP articulated below. WP:NPOV seems clear on this: the dossier made an (unproven) allegation, which Cohen denies. McClatchy's sources allege that Mueller has evidence to the contrary. To cover this neutrally, we include a description of the allegation, Cohen's denial, and the reported existence of evidence contradicting Cohen's account. BLP and NPOV mandate that Wikipedia not take a position on the veracity of these items. But, since these details are now widely reported, per WP:WELLKNOWN: "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." Sławomir Biały (talk) 16:10, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

   In the case of public figures, there will be a multitude of reliable published sources And that is what we are lacking: instead of a multitude of sources - that is, of INDEPENDENT sources - we have one source, which all the other stories are based on. --MelanieN (talk) 17:50, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

   Yes, and we have a multitude of reliable sources citing the McClatchy report. That amply establishes WP:WEIGHT in this context, and we can with no violation say "McClatchy reported that..." couched in appropriately neutral language. Cohen's denial, too, is not an INDEPENDENT source. When we have independent sources that offer conflicting accounts, we do our best to summarize those sources. I do not believe that it is consistent with the spirit of maintaining a neutral point of view to privilege information in which the subject of a BLP appears favorably to that in which he or she appears unfavorably, other things being equal (e.g., WP:WEIGHT). Sławomir Biały (talk) 01:11, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

   What I am concerned with, and I'm not sure if MelanieN is saying the same thing, is making such a potentially damaging and incriminating statement about a person with only one source that claims to have "two sources familiar with the matter" saying Cohen went to Prague. The claim remains unverified by any other source (reliable or otherwise). WP:NOHURRY applies. There is no reason to rush this news report into the article, when the other option on the table is to remain prudent and exert caution when including a claim of this nature, when the target of the report has strongly denied the news report. Other sources have referred to the original report, but in my view that doesn't add extra credence to the validity of the McClatchy article. Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 18:19, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

   This is why it is attributed, rather than stated as a fact in Wikipedia's voice. Sławomir Biały (talk) 20:57, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

   I will also add that this is an independent source, including Cohen's explicit reference of the McClatchy source in his denial of having been to Prague. This destroys the rationale for exclusion on the basis that there is only one source. Sławomir Biały (talk) 22:04, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

So any accusation publicly denied by the target is automatically upgraded to "multiple high quality reliable sources" status. Genius! Factchecker_atyourservice 22:22, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

For an allegation, we simply need one attributed source covered but multiple high-quality secondary sources. That standard is easily met here. We don't need independent corroboration at the allegation is true. Please read WP:PUBLICFIGURE. The key word there is documented. Cohen himself documents the allegation, as do all of the dozen or so secondary sources discussed in this thread. Sławomir Biały (talk) 11:37, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

WP:REDFLAG requires multiple high quality reliable sources, not a single anonymous report that other news agencies have referred to as uncorroborated. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:34, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

We have multiple secondary sources for the fact that McClatchy reported this allegation. WP:V is not an issue. 16:13, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

We have one source and WP:REDFLAG clearly requires more, so as shown, WP:V is an issue. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:33, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Several sources have already been given for the sentence "McClatchy reported that Robert Mueller's investigators were in possession of evidence that Cohen travelled to Prague in August or September 2016". You contend that McClatchy did not, in fact, report this? If not, then the requirements of WP:V are clearly met. We can say, in Wikipedia's voice, that McClatchy did in fact report this. So the WP:V objection is a complete red herring. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:30, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Your argument that "if he denies it, that's an additional confirming source!" was a red herring. Your argument that one uncorroborated news report becomes "multiple high quality reliable sources" if it is repeated (but not corroborated!) by other newspapers, is a red herring. The obvious purpose of WP:EXCEPTIONAL is to prevent inclusion of poorly sourced contentious material, which is exactly what this is. Factchecker_atyourservice 19:45, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

'Your argument that "if he denies it, that's an additional confirming source!" was a red herring.' That was never my argument. I'd encourage you to read it again, please, before continuing. The fact, that I see you are disputing fails WP:V, is that McClatchy raised an allegation against Cohen. Now, I attest that the existence of this allegation is evidently documented by many sources, with something to the effect of "McClatchy reported that Mueller has evidence linking Cohen to Prague." Cohen also claims to the contrary, and explicitly references the McClatchy report. So we have independent sources regarding Cohen's alleged visit to Prague that are in contradiction. The neutral point of view policy is very clear that we should summarize these viewpoints neutrally, including careful attribution (please see WP:YESPOV: "If different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements.") That is precisely what I am trying to do here: assert McClatchy's notable opinion on this matter, and Cohen's also notable denial. One editor raised WP:PUBLICFIGURE as a reason for exclusion, but that is also very clear on the matter: "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." The existence of the McClatchy allegation is noteworthy, relevant, and well documented, as is the existence of Cohen's denial. Sławomir Biały (talk) 20:19, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

1. Support It's actually ridiculous to try and exclude info which is DIRECTLY pertinent to the topic. Crying "Not news!" or "Recent!" is doubly ridiculous and bad faithed since if we go by this logic we couldn't include ANY developments about the dossier in the article. I could go and remove - err, 'scuse me "challenge" - the entire section "Use in the FBI's Russia investigation" or "Nunes memo" section because that too is "Not news!!" "Recent!!". EVERYTHING in this article is going to be fairly recent and newsworthy. Shameless, POV driven WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT weaselly WP:AGENDA !votes. And frankly, some of these "Oppose" !votes are borderline incoherent (and putting up the freakin' Daily Caller as counter source to this??? Come on people, at least pretend to have some standards).Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:39, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
2. Support. This is a clear cut case when something simply must be included per WP:NPOV. And remember that WP:NPOV is our main non-negotiable policy. It overrides WP:Consensus here, whatever it might be. My very best wishes (talk) 18:25, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
3. Support Direct relevance to the article. To exclude would provide POV.Casprings (talk) 03:38, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
4. Support restoration. This is highly relevant material that has been covered extensively in the media, making headlines in many papers. It is important to keep this page up to date. Editors above do a quite sufficient job in explaining why, really, none the arguments for why should not be in the article hold water.--Calthinus (talk) 19:29, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

   Support; the wording directly attributes the statement, and the publication that the wording attributes it to (McClatchy) is generally perceived as reliable so there is no problem in that department. GreyGoose (talk) 20:12, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

5. Rewrite – I don't think the news coverage is as significant as some have said, at least when we look at the papers of record. The New York Times has republished two Reuters articles. The Washington Post has published two blog posts, a Q & A, and one editorial analysis. The Wall Street Journal has completely ignored the report. This is very much a borderline case.
   If the report is to be mentioned, the material should be rewritten. (a) The raid should not be mentioned. McClatchy indicates it is irrelevant: "The raid was unrelated to the Trump-Russia collusion probe". (b) "confidential sources" – Wot? Why not just say "two sources familiar with the matter" (McClatchy) or "two unnamed sources" (Reuters)? (c) Source #2 is an editorial analysis that should be attributed in-text per NEWSORG. (d) Something should be said right away about what the two sources familiar with the matter were not familiar with: notably whether Cohen actually met anyone. Politrukki (talk) 17:09, 25 April 2018 (UTC); added mention of Q & A 05:11, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Oppose per Atsme as well as WP:NOTNEWS, WP:RECENT, and WP:TOOSOON. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 14:50, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
2. Oppose per my argument above. There is no verifiable evidence. Not all incidents and/or speculation, even when published in RS, is suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia per NOTNEWS. McClatchy attributes their article (primary source) to "two sources familiar with the matter" which is questionable at best...nice for baitclick, but nothing more. The Cohen investigation is not even part of the Mueller probe - it was turned over by Mueller to NY law enforcement because (according to CNN) it's about Cohen's financial investments in a taxi company. It has nothing to do with the Steele dossier.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Atsme (talk • contribs) 15:08, April 17, 2018 (UTC)
3. Oppose this should remain out until it doesn't look and smell like a conspiracy theory.--MONGO 16:01, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
4. Oppose Not confirmed and no indication of what the evidence is.Phmoreno (talk) 16:06, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
5. Oppose until more information is available. Right now this only summarizes what one news agency is reporting and is not very encyclopedic. Mr Ernie (talk) 16:17, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
6. Oppose For the reasons listed above. McClatchy is still the only newsorg claiming to have confirmed this information. Now we have this: [4]. A Special Counsel's office spokesperson warns the Daily Caller that "many stories about our investigation have been inaccurate. Be very cautious about any source that claims to have knowledge about our investigation and dig deep into what they claim before reporting on it." This statement comes after being questioned about the Cohen-Prague pandemonium specifically. Seems like good advice for both journalists and Wikipedia editors. WP:NOTNEWS. Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 16:54, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
7. Oppose, is it really too much to ask, that we wait until Mueller ends his investigation? GoodDay (talk) 00:25, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
8. Oppose We should avoid speculation until actual facts are known. MelanieN also makes a good point below in regards to sourcing on BLP topics. PackMecEng (talk) 13:03, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
9. Oppose A single report from anonymous sources is not sufficient for BLP claims. Wait for independent verification. James J. Lambden (talk) 20:55, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

   Comment: The proposed text states "Cohen travelled to Prague via Germany, a passage which would not have required use of a passport" which I believe is correct as the Czech Republic is part of Schengen, but wouldn't travel into Germany have required a passport? James J. Lambden (talk) 18:56, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

10. Oppose Not enough evidence of BLP claims.--Piznajko (talk) 21:43, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
11. Oppose As I said below, we should not include this unless it is reported by two independent sources - because it accuses Cohen of repeatedly lying about this, and a serious allegation like that requires two reliable sources per BLP policy. There has still not been a second independent report; it's still just McClatchy, and all the other news reports are based on McClatchy. If and when we get a second such report I will support including it. Since we do not have a second source, we should continue to leave it out IMO. --MelanieN (talk) 23:48, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
12. Oppose: Melanie's rationale is persuasive. And correct. Obviously WP:REDFLAG is applicable. As everyone knows it says "Any exceptional claim requires multiple high-quality sources." One source is insufficient. Period. Other sources that pickup the story do not count toward "multiple." Hey everybody... my first edit to the infamous Dossier. I'm playing with the big boys now. Sorry, big girls too. Or should that be significant girls? Well, you know what I mean.– Lionel^(talk) 04:39, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
13. Oppose per MelanieN's rationale. ^Falling_Gravity 06:56, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Discussion

Ok. Let's see. Take'em one by one:

Winkelvi - "WP:NOTNEWS, WP:RECENT" - everything in this article is recent and news worthy. Singling out this particular piece of info sorta betrays that this is just an excuse for an WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT !vote. Atsme - "no verifiable evidence" - what is that suppose to be? And that's not the standard for inclusion, whatever that's suppose to mean. The standard for inclusion is whether or not it's in the sources. ALL sources attribute their sources. MONGO - "remain out until it doesn't look and smell like a conspiracy theory" - not your call to make. Not sure when you were made Wikipedia's sniffer-in-chief. All that matters is whether it's covered by sources. Come on, you know this! Phmoreno - I can't even understand what that is suppose to mean. Mr Ernie - borderline reasonable so I'll leave it alone.

Shameful.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:44, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

"Singling out...Shameful"

Singling out editors and literally attacking them with insults because of their !votes is shameful. Talk about a perfect example of "I don't like it". All your comments here serve to accomplish is starting a brawl. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 18:24, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Criticisms (esp. valid ones) are not insults.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:26, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps, if they were valid. Sometimes we all need to refresh our memories by re-reading relevant policies. In this case, starting with NOTNEWS, NEWSORG, and RECENTISM wouldn't hurt any of us. I recommend reading slowly. ^{Atsme📞📧} 18:32, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

You know I've already addressed that like four times already, right? Maybe if you read my comments above... slowly. To reiterate - everything in this article is newsworthy and everything in this article is fairly recent. This article exists. Get used to it and accept it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:49, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm glad my vote has been deemed "borderline reasonable," but where can I apply for a position as a Wikipedia sniffer? Mr Ernie (talk) 19:26, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Mr Ernie...it depends on what you intend to sniff. ^{Atsme📞📧} 20:02, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

I have struck out my "include" vote above; consider me neutral-borderline-opposed opposed since there is still no second confirmation. The reason is that by including this (even with the qualifier "if true") we are calling Cohen a liar - possibly a liar under oath. To make this kind of assertion against a living person we should have two independent sources, and we don't. If some source comes out with independent confirmation we should definitely include it. Until then I think we should probably leave it out. I still do say that we should remove any reference to the Cohen investigation. The proposed version implies that the counsel got this information from the Cohen raid, and that is not only not supported by the source, it is highly unlikely - bordering impossible. The special counsel wasn't part of this raid, and the office that did carry it out hasn't even begun to look at the material they got; it's all pending court review. --MelanieN (talk) 20:31, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN is right about the raid. It is unnecessary to mention it here. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:48, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Wow. Good catch, MelanieN. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 20:37, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

That’s a good point. But, there have been innumerable suggestions on this TP, and in the press, that Steele is a liar. How under NPOV and BLP can we exclude one side? O3000 (talk) 21:16, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

What we say on this TP is irrelevant. Neither NPOV nor BLP applies, at least not strictly; we are free to propose things and discuss things that aren't necessarily going to wind up in the article. What matters is what we say in the article, and we don't say there that Steele is a liar. Nor should we imply that Cohen is. --MelanieN (talk) 22:01, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

While we are allowed to discuss, often what we discuss is a reflection of what is in the media, reliable and unreliable. The article provides several criticisms of the dossier, which is all well and good. Just want to make certain that we consider inclusion of the supporting sources. Obviously correct handling of NPOV can be difficult in such an article. We need to apply BLP to both Steele and those that would attack or support him.O3000 (talk) 22:17, 17 April 2018 (UTC).

• I'm curious why this: "Seeking consensus to restore content challenged by _____ " is being seen as acceptable as this section's header/title. It's quite non-standard, and the name was removed at the request of Atsme because she correctly pointed out that putting the name of an editor in a talk page header is against policy/guidelines. I know I've seen somewhere before at a noticeboard somewhere, more than once, where a policy or guideline was named as anti-naming editors in headers. Can't put my finger on what the policy or guideline is, but I know that I've seen admins and long-term editor admonish and name some policy/guideline when they've removed the name and turned the header into a neutral, just-the-facts-ma'am kind of title. I changed it, it was reverted. What purpose does it serve or point does it prove to have the header remain as unnecessarily non-standard in its current state? Shouldn't it be more standard and per TPG/MOS? -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 23:54, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

All fixed - for those who may be curious about the guideine, see WP:TALKNEW. ^{Thanks to Mandruss for pointing it out in a different discussion. Atsme📞📧} 00:26, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Is it fixed? Regardless, I'm thankful to Mandruss for knowing what elusive policy was being referred to. I knew it existed (and not just in my imagination). -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 00:31, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

@Winkelvi, Atsme, MONGO, Phmoreno, Mr Ernie, Mr. Daniel Plainview, MelanieN, GoodDay, PackMecEng, James J. Lambden, and Piznajko: Do you oppose this proposal specifically or mentioning the McClatchy report generally? This is what the article says right now: "McClatchy reported that the Mueller investigation had evidence that Cohen visited Prague in August or early September 2016 by traveling through Germany." Politrukki (talk) 17:42, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

I will have to reexamine the coverage. Your Rewrite vote identifies sources I was not aware of. James J. Lambden (talk) 18:56, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

My thinking is that the raid should be mentioned briefly less the speculation by McClatchy - but if mentioned, make it known that it is unconfirmed and that a warning by Mueller's spokesperson was issued following McClatchy's report. It's still NOTNEWS, so I'm hesitant to support its inclusion. The raid occurred but we don't know why. My editorial judgement tells me to exercise caution - WP has no deadline; therefore, our priorities should be getting the article right. If we must include speculation and opinion simply because it was published in RS, then it should be included using in-text attribution - without editorializing. Provide only the facts, dispassionate tone...NPOV. ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:16, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Politrukki: Exactly what Atsme said. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 00:10, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Why do you mention the raid? The main issue is whether the possible evidence of Cohen being in Prague should be mentioned at all. The raid is just a sidetrack. Is there any indication that Mueller's spokesperson's warning is directly related to McClatchy's report? What if we keep the current content and add something along the lines of "Journalist Andrew Prokop said the report "could still prove to be mistaken", but [reason why this is important] ..., citing Vox? Politrukki (talk) 05:37, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Bingo! You are correct on both points. There is no evidence the raid is connected with the McClatchy report, nor is there any evidence that there is any connection with the warning. Neither should be mentioned. The mention of the McClatchy report should be kept short, much as it is now. Some minor tweaks might be in order, but it shouldn't balloon. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:11, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Politrukki - Good point...I was trying to compromise which caused me to stray off-track a bit. There's no evidence it's connected, no reason to include any of it since it's pure speculation all the way around. ^{Atsme📞📧} 17:34, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Adding about the so-called papers of record; using a web search (from April 13 onwards) I found the following:

• The Washington Post has published an editorial analysis (that also says "but we hasten to note that these allegations have not been confirmed by The Washington Post"). One, two blog posts, and a Q & A (Eugene Robinson says "McClatchy is a first-rate news organization", but thinks it would stupid for Cohen to lie about visiting Prague). One, two in-house news articles mention the Cohen and Prague, but not the McClatchy report.
• The New York Times has republished one, two Reuters articles. One, two in-house news articles that mention Cohen and Prague, but not the McClatchy report.
• The Wall Street Journal has published one article that mentions the dossier and Prague, but nothing about the McClatchy report. In January 2017, WSJ reported that the FBI had not found any evidence of Cohen visiting Czech Republic. WSJ has reiterated the same point several times, previously in September.

My conclusion is that papers of record have provided some coverage, but no in-house reporting. But that is only one possible viewpoint. Politrukki (talk) 05:11, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

@Politrukki: Having reviewed the sources you list in your Rewrite vote I see all attribute the claim to McClatchy. Of the sources you list above that I've examined all attribute the claim to either McClatchy or Steele. If there are any that don't please let me know. Otherwise my position is the same – the McClatchy report shouldn't be mentioned until we have corroboration. James J. Lambden (talk) 17:00, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Got it. McClatchy is the only news outlet with own sourcing. Sorry if I misled you. Politrukki (talk) 17:19, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Simple misunderstanding and (in my defense) not surprising given the length and format of this discussion. James J. Lambden (talk) 17:27, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN, the splintering of discussions and requests for input regarding the same material before the initial request has been closed is highly disruptive, as evidenced in part with the Cohen material. Local consensus does not/should not require the same amount of time as a formal RfC, yet here we sit, some 17 days later and the material I challenged on April 17th was restored without consensus by BullRangifer on April 18, the very next day with the following edit summary: (restoring previous unchallenged and consensus version). WHAT? It was challenged. We didn't even start the consensus discussion until April 17th, and here we are in what appears to be a blatant STONEWALLING attempt. Where is the consensus BR spoke about? I realize this Cohen mess has become quite confusing so please explain why the material was restored and the local discussion has not been closed so we can all be on the same page. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:19, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

The key words are "previous unchallenged". It was long-standing and consensus content. (1,257 bytes)‎

The content you deleted was a greatly enlarged version (2,744 bytes)‎ which was challenged.

While that was being discussed, I restored the original, long-standing, and much smaller (1,257 bytes)‎ version (literally less than half the size of what you deleted) which had not been challenged. We're actually talking about two different versions of that content. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:32, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Seeking consensus to remove the existing reference to McClatchy from the article

Right now we have a second paragraph in the "Michael Cohen" subsection which says, On April 13, 2018, McClatchy reported that the Mueller investigation had evidence that Cohen visited Prague in August or early September 2016 by traveling through Germany.[98] The following day, Cohen again denied he has "ever been to Prague".[109][110] I propose to remove the McClatchy reference, and to add to the first paragraph the single sentence Cohen denies he has ever been to Prague. (All we say now is that he "denies the allegation" and names other places where he was during parts of that time; we need to include his more sweeping denial.) My reasoning is spelled out in the section above: I oppose any mention of the McClatchy article because no other news outlet has corroborated it; McClatchy is still the only news outlet making that claim. --MelanieN (talk) 23:58, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

I support this. James J. Lambden (talk) 17:02, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

I oppose this because McClatchy is a RS and no assertion is being made that their report is necessarily correct. By the reasoning that no other RS has corroborated their report, countless other references throughout WP would need to be removed. soibangla (talk) 17:31, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

To make my position clear, were this not a BLP claim a single reputable source would be sufficient. I don't believe the claim itself is a BLP violation but BLP is a factor in my vote to exclude. James J. Lambden (talk) 17:40, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Soibangla, certainly we are able to use information that has only a single source - but not to report negative information about a living person. See WP:PUBLICFIGURE: "If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the (negative) allegation or incident, leave it out." Negative information or allegations about a living person have a higher bar. In this case, the negative allegation is that Cohen was lying. At least that's my take. YMMV. --MelanieN (talk) 17:48, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Even if it weren't a BLP it would be a WP:EXCEPTIONAL issue because the claim is important, and while multiple agencies have repeated this item, WaPo caveated the report by saying they had not separately corroborated it. In any event I would think the not-newspaper thing is especially relevant went the claim isn't even firmly reported. Factchecker_atyourservice 04:12, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

The source is WP:RS. Name the source and include the denial. Just don't put it in Wikipedia's voice, yet.Casprings (talk) 02:54, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• Remove - when/if the allegation is corroborated by Mueller, McClatchy can get a pat on the back but until then, let it incubate. ^{Atsme📞📧} 16:01, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose removal. A large number of secondary sources are available to corroborate the assertion that "McClatchy reported that..." (etc), so this is certainly something that McClatchy verifiably reported, and it satisfies the requirements of WP:WEIGHT. Those arguing for a BLP exception have not apparently read WP:PUBLICFIGURE with sufficient care: "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." That is precisely what we have here. What those arguing for a BLP exception here have apparently latched onto is the next sentence, which says: "If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation or incident, leave it out. If the subject has denied such allegations, that should also be reported." We are documenting the allegation raised by the McClatchy report, and have ample secondary sources to satisfy the requirements explicitly set forth at the BLP policy. The argument for exclusion is wholly without merit. Sławomir Biały (talk) 17:13, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Comment
  

(1) This report came out on Friday April 13th after close of business—and first thing Monday morning, April 17th, Mueller's office released a statement warning "many stories about our investigation have been inaccurate".

(2) At least one top news outlet, Washington Post, made a point of specifically saying "we hasten to note that these allegations have not been confirmed by The Washington Post".

(3) It's been over two weeks and still no sign of independent corroboration. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:25, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

It bears noting that Daily Caller first reported that, but did not name who said it (which would typically be Peter Carr, Mueller's spokesman) and specifically stated "A spokesperson for the special counsel’s office wouldn’t comment on the Cohen-Prague story specifically". Daily Caller has an established history of deliberate distortions. It's Tucker Carlson, after all. soibangla (talk) 18:51, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN - local consensus above is to remove all mention of McClatchy, so how many times do we need to get consensus for the same issue? ^{Atsme📞📧} 15:38, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

The "remove" arguments are vacuous or worse. I see clear consensus to sustain this content. Maybe some relatively uninvolved editor will see this and put us out of our misery. There can't be constant tail-chasing over simple decisions such as this. We'll never get any work done. SPECIFICO talk 16:09, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

• I think this should be kept. Saying "McClatchy reported that the Mueller investigation had evidence..." is a perfectly normal way to frame it. But a much better way would be to place this into a better context, i.e. as suggested at the top of the section, "Cohen's office, home, and hotel were raided by FBI agents acting under a federal search warrant in mid-April 2018. A few days later, McClatchy reported that Mueller investigation was in possession of evidence...". My very best wishes (talk) 18:20, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Even if we keep the item - and that decision is still open - I STRONGLY oppose any wording that connects it with to the Cohen raid. AFAIK no reliable source has suggested there is a connection. For us to link the two events, just because they were close in time, would be unsupported Original Research. It's also extremely unlikely, from a practical standpoint, that there is any connection. "A few days" after the Cohen incident, it was still being debated in court what parts of the material could be viewed by the Southern District of New York office, and reporting suggested that they had not yet looked at any of it. Mueller is still another link removed from being able to see the material obtained by the U.S. Attorney's office. The likelihood that Mueller's office obtained this information within days of, and because of, the Cohen searches is effectively zero. --MelanieN (talk) 21:45, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

OK, I see the problem (also saw comment by SPECIFICO below). Some rephrase would be fine. My very best wishes (talk) 22:29, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose Removal: Different reporters have different sources for different aspects of the story. There have been numerous "scoops" reported by reliable sources that have been accepted here and in many other articles. Although McClatchy might not be a household name like CNN, NYT, WSJ and WaPo (which each have had exclusives on various aspects of the story) their credibility and integrity should not be discounted. No source other than McClatchy has reported "The Special Counsel is also investigating whether the Central Bank of Russia's deputy governor, Alexander Torshin, illegally funneled money through the National Rifle Association to benefit Trump's campaign" yet that McClatchy report has been accepted in Special Counsel investigation (2017–present) for weeks/months. soibangla (talk) 18:37, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

McClatchy doesn't say Mueller just learned it from the raid. No such implication appears in the article text. SPECIFICO talk 22:12, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Nothing should happen with the McClatchy info until the above challenged edit has been closed - which I just mentioned again via this diff. I'm going to borrow what Drmies said with reference to another situation because it works equally as well here: what I see is basically a ton of reliably sourced speculation which crosses the NOTNEWS boundary. I pinged MelanieN and BullRangifer earlier regarding the McClatchy info I challenged (removed) that was restored in part by BR. One thing at a time, please. We need to close and abide by the initial informal request for local comment before anything is restored or modified. We should not be STONEWALLING a request for local consensus that has gone on for 17+ days just because it doesn't fit a particular POV. If you disagree what local consensus indicates, start a formal RfC and eliminate all the confusion and ambiguities. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:36, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Well, I'm not sure I understand what that has to do with what I wrote, but to make things even more interesting, there's this: Michael Cohen Says He’s “Never” Been to Prague. He Told Me a Different Story — “I haven’t been to Prague in 14 years. I was in Prague for one afternoon 14 years ago.” soibangla (talk) 01:19, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Well that's a weird one. You're citing Drmies who has given no harbor to your POV suppression of this material? Does that make your view more or less credible d'you think? SPECIFICO talk 00:56, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I clearly qualified borrowing his words by adding "with reference to another situation". I credited him for the arrangement of the words so there's no copyvio. I have always admired his ability to speak volumes with so few words and they often fit well in so many different situations...^{Atsme📞📧} 01:32, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

In other words, (b): Less credible. SPECIFICO talk 01:55, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

As I mentioned above, but bears repeating, now that Cohen himself explicitly references the McClatchy report in his denial. Even if we were to regard all news reports concerning the McClatchy report as a single secondary source (which is questionable), the further denial is obviously a second independent source. And it, too, was covered amply by several secondary sources. Sławomir Biały (talk) 23:08, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Wait, that makes no sense. If someone DENIES the claim, that somehow becomes an independent source CONFIRMING the claim? Sorry. We still have only McClatchy and sources quoting McClatchy. We do not have a second, independent source for the allegation that he did go to Prague after all. --MelanieN (talk) 00:41, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

I did not say that it was an independent source confirming the claim. It is an independent source, period. When independent sources that are in conflict, we summarize those sources, with attribution. You earlier referred to WP:PUBLICFIGURE, which states " 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. If you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation or incident, leave it out." The added content easily meets the standard of "multiple reliable thirdy-party sources documenting the allegation". Now even the subjects own Twitter feed documents the allegation (as referenced in other reliable third-party sources). Sławomir Biały (talk) 01:38, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

The first local consensus has not been closed yet. The first discussion has to be closed in order to avoid disruption/confusion because it also refers to the McClatchey report. I can request a close at AN since the (informal) request has been open since April 17th which is longer than most local consensus discussions....unless there are any reasonable objections to my doing so. It appears by the weight of the arguments in the first and some of them in this discussion that it's a pretty clear exclude. Plus it appears more attention is being paid to NOTNEWS based on Drmies discussion below. ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:43, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

I do not see any consensus to remove here. My very best wishes (talk) 17:49, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Obviously I agree. And this discussion ideally should be closed by someone WP:UNINVOLVED, rather than by participants in the discusdion. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:33, 6 May 2018 (UTC)]

Point of Order - this section about McClatchy was started after the other McClatchy consensus was under way for basically the same material; i.e. McClatchy's unsubstantiated claim...and it appears to me that the 1st consensus supports the removal of the McClatchy material. Keep in mind, that claim never gained any traction - it withered on the vine - and is noncompliant with NOTNEWS and NPOV (UNDUE). ^{Atsme📞📧} 22:40, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

RFC on stating no public evidence of collusion

Should the article state that "To date, news agencies have reported that there is no public evidence of collusion by Trump or his campaign." per [5] Casprings (talk) 16:44, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Sourced content
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Collusion claims To date, news agencies have reported that there is no public evidence of collusion by Trump or his campaign. The New York Times has said there is no known evidence of clandestine discussions about disseminating the hacked emails, but noted that Trump had publicly urged Russia to hack Clinton's emails, which his son claimed was a joke. The Times also reported that despite extensive evidence of links between Trump associates and Russian intelligence operatives, there is no known evidence of a direct link between Trump and the Kremlin. Newsweek has said that it is proven that Trump maintained ties to wealthy businessmen in Azerbaijan, but that it was unproven that the Kremlin had been cultivating Trump other than attempting to contact him during the 2016 campaign; or that it had offered him lucrative real estate deals; or that there was any evidence the "golden showers" tape existed. Politicial figures and other commentators have disagreed on the significance of existing public evidence. Adam Schiff, the House Intelligence Committee ranking Democrat, and some critics have argued that the evidence already known shows collusion, with Schiff further saying that additional non-public evidence further supports the allegations. Early investigations and beginning of formal probes Soon after the allegations of collusion surfaced, former DNI Clapper said in March 2017 that a report assembled by the NSA, FBI, and CIA under his supervision as Director of National Intelligence included no evidence "that had any reflection of collusion between members of the Trump campaign and the Russians", and that to his knowledge, none existed during his time as Director. He later clarified that he would not be aware of any matters arising after his tenure, and that he had not been aware of a separate investigation by the FBI that had existed at the time. Still later, in an interview with Chris Matthews of MSNBC, he said that the Russian effort to meet with Trump's son was a "classic, textbook Soviet and now Russian tradecraft" whereby they confirmed that those close to Trump would be interested in receiving information damaging to Hillary Clinton. In November 2017, Clapper told CNN's Jake Tapper that since his earlier reports, "a lot more has come out that raises, I think, circumstantial questions if nothing else". As questions about possible Trump links to Russian leadership mounted, separate investigations by the Department of Justice and both houses of Congress began. Partisan division on House Intelligence Committee; Republicans end investigation saying no evidence of collusion The proceedings and conclusion of the House Intelligence Committee in its investigation were marked by partisan division. The New York Times wrote that "the day-to-day reality of running a closely watched investigation potentially implicating a sitting president left the committee badly frayed", and noted that Democrats on the committee had accused Republicans of hindering the investigation to protect Trump, while Republicans had complained that Democrats were turning the investigation into a TV spectacle to earn political points. In early 2018, as the special counsel investigation continued, the Republican majority on the house committee ended its investigation—declaring in press statements, and a memo authored without Democratic input, that no evidence of collusion had emerged. Republicans also seized on what they said were efforts by investigators to conceal the association between the document and Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign from a FISA court considering a warrant for a wiretap against Carter Page, an argument buttressing Republican claims that the surveillance and Russia investigation were based on the dossier, at its roots a Democratic political document. Regarding the collusion accusations, Rep. K. Michael Conaway (R-Tex.), who oversees the committee’s Russia probe, said that they had found "perhaps some bad judgment, inappropriate meetings, inappropriate judgment at taking meetings", and that the Trump tower meeting with the Russian lawyer "shouldn’t have happened, no doubt about that", but said that they had found no evidence of collusion. The end of the investigation and dissemination of the memo were met with skepticism and criticism by Congressional Democrats and others who said the moves amounted to a premature end to a flawed investigative process which failed to adequately obtain witness testimony that would implicate Trump, due to Republican control of the committee's subpoena power. Democrats pointed to multiple contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia and said they had seen too few witnesses to make a judgment on collusion; one Republican panel member complained that the probe was "poison" for the previously bipartisan panel. Dissemination of the memo by Nunes also generated an outcry by Democrats, law enforcement officials, and intelligence experts, who said its release would harm national security. The Republican majority also disagreed with the assessment of the U.S. intelligence community that Putin had a preference for Trump to become President, drawing further criticism. Ranking Democrat Adam Schiff released a memo for the minority on the intelligence committee, summarizing the case against Trump. Schiff told NBC that the evidence of collusion was "more than circumstantial", and that there was direct evidence of deception. He later insisted in an interview with George Stephanopoulos that already-public information—particularly about the campaign's discussions and meeting with Russians regarding the hacked Clinton and DNC emails, and the conversations between George Papadopoulos and Russian government agents—amounted to evidence of collusion, though not necessarily proof of a criminal conspiracy. Schiff also said he thought that some of the non-public evidence in front of the committee was evidence of collusion. Others have argued that Republican actions such as the release of the Nunes memo and calls for Mueller to step down showed an attempt to discredit his probe into Russian election interference. USA Today said: "The investigation's abrupt end underscores the bitter partisan divide that has plagued the committee's work. And it increases pressure on the collegial Senate Intelligence Committee to come out with a credible bipartisan report from its own Russia probe." The Senate Intelligence Committee probe continues. Commentary Public commentary has been largely divided among partisan lines, though prominent Republicans have found the allegations credible while some Democrats have expressed doubt. Critics have said that there is mounting evidence of collusion, while supporters and skeptics have either expressed doubt that collusion actually occurred or have said that there was no evidence to prove the allegation. Commentators have also disagreed on the importance of the fact that the dossier was funded by Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, as well as what some regarded as a lack of transparency in a Carter Page FISA warrant application that referenced the dossier. Commentary suggesting collusion claims are true Congressman Adam Smith, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee told The Hill in an interview that there was "a lot of evidence of collusion, despite what the president and everyone else says." Colin Kahl argued in Foreign Policy magazine that circumstantial evidence suggesting collusion continued to mount, but said that even if there was no collusion, Trump's efforts to minimize the U.S. response against Moscow's interference were "incredibly troubling". Los Angeles Times former D.C. bureau chief Doyle McManus wrote: "So while there is not conclusive public evidence of direct collaboration between the campaign and the Kremlin, there's mounting evidence that both sides wanted to cooperate and actively explored what they could do for each other." Commentators from NBC news argued that "cooperation without collusion is still cooperation". Republican commentators David French and Charles Krauthammer both said that Trump Jr.'s conversations with the Russians were proof of attempted collusion. Krauthammer wrote, "What Donald Jr.—and Kushner and Manafort—did may not be criminal. But it is not merely stupid. It is also deeply wrong, a fundamental violation of any code of civic honor." David A. Graham wrote in The Atlantic that "the Trump campaign and later transition were eager to work with Russia, and to keep that secret." Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank said that as evidence of the Trump campaign's "entanglement with Russia" continued to emerge, Trump and his advisors were forced to come up with "revised talking points" as part of a "veritable Marshall Plan for the moving of goal posts". Commentary skeptical of collusion claims As the story of collusion claims broke, Scott Shane of The New York Times wrote: "Under the circumstances, many in Washington expected the agencies to make a strong public case to erase any uncertainty. Instead, the message from the agencies essentially amounts to 'trust us.' There is no discussion of the forensics used to recognize the handiwork of known hacking groups, no mention of intercepted communications between the Kremlin and the hackers, no hint of spies reporting from inside Moscow’s propaganda machinery." Jason Kirchick, a Brookings Institution visiting fellow, wrote in Washington Post that "Trump's Defense Department in 2017 proposed a boost in financial support for [NATO]; he's announced the sale of antitank weapons to Ukraine; and, according to reports, U.S. military forces recently killed 'at least 100' Russian mercenaries in Syria. Yet so attached to the collusion narrative are some Trump critics that their theories are impervious to countervailing data." Richard A. Epstein, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, law professor at New York University and senior lecturer at The University of Chicago, wrote in Newsweek: "I agree with the Hoover Institution’s Paul Gregory, who has extensively studied Russian propaganda tactics, that the Russians knew that they could not influence the outcome of the election with a few well timed tweets. But they understood that a disinformation campaign could raise the specter of collusion with either party, which would then weaken the presidency no matter which candidate won." Jonathan Turley, a law professor specializing in public interest law at George Washington University, said in The Hill that "[i]t takes willful blindness not to acknowledge either the lack of direct evidence of collusion or the implausibility of many of the theories abounding on cable news programs." Writers for The New Republic and The Atlantic suggested that it was likely Mueller had not found evidence to implicate Trump. James S. Robbins, national security expert and member of USA Today's Board of Contributors, called the dossier a "sketchy gossip-ridden anti-Trump document paid for by the Clinton campaign and compiled with input from Russian intelligence sources" and said its use to authorize surveillance on Trump campaign members "was an unprecedented investigative intrusion into the American political process that makes Watergate look like amateur hour." Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Victor Davis Hanson argued in National Review that "[a]side from former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, a few minor and transitory campaign officials have been indicted or have pleaded guilty to a variety of transgressions other than collusion." Aaron Maté, writing in The Nation, argued that officials had acknowledged they had seen no evidence of collusion or wrongdoing, and that "[w]ell-placed critics of Trump—including former DNI chief James Clapper, former CIA director Michael Morrell, Representative Maxine Waters, and Senator Dianne Feinstein—concur to date." "[T]he relentless pursuit of this narrative above all else has had dangerous consequences," he later wrote. References

Survey

• Oppose, as RFC nom. RS after RS has stated there is evidence there is evidence.
  • Foreign Policy: There are reams of evidence pointing to Trump's collusion with Russia
  • New Yorker: The ‘Did Trump’s Campaign Collude’ Debate Is Over. The Only Question Now Is How Much.
  • US News and World Report: Ample Evidence ... of Collusion': Adam Schiff says both public and nonpublic evidence points to collusion
  • Newsweek: VIDENCE OF TRUMP-RUSSIA COLLUSION ALREADY EXISTS, WATERGATE PROSECUTORS SAY
  • Reuters: Russia-Trump campaign collusion an 'open' issue: U.S. Senate panel chiefs

Starting this section and this edit in general seems designed to push a narrative that there is no collusion. This is neither backed up by the facts or by WP:RS.Casprings (talk) 16:49, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Additional Note: This just broke: Mueller Has Dozens of Inquiries for Trump in Broad Quest on Russia Ties and Obstruction Questions such as:

What knowledge did you have of any outreach by your campaign, including by Paul Manafort, to Russia about potential assistance to the campaign?

clearly show that there is some evidence that the campaign was working with Russia and the investigation continues.Casprings (talk) 08:32, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

As to your additional note, I don't think it's reasonable to assume the evidentiary bases for the questions from their wording. The questions neither support nor undermine whether evidence for collusion exists. Dyrnych (talk) 14:26, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

These are opinion sources and reported claims of democrats. Fact sourcing says there is no evidence. Moreover the cited material itself plainly shows that it is utterly backed up by both facts and RS. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:55, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

SO WHAT MOST OF YOUR SOURCES ARE ALSO OPINION SOURCES AND I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IT MEANS "REPORTED CLAIMS OF DEMOCRATS" EXCEPT FOR THE FACT THAT THAT'S BLATANTLY FALSE!!!!!!!!!!. Seriously, why did you feel the need to bold your comment? Bolding words doesn't make them magically true (and for example the first source is not "reported claims of democrats" (sic).Volunteer Marek (talk) 21:19, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

VM, your yelling blew-out my hearing aids...and I had them down to low volume. Please reciprocate in-kind. ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:29, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Take it up with Factchecker.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:51, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

• No, as this is irrelevant. There is an ongoing investigation and it has been claimed that there is an "abundance” of evidence of collusion with Russia and obstruction by Donald Trump’s campaign and administration that is not yet public". Also it is not that black and white [[6]].Slatersteven (talk) 16:53, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

  There is an abundance of evidence that Trump was framed and this whole collusion narrative is a fraud.Phmoreno (talk) 17:09, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

  Maybe, and if there is we can say that. This question is about whether or not there is public evidence of collusion.Slatersteven (talk) 17:12, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

  Phmoreno, but is that "evidence" found in RS? No. We don't include conspiracy theories, but if they are discussed in RS, we might mention them. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:16, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, there are RS's, but most some not in the scope of the dossier article. The DeSantis letter is part of the evidence directly related to the dossier. The Trump server fraud is connected because Alfa-Bank is mentioned in the dossier. Because Carter Page was an FBI informant in a case involving Russians he was someone who could be framed as a spy (Title 1 FISA), but this would make him a double agent. There is the suspicious link of Bruce and Nellie Ohr to the the dossier that is backed up by RS. Apart from the dossier, there are suspicious links and in some of the other circumstantial evidence, such as the Natalia Veselnitskaya / Fusion GPS sting operation. Also the George Papadopoulos operation looks like it was a set up.Phmoreno (talk) 20:07, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• No. This is well explained by people above. My very best wishes (talk) 04:10, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Yes – but it should be made clear that this specifically refers to the dossier allegations of collusion.
  1. There has been no public corroboration of the salacious allegations against Mr. Trump, nor of the specific claims about coordination between his associates and the Russians. — The New York Times (answering the question "How much of the dossier has been substantiated?")
  2. That assertion is unproven — as are many of the other claims in the document. That includes the overarching claim that Russian government officials allied with Trump employees and campaign aides to help his election. — The Washington Post
  3. The 35-page dossier, written mostly by former British spy Christopher Steele, includes unverified allegations about Trump, including contacts between Russian officials and his staff during the presidential campaign, and Moscow’s possession of compromising information about the president. — Bloomberg
  4. No evidence has surfaced so far that Trump aides or campaign advisers were involved in Russian efforts to disrupt the 2016 election — The New York Times
  5. Those ties originate in part from a document compiled by former MI6 intelligence officer, Christopher Steele, which contains unverified allegations of misconduct and collusion between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia. — Newsweek
  6. dossier containing unverified allegations about collusion between President Trump and Russia — The Hill
  7. It contains unproven allegations of coordination between Trump's advisers and Russians on hacking the emails of prominent Democrats and makes unverified claims about sexual activities. — AP
  8. dossier that made unverified allegations of collusion between Trump’s campaign for president and the Kremlin — Times of Israel / AP
  9. It contained as yet unproven allegations that the Russians had wanted Mr. Trump to win the election, that Russians had shared valuable information about Hillary Clinton with the Trump campaign, and that Russia had compromising sexually explicit video of Mr. Trump that could be used as blackmail. — PBS
  10. At this point, no evidence of collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign has been made public. It may or may not exist. However, there is an ongoing investigation. — factcheck.org (updated regularly but this is not specifically about dossier allegations, unlike other sources I listed above)
      It is DUE to include one sentence about what news sources have reported. Reliable sources have deemed it necessary to report that as yet there is no evidence. We should follow reliable sources. Politrukki (talk) 13:38, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

  The text doesn't say "there is no conclusive proof" it says "no evidence". This is false and RS do not state there is no evidence. SPECIFICO talk 12:58, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  That's demonstrably false. Some sources say "no evidence", others say the allegation is unverified/uncorroborated/unproven. Which one would you prefer? Politrukki (talk) 13:12, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  This RfC is about the first. Now where are your sources? SPECIFICO talk 13:31, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  Check Factcheck.org: "no evidence of collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign has been made public". The rest of my sources above are specifically related to dossier. If you don't like specific wording, you can make constructive suggestions instead of opposing the proposal. Politrukki (talk) 14:21, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

• Yes as per Politrukki --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 13:46, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support with different wording I recommend the House Intel Committee's Report findings (External links section). "When asked directly, none of the interviewed witnesses provided evidence of collusion, coordination, or conspiracy between the Trump campaign and the Russian government." See p-61 for Brennan and Clapper's statement's of "no collusion". That should conclude the matter.Phmoreno (talk) 13:50, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support as per Politrukki. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 18:35, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Comment. With all of the back-and-forth over recent days, the article currently lacks an easy-to-find description of the highly exculpatory House Intelligence report. What we must attempt to do is find a version that is simply a neutral description of that report. Like Phmoreno, I am opposed to the summary tagline given in the RfC (which was, I note, wording taken from the original long edit). For now, I suggest settling on Phmoreno's suggestion, but we should also plan to include a neutral description of Friday's minority report as well. Sławomir Biały (talk) 19:20, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

  Oppose as worded. The conclusion of the majority report of the HPSCI are that there has been no public evidence of collusion. This should certainly be covered in the article. And it must also be attributed. And the minority report should also be mentioned and attributed. That is how to satisfy NPOV. Sławomir Biały (talk) 22:54, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - this is a ridiculous proposal. Which sources? When? Is there a secondary source that actually says this ("news agencies said that blah blah blah") or is it just a collection of some cherry picked sources WP:SYNTH'ed to reach a conclusion by the person wishing to put this into the article? Answer: it's the latter. Blatant POV and SYNTH attempt. No.Volunteer Marek (talk) 21:16, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose: unneeded, possibly OR, and unhelpful to readers. --K.e.coffman (talk) 01:11, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support - as there's yet to be any evidence of collusion. Indeed, there isn't even any clear definition of what's meant by collusion. GoodDay (talk) 01:27, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support - it is needed, it is factually accurate, there is no OR involved, and ommission would be a disservice to our readers. In fact, more of the same kind of editing updates for accuracy and compliance with NPOV is needed throughout this article. ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:30, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
• No. Unsourced OR that contradicts sourced content. SPECIFICO talk 01:32, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  Which part is OR? "news agencies"? We could simply say "There is no public evidence of collusion by Trump or his campaign." or, if the question is specifically about the dossier allegations, "The dossier's allegations of collusion between Trump campaign and Russia have not been corroborated." Which source says there is evidence? Politrukki (talk) 14:21, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

• Support This is getting a little silly now isn't it? It is overwhelmingly covered that there is no public evidence to date by several high quality sources. It would be a dis-service to our readers to not have this information and give the article an even bigger POV issue. PackMecEng (talk) 01:33, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  This just isn't true. See below. Two of these high quality sources are from April 2017, before a lot of developments (in particular, Papadapolous getting busted) came about. The next two or three are being straight up misrepresented and don't say what this text claims they say. THAT is silly.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:06, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  "Papadapolous [sic]" is not even mentioned in the dossier. Is Factcheck.org a reliable source? Above I provided nine sources that say the dossier allegations of collusion are uncorroborated/unverified/unproven or there is "no evidence". Many of them are from October, one from January 2018. Politrukki (talk) 14:21, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

  ""Papadapolous [sic]" is not even mentioned in the dossier." - yes, but the proposed sentence isn't about the dossier, it's about collusion in general (this also address your nine sources). (your factcheck link doesn't work for me)Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:39, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

  Nothing wrong with the link. The source was last updated on May 1, 2018. The relevant part is quoted above. Politrukki (talk) 11:45, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose: there remains considerable debate, but while there is such debate, we can't have such a bald claim. Bondegezou (talk) 09:05, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose While the public evidence wouldn’t be enough for certainty, there is certainly evidence. And, I don’t see the preponderance of RS stating that there is no evidence. O3000 (talk) 12:53, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
• Comment – There are two separate questions: (a) Should it be mentioned that there is no public evidence of collusion between Trump campaign and Russia? and (b) Should it be mentioned that there is no public evidence of the dossier's allegation of collusion between Trump campaign and Russia?
  It seems that everyone who has opposed, is answering the question (a), but the questions are separate because the dossier for example does not mention Papadopoulos or the Trump Tower meeting (if someone thinks they prove collusion). Politrukki (talk) 13:03, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support: This has been going on for what? A year and a half now? Nobody seems to be able to find any solid evidence to back the assertion that Trump and Russia colluded to win the election. However, it should be stated simply that "There is currently no evidence of collusion between President Trump and the Russian Government". To say that there isn't public evidence would make people assume he did collude. To say there isn't any evidence period would simply be wrong as the investigation may have something that hasn't gone public yet. Figfires^{Send me a message!} 17:05, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
  • How long did the Benghazi investigation go on? Somehow that wasn't a problem. How many arrests or indictments did that produce? None. Somehow that wasn't a problem. This investigation has had more than a dozen arrests and it probably barely just scratched the surface. Solid evidence is the Papadapolous et. al guilty pleas.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:18, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

    "solid evidence" Factchecker_atyourservice 18:47, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

    Apparently according to Papadopolous himself since he pled guilty.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:54, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

    It has been 6 months since he pled guilty to lying about things that were not illegal, so if anybody thought that was "solid evidence" of collusion, there's been plenty of time for them to say so and yet the fact sources say there is no evidence. Do you think they forgot about Papadopoulos when they made that assessment? Factchecker_atyourservice 19:05, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

    Well, no, actually, you presented a bunch of sources from before Papadopoulos pled guilty ("to things that were not illegal"? Really, ) and tried to pass them off as recent. That's your "fact sources say there is no evidence". Quit trying to play shenanigans with the timeline.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:49, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

    Oh quit your iterated nonsense. The BBC source is from March 13th. The WaPo source is from Feb 23rd. Both many months after guilty plea. Factchecker_atyourservice 01:50, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

    I'm going to save myself a bit of time and copy/paste my previous reply which you failed to address:

    Take this source (BBC from March). It doesn't actually say "news agencies have reported that there is no public evidence". What is says is "Republicans claim that there is no public evidence." So this is a straight up misrepresentation of a source. The WaPo (from Feb) source is a bit better here but it too uses words like "directly" and is talking about whether Trump advisers "sought to aid" (you don't have to "aid" to "collude", you just need to know and do nothing, or benefit from it). And so on and so forth. Basically this is a sorry hatchet job - WP:POV and WP:SYNTH.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:43, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

• Neither best -- or include both - This is all going into a lot of things not one of the Steele collection of allegations, a result of them, a cause of them, or tied to them. None of this is from or about the dossier so it does not belong in this article. But if the article talks collusion then include this or similar also. Talk of 'collusion' seems more a dog whistle term on later suspicions of conspiracy. But if collusion is included, then I think NPOV and BALANCE requires this one or something of the same ilk. Best to not go offtopic once, second best is to go offtopic twice as two wrongs would make an almost-right. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 04:38, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. There are clearly significant Reliable Sources giving opposing or more complicated views on the subject. That may be due to differing standards of what is "evidence", differing scope of of consideration, or other reasons. Unfortunately it's still going to be some time before Reliable Sources resolve this mess down to a single coherent narrative. Alsee (talk) 11:19, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
• (Summoned by bot) Support with revised wording, which should say there is no evidence substantiating any of the allegations in the dossier. As far as I'm aware, nobody currently believes the dossier to have been reputable. Meanwhile, the current proposal addresses the collusion investigation altogether, which is outside the immediate scope of this article. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 14:05, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
• I now oppose per my comments below. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:10, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

• Compassionate727, two points:

1. There are many RS, and especially the intelligence community, which take the allegations very seriously, and have found independent evidence confirming that a number of allegations are true, and others very likely true. That's why the intelligence community uses it as the "road map" for the whole investigation. If it was unreliable, they would have trashed it immediately, or as soon as its claims were found to be unreliable. That has not happened. On the contrary. You should read this article. We cover this quite well, and you can read the RS.
2. You are absolutely right that the RfC is malformed as it discusses matters outside the scope of the dossier. I have pointed this out several times, to no effect. The discussion must focus ONLY on the dossier.

Your narrative, that "nobody currently believes the dossier to have been reputable", only applies to Trump supporters, far-right unreliable sources, and those who believe them (but not to Trump and top GOP leadership, who know the dossier is right). RS tell a very different story, backed up by evidence, rather than conspiracy theories, such as this one in the National Review, which flies in the face of the RS evidence that Papadopoulos was that "inside source" close to Trump, and that he drunkenly revealed that the Trump campaign had inside knowledge of the hacking far earlier than any innocent person should know. That fits the dossier narrative that the Trump campaign worked with Russia and hackers and partially paid for the hacking, all with Trump's knowledge. The FBI later contacted Papadopoulos and flipped him. He then worked for them as an informant. He worked out a plea deal, and was only convicted of lying to the FBI. This is very worrying for Trump. That Nunes and the GOP leadership are panicked that there may be others in Trump's close orbit who are also feeding incriminating evidence to the FBI is logical. Rather than being patriotic and supporting the legitimate efforts to uncover Trump-related corruption and collusion with Russia, they are carrying water for Trump and Putin and seeking to find out who it might be, and feed the info to Trump. Treason? Clearly obstruction of justice. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:44, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: I would dispute the reliability of the intelligence community as a reliable authority on this issue, but that would be wading into FBI/DOJ conspiracy grounds, and it's frankly not relevant. There's been a lot of POV-pushing in this RfC from both sides, and I'm sick of the toxicity. There's a reason I'm interested in politics but don't edit political articles. Anyway, returning to the matter at hand, I'm switching my vote. I completely failed to do basic research before voting here, such as reading this article, for which I apologize. In my (new) view, the third paragraph of the lead here satisfactorily addresses the disputed reliability of the dossier, and this addition is wholly unnecessary in light of that. I thus oppose the proposed addition, unless someone would like to argue that "the media tends to treat its allegations as gossip" is different than what we're trying to establish consensus for. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 17:00, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

No need to avoid these topics, since you are clearly able to consider facts and sources and form straightforward editorial judgments. In the WP sense, there's actually only one POV narrative being promoted here for the past 2 years. One of the many false accusations is that NPOV mainstream responses to it are somehow equivalent POV's. Well the mainstream is different than the GOP and right-wing conspiracy theories, but in Wikipedia terms it's NPOV representation of the mainstream view. We don't deal in absolute truth here. We just reflect the weight of mainstream accounts, and for the time being at least the mainstream view is not accepted by folks who hear it for the first time on a WP talk page and discover that it refutes the Daily Caller, Fox News, Breitbart, Washington Times, and other weapons of mass deflection. BTW, you may want to change your bolded !vote at the location of your strikethrough to make it clearer for whoever closes this thread. SPECIFICO talk 17:19, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

SPECIFICO, you'll appreciate this from Aaron Blake, on Twitter summarizes his WaPo article:

A collusion denial play, in 7 acts

1. No communication w Russia

2. No communication *we're aware of*

3. No *planned* communication

4. Planned meeting, but not re: campaign

5. Was re: campaign, but no good info

6. Collusion isn't crime

7. No info was used

Analysis: Rudy Giuliani just watered down Trump's Russia collusion denial — again. This is now at least the seventh time the goal posts have been moved — all in one direction. The Washington Post

Blake closes with this: "One thing, Rudy Giuliani: The Trump campaign *did* use it."

So even by the Trump campaign's own moving-goal-post redefinitions, they can't escape the obvious conclusion that they really did collude. Maybe they can't settle on a definition which removes them from the guilt-equation, but we know the definition, and it fits what they did, and are still doing. It hasn't stopped. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:37, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. We definitely lack the sources for such a strong claim; the sources that people are trying to cite for this are largely much, much more circumspect and careful in what they say, with numerous qualifiers. Additionally, the wording implies a unanimity among the sources that is definitely not there. --Aquillion (talk) 04:45, 15 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Aquillion and others: a "unanimity" of sources does not exist. It's not "all or nothing". We can't make such a categorical statement when the weight of RS don't do it either. We can't cherrypick only some RS which say that and ignore those which don't. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:11, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

There is no fact sourcing that says there is evidence of collusion, so you apparently don't know what "cherry picking" means. Since no evidence has emerged, RS's have been unanimous in stating that in their own editorial voice. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:40, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose- For all the obvious reasons - we report verified facts not the ongoing absence of verified facts. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:13, 19 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose for the reasons stated above. All of the evidence in the Trump/Russia investigation is not public because it's not supposed to be public. Saying there is "no public evidence" appears to be an attempt to claim "NO COLLUSION" the same way we might see from Trump's twitter feed. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:23, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Threaded discussion 2

• The subject can certainly be covered better. A section which quotes various RS might work. Doing it chronologically is important, as serious sources have tended to change their way of discussing it. Failure to stay up to date and continue to make the "no collusion" claim as the only possible claim is a sign of a careless or agenda-driven journalist/author/source.

There are obviously two general narratives, with the Trump camp insisting there is only one proper way to interpret all this, and that is that there is absolutely no form of collusion. They will continue to make that claim until they die in jail, if that happens. Truth is irrelevant to them. This is a legal strategy, and the modus operandi Trump learned from Roy Cohn: "Deny, deny, deny, and immediately accuse your enemies of what you are doing."

The other view is that there is lots of evidence of several forms of collusion, but we still haven't concluded the investigation, so a final verdict can't be added as a definitive conclusion. The many sources, including Brennan, who see lots of evidence of collusion on several fronts, should be included.

That way NPOV is met by covering both sides of the issue. Trump, Fox, GOP, and fringe sources insist "no collusion" is the only correct POV, while RS are much more nuanced and varied in their interpretations of the available evidence. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:13, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer:, as I have repeatedly complained, "the Trump camp insisting there is only one proper way to interpret all this, and that is that there is absolutely no form of collusion" is a dumb straw man and you're simply preventing constructive discussion by repeating this nonsense.

Please strike your comment and move it to your own userspace where similar angry personal attacks and diatribes fester. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:17, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Just how many threads do we have on this? Can we keep this all in one place?Slatersteven (talk) 17:40, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@Slatersteven: maybe it would be useful to close this, uh, "RFC", which was not presented straightforwardly. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:57, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

One, we needed a formal RFC because above wasn't going anywhere. Two, how much more straightforward do you want?Casprings (talk) 01:08, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

My mistake, for some reason I thought you had linked a diff of the lead sentence, I must not have checked. Factchecker_atyourservice 01:16, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

As an RFC is now open the other thread should be closed.Slatersteven (talk) 10:45, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: "cherry picking" implies I'm skewing the source presentation by ignoring fact sources that say there is public evidence of collusion. No such fact sources exist that I am aware of—not high quality ones, at any rate.

Would it alleviate your SYNTH concerns If the text were changed to match the source exactly, so it simply reads, "There is no public evidence that . . ." without the initial language attributing it to news agency reporting? Factchecker_atyourservice 21:45, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

No. Cherry picking is just the first of your problems. Another one of your problems is that the sources being added are outdated. Yes, at one point in time, there was no public evidence. But let's see... the Papadapolous story broke in October 2017, right? So why are you trying to use a source from April 2017? Or take this source. It doesn't actually say "news agencies have reported that there is no public evidence". What is says is "Republicans claim that there is no public evidence." So this is a straight up misrepresentation of a source. The WaPo source is a bit better here but it too uses words like "directly" and is talking about whether Trump advisers "sought to aid" (you don't have to "aid" to "collude", you just need to know and do nothing, or benefit from it). This is another source from April 2017, before Papadapolous. This source is again, being misrepresented. What it says is that Trump himself hasn't been connected. In the very next line it actually explicitly mentions "illegal activity" by "his campaign". Trump not knowing about it is not the same as no evidence it didn't happen.

And so on and so forth. Basically this is a sorry hatchet job - WP:POV and WP:SYNTH.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:04, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: It is the picture being painted by top RS fact sources in their own editorial voice. I have looked and looked for a contrary one and did not find it. If I'm wrong show me. Additionally, the "analysis" sources linked, such as from BBC and WaPo, also say there is no evidence, although they don't all say the exact same thing that there is no evidence of—none of them say there is evidence of something. If fact sources say there is public evidence of some Trump collusion, show them now now now.

The sources saying that the evidence known shows collusion, like the sources saying there was probably no collusion, are all opinion commentary. Additionally, in the specific case of Adam Schiff, I treated him like a fact source by putting his views about public and non-public evidence in the introductory summary as well as the investigation subsection, rather than the commentary subsection.

Moreover, the "collusion probably true" opinion commentary all acknowledges the lack of collusion evidence, as we see when NBC News says "cooperation without collusion is still cooperation" and numerous other quotes saying the same and similar things. The idea that we wouldn't report what newspapers say about whether there is any evidence of impeachable offenses by Trump seems extreme, especially given the readiness with which this article reports sensational accusations not widely circulated in high-quality RS. Factchecker_atyourservice 20:41, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

"It is the picture being painted" <-- Is that like a new fancy way of saying "I just did a bunch of WP:SYNTH?" Cuz that's what it sounds like.

"by top RS" <-- some of which are outdated, from before more recent significant developments, and some of which don't actually say what you claim they say. As explained in detail above. Somehow your response didn't bother addressing these two issues.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:28, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: How, then, does your fantasy-based view account for statements like Ongoing congressional and FBI investigations into Russian interference have so far produced no public evidence that Trump associates colluded with the Russian effort to change the outcome of the election.]? That's from 2 weeks ago. Ever hear of Reuters? They're, like, totally a thing. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:15, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Lol. Yeah, if you're going to obnoxiously accuse others of having "fantasy-based views" you MIGHT want to leave that fantasy timeline you're living in which is always one year behind the non-fantasy timeline. It's 2018 buddy.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:02, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Woops! That source is indeed from 2017! That said, you did obnoxiously accuse me of "misrepresenting" sources which is an, uhm, interesting proposition at best given the supplied source quotes. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:12, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

"you did obnoxiously accuse me of "misrepresenting" sources" <-- I did. And then I backed it all up in the paragraph above which starts with "No. Cherry picking is just the first of your problems...." which then goes on to explain precisely how you're misrepresenting them. And I like how you basically say "woops, I was wrong, but I am still right dognabbit!" in your second sentence. Time to fold up.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:21, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Oppose As not all the sources say this "no clear-cut evidence of "collusion" has been unearthed." is not saying there is none, just that it is not strong. "We hasten to note that there is no public evidence at this time that Trump campaign staff directly sought to aid..." does not say there is no evidence of collusion, just no evidence of direct collusion to aid the attempts. "So while there is not conclusive public evidence of direct collaboration", again this is not saying there is no public evidence of collusion. Sorry the sourcing is not strong enough to say this in wiki's voice.Slatersteven (talk) 09:24, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Per my comment ("There are two separate questions) above, which question is more relevant to this article? Should we have two separate RFCs if one group is answering to question (a) and another to question (b)? Politrukki (talk) 13:03, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

As Jimmy Dore would say, what collusion? What does that mean? Where's this evidence at? GoodDay (talk) 13:20, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Why should anyone care what that particular person would say? Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:24, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

The guy's correct. There's been no evidence of collusion, no explanation of kinda collusion. There's no treason committed. You can't have treason, when the 2 countries aren't at war with each other, according to the US Constitution. GoodDay (talk) 15:15, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

The guy's a ... lemme watch BLP here. Anyway, the guy is a non-notable, non-reliable... comedian? Also not sure where you got "treason" from. Has anyone said anything about treason? No? So why are you bringing it up? Also, Papadapolous and Page are your evidence of collusion.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:04, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

• "We found evidence of collusion in the abundant secret meetings & communications between Trump campaign officials & associates such as Manafort, Gates, Papadopoulos, Don Jr., Flynn & others, w/ emissaries & officials from, or linked to the Russian gov." Adam Schiff -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:28, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

That's Schiff's view—entitled to special prominence, but it's still just a view. Factchecker_atyourservice 20:43, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

The guilty pleas say otherwise.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:04, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Factchecker_atyourservice 17:23, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

It's time to close this RfC and possibly start another one. We've been chasing the wrong rabbit down the wrong path.

Politrukki made some very good points here.

This RfC is about the wrong question, one better suited for the Special Counsel investigation (2017–present)‎ and Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections articles. We should not be discussing the broader question of whether there is evidence of collusion.

Instead we should be discussing whether there is evidence for the narrower allegation of "conspiracy" (and other allegations which could be included under the "collusion" umbrella) found in the dossier.

The dossier does not mention Papadopoulos or the Trump Tower meeting, two factors which many consider evidence of collusion. IIRC, many RS note that Mueller may consider the Trump Tower meeting the strongest evidence of collusion that the public knows about. There Trump himself wrote a deceptive press release, and signed it with his son's name. That tied Trump into what happened; because he wrote a press release which was a cover-up of what actually happened, he could not claim to be uninvolved or ignorant. The act of lying was evidence of a guilty conscience.

There are many activities which, seen together, are interpreted by many to be evidence of collusion: the activities of Papadopoulos, Carter Page, Manafort, and Cohen; other secret contacts between Trump campaign members and Russians; intercepted conversation between Russian nationals discussing their contacts with Trump campaign members; and other information shared by friendly foreign intelligence sources. All of this started the CIA/NSA/FBI investigation into Russian intervention before the dossier mentioned Carter Page.

Trump's own actions are also suspiciou: his odd refusals to condemn Putin; his refusal to take action to prevent further cyber attacks, even though $120 million has been granted to fight Russian meddling (none has been used); his refusal to do anything to improve election security; and his refusal to definitively accuse Russia of interfering in the election to help him. This is interpreted as evidence that he is controlled by Putin, IOW that he is being blackmailed.

The dossier covers some things which have been confirmed, and others not, at least not publicly. Not all things in the dossier are related to collusion, and it never deals with questions of treason, as those are legal questions. Collusion is not illegal when it does not involve secrecy to commit illegal actions, but it is equal to conspiracy (which is illegal) when it does involve secrecy to commit illegal actions.

So we've been discussing the wrong question. We need to focus on what's relevant for this article. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:18, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

FWIW, the USA & Russia aren't at war with each other, so treason is impossible according to the US Constitution. GoodDay (talk) 03:54, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

What are you going on about? The only person bringing up treason is you.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:08, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: so basically you are saying we should reject RS characterizations of the evidence, and instead make up one that suits the interests and views of some Wikipedia editors? Couldn't we just cite Reuters saying "Ongoing congressional and FBI investigations into Russian interference have so far produced no public evidence that Trump associates colluded with the Russian effort to change the outcome of the election." a mere 2 weeks ago and then we could cite User:BullRangifer by saying "but Wikipedia user Bull Rangifer disagrees with this characterization and says there is oodles of evidence"? Factchecker_atyourservice 14:37, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

No, he's probably saying the same thing as other folks - that we shouldn't base our article on outdated sources, like you're trying to do, and we shouldn't misrepresent reliable sources, like you're trying to do. Can you please strike this nonsense about "a mere 2 weeks ago". It's embarrassing.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:08, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

"Outdated sources" were included just to show you that fact sources have consistently reported the lack of evidence for over a year now. I didn't "misrepresent" any reliable sources. If you think better wording could be used for what the RS's say there is no evidence of, I'm all ears. But I don't see how you can argue that RS fact statements like the following are not saying there's a lack of collusion evidence.
"no clear-cut evidence of "collusion" has been unearthed"
"there is still no public evidence of a direct link between President Trump himself and the Kremlin"
"there is no public evidence at this time that Trump campaign staff directly sought to aid Russian interference efforts"
"There’s no public evidence that Trump is connected to any collusion with Russia to influence the 2016 vote."
Factchecker_atyourservice 17:21, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

So which one of these are from last year? I don't feel like checking again. And none of these say what the proposed text is claiming.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:49, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

These are all fact sources from 2018, and 3 of them are top-drawer. There is also ample admission of lack of evidence in anti-Trump opinion commentary such as the NBC commentators saying "cooperation without collusion is still cooperation". As you can see in my proposed text, there was an expansion tag on the section of commentary saying Trump colluded or that there's evidence of collusion—inviting editors to flesh out that view more extensively rather than trying to eliminate coverage of the contrary view, which has been stated in the reported pages of top papers rather than merely in opinion columns. Factchecker_atyourservice 19:00, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

I see. You're just repeating the same claim made before even though it's already been replied to and debunked. Here let me copy paste my previous comment, rather than waste my time writing it up again:

Take this source. It doesn't actually say "news agencies have reported that there is no public evidence". What is says is "Republicans claim that there is no public evidence." So this is a straight up misrepresentation of a source. The WaPo source is a bit better here but it too uses words like "directly" and is talking about whether Trump advisers "sought to aid" (you don't have to "aid" to "collude", you just need to know and do nothing, or benefit from it).(...) This source is again, being misrepresented. What it says is that Trump himself hasn't been connected. In the very next line it actually explicitly mentions "illegal activity" by "his campaign". Trump not knowing about it is not the same as no evidence it didn't happen.

And so on and so forth. Basically this is a sorry hatchet job - WP:POV and WP:SYNTH.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:03, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Pay attention, it most certainly says that. "That these are the key questions is good news for the Trump administration - an admission that no clear-cut evidence of "collusion" has been unearthed." Factchecker_atyourservice 19:07, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

This long song has a simple refrain. "Evidence" is not the same as "proof". We just keep repeating that after every attempt to shoe-horn some kind of exculpatory OR into the article. And even "proof" comes in many flavors. Chocolate, sugar-free, butterscotch, and lemon chiffon. RS tell us there's a ton of evidence. Whether there's proof is left to the future. SPECIFICO talk 17:27, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

"RS tell us there's a ton of evidence."—if that were true then fact reporting would say so. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:30, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Evidence: [7] Not proof. Proof comes from an argument that builds on and interrelates Evidence. RS tell us there's a ton of evidence. I didn't say to put "ton of evidence" in the article, so we don't need a source for "ton" although I'm sure you could easily find one. SPECIFICO talk 17:33, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

I think given the levels of sniping going on this has gone way beyond constructive and should be closed.Slatersteven (talk) 17:25, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Who is talking about "proof"?? Factchecker_atyourservice 17:35, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Per NYT yesterday, Mueller question for Trump: "What knowledge did you have of any outreach by your campaign, including by Paul Manafort, to Russia about potential assistance to the campaign?" Prior to this disclosure, there had been no publicly available information indicating any such outreach. Now there is. soibangla (talk) 17:31, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

What the actual" quote says "This is one of the most intriguing questions on the list. It is not clear whether Mr. Mueller knows something new, but there is no publicly available information linking Mr. Manafort, the former campaign chairman, to such outreach. So his inclusion here is significant. Mr. Manafort’s longtime colleague, Rick Gates, is cooperating with Mr. Mueller." It is telling they do not say anything other then about Mr Manfort.Slatersteven (talk) 17:36, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

I was not quoting NYT, didn't intend to create that appearance soibangla (talk) 17:40, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

No I know, I think that was my point.Slatersteven (talk) 17:41, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Sources characterize the state of evidence in one very specific way: "there is no public evidence". They do not all use the exact same wording, but they are all clearly talking about the lack of evidence of Trump collusion. Here we have editors wanting to contradict top quality RS characterizations of the evidence because they disagree with it. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:42, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

No, how is saying "they have not said X so we cannot say they have said X" contradictory them, you admit they are not actually saying X. It is your personal interpretation that reads them as saying X, one I disagree with. As I said they (in this instance, and how I interpret it, which is no less valid then your interpretation) knowingly just said Manfort. That is not contradicting them, as it does not say anything that is opposite to what they have in actuality said. But as I said this is just going nowhere and should now be closed.Slatersteven (talk) 17:49, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

My personal interpretation? This is interesting. I think we need to take things slowly, because maybe words don't mean stuff.

""no clear-cut evidence of "collusion" has been unearthed"

What is your personal interpretation of this statement?

My personal interpretation is that it is saying that no clear-cut evidence of collusion has been unearthed.

Factchecker_atyourservice 17:55, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

"No clear cut" means not unambiguously, not non existent. Thus it is saying it is not clear if evidence is available. That is not the same as saying it does not exist.Slatersteven (talk) 18:00, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

"not clear if evidence is available"--no, it's saying the evidence that is available is not clear-cut evidence of collusion--to wit, no clear-cut evidence has been "unearthed". Before moving along I want to make absolutely certain we are on the same page here.

To the extent that Mueller has additional evidence, and he may, it does not change the reported fact that none of the public evidence shows collusion, which is what the news agencies are reporting on, nor does that change the fact that some people have argued the existing evidence shows collusion--which is what users are doing here by piecing together bits of evidence that they think are strong. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:04, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

OK word it like that then, now what did the BBC actually say "That these are the key questions is good news for the Trump administration - an admission that no clear-cut evidence of "collusion" has been unearthed. "We just didn't look hard enough" doesn't carry as venomous a political sting.". So no they are not saying there was no clear cut evidence unearthed, which in context of the above paragraph and the whole section is asking (not saying) the (key there words) question that maybe the reason that the committee said (and note they are saying it was the committee, not the BBC) said they had found no clear cut evidence was they had not really tried.Slatersteven (talk) 18:16, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Slater if you look at my proposed text, I gave very significant coverage to the views arguing that this was not a full investigation. I also went into Schiff's views about the existing evidence, additional non-public evidence, and attempts at deception. Nonetheless as the BBC analyst has put it, no clear evidence has emerged. If you think the summarizing language could be adjusted in a way that you feel would be adequately NPOV that would be helpful, but I don't think it makes sense to just say we can't talk about the news agency summaries of the evidence. Even most of the opinion commentary sources saying Trump probably colluded admit there is no known evidence of it. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:28, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Note that the quoted text I was replying to is from this cite [[8]], which was referred to here [[9]], with that decision to alter what I was replying (after it was made clear that it was being misrepresented) to I am now bowing out. There is no reason to keep this open.Slatersteven (talk) 18:24, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't quite understand what you are accusing me of? I removed an unnecessarily snarky remark from one of my own comments? And I supposedly misrepresented a source? Factchecker_atyourservice 18:30, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrarier break

The story is at least starting to develop though, with some juicy crystal balling from the NYT editorial board explicitly speculating Mueller may know "a great deal more than he's letting on". Although the bulk of the questions relate to obstruction, a couple of them about Manafort and Stone suggest Mueller might have some collusion evidence. It will be very interesting to see whether Trump agrees to answer any or all of them and if he refuses, there's a possibility we may get to hear what evidence there is, although there is also a possibility Mueller will continue to keep it secret and maintain an active investigation. Factchecker_atyourservice 00:45, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

That's really beside the point. The key question is who leaked this document to the press and why and what reaction were they seeking to precipitate. Those are the questions editors ask. SPECIFICO talk 00:59, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Oh lord, you're an editor and I'm not. Very profound Mr. SPECIFICO, and very specific as always. Actually I misremembered, the story didn't say they were leaked, though it seems likely given that the NYT story doesn't say where they got the documents from. At the same time if Mueller were going to "leak" them for some reason he wouldn't want the NYT to say where they got the questions. Factchecker_atyourservice 01:12, 2 May 2018 (UTC) No, you don't seem to understand how, why, and when reporters get their hands on such material and why they publish it. SPECIFICO talk 01:57, 2 May 2018 (UTC) Enlighten me or shut up. Do not tell me what you think about me personally. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:01, 2 May 2018 (UTC) What you understand is your business. I'm just explaining it's incorrect and not a fruitful approach for our jobs here. Not going anywhere useful. SPECIFICO talk 02:07, 2 May 2018 (UTC) Either say why it is incorrect or unfruitful or shut your incorrect, unfruitful mouth. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:09, 2 May 2018 (UTC) I will pray for you on Sunday. Meanwhile, I summarized the issues above. SPECIFICO talk 02:18, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Dossier was one of a series of schemes to frame Trump with colluding with Russia

soapbox, OR, youtube, etc.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Now that we know that the meeting with Natalia Veselnitskaya was a set up. The meeting was arranged by a Clinton associate and Veselnitskaya was given a folder of incriminating information on Democrats by Simpson to take to the meeting. Veselnitskaya met with Simpson again after the meeting. This article gives entirely too much credibility to the dossier. There was no need for the information in the dossier to be accurate. Also need to point out connections of Bruce and Nellie Ohr.Phmoreno (talk) 15:47, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Sources Your suggested edit is?Slatersteven (talk) 15:56, 29 April 2018 (UTC) We don’t know any such thing. And, the section title improperly draws a conclusion, as well as sounding like something out of NewsMax. O3000 (talk) 16:09, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Suggested edit to lede: "The dossier was part of a scheme to make it look like the Trump campaign was working with Russia." New section: "Other Trump-Russia situations related to dossier" discussing Natalia Veselnitskaya meeting with Fusion GPS before and after meeting with Trump Jr. team and the Alfa Bank-Trump server fraud.Phmoreno (talk) 17:41, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Phmoreno, please remember to use the "sources-talk" template, not "reflist". I went ahead and added it under the paragraph that cited sources. Atsme📞📧 17:43, 29 April 2018 (UTC) PS: this is the link to Reuters who broke the story. I'm wondering if maybe this material belongs in the Russia investigation, too? Atsme📞📧 17:55, 29 April 2018 (UTC) I am wondering where the source says "Dossier was one of a series of schemes to frame Trump with colluding with Russia".Slatersteven (talk) 18:00, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Only source I can find is this talk page. O3000 (talk) 18:04, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Oh, everybody knows that. It's obvious. Use your noodle. SPECIFICO talk 18:08, 29 April 2018 (UTC) (edit conflict x2) Absolutely not. Not on your life. The source - NBC - is reliable, but your conclusions from it are not. You said “The meeting was arranged by a Clinton associate” - not in the source and not true. The meeting was actually arranged by Rob Goldstone on behalf of the Agalarovs. You said “Veselnitskaya was given a folder of incriminating information on Democrats by Simpson to take to the meeting” - this is completely invented, not at all what the source says. It says she used information she had gotten from Simpson a year earlier and had given to the Russian prosecutor general at that time. Simpson and Fusion say they were unaware of the Trump Tower meeting and had no idea she would be sharing anything she had learned from them. You claim "The dossier was part of" this alleged scheme. Not true. The source actually confirms that Fusion's work on the dossier was entirely separate from the two-years-earlier work that involved her. You claim she discussed the meeting with Fusion before and after it happened. That is flatly contradicted by your source. Note that Veselnitskaya’s story has evolved over time. In July 2017, she said “I never had any damaging or sensitive information about Hillary Clinton. It was never my intention to have that.” In August she said that actually she did turn over information about Clinton political contributions that she thought was damaging. In this article, from November, she says she turned over information about tax evasion and donations to Democrats. In this article she says she worked with the prosecutor to confirm the information at the time she gave it to him, but insists she did not discuss the Trump Tower meeting with the prosecutor or his office before it happened. But in setting up the meeting, Goldstone said the information she would bring was coming from the prosecutor. Please don't waste our time with this kind of stuff. Your proposals are either completely unsupported, or supported only by your own misreading of sources. --MelanieN (talk) 18:01, 29 April 2018 (UTC) I've not finished adding sources and apologize for posting what I did ahead of a scheduled appointment. Will pick up on this later.Phmoreno (talk) 18:28, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Analysis from a few months later does talk about issues Phmoreno at least references issues which may not be in the sources he cited, though offhand the sources making the specific accusation of handing the folder did not look good. NYT mentions that Simpson the Fusion GPS guy met with Veselnitskaya on the day of the meeting both before and after the meeting, though Simpson's lawyer claims those contacts were totally coincidental and was actually related to Simpson's smear campaign against a Kremlin enemy, an ally of Sergei Magnitsky.: That's a pretty airtight alibi, right? He wasn't there to help implement a Trump sting operation, he was there because of his work helping Putin undermine the US government and providing a cover story for Russia's abuse of the Interpol criminal referral system to get an enemy temporarily barred from entering the US. According to that Magnitsky ally: "'He’s a professional smear campaigner and liar for money,' Mr. Browder said of Mr. Simpson. 'The credibility of anything that he does is in question.'" Of that involvement NPR said: "For other critics, the Simpson transcript includes a reminder about his potentially conflicting incentives: Fusion GPS has also done work for a law firm that represented the Russian company Prevezon Holdings. Prevezon's lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, was also present at the 2016 Trump Tower meeting. Fusion GPS has told the Washington Post that it 'had no prior knowledge' of that meeting and denied any involvement." And news reports did focus on a "plastic folder" containing the information which, admittedly, came from Fusion, though as I said they don't actually suggest Simpson passed it to her, with that claim being in other sources that may not pass muster. For what it's worth the NPR source has some extensive verbiage laying out the arguments about Republicans attacking the dossier as a tactical move and I have no argument reflecting material like that although I believe that POV is already pretty well put in the article.Factchecker_atyourservice 18:50, 29 April 2018 (UTC) We go wot what RS say, not what we infer. Do any RS explicitly say what the OP is suggesting?Slatersteven (talk) 19:15, 29 April 2018 (UTC) The claim about the folder changing hands and meeting arrangement, no. I have no idea what sourcing Phmoreno means to add later. There may be other worthwhile things to discuss though, such as the questions and conflicts re: Simpson, the fact that the guy who arranged the Trump Tower meeting thinks the Clinton dirt was just a pretext to get Trump Jr. in the room so they could lobby him on unrelated issues. Factchecker_atyourservice 19:27, 29 April 2018 (UTC) I brought this up is because in an interview broadcast yesterday Devin Numes discussed his suspicions of the meetings with Fusion GPS and Veselnitskaya before and after the Trump Tower meeting. I had previously read several sources discussing this meeting, but the most incriminating one involving a Clinton associate participating in the arrangement was the weakest. The House Intel Committee discussion of the events surrounding the meeting are on page 88 of the committee report. Veselnitskaya was given (redacted) information for the meeting by Fusion. Both Fusion GPS and Veselnitskaya are on record denying they discussed the Trump Tower meeting. They were together at a court case involving a separate matter before the meeting. I have discussed the Trump server-Alfa Bank here before. It was a planted news story pushed by a Clinton supporter that struck me as being fake at the time. Sara Carter and John Solomon covered Alfa Bank's investigation, which suspected fraud and asked the DOJ to get involved. Phmoreno (talk) 21:13, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Sources Phmoreno...let it incubate. Que sera, sera. WP has no deadlines. Atsme📞📧 21:21, 29 April 2018 (UTC) HAHAHA! That's all. Just...HAHAHA! soibangla (talk) 22:18, 29 April 2018 (UTC) I'm guessing Mueller probably has had collusion evidence for a long time, but he hasn't made a report to Congress yet because reasons. Factchecker_atyourservice 22:30, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Lorty, I hope the Mueller report doesn't come out at the same time as the IG report. It's likely to get a bit western. 🤠 Atsme📞📧 02:04, 30 April 2018 (UTC) Two significant stories: The George Papadopoulos spy trap and contractors accessing the intelligence database possibly including CrowdStrike and Fusion GPS. Digenova's interview is related to Section 6 of the Desantis Letter referring FBI and DOJ officials for investigation.Phmoreno (talk) 14:37, 12 May 2018 (UTC) Phmoreno, please stop posting unreliable sources here (and filling your mind with them). disobedientmedia and Daily Caller are not RS. desantis.house.gov is a primary source. You can't use it unless part of it is quoted in a RS. Otherwise you're performing OR. Keep in mind that the GOP coverage (such as anything from Nunes) of this is not intended to find out what really happened, but is intended to run interference for Trump and carry water for Russia. They are seeking to undermine (obstruction of justice) a legitimate investigation. What are they afraid of? BTW, there was no FISA abuse. Carter Page (read his article) had been under surveillance, using a FISA warrant, since 2014, because of proven contacts with Russian agents. His FISA warrants were renewed three times by people (Republicans) appointed by Trump because evidence justified suspicions of possible wrongdoing. All proper. Read this section of our article too. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:33, 12 May 2018 (UTC) Sources

Luke Harding and "Collusion"

This edit was removed because "Undue, claim published in sensational book, largely ignored in reputable media and it's not even about the dossier"

• The book, "Collusion," was a #1 NYT bestseller published by a major publishing house; excerpted on a major politics site; discussed on nationwide radio and in serious policy magazine.

• The author, also cited in four other places in this article, appears serious and reputable, rather than a sensationalist

• The book/edit asserts Russia's interest in Trump dates back to at least 1987, perhaps even 1977, and this buttresses the assertions made in the dossier that Russia had been actively cultivating him for "at least" five years.

I suggest the edit should remain in the article. soibangla (talk) 21:35, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

"Collusion: Secret Meetings, Dirty Money, and How Russia Helped Donald Trump Win" is not a book of sensational claims? What do we make of the fact that the author isn't reserving judgment, like typical facts sources do, but instead tries to persuade the reader that Trump colluded? Biased sources are supposed to be used with caution—if at all. If this claim is important and/or credible, why isn't it widely reported? Factchecker_atyourservice 22:11, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Books by their nature can be more detailed than website and newspaper articles, but the other parts raised are good. --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 22:26, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Can you cite specific "sensational" items in the book? If you think these topics haven't been widely reported, I suggest you read Special Counsel investigation (2017–present) thoroughly. There were secret meetings, there are numerous indications of dirty money, and the CIA has concluded in a secret assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win the presidency. soibangla (talk) 00:54, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

This is all a red herring, because the source is the article, not the book, although it's also in the book. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:21, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

@Soibangla: the specific sensational allegation we are talking about right now is a perfectly good example so I don't know why you are demanding others. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:38, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Looks like @BullRangifer: removed it here citing "Restoring longstanding content is okay, per NeilN's interpretation of DS. Deletion of that is then not OK. Deal with this on the talk page." I assume BullRangifer means that he is challenging the removable of material and warning others not to restore unless consensus on talk is reached? If that is the case what is your rational for restoring the material? PackMecEng (talk) 02:50, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

It's the other way around. It was long-standing content, so I restored it. According to the clarification NeilN provided in response to your query, it would violate DS restrictions to delete it again without consensus.

The idea is to promote article stability, so we should leave such content in place and seek to improve it as described at WP:PRESERVE (fix, rather than delete). When we have reached a consensus version, we can then replace the existing content with the improved version, if there is any consensus to even change it. I hope I've got that right! -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:27, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Yeah that is kind of what I thought you did. You have it wrong in your understanding. Please check this discussion on his talk page. "If someone removes long-standing material and someone restores it then it should not be removed again without consensus." That is not the same as don't remove long-standing material at all without consensus. Did you have another reason for the restoration besides it was long-standing? Also pinging @NeilN: since your ping was not done correctly. PackMecEng (talk) 03:37, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

That was a previous misunderstanding, one I have not repeated here.

My reason was to promote stability and prevent gutting of the article, one section at a time. The edit summary seemed to use spurious excuses which would need much further explanation before I'll accept them. The discussion section below is for that. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:27, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Okay so because you did not believe the edit summery? PackMecEng (talk) 12:59, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

That's an oversimplification. I obviously believe it's good content. The dossier speaks of things which started before it was written, and Harding adds more history to that information in the context of what is in the dossier. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:25, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

I like simple, gets right to the root of the problem with little fuss. I am just trying to nail down the objection so we can correct it. PackMecEng (talk) 15:22, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

So do you plan on posting a rational yet? PackMecEng (talk) 13:32, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

No good reason for deletion has been provided. I've already explained why it's a nice addition. It provides historical context for the dossier's allegation. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:42, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

This thread is all a red herring, because the source is the article, not the book, although it's also in the book. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:23, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Possible earlier interest in Trump

The "Possible earlier interest in Trump" section needs a better location, as it's not strictly part of the allegations. Any ideas? Can it be incorporated into an existing section? It's only one paragraph. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:41, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

• Bumped from above as it's relevant here. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:34, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Closed.

PLEASE USE DISCUSSION SECTION BELOW.

Immediately before the current content, we find this tie-in to the dossier

"Trump's first visit to Soviet Moscow in 1987 looks, with hindsight, to be part of a pattern. The dossier by the former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele asserts that the Kremlin had been cultivating Trump for “at least five years” before his stunning victory in the 2016 US presidential election. This would take us back to around 2011 or 2012."

Sources

Current content

Possible earlier interest in Trump

Although the dossier alleged in June 2016 that the Kremlin had been cultivating Trump for "at least five years", Harding wrote that the Soviet Union had been interested in him since 1987. In his book Collusion, Harding asserts that the "top level of the Soviet diplomatic service arranged his 1987 Moscow visit. With assistance from the KGB." Then-KGB head Vladimir Kryuchkov "wanted KGB staff abroad to recruit more Americans." Harding proceeds to describe the KGB's cultivation process, and posits that they may have opened a file on Trump as early as 1977, when he had married Czech model Ivana Zelníčková; the Soviet spies may have closely observed and analyzed the couple from that time on.

Sources

Discussion about Harding content

BR, the concern over adding material that pre-dates the dossier is two-fold:

1. It's OR because of the assumption of a connection with the dossier and any prior interest in Trump. Our job is not to solve mysteries.
2. The key collusion allegations in the dossier are still unsubstantiated. If something substantial is proven, there will be a timeline trail to all kinds of material to draw from in RS. Their investigative reporters will put the pieces together, and publish factual evidence. Is from the latter that editors can build an article. The allegations must first move beyond speculation to become corrobated and confirmed. ^{Atsme📞📧} 04:07, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

1. Maybe you're thinking of a SYNTH violation? That's always a danger, but Harding ties this together as part of a pattern. The question of Putin cultivating Trump is part of the dossier, and Harding, who has written a whole book dedicated to the dossier and related Trump-Russia matters, shows how the Russians didn't start this cultivation in about 2011, but probably much earlier. This is why this content is attributed to Harding. It's not our ideas, but his. He's an expert on this subject.
2. Irrelevant here. We document what RS say. That's our job. We don't wait til the investigation is finished. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:17, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Note: The article, not book, is the actual source. Since it refers to the book, that source is provided, a practice we often follow when a secondary sources refers to, or quotes from, a primary source. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:22, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

See WP:OR - This includes any analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources. To demonstrate that you are not adding OR, you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and directly support the material being presented. ^{Atsme📞📧} 04:45, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

It's Harding's OR and SYNTH, which is okay. It's attributed to him. It's about a subject in the dossier, written after the dossier was published, and he ties it directly to that content. Your dispute is with him. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:59, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Under WP:EXCEPTIONAL, this should be cited to multiple high quality secondary sources, not a single guy trying to make money by presenting speculative claims as established fact without reserving judgment. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:30, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

There is nothing exceptional about describing what is commonly known practice in the USSR and modern day Russia. It would be "exceptional" if this didn't happen to Trump and Ivana, and later just to Trump. It's presented as his opinion as a subject expert. If that isn't clear enough, we could add qualifiers to make it even more clear that it's his opinion. The idea is to improve content, not delete it. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:34, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: This is an WP:INCOMPETENT response.

First, the current president is alleged to have been cultivated by the Soviets for 30 years. The claim is "exceptional" in the plain English sense.

Second, more importantly, if you actually read the WP:EXCEPTIONAL policy, then you'll see that any "APPARENTLY IMPORTANT" claim falls under "exceptional".

Obvious misinterpretation of both English words and WP policies are not constructive. Factchecker_atyourservice 13:53, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

• Second, more detailed version is better - it should be included. Yes, it is precisely the point by the author that influencing elections in other countries is nothing exceptional for the USSR and Russia (USA influenced elections in other countries as well). How successful they were in doing this is another question. My very best wishes (talk) 12:14, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

The "Second, more detailed version is better" violates WP:V Factchecker_atyourservice 13:54, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

How exactly 2nd version violates WP:V? The text is sourced to the book, with direct quotation. Moreover, this is very clearly attributed to the book by the notable author. My very best wishes (talk) 14:09, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

How about waiting until Mueller and his team actually determine collusion - and even if there was, guess what - it's not a crime so why obsess over it? This whole ordeal sorta reminds me of the chem trail conspiracies and other batpoop crazy theories that allowed conspiracy theorists to make money writing books - none of claims proven...Kennedy assassination comes to mind, 9-11 comes to mind...and so on. Here's an idea - create an article about the book. ^{Atsme📞📧} 14:18, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

But the text in question does not tell anything about actual collusion. The book by Luke Harding qualify as a secondary WP:RS by any reasonable standard. What you say is your personal opinion. My very best wishes (talk) 14:31, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@My very best wishes: it violates WP:V in exactly the way I just described in the talk page section you're replying to—by sourcing a WP:EXCEPTIONAL / WP:REDFLAG claim only to a single source with an apparent conflict of interest, when that policy says such claims should be sourced to multiple high-quality reliable sources, and that we should avoid taking disputed claims from sources with an apparent conflict of interest. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:26, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Once again, this is not an exceptional claim. What "conflict of interest"? My very best wishes (talk) 14:31, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Just curious...how is it not an exceptional claim? ^{Atsme📞📧} 14:33, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Forget "exceptional", that is just the word that fringe editors fixate on in order to claim that nothing's "exceptional" if they think it is true. What the policy actually says is that any "APPARENTLY IMPORTANT" claim is covered.

@My very best wishes: If you bother to read what the policy says you'll see it points out that "Sources that may have interests other than professional considerations in the matter being reported are considered to be conflicted sources."

Unlike journalists, who don't have an interest in the outcome, simply report facts and avoid reporting anything that can't be substantiated, a guy writing a TRUMP IS GUILTY book has an interest in the outcome, wants to persuade readers that Trump is guilty. The same would not be true of Harding's Guardian columns. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:41, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Authors of almost every book have positions/opinions on a number of subjects. These positions are usually based on results their research. It is not uncommon that some of them emphasize main idea of the book in the title (this is actually a good practice). That does NOT invalidate any secondary sources. Was the author a reputable journalist, known for his research and fact checking? Only that is relevant. And he is definitely a reputable journalist. My very best wishes (talk) 15:13, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I didn't say he "has views" I said he is not reserving judgment like a fact reporter. Instead, he is trying to convince readers his speculation is correct. Moreover he has a financial interest in selling these claims rather than reporting impartially on them. It very clearly falls under the footnote on sources with a conflict of interest. More importantly, once again, this claim has been ignored by other sources. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:25, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Every author wants to sell his book. This does not invalidate any sources. Now, speaking about your question (the "exceptional claim"), are you familiar with the literature about KGB operations? My very best wishes (talk) 15:45, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, actually it means that sources not written in a disinterested tone are not treated the same as other sources, certainly they are not treated as neutral fact sources.

Your supposed expertise on "the literature about KGB operations" is irrelevant. If it is claimed that the president was cultivated by the Soviets for 30 years, that claim is "important" and thus the policy applies. QED, with nothing left for you to argue about. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:15, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I am not an expert in this. I simply asked what do you know. How can you claim that something was "exceptional" if you are not familiar with the subject? Do you know about Urho Kekkonen, for example? My very best wishes (talk) 17:02, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Your argument and questions make no sense. The claim is that the president was cultivated by the Soviets for 30 years. It is an "apparently important" claim. The clear language of the policy applies. QED. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:21, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I think you do not understand the policy. The "exceptional claims" (aka fringe claims) are those "that are contradicted by the prevailing view within the relevant community, or that would significantly alter mainstream assumptions, especially in science, medicine, history...". In that case, the mainstream views would be not YOUR views, but views from the books by historians on the subject of KGB operations. My very best wishes (talk) 17:30, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

You obviously cannot read WP:EXCEPTIONAL. The quote you quoted is one bullet item in a list. The list is a list of different red flags. You quoted one of them. It's the fourth one in a list of four. The ones I was citing are the first two ones in the list of four. Again, the claim was largely ignored. It was made only by Luke Harding and he appeared on an interview show talking about it. That's about it. If anything, it merits a brief sentence saying that Luke Harding has asserted this in his book, and we should give the title of the book so the reader understands it is not being presented by the source as a verified factual claim, the way it would be if a newspaper were presenting it as fact in its own voice.

Moreover, the claim that Trump was cultivated by Soviets for 30 years is important even if the KGB did not use special super sekret spy craft to do it. None of what you are saying makes sense. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:44, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

"Your" version (on the left (here) makes an incorrect summary of the source. I can agree that version by BR could be probably summarized more briefly or rephrased (but not as you did). But there is nothing extraordinary in this claim. Do not you know that almost every important Western businessman or politician who came to the USSR was considered a potential subject of recruitment? It only mattered if he was of any interest for the KGB. When the foreigner applied for the Soviet visa, his documents went to a KGB officer who decided if the foreigner was "a person of interest" for potential recruitment. This is actually a trivial information. My very best wishes (talk) 18:04, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

It is quite very very very very very very very very very obviously not "trivial information" if it is being presented as contributing evidence of a plot of collusion or criminal freaking conspiracy with the Russians mmmk? How do you think I gave an "incorrect" summary of the source? Factchecker_atyourservice 18:26, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

So, here is a summary article by Luke Harding published in Politico. This is the book. Harding makes references to a number of sources, including Natalia Dubinina, a daughter of Soviet ambassador Yuri Dubinin, and opinions by experts. This is not a "speculation", but an investigation and analysis by a notable journalist. How exactly this should be included is debatable. If you have a text alternative to suggestion by BR, you can post it here for discussion. As for the "trivial", well, if you do not trust me, please read the comments by Victor Suvorov cited by Harding (first link above). My very best wishes (talk) 18:46, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

You are missing the point. I am not saying it is unusual Soviet intelligence practice. IF IT POTENTIALLY HELPS TO IMPLICATE THE PRESIDENT OF COLLUSION THEN IT IS IMPORTANT. There is simply no way to dispute this so please stop.

I didn't say the book wasn't based on research and claims, I said it is speculation because it purports to offer conclusions about things which are not known. This is why the title of the book is, essentially, TRUMP TOTALLY COLLUDED, PEOPLE—which is totally unlike any repuable fact sourcing. This is an opinion source.

The proposed text is the exact proposed text which you removed. If you think it is "inaccurate", say why. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:54, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I am sorry, but you are the only one on this page who repeatedly tells about "COLLUSION". Once again, please suggest an alternative text based on the sources above.My very best wishes (talk) 19:06, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I have no idea what you just said. The alternative text I proposed is the one you deleted. Factchecker_atyourservice 19:14, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Then post it here for discussion and wait for comments by other contributors. My very best wishes (talk) 19:23, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I disagree with your position, MVBW, but appreciate your input as well as Factchecker's and for giving us a chance to evaluate what you've both presented. It's time for the back and forth to end, and call an RfC for whatever it is that is proposed for inclusion/deletion. ^{Atsme📞📧} 23:00, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Harding's KGB speculation irrelevant to Steele dossier

Howdy y'all, back from wikibreak! I was about to delete the blurb enshrining Harding's KGB speculation, but I saw this recent discussion and refrained from bold action. Let us remember that the topic of this article is the Steele dossier, which was compiled in 2016, and only alludes in passing to potential "cultivation" of Trump by Russia over several years, ostensibly since he set up the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow, and perhaps a couple years earlier as he was exploring real estate projects in Russia. Harding further speculates in his book that the KGB may have kept tabs on Trump and his Czech wife in Soviet times. Well, sure, that may be the case, but it's extremely speculative to link the alleged 5-year-old "cultivation" of Trump to an alleged 30-year-old KGB file; the latter, if it existed, may just as well have been routine vetting of visitors to the Soviet Union. Whatever we think of the likelihood of a link, this paragraph strikes me as woefully WP:UNDUE in an article about the Steele dossier. @BullRangifer, Atsme, Emir of Wikipedia, Factchecker atyourservice, My very best wishes, NeilN, PackMecEng, and Soibangla: would you agree to delete this? Bearing in mind that extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence (part of our core WP:Verifiability policy), did anybody else than Harding independently make that claim? (aside from articles citing Harding, naturally) — JFG ^talk 10:27, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

And it's "extraordinary" cause why? SPECIFICO talk 11:35, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Keep. This is precisely on the subject of the page. This is also not a speculation and not an extraordinary claim, but something pretty much obvious for anyone familiar with the history of KGB operations (like Harding). This is a conclusion by a notable journalist and a result of his analysis and investigation. This should stay, as has been already discussion above. My very best wishes (talk) 13:21, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

@My very best wishes: I object to your characterization that the text reflects a conclusion by Harding. In the cited book excerpt, Harding himself admits that he is only speculating:

• "When did the KGB open a file on Donald Trump? We don’t know,"
• "At this point it is unclear how the KGB regarded Trump."
• "Dubinin wouldn’t have answered to the KGB. And his role wasn’t formally an intelligence one."
• "Dubinin’s invitation to Trump to visit Moscow looks like a classic cultivation exercise, which would have had the KGB’s full support and approval." (emphasis on conditionals indicating speculation)
• "That July the Soviet press wrote enthusiastically about the visit of a foreign celebrity. This was Gabriel García Márquez, the Nobel Prize–winning novelist and journalist. […] Trump’s visit appears to have attracted less attention. There is no mention of him in Moscow’s Russian State Library newspaper archive. […] The KGB’s private dossier on Trump, by contrast, would have gotten larger. The agency’s multipage profile would have been enriched with fresh material, including anything gleaned via eavesdropping.
• "Nothing came of the trip—at least nothing in terms of business opportunities inside Russia. This pattern of failure would be repeated in Trump’s subsequent trips to Moscow."

In summary, nothing there, and especially nothing remotely connected to the Steele dossier 30 years later. — JFG ^talk 21:14, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

• No, I think you are mistaken. Here is article by Harding, and he tells: Trump's first visit to Soviet Moscow in 1987 looks, with hindsight, to be part of a pattern. The dossier by the former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele asserts that the Kremlin had been cultivating Trump for “at least five years” before his stunning victory in the 2016 US presidential election. This would take us back to around 2011 or 2012. So, the author makes a direct connection to this dossier. Reading the source further, one can see that Harding indeed tells about Dubinin and many other things to justify his conclusion. Of course one can call it not "conclusion", but "view", "assertion", "claim", whatever, but it does not change anything. As an additional note, I think BullRangifer make an excellent work with sources here. My very best wishes (talk) 21:27, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Certainly BR did a great job dissecting sources, and I helped. You and me are quoting the exact same article by Harding. If you go beyond the first few paragraphs, you will see that everything I quoted demonstrates that he is speculating. He says, in summary, "Steele alleges cultivation of Trump by the Kremlin since 2011, and Dubinin invited Trump to Moscow in 1987, therefore it's a pattern." A bit light indeed. And to repeat my earlier question, can you cite anybody else than Harding who connects the Steele allegations to KGB practices in the 1980s? — JFG ^talk 22:00, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

"can you cite anybody else"? Meaning earlier than 5 years prior to the elections? Well, there was obviously something like this about connections with "Felix Sater, a felon with ties to Russian organized crime" [10] in 2005. And the claims about "cultivation" appear in a number of sources [11], [12]. This is not just a single RS, but it was repeated many times, even by RT Russia (obviously, RT said that was only a "speculation", pretty much like you say...). My very best wishes (talk) 03:07, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, let's see what we have: WaPo talks about real estate plans that never happened, and does not allege that Sater was connected to the Soviet KGB, or that the Russian government entertained any cultivation of Trump; the only mention of the Kremlin is Putin calling Trump "colorful" in 2015 when questioned about his presidential bid, and agreeing that improving US–Russia relations would be good. NYT is an opinion piece that largely cites Harding ("I mostly forgot about these reports until I read Luke Harding’s new book"). NPR and US News are just repeating what Harding wrote. Again, Harding looks like the only source for this speculation, as his writings were echoed all across the press (as you noted, even RT, hah!). In any case, there is nothing relevant to the subject matter of this article, i.e. the Steele Dossier. — JFG ^talk 05:40, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

That material was not included by me. You asked for my opinion (by pinging), and I am telling that the claim was published in multiple RS, starting from the book, by a notable and highly professional journalist, and that the wording on the page is careful and neutral. My very best wishes (talk) 14:58, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

JFG, you're saying too many things that just are not true and that are evidently not true to anyone who has read the sources. It's a waste of time unless you have views you can support with RS references. These are not the fine points you're getting wrong. These are the big bones. SPECIFICO talk 21:42, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

You make some good points. Vague claims of potential this or that mean very little. I would classify it as an extraordinary claim for obvious reasons. I would be fine with removing the section. PackMecEng (talk) 13:45, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Delete - it's the stuff conspiracy theory style books comprise - speculation and unsubstantiated allegations - the latter being the only commonality or relevance to the dossier. ^{Atsme📞📧} 13:51, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

There is nothing extraordinary about it. It would be highly unusual, dare we say impossible, that this hadn't happened, especially with such a high profile person. It was routine intelligence gathering in the typical style in the USSR, and only later became even more pertinent and useful when he voiced wanting to become president, and planning, with Russians, his plan to run for the presidency in 2016, something he didn't share with the American people at the time. It was their plan, and only a few Russians knew, and unfortunately for Trump, seen with hindsight, they publicly mentioned how they knew of the plans and expressed how they'd support him. Now those expressions are evidence that something was indeed brewing in Russian that was kept from the view of Americans. The cultivation occurred at several levels, from the government, intelligence gathering angle, and also from personal friendships. Wealthy friendships are not limited by country borders. Now we're learning that the cultivation occurred with the NRA as well, and for some time Russia has been exploiting that angle, and ended up funneling illegal monies to the Trump campaign through them. What a tangled web. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:21, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

The extraordinary claim is cultivation in general and that it was specifically targeting Trump vs what they did to everyone. Basically it's a bunch of paranoid nonsense that has no value, and the article text should be removed as well. PackMecEng (talk) 14:30, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Now that is a very extraordinary claim. I'll stick with RS and a renowned subject expert. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:49, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Really? And what did the Russians want with Trump then? They admired his smooth command of language? They wanted to purchase steaks? It would be extraordinary if they did not cultivate him, as they have done with thousands of Americans. In Trump's case he took the bait, apparently. SPECIFICO talk 14:54, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps, is the steak any good? My point is it goes to far to say they targeted him for someone special as opposed to as you say the thousands of Americans they looked into. It presents the situation as much more than it really was. PackMecEng (talk) 15:04, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

In the beginning it was just the standard practice. It only became "more" when he expressed political ambitions, and especially so when he started getting help toward that end. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:20, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

See that sounds like guesswork that would be almost impossible to prove. I would still like to know if the steaks are any good though. PackMecEng (talk) 15:24, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Trump's physicians all say they're nice and lean, but... you be the judge. BR has it correct. It's like fishing. Trump responded, they tailored the approach, they learned his proclivities, then when he became financially needy they turned the screws. This is all well-documented in RS. SPECIFICO talk 15:29, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

@SPECIFICO: "This is all well-documented in RS." — I hate to lecture a supposed D. Phil. on basic logic, but if that were true then we wouldn't be arguing about the fact that Harding is the only source for this speculation. Factchecker_atyourservice 19:08, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

We are soapboxing now, please stop, all of you.Slatersteven (talk) 14:55, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Synth of "possible confirmations of collusion"

I get that people don't like RS fact coverage summarizing the lack of public evidence, but at least don't use SYNTH stringing crap together to show "possible confirmations of collusion" when there is plenty of top quality sourcing that says what the Mueller questions mean regarding the collusion claims. User:Soibangla please immediately revert this badly written prose that is not supported by consensus. Factchecker_atyourservice 20:14, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I haven't edited this article up to this point as it is such a tangled web of accusations, intrigue, and so much at play here. Soibangla: I removed the content that Factchecker_atyourservice is referencing[13]. Discussion is almost certainly necessary for this kind of material, for the reasons stated by FCAYS, and also I think we may have a BLP problem with some of this, due to the largely debunked nature of the wild claims in the Hillary Clinton-DNC dossier (which I personally feel is a far more apt name, considering the genesis of the funding and purpose for its commission). Taking the advice of other editors, I'd be much more comfortable if we could be quite careful and be sure we all agree this is something that should go into the article. Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 21:00, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

"the largely debunked nature of the wild claims in the Hillary Clinton-DNC dossier (which I personally feel is a far more apt name, considering the genesis of the funding and purpose for its commission" suggests WP:IDONTLIKEIT to me. Cheers. soibangla (talk) 21:08, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Well you got me there! I personally don't like the article title. I don't think Wikipedia articles should be in the habit of supporting false and outrageous allegations in a dossier compiled by political opponents. But the material does seem in violation of WP:SYNTH to me. Congress hasn't found any evidence of "collusion," and neither has anyone else as far as I'm aware. I do believe a congressman of California named Adam Schiff has claimed to have the evidence, but has not communicated what that evidence is as of today. Until we have multiple reliable sources stating that it's possible that "collusion" has been confirmed, I think we should exercise more caution before putting this material into the article (and not just one of Trump's sons being scammed into meeting with someone who claimed to have "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, who in fact did not). Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 21:15, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

"one of Trump's sons being scammed into meeting" = "Hannity rules!" soibangla (talk) 21:22, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Despite my edit summary, "possible confirmations of collusion" does not appear in the edit. What appears in the edit are three indications of investigators suspecting coordination, soliciting assistance and outreach by Trump associates. soibangla (talk) 21:19, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm sorry, Soibangla, but if you have no interest in defending the material that you added into the article, I think we are done here. I would also like to point out that this page is subject to active arbitration remedies, and incivility/assuming bad faith (which making snide remarks about other editors basing their views on what Sean Hannity says certainly qualifies) is not permitted. Please don't take disagreements personally and let's keep a collegial atmosphere, here. Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 21:32, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

You just responded to my initial defense of the edit. I posted the edit, it was challenged, it is now here for consensus. I concur that you and I are done here. Cheers. soibangla (talk) 21:37, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

The problems are clear. There is no reason to stitch together two CNN sources from 12 and 7 months ago alongside a NYT piece that came out 2 days ago. As I said, there is plenty of coverage where a single source will summarize the significance of these questions and the new collusion evidence they possibly point to. Thus no need for SYNTH using the 2 old CNN sources to explain the significance of the NYT source. Factchecker_atyourservice 22:27, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

The fact the CNN articles are dated is irrelevant, perhaps they should have been here all along but were overlooked, and now we've caught up. These things happen sometimes. Again, despite my edit summary, the actual edit is not SYNTH. And if you think my prose sucks, the solution is to fix it, rather than to use it as a "pile-on" excuse to challenge/remove. soibangla (talk) 22:36, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

All of you - WP:NOTAFORUM. Another useless section.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:38, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I suggest there are some who seek to prevail with their POV here simply by gaslighting others into exhaustion with diversions and tortured, impenetrable verbosity. There oughta be a law against that. soibangla (talk) 22:49, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Respectfully, User:soibangla, I posted a modest thread nearly a month ago asking why (1) the article was sourced so very heavily to 2 Guardian journalists and a newbie writer at Business Insider who have all given emphasis to claims that have been widely ignored, one of whom actually published a book declaring that Trump colluded to steal the election which is treated as a straight fact source for whatever reason; (2) why didn't we rely more heavily on top US news sources; (3) why would we use crappy sources at all (Paste, a Cosmo sex writer, etc.;) (4) why did it so aggressively ignore commentary casting doubt on the dossier.

This comment was not long or difficult to read, but it went totally ignored, I posted a slightly more detailed account and still essentially ignored, as did a couple of much longer posts which were complained about as both too long and not detailed enough, with one user going on for quite some time about a dubious "inability" to find a particular source that was referenced, meanwhile User:BullRangifer totally coincidentally began composing what blossomed into an insanely long and detailed diatribe which, while making some coherent references to some sources, in essence said, everybody who disagrees with anything on Trump articles is an Infowars reading dupe slave to Trump and Putin who not only supports him but also thrallishly believes things he says. It has not helped that he actually edits Wikipedia articles using this perspective, and it's a somewhat ironic stance for someone who maintains Twitter and Facebook accounts replete with references to progressive social activism and--at least by appearance--using Wikipedia to promote progressive views, as well as at least one direct reference to User:SPECIFICO, raising the troubling possibility that their tag-teamish like abuse is (possibly) being coordinated via DMs off-Wiki.

In essence, the message was, shut up, you're a troll who reads Russian propaganda, it's not our job to reflect your views, go find sources if you disagree.

When I came back with sourced content, which I boldly added to an important subsection that for whatever reason was pointlessly dead, I didn't expect it to go totally unchallenged but I did not seriously think editors would be reverting it. I thought people would be arguing about wording and talking about more sources that needed to be added. There was plenty of room for expansion and I specifically put an "expand" tag in the commentary-saying-collusion-likely section inviting editors to do just that. Moreover, the content was detailed and footnote-quoted enough that I don't see what shepherding of discussion I was needed to do at this point. The material pretty much speaks for itself, it is not convoluted or subtle.

Finally, I certainly did not expect that the abusive users would actually double down on their abusive chatter, scurrying off to user talk to continue talking about me with references to my supposed partisan delusions and consumption of "junk sources in real life", and, worse, floating blocks, indef blocks, and topic bans for the crime of talking about these sources and throwing salt back when it's thrown my way.

In any event, I really do not see the harm in reflecting something that has been reported in top fact reporting sources, consistently and with little variation, starting last winter, and there has got to be allowance for the well-sourced and reputable commentary arguing against the dossier and collusion claims. Factchecker_atyourservice 00:05, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

At some point you need to realize that continued attacks and claims of victimization on article TPs and various editor TPs are not conducive to creating consensus. Respectfully, at this point I think you are your own worst enemy. I suggest you develop a new tack. O3000 (talk) 00:21, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Surely we shouldn't talk about sources at any point. Let's talk more about my ignorant troll perspective? A month of that is not enough. More essays perhaps? Factchecker_atyourservice 00:26, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

I just goofed and restored a deletion of a large amount of content. The total number of bytes fooled me. I now see it was a combination of two of Soibangla's additions added a few hours ago, in fact the subject of this thread. My bad. I have therefore self-reverted. Carry on, as consensus is needed to restore this content. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:20, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Actually, I think that was an OK edit by Soibangla, and it can/should be included, possibly after minor editing. Also, no reasonable rationale for excluding it was provided above. This is merely a summary of content currently on the page, not WP:SYNTH. My very best wishes (talk) 14:13, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

I agree with User:My very best wishes that "no reasonable rationale for excluding it was provided above." Would others like to provide reasonable rationale or should the edit be restored? soibangla (talk) 19:01, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Hello? *tap tap* — Is this thing on?

PROPOSAL: Prepend two sentences and restore this edit:

The New York Times reported on February 14, 2017, that phone records and communications intercepts showed that Trump associates — including members of the Trump campaign — had "repeated contacts" with senior Russian intelligence officials during the 2016 campaign. Paul Manafort was the only Trump associate who was specifically identified as participating in these communications. CNN reported on March 23, 2017 that the FBI was examining "human intelligence, travel, business and phone records and accounts of in-person meetings" indicating that Trump associates may have coordinated with "suspected Russian operatives" to release damaging information about the Hillary Clinton campaign. CNN reported on September 19, 2017 that Manafort had been a target of a FISA wiretap both before and after the 2016 election, extending into early 2017. Some of the intercepted communications raised concerns among investigators that Manafort had solicited assistance from Russians for the campaign, although the evidence was reportedly inconclusive. On April 30, 2018 The New York Times published a list of interview questions for Trump that the Mueller investigation had provided to the president's attorneys. Among the questions was, "What knowledge did you have of any outreach by your campaign, including by Paul Manafort, to Russia about potential assistance to the campaign?"

soibangla (talk) 17:47, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Mueller's leaked wish list of interview questions is a great example of why high quality RS coverage of article subject matter can be encyclopedic even when it is recent. The list of questions Mueller wants to ask Trump is significant even though we don't know what questions he'll actually ask, and certainly we know nothing about the subsequent gotcha questions he will inevitably ask. So, while I support the inclusion of this relevant material I remain troubled by selective application of NOTNEWS to exclude matters old and new that could be interpreted as showing the collusion accusations as unproven. And thus I guess I would say I am not comfortable supporting material like this unless news coverage conceivably favorable to Trump could be included. Factchecker_atyourservice 00:29, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Um, gee whiz. It was not "Mueller's list". Better to read the sources before you start flashing the italics. SPECIFICO talk 00:38, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

"Robert S. Mueller III . . . has at least four dozen questions . . . according to a list of the questions obtained by The New York Times."

On a scale ranging from "highly pointless and wrong" to "utterly pointless and wrong", how pointless and wrong do you think your comment was? I'd say "utterly". Factchecker_atyourservice 14:49, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Just to connect all your dots for readers who might be misled by this insistent denial: The questions in the leaked document are not written by Mueller and it is false to say they're Mueller's questions. And anyone who has actually read RS reporting on this revelation would know that. SPECIFICO talk 15:10, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The source just cited above is RS reporting and it describes the questions as questions that Mueller wants to ask Trump, which is why I referred to it as "Mueller's leaked wish list of interview questions". I didn't say Mueller typed them up himself on his personal palm pilot because Sally Secretary was out of the office and all of his other subordinates were on the golf course. If you have anything to contribute here that is actually relevant to the article in any conceiveable way, maybe add it and then unhat this little subsection of nonsense. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:20, 5 May 2018 (UTC) You may not hat discussion of article content and sourcing just because it refutes your claims. Please read WP:TPG and let readers and editors form their own conclusions. @NeilN: SPECIFICO talk 15:24, 5 May 2018 (UTC) You're just spamming nonsense onto the page. You didn't "refute" anything, nor did you even explain what you meant, the only purpose of your comment was to claim (absurdly) that I haven't read RS reporting on the subject. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:31, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Soibangla, none of the speculation in the proposal matters - it won't have any lasting encyclopedic value until the Russian collusion conspiracy theories are proven, and that isn't looking highly likely right now. Surprisingly, there's actually an encyclopedia titled "Conspiracy Encyclopedia"...maybe it's time for volume 2? ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:20, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Nothing in my proposed edit is speculative. "collusion conspiracy theories...isn't looking highly likely right now" is certainly speculative. The proposed edit contains four reliable cites that point to evidence of collusion that is in Mueller's possession, and this reportage has seemingly gone largely unnoticed. My guess is that some saw my edit and thought "excuse me? when did that come out?" when it had been there all along. And that might also explain why it was promptly removed ("it must be silenced!"). soibangla (talk) 02:15, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Reject. The content does not seem to have anything to do with the dossier allegations. And there are major POV issues.

You have not summarised major parts in the NYT report (February 14). (a) "The officials interviewed in recent weeks said that, so far, they had seen no evidence of such cooperation." and "The F.B.I. has spent several months investigating the leads in the dossier, but has yet to confirm any of its most explosive claims." BTW, wasn't this the piece Comey commented in public testimony, saying the report is not accurate?

CNN (March 22) report says the new information is not derived from the dossier. The CNN story is very suggestive: "though officials cautioned that the information was not conclusive and that the investigation is ongoing ... One law enforcement official said ... But other U.S. officials who spoke to CNN say it's premature to draw that inference from the information gathered so far since it's largely circumstantial." It is somewhat suspicious that CNN apparently does not have a followup to the story.

CNN (September 18) report does not seem to address the dossier and neither does the NYT (April 30) report.

Conclusion: even if we forget POV problems, two sources cannot be used at all, per WP:OR, because they are not directly related to the dossier, and two sources more specifically violate WP:STICKTOSOURCE, because the proposed content does not comment the dossier claims. Politrukki (talk) 13:11, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

"The content does not seem to have anything to do with the dossier allegations" — Just to clarify, the original edit that was removed contained this prefatory excerpt from the dossier to establish the edit's relevance to the dossier, I apologize for not including that here, as I was focusing on the specifically challenged material. This is how the proposed edit would read in full:

The dossier stated "there was a well-developed conspiracy of co-operation between [the Trump campaign] and the Russian leadership. This was managed on the TRUMP side by the Republican candidate’s campaign manager, Paul MANAFORT, who was using foreign policy advisor, Carter PAGE, and others as intermediaries." The New York Times reported on February 14, 2017, that phone records and communications intercepts showed that Trump associates — including members of the Trump campaign — had "repeated contacts" with senior Russian intelligence officials during the 2016 campaign. Paul Manafort was the only Trump associate who was specifically identified as participating in these communications. CNN reported on March 23, 2017 that the FBI was examining "human intelligence, travel, business and phone records and accounts of in-person meetings" indicating that Trump associates may have coordinated with "suspected Russian operatives" to release damaging information about the Hillary Clinton campaign. CNN reported on September 19, 2017 that Manafort had been a target of a FISA wiretap both before and after the 2016 election, extending into early 2017. Some of the intercepted communications raised concerns among investigators that Manafort had solicited assistance from Russians for the campaign, although the evidence was reportedly inconclusive. On April 30, 2018 The New York Times published a list of interview questions for Trump that the Mueller investigation had provided to the president's attorneys. Among the questions was, "What knowledge did you have of any outreach by your campaign, including by Paul Manafort, to Russia about potential assistance to the campaign?"

soibangla (talk) 17:29, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I noticed that you used that piece of unsourced material in the article. You cannot fix OR problems by adding unsourced material. If reliable sources have commented the dossier allegations, they might be relevant to this article, but tangential stuff does not belong. Politrukki (talk) 05:41, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Mention of "longstanding"

(inserting break since prior thread got retitled, discussion inserted at top and has gone from 'Bullrangifer what was that revert series about', and to discuss the mentioned item seperately) Markbassett (talk) 02:34, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

User:NeilN -- is the cite to you as a guide making sense for this case? I think he's referring to your line "Reminder: Consensus-required also applies to removing long-standing material. While the definition of long-standing can vary from admin to admin, I take it to be more than four to six weeks on highly-edited, highly-watched articles like this." The last para was part of a bunch of Reaction put in early this year and a lot of edits -- it's the only bit left of those and I didn't see your comment as a top note or know if you meant it for wide use. RSVP. Markbassett (talk) 00:34, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Keep in mind that "consensus" requires more than the opinions of 3 or 4 local editors. I'm trying to straighten out something similar above - local consensus was clearly to not restore, but that apparently did not fit well with a small handful of editors, so they've decided to ignore the ongoing consensus and start something new with some slight mods. Noop...not how consensus works. We start one, we finish one...we don't break off and start another before the initial challenge is closed. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:46, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

@Markbassett: What exactly is your question? Keep in mind I will comment if specific edits meet or violate edit restrictions, not on the appropriateness of content. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 03:12, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

User:NeilN -- I think it is two questions, since there were three reverts with mentioning you and "long-standing".

"Restoring longstanding content is okay, per NeilN's interpretation of DS. Deletion of that is then not OK. Deal with this on the talk page."

• First, did you intend this comment done for the Nunes discussion above to be a general thing for the article ? If so, I think that notion needs to be explicitly discussed and any result posted to the top of TALK so people at least know about it.

• Second -- is this a case of what you meant  ? The delete was of an odd bit 'section - empty space - section - single quote' at the bottom of the article, I think put in with a lot else around January but after lots of edits in the area last month all that was left was this one which looked like a photobombing quotefarm / edit remnant.

RSVP, thanks. Markbassett (talk) 02:56, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

@Markbassett: First, my statement, "Consensus-required also applies to removing long-standing material. While the definition of long-standing can vary from admin to admin, I take it to be more than four to six weeks on highly-edited, highly-watched articles like this" was intended to remind editors of the consensus-required restriction already applied to the article: "Consensus required: All editors must obtain consensus on the talk page of this article before reinstating any edits that have been challenged (via reversion)." I've expanded on this further on my talk page in response to inquiries but the restriction is nothing new. MelanieN did a more thorough job explaining. To quote her: The intent of the "consensus" requirement is stability of the article. That means that newly added material can be challenged (by removal) and it cannot then be re-added without consensus. It also means that an edit which removes longstanding material can be challenged (by restoring the material), and the material cannot then be removed without consensus. The default in all cases is the version which has been stable for a period of time. That does not make retention of longstanding material automatic; it makes it subject to discussion, with consensus needed to remove it.

Second, if the deleted then restored longstanding material truly is irrelevant or unnecessary then it should be straightforward to gain consensus to remove it again. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 03:16, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

User:NeilN - thanks for the quick reply. Can I ask you to post this as a guideline so folks are not unaware of it due to being somewhat out of sight ? A short note this TALK article top would do, though I'd suggest a separate guideline article so it could be cited for similar cases and would get openly worked on. Markbassett (talk) 03:37, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

@Markbassett: There are over 200 articles, minimum, that have this restriction. Why is this article special and why now, when the restriction has been effect on various articles since July 2016? Also, what do you want to work on? Restriction wording comes from the admin (and not community consensus) and can only be changed by the admin or by appealing at AN, AE, or ARCA. This particular case is even more complicated as the restriction on this article came from Coffee who is no longer an admin and has currently left the community. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 04:52, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

User:NeilN - umm the question was can I ask you to post whatever the restriction is referenced as “NeilNs interpretation of DS”, (apparently something related to “long-standing”). The why now is since I had never heard of a “NeilNs interpretation of DS” about “long-standing” and have almost no idea what it is. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 03:25, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Markbassett, it's about four comments up in his reply to you. You even replied to him. He also pinged you. His wording, and MelanieN's, are both there. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:15, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

User:BullRangifier And I asked if he would *post* whatever as a guideline, at the head of this article or as separate article that could then guide editors. That he wrote here something *different* from the only visible mention in the Nunes thread, or that there is something in his Talk and MelanieN has something in her Talk is useful for his thinking but only demonstrates how little is findable by a cryptic “NeilNs interpretation of DS”. To have invisible, surprise rules as something, somewhere is saying you do not mind if editors generally remain unaware and not using them. “Long-standing” as a general talking point is one thing — invoking an invisible rule exists is another. Cheers. Markbassett (talk) 04:36, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Oh! I missed the "at the head of this article..." part. Now it makes sense, and I agree. It is so good it should become part of all the templates. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:56, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Why are editors assuming "reinstating any edits" only applies to additions and not deletions or modifications as well? I need good reasons here before I go through the grind of ARCA and all that entails. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 05:49, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Maybe because the only one I've seen (and apparently others as well) is the one at the top of this page, and the grammar allows for no other interpretation than what it plainly says: "obtain consensus...before reinstating any edits that have been challenged (via reversion)." Those original italics even reinforce, and tightly limit, that meaning, which can only be referring to content which has just been "added" and then "reverted". Grammar's a tough task master.

The addition of your excellent and sensible wording would really improve things. It needs to be spelled out and not assumed. The fact that so many here are questioning, discussing, and arguing it reveals that the current wording is not clear enough to include your understanding. I think you'd get a lot of backing for this improvement. Increasing stability and counteracting gaming the system are needed reforms. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:30, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Coffee's stated rationale for leaving is quite interesting in view of the abusive sniping favored by so many editors at this page: "That's just why I'm leaving: this site takes hours of your life and most of what anyone get in return is nastiness and headaches from idiots too afraid to use their actual names"

It would be grand to be able to talk about stuff without having ignorance and venom spat at you, including by site admins. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:03, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Musings

I came this close to putting this on top of the article.

• My own musings are that we should just close this dossier and not edit it for another year. Imagine how much more peaceful our lives would be. Drmies (talk) 18:04, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

There should be at least 3 books published on the subject before it is reopened. C. W. Gilmore (talk) 18:13, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Too late. There are at least 3 already. :) O3000 (talk) 18:32, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I think they mean good books PackMecEng (talk) 18:50, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I find that proposition difficult to disagree with. PackMecEng (talk) 18:28, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

LOL Drmies has one of the best suggestions I've seen so far on this article. I was thinking about an editing bonanza for these ever-changing political articles, in the tradition of The Purge film. Lock the article for all non-administrators six days a week, then unlock it for 24 hours and let the frenzy begin. If stuff gets in, it gets in, and if not you'll get another chance in a week. Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 18:46, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I have suggested this in the past as a wikiwide concept, not edits about breaking news while it is still news.Slatersteven (talk) 18:49, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

My suggestion is that we create even more contentious articles that will attract and keep busy all politically-minded editors and let them (us) have free rein. But, we modify the Wiki-core such that only non-editors can see the articles. O3000 (talk) 20:01, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Separate all political articles into a separate, profit-generating, ad-supported-Wiki-slash-class-based-MMO, complete with editor avatars, microtransactions, etc., this way WMF could turn all that raw energy into WMF dollars and there is literally nothing that could possibly go wrong . . . Factchecker_atyourservice 20:13, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Drmies...have we ever hatted an article? If not, let's set the precedent with this one. ^{Atsme📞📧} 22:47, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

• Slatersteven, have we agreed to this extent before? It feels good. Factchecker, we could take NOTNEWS seriously. Atsme, I'll be happy to surrender my MAGA hat for that purpose. Drmies (talk) 22:51, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

@Drmies: So a single shaky news report is fine for immediately adding to the article as evidence allegedly secretly helping prove a Trump underling's part in the conspiracy, but when a judge says on the record that another underling's criminal case appears unrelated and outside the scope of the collusion investigation, and it's independently reported by numerous news agencies, it's time to put on the brakes.

I suppose the news reports that there was no public evidence of collusion, that started coming out last March or whatever, have similarly been NOTNEWS for the entire 1 year+ intervening period, simply because editors don't like the idea that there's no public evidence of collusion. Factchecker_atyourservice 23:14, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
You should stop being such an enormously myopic whiner. For you this is about Trump. Drmies doesn't care about Trump, or Clinton, or Mueller. So your "so" is in fact a non sequitur, it is your attempt to put words in my mouth. Nice strawman. You're confusing me with some partisan hack like you, only from the other side. This is Wikipedia, not your or anyone else's blog. Drmies (talk) 23:32, 4 May 2018 (UTC) Brussels sprouts. SPECIFICO talk 23:50, 4 May 2018 (UTC) I don't care about Trump either, you troll, nor did I attempt to put "words in your mouth", I was just pointing out your sanctimonious faux-concern for NOTNEWS is being selectively dusted off when you don't appear to have any concern with a single agency's uncorroborated news report that was insta-added weeks ago and still hasn't been corroborated weeks later, and yet is left in the article even though it's supposedly implicating somebody in a crime. You're not even saying "yeah, that doesn't belong either", instead you are spitting at me for talking about the obvious double "standard". Your pretentiously high-minded concerns are manufactured. Hell, you cited NOTNEWS to exclude a summary of RS fact descriptions that remained relatively unchanged for the past year. Factchecker_atyourservice 00:07, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Factchecker, Specifico, Atsme, me, et al, Hitchens said: “The one unforgivable sin is to be boring”. Sorry if I misunderstood Drmies; but I think it goes along these lines. O3000 (talk) 00:17, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

O3000, far worse is failing to get the article right, being discredited and type-cast as unreliable, and then reading about it a few years later in academic publications. Just ask any pollster/strategist/news publication who predicted the wrong outcome in 2016. It will sting for a very long time. Let's hope we've learned from it. ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:04, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Actually, I'd rather not learn from those folk. And, I don't see the relevance as we don't predict anything. O3000 (talk) 01:15, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Atsme, that's a kind of chatter that kind of sounds like it kind of might mean something or other, but actually, no. SPECIFICO talk 01:25, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Predict....speculate...hmmm...close enough. SPECIFICO...sit on it...🥚=🐣 ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:47, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Sorry Atsme, I'm afraid this time you laid an egg. SPECIFICO talk 01:51, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Drmies - start another article Steele Dossier (and only dossier!) to sticks to the dossier itself facts? Things like structure, date, content, preparation. This article seems a lot of gossip that is not involved with or using the dossier, and to not have many facts about the dossier itself. But that seems what the editors want to have. CheersMarkbassett (talk) 03:07, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Mark, I really don't understand your comment. Aside from some allegations in the dossier which are not included here (OR forbids us including content not mentioned in secondary RS), we document the gist of the dossier pretty well. We also document the preparation and timing. Do you want us to add the dates for each of the seventeen memos? We could do that. Do you want the summary of each memo? We couldn't do that without secondary RS mentioning those summaries. In some cases we have that and have included them, but there are several which are not included. I don't think you're interested in us doing any OR. We have been very careful to avoid that.

Also, what is this about: "gossip that is not involved with or using the dossier". What are you referring to? -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:58, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

User:BullRangifer That names some of the factual basics about the memo, largely missing in the article. (This article went a lot more with gossipy threads not about or using the dossier contents, which seems ironically appropriate for a collection of gossip as well as seems like the way press gives coverage WP:WEIGHT.) The OR concern is not applicable as all that has been in RS, though plain factoids are not very sensational. I doubt much could get in here, unless a separate article is done. Maybe a line or two of factoids in the article would be accepted. Summaries of memos would be more contentious. Any overviews or overall evaluation even more contentious. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 05:27, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm seriously interested in fixing this, but I'm still unclear. Would you mind mentioning some examples? Even just one or two. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:17, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

BullRangifer - sure, but which part are you interested in at the moment ? Some of this was coming up last February, but it depends on what kind of alterations being looked at:

• Basic document information, giving simple fact and fixing errors here now ? e.g. Titles of the document sections with date produced, how many there were, and time period they cover ? ?
• Gossipy nature of the article, sometimes kind of going off into not related to dossier? The chase of many individual bits of sensation over who says what about it or about participants and individual points or process or events stemming from it, gets into quote not on the text itself. (Not about the dossier includes gossip or where article kind of follows the WP:WEIGHT of the tabloid nature coverage.)
• Summary of sections ? That would be contentious because the overviews are by the document divisions, which will not match the article went with creating its own topic categories and quote-farmed snippets into those bins instead.
• Overview or overall evaluation ? That would be highly contentious, because ultimately he was to deliver reports on what gossip or suspicions existed and not to newspaper or legal standards. So googling questioning or critiques or reviews take is going to get negatives about the logic or QC on sourcing, and to state the plausibility of a memo - which is going to vary, and some folks would be upset. VheersMarkbassett (talk) 04:29, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

@Drmies: No we have not, and it has been voted down (not on this article, in wikispace).Slatersteven (talk) 07:48, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

• All of this is why I prefer to spend my time on articles that are at least 50yrs old, the dust has settled and few people are kicking up more. C. W. Gilmore (talk) 17:09, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Reduce to a few paragraphs, and merge with Russia investigation. I somehow doubt many visitors read much beyond the lede as it is now. At best we have a bunch of unsubstantiated allegations and speculation cited to RS...a great spy thriller. The way this article is written is not limited to stating what is in the dossier, rather it appears more like an attempt to justify what's in the dossier leaving readers with the assumption that Trump is guilty by association. There is no question about the partisanship involved - it was opposition research. Sources tell us it is not credible, others say it is - I think it's borderline at best but only because a few things happened to parallel what real investigations had already turned-up (made public), not that it was a result of the dossier memos provided by anonymous sources known only to Steele. Credible authors have explained why the dossier is false/problematic. Their conclusions are supported by the results of a recent Congressional investigation, and also a year long investigation by special counsel that has produced no evidence of collusion. We know that several of the individuals involved in the spying of private citizens (FISA warrants) held high level positions in the FBI, and have either been fired, demoted or have retired. The Strzock - Page emails are damning, so I have not completely shut the door to this dossier possibly being the "insurance policy" to which Strzock referred - it is in the incubator waiting for substantial evidence. There is also the recent OIG investigation report on McCabe which provides the justification for his firing. The OIG is still investigating some of the players. All totaled, I think these types of news stories and conspiracy theories belong in Wikinews not en.Wiki. At the most, a paragraph or two may be justified but not with all the detail we're seeing in this article, and certainly not until the allegations have been substantiated and the theories have evolved into something with encyclopedic value. It may even be best suited for Jimbo's WikiTribune. ^{Atsme📞📧} 20:32, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

• Support this proposal 100%. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 14:11, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Yeah... no.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:35, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

That anyone could take this thread as a serious proposal is very telling. If any other editor had started this thread and allowed it to run, they might have been accused of making a WP:POINT violation, but we know that this was just wishful thinking. Actually doing it would have violated multiple policies and been a serious deviation from the purpose of Wikipedia. This has been more of an outlet for humor and expressions of free thought not normally allowed on a talk page. Don't take this thread seriously. Take it as a welcome break and an oasis. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 00:54, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I heard that Drmies writes for The Onion. OK, I was drinking when I heard that and it could have been Dr. Mises. In any case, whether this article makes sense or not, it’s not likely to disappear in the near future. (Or maybe it was Ludwig von Mises. Hope not, but it sounds kinda like “musings”.) O3000 (talk) 01:11, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I've seriously suggested that indefinite Full Protection might be the best option before. Additions can be discussed here, and there will be less bickering over whose edits violate the rules. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:46, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

That’s rather an extreme limitation given the current lack of vandalism. I’ve half seriously thought that a new 1AR rule could be of use in some articles. Like 1RR, but one addition per 24 hours. O3000 (talk) 23:01, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Look here...I'm agreeing with O3000 yet again. 😉 ^{Atsme📞📧} 23:50, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

What's all this talk about Muesli? SPECIFICO talk 00:41, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

😂 For a bit of clarity. ^{Atsme📞📧} 14:51, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Latest New York Times report confirming "no public evidence"

The latest in-depth report from New York Times says the following:

"A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts."

I don't want to argue about paraphrasing so I'm not going to attempt to paraphrase it. Does somebody have some objection to quoting the latest assessment of the "evidence" against Trump? News reports have been doing this for over a year. They talk about allegations but they don't fail to mention the evidence (in this case, none).

This article, nominally about the dossier, presents reams of fact and opinion presented as supposed evidence of Trump collusion and it should have some RS analysis about the state of the evidence. Factchecker_atyourservice 21:50, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

References

Agree: this simple fact should be mentioned in the article lead. — JFG ^talk 10:22, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Agree the quote should be included in the lede.Phmoreno (talk) 14:09, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

No, it shouldn't be. There's no "public" evidence because the Mueller team is still investigating and, if they have that evidence linking Trump to Russia, they're still keeping it close to the vest. WP:CRYSTAL applies. – Muboshgu (talk) 14:15, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Wouldn't crystal be guessing they are keeping something close to the vest? Not confirming there is no public evidence. PackMecEng (talk) 14:25, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

My concern, which I did not explain clearly, is that people will take "no public evidence" to mean "no evidence", much as we might see from tweets from The Donald decrying the "WITCH HUNT". We shouldn't try to suggest there is "NO COLLUSION" and nor should we imply that Mueller does have any smoking guns that will end with DJT himself being indicted. I think it's better to make it clear that the investigation is ongoing and not say anything (yet) about what evidence there is or is not. With the exception of what has been definitively released, including the indictments and convictions. – Muboshgu (talk) 15:45, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

@Muboshgu: The approach you propose is irresponsible and that is why reputable news desks have taken the different approach of explicitly saying no evidence is known to the public. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:12, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

No they do not confirm, they conclude. So as proposed, no.Slatersteven (talk) 14:21, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by "they do not confirm, they conclude" or "as proposed, no"? Factchecker_atyourservice 16:14, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

This is a conclusion they have drawn, as such I oppose the edit at it has been suggested, its not that hard.Slatersteven (talk) 16:21, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't understand what you mean by saying it is a "conclusion". Are you just using that as a synonym for "factual statement"? Factchecker_atyourservice 18:26, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

No I am using it as a synonym for "it is not a fact it is an opinion".Slatersteven (talk) 18:29, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

It is in-depth fact reporting from The New York Times, which is probably fairly described as the finest newspaper in the world. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:31, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

It is still only their opinion, not a fact.

Statements, made in top quality fact reporting—not attributed in quotes or otherwise referred to as somebody's opinion, but instead stated in the editorial voice of the source—are facts. That's not even Wikipedia 101, it's Wikipedia 99. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:38, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Point to policy.Slatersteven (talk) 18:45, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

WP:NEWSORG. "News reporting" from well-established news outlets is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact (though even the most reputable reporting sometimes contains errors). News reporting from less-established outlets is generally considered less reliable for statements of fact.

Again: this is newbie stuff. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:52, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Generally, not automatically. Also it does not say "even if this disagrees with other RS".Slatersteven (talk) 08:13, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, automatically, unless there is a reason not to treat as fact, which in this case, there isn't any reason whatsoever. You just don't like what the source says. No RS fact coverage says anything differently. You're just fantasizing that this factual claim is contested. Factchecker_atyourservice 13:42, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Very strong objection. First, you didn’t include the very next sentence: “But the article’s tone and headline — ‘Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia’ — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning.” So, they found no evidence yet in an investigation that was just beginning. That’s meaningless information, particularly since many links between campaign members and Russia have been found since, and the Senate intelligence committee determined that Russia was trying to influence the election in Trump’s favor. Further, this is a very long article and that one sentence is out of context. They repeat, again and again, that they proceeded very cautiously, not even questioning anyone in the Trump campaign for fear of exposing the investigation. The FBI severely limited the evidence that they could collect as they didn’t want to affect the election. I think the article is quite interesting. But, this sentence does not at all reflect the content of the article. O3000 (talk) 14:27, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I should add, this is not the “latest report of the NYTimes” as posted by the OP. That was taken from a Times Oct 31st article, 6.5 months ago[14]. It is obsolete. O3000 (talk) 14:33, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

What do you mean? Perhaps I missed it but the source he uses is a different article than what you list. PackMecEng (talk) 15:34, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

The very long article cited by the OP had two sentences referring to an old article. I cited the original article from a half year back. O3000 (talk) 15:39, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Ah I see, thanks for the clarifications. So you were saying the new article used some references from the old article. PackMecEng (talk) 15:49, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

@Objective3000: Why don't you try paying attention to what you are reading?

1. THE REPORT IS FROM MAY 16, 2018, NOT OCTOBER 2017 — This is incredibly obvious from the words "A YEAR AND A HALF LATER no public evidence has surfaced . . ."

2. The sentence you quote refers to a 6.5 month old article, and the complaint from the quote is about that old article, not this one. Literally, democrats complained that the headline of an October 2017 NYT article made it sound like the investigation was wrapping up, when really it was just beginning.

That has absolutely nothing to do with the May 16, 2018 New York Times statement confirming there is still no publicly known evidence a year and a half later. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:08, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

WP:CAPSLOCK Man fell off the roof of the Railway Exchange Building. As he passed each floor on his way down, he was heard to say: "So far, so good". Why do editors keep trying to add to this article that no public evidence exists when most of the evidence isn’t public and the investigation continues? How about a new guideline: NOTFUTURENEWS? O3000 (talk) 16:21, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

"NOTFUTURENEWS"? The news desks started saying this in spring 2017 and they haven't stopped. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:12, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Comment: All that the claim "A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts." means is that reporters have not found any evidence? Why is reporting what reporters have not found encyclopedic? When the dust is settled, it then makes sense to say in addition to what evidence was found and what was not. --I am One of Many (talk) 16:32, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Reply: The article is chock full of details that haven't even been mentioned in any reliable source such as the claim that Carter Page had Trump's "full authority" to tell the Russians he would lift sanctions in exchange for their alleged $11 billion bribe. The supposed gas company offer is discussed in sources, the claim that Trump gave Carter page his "full authority" to accept the bribe is not discussed anywhere except a self-published source funded by a progressive activist group to publicize the dossier. It's puzzling that people think stuff like that is "encyclopedic" but the words of practically every major news desk saying there's no public evidence is somehow not. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:54, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

FCAYS, you wrote: "The supposed gas company offer is discussed in sources, the claim that Trump gave Carter page his "full authority" to accept the bribe is not discussed anywhere except a self-published source funded by a progressive activist group to publicize the dossier." There seems to be several misunderstandings there. The "full authority" comment was not connected to "accept the bribe". It was connected to stating, with Trump's "full authority", that Trump would lift the sanctions after his election, IOW, he could confirm that it was Trump's intention: "SECHIN’s associated opined that although PAGE had not stated it explicitly to SECHIN, he had clearly implied that in terms of his comment on TRUMP’s intention to lift Russian sanctions if elected president, he was speaking with the Republican candidate’s full authority."

I'm not sure why you mention the Moscow Project, which, BTW, does not make the allegation you mention. It is not a source we use or should use. That source has been ruled out by ME. I would strongly object to its use because of its crowdsourced nature. OTOH, just like here, the RS it uses could also be used here.

As you mention, "The supposed gas company offer is discussed in sources,", and a few of the RS which discuss the "gas company" matter are used in our article. They are good enough. I hope that clears things up. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:08, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

It clears up that exactly what I said is accurate -- no RS has discussed this claim or direct quote that Carter Page did anything with Trump's "full authority". So why is that claim in the article? Factchecker_atyourservice 18:21, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Okay, after some attempts to figure out what you meant, I think I get the point. (The part about "accept the bribe" threw me off.) Your point is the "full authority" part of our content, which is also from the dossier. After searching the sources we currently use and not finding those exact words in them, I'm wondering if that came from some of the previous sources that got axed when I went through and reduced the number of sources for each claim. Sometimes I'd have 6-8 refs after each allegation, and that was indeed a bit much! Maybe that's what happened? Whatever the case may be, the current sources do not justify including that part, so I'll remove it. Thanks for bringing this to my attention. If I ever find the sources which do justify it, I'll return it. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 23:27, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I checked for other sourcing and I don't think any RS ever talked about that specific part of the claim. Factchecker_atyourservice 00:54, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand the point. It is encyclopedic to report sourced evidence but how is it encyclopedic to report things we don't have evidence for? One has to use some common sense here. One article has one sentence on what reporters have not found yet? This is embarrassing POV for a project aimed at a serious encyclopedia. --I am One of Many (talk) 21:39, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

What's embarrassing is the apparently emotional attachment to the idea of Trump guilt, and the irrational opposition to any contrary suggestion—both fact sourcing and opinion commentary. The article goes to incredible lengths to imply Trump is guilty, including extensive use of self-published, biased, and low-quality sources because they paint Trump in a worse light than more reputable sources.

What you are suggesting is cherry picking things in an effort to make it look like there is evidence of Trump guilt, while deliberately ignoring the analysis that says there is no such evidence. Factchecker_atyourservice 22:33, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

There is no analysis that there is no evidence in RS. Therein lies the problem. The statement that you want in the article suggests that there is no evidence of collusion. But, the actual fact is we don't know what evidence exists, if any. So, let's not add meaningless, but misleading text. O3000 (talk) 22:36, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

False, utterly wrong. I have cited numerous such articles showing precisely that analysis, and this one is just the latest. The actual fact is precisely what the sources say. The fact it conflicts with WP editor opinions is precisely the point of WP policies that say WP editor opinions are meaningless.

WP articles reflect what RS's say about article subjects, not what WP editors want to think about article subjects. Factchecker_atyourservice 22:40, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

E.g., the following: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

Sources

On April 30, 2018, the NYT editorial board ran its own opinion column and said "The 49 questions that the special counsel, Robert Mueller, hopes to ask President Trump as part of the yearlong Russia investigation suggest that Mr. Mueller knows a great deal more than he’s letting on — and he hasn’t even gotten to the follow-ups yet."

Yet nearly 3 weeks later, NYT still reported the above statement that no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts. The two statements are not in conflict, and NYT is not just blowing smoke—it's an important point. You're talking about serious criminal/treason accusation and it's important not to prevaricate.

Both these statements are directly from the horse's mouth of the #1 fact source that we should be using to cover this U.S. politics issue. Can we not mention them side by side, either quote them directly or paraphrase? i.e. no public evidence of direct Trump link to Russian meddling, no public evidence of anything connecting Trump's advisors to hacking, but Mueller is speculated to have considerable evidence. Attribute it to NYT if need be. Factchecker_atyourservice 23:50, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I support adding the quote. It seems to be due weight, from a reliable secondary source. Sławomir Biały (talk) 00:04, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

No, as it is not about the dossier, and as far as I can tell it only evens mention it in passing. It does not say anything about its veracity.Slatersteven (talk) 08:16, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

It is about the dossier's accusations which are featured in a stupid level of detail in this article, far beyond any RS coverage—and WP is supposed to treat criminal accusations carefully rather than exaggerating them. Factchecker_atyourservice 13:35, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I oppose per others. It is one sentence in one article and multiple other WP:RS directly address the subject of "evidence" and come and state there is evidence. Also, this looks like WP:FORUMSHOP to me. There is an RFC on this page on the same subject.Casprings (talk) 09:54, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

The RFC above stalled with everyone calling me a liar because I tried to paraphrase a source and some people claiming the news reports were too old even though they were only weeks old. This report is fresh and there should be no objection to quoting it if nobody wants to suggest a paraphrase (I can't suggest a paraphrase because anything I suggest will be called a lie). Factchecker_atyourservice 13:36, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

OK " a recent NYT article had nothing to say about the veracity of the dossier. Saying that whilst at this time there is no publicly available evidence the investigation is not yet finished and that its earlier story saying the "F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia” — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning.", that is what the source says.Slatersteven (talk) 13:50, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Could you edit or rephrase your comment? I don't know what you're saying. Factchecker_atyourservice 13:54, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Suggested text

"A recent NYT article had nothing to say about the veracity of the dossier. Saying that whilst at this time there is no publicly available evidence the investigation is not yet finished and that its earlier story saying the "F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia” — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning."

How hard is it?Slatersteven (talk) 13:58, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

That's proposed text? Are you nuts? Factchecker_atyourservice 14:02, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Care to raise an actual objection?Slatersteven (talk) 14:04, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

It's OR and it misrepresents the source. What's wrong with quoting the source or paraphrasing it in a non-OR way? Factchecker_atyourservice 14:09, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

So what did I write that is not in the source?Slatersteven (talk) 14:11, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Everything you wrote.

The source says "A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts."

Again, what is the problem with quoting the source? Factchecker_atyourservice 14:15, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

It also says "...But the article’s tone and headline — “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia” — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning." (in the same paragraph), so yes lets quote them shall we? So the only part that is not a quote is the part about the veracity of the steele dossier, well does it question it?Slatersteven (talk) 14:22, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

The source says no public evidence of X accusations and your paraphrase is the source said nothing about the truth of X accusations.

Do you really need me to explain why this is deceptive? Similar to the way you needed me to cite chapter and verse on the fact that fact sources are sources for facts? Factchecker_atyourservice 14:28, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Slatersteven’s suggestion looks like an honest representation of the story to me - unlike using the partial quote that omits the qualification. O3000 (talk) 14:30, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Loooooooooooool so if you're so worried about dishonesty we can just quote the whole paragraph then?

A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts. But the article’s tone and headline — “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia” — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning.

The second sentence is absurdly, absurdly irrelevant but if it will eliminate all this "discussion" I see no problem with it. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:36, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

It does not say anything about it's truth, No publicly available evidence does not mean no evidence. In fact it also says this " And when The New York Times tried to assess the state of the investigation in October 2016, law enforcement officials cautioned against drawing any conclusions, resulting in a story that significantly played down the case.", in fact the whole tone of the article is that at the time (October 2016) too much effort was made to (in effect) underplay this so as not the affect the election. In fact (in context) it seems to be both criticizing itself and the FBI for taking these allegation more seriously earlier on. So far form saying that "there is no evidence" it is saying "Much remains unknown and classified". Why is it even relevant (given there is a closed session investigation) that no public evidence has emerged (according tho the NTY)?Slatersteven (talk) 14:42, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

@Slatersteven: Why are you trying to paraphrase claims about "truth" that the article isn't making? Why do you object to quoting analysis of factual evidence that the source is making?

I have no objection to quoting the "much remains unknown and unclassified" blurb, that says something very similar to the NYT blurb I proposed where they speculate about what evidence Mueller may have.

These are criminal/treason accusations against the U.S. president—it's important to mention the state of the evidence and that is why the top news desks keep doing so. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:51, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

It does not talk about the state of evidence, and it does talk about how people too early on dismissed this (including itself), and in a lot more then one sentence. why do you think that is also not relevant? This talks about public evidence, not secret or classified evidence. So no it says nothing about the "state of the evidence" only that we have not seen it.Slatersteven (talk) 15:00, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• Support - the proposed wording by Factchecker is a welcome addition to this unbalanced, UNDUE weighty article that appears to be one helluva batch of commentary and a ton of RS speculation which crosses into NOTNEWS territory. I also agree with what I am One of Many said above, adding that as he appropriately pointed out (but for a different reason), it is encyclopedic to report sourced evidence, not things we don't have evidence for, and the latter is exactly what this article attempts to do using unsubstantiated claims - which is nothing more than speculation without evidence - whereas the fact that there is no evidence is supported by a high quality RS and belongs in this article - omission is censorship which is noncompliant with NPOV. ^{16:25, 19 May 2018 (UTC) Atsme📞📧} 14:45, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• I doubt that I am One of Many would appreciate your misuse of their statement. They are speaking about our use of sources, and you are repeating your misunderstanding of Wikipedia's GNG requirements for the creation of articles. Much as you hate the fact, Wikipedia's rules do not allow deletion of this article. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:04, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Are you now the spokesman for IaOoM? As for deletion of this article, a reasonable time has passed so I'm not sure why you think it cannot be nominated for AfD again, particularly as merge/delete since there is no evidence to date that ties Trump to anything the dossier claims. I'm waiting to see what develops from the ongoing investigations, because all we have now is guilt by association and a whole lotta speculation and conspiracy theories. In fact, what little of this article is worthy of keeping belongs in either Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, or Special Counsel investigation (2017–present). ^{Atsme📞📧} 20:20, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I truly hope you don't nominate this article for deletion because there's a snowball's chance in hell it will be deleted. Its notability is beyond question even if it were to be fully discredited. Instead, parts of it have been verified. – Muboshgu (talk) 20:42, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

She really means it! SMH. Again she reveals that she doesn't understand Wikipedia's GNG requirements for the creation of articles. Another AfD would just be disruptive and seriously raise (more) doubts about her competency, at least on Trump-related articles. Her single-minded devotion to deleting all things negative about Trump is a net negative for the project, and one pinpointed by User:MastCell: [Atsme], "you seem to consider anything that reflects negatively on Donald Trump to constitute "anti-[Trump] fodder" and to argue to downplay it on those grounds."[15] That explains much of her editing on Trump articles, but on other articles she can be quite reasonable.

The results of investigations are irrelevant. The speculation is irrelevant. True or false is irrelevant. Credibility is irrelevant. The only thing that counts is the obvious notability of the dossier and its allegations, warts and all, and that is beyond question. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 23:45, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose I have said my piece and this is going nowhere.Slatersteven (talk) 15:01, 19 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose We don’t include what we don’t know, and further discussion will likely lead to further PAs. O3000 (talk) 15:08, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Isn't that most of this article? PackMecEng (talk) 17:41, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose Here's the full quote:

"A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts. But the article’s tone and headline — “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia” — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning."

It would be very dishonest indeed to manipulate this information to mean only the first part of the full quote. Gandydancer (talk) 15:20, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

There's nothing dishonest about not mentioning irrelevant crap, but as I already said I have no problem quoting the irrelevant crap if it will stop people from making nonsensical claims about "dishonesty". Sooooo by all means let's include the important blurb about dems being butthurt about a newspaper headline from 19 months ago. Factchecker_atyourservice 15:32, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Nasty comments don't generally perturb me in the least...except when made by an editor who complains about the comments of others. Please try to improve your manner of communication on this talk page because it is needlessly confrontational, dismissive...and irritating. Re your suggested edits, I see no reason to include the obvious: Mueller has not disclosed anything so far so it is obvious that no Trump collusion has been disclosed. Gandydancer (talk) 15:49, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

You claimed I was trying to misrepresent something by omitting it, when I explicitly said it should be included if anybody had a complaint—and even if it had been omitted, that wouldn't be misleading in any way. Hence your calling it "very dishonest" is insulting and needlessly confrontational, manufacturing a gripe out of thin air. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:11, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

How dumb do you think I am anyway? Your proposed edit reads, "no public evidence of direct Trump link to Russian meddling, no public evidence of anything connecting Trump's advisors to hacking, but Mueller is speculated to have considerable evidence. Attribute it to NYT if need be." Please just quit playing dumb and acting wronged. (I speak harshly since that seems to be your manner of conversation.) Gandydancer (talk) 17:07, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I already dealt with this non-issue before you ever posted about it, literally said "we can just quote the whole paragraph then", and I already pointed this out to you immediately after your first post. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:35, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

There is no need to point out to me what you have said or have not said in this thread. To suggest that I have made edits while not following the posts that you and others have made is insulting, dismissive and irritating. Gandydancer (talk) 18:43, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

You showed up just to call me "dishonest" and claim it was "manipulation" to fail to mention some irrelevant trivia about a 19-month old news article, even though I had already said we should quote the whole para if it would make people feel better—that's insulting and irritating. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:55, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I think when you combine the POV pushing, the forum shopping, and the manipulation, this is starting to get pretty ripe for WP:AN.Casprings (talk) 15:40, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Gandydancer makes a good point. There is no finality to this "state of the evidence" matter.

Note that this New York Times quote only speaks of a very limited part of the allegations, the hacking, and only about his "advisers". That's all. And for Trump himself, only about "linking to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts". That's all.

We can't imply that there is no evidence, since the state of even the "public evidence" keeps changing. We keep getting more and more public evidence (which does not equal "proof"). The hidden evidence is successfully getting people arrested, confessing, and convicted, and this isn't slowing down for lack of evidence. It's growing.

The historical development of these Trump denials has been interesting: We've gone from the Trump administration making broad denials, and now it's small denials because successive revelations have exposed the previous denials as falsehoods. "Oh, what a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive!"

Aaron Blake's WaPo article the other day illustrates the point, and he summarized his article very nicely on Twitter:

A collusion denial play, in 7 acts
1. No communication w Russia
2. No communication *we're aware of*
3. No *planned* communication
4. Planned meeting, but not re: campaign
5. Was re: campaign, but no good info
6. Collusion isn't crime
7. No info was used

The article: "Analysis: Rudy Giuliani just watered down Trump's Russia collusion denial — again. This is now at least the seventh time the goal posts have been moved — all in one direction." The Washington Post

Blake closes with this (linking to another article he wrote): "One thing, Rudy Giuliani: The Trump campaign *did* use it."

So even number seven is a lie.

So even by the Trump campaign's own moving-goal-post re-definitions, they can't escape the obvious conclusion that they really did collude. Maybe they can't settle on their own fake definition which temporarily appears to remove them from the guilt-equation, but we know the definition of collusion, and it fits what they did, and are still doing. It hasn't stopped.

We must not leave any sort of dishonest impression. Focusing on a cherry picked truth ("public") which ignores the larger context, leaves a false impression. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:48, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

This source is an opinion piece, and a two-pager at that. And it also says "We don't know whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russian government, legally speaking." Factchecker_atyourservice 17:56, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

"legally speaking"... -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 18:14, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Your point being? Factchecker_atyourservice 18:17, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

My point is that the addition of "legally speaking" can (and usually does, especially when followed by "but") imply that, practically speaking, there likely was collusion, which is the underlying assumption of his whole article, otherwise he wouldn't have written it. Take it or leave it. It's not worth discussing here. I just provided it to show how the Trump campaign has repeatedly moved the goal posts for their own definition of collusion. If they were certain that they never colluded with Russians, they wouldn't do that. Their actions indicate they are uncertain and feeling guilty. Their actions indicate that it's highly likely that they are covering up "something" nefarious. When law enforcement sees that type of behavior, they see it as admissible evidence of "consciousness of guilt". -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 04:13, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

It is a 2-page opinion article obliquely implying that Trump may have committed "practical collusion", or "non-legal collusion", who knows what that means since there's no such thing as "legal collusion", but in any event it does nothing to detract from the fact reporting that there is no public evidence of collusion. I already repeatedly discussed that there are dueling opinions on the significance of existing evidence, with, e.g., Schiff repeatedly insisting the public evidence shows collusion, but news desks have ignored this and continued to report there is no public evidence. Your OR legal analysis is meaningless for this article. Factchecker_atyourservice 06:09, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose, per above. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:56, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Lol, the old New York Times is wrong, or lying! gambit.

The hacking and manipulation claims are the collusion claims. So when they are talking about the lack of evidence of hacking and manipulation claims, they are talking about the lack of evidence of the collusion claims.

And there's no need to "imply" anything not stated by the source--that's why I didn't try paraphrasing it because people would claim the paraphrase is a lie. So let's direct-quote. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:06, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

That's a "gambit" I have never played, so don't imply I have made it. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:16, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

BTW, the hacking is just a small, though important part, of the collusion accusations. There are many other aspects. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:20, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

You are, right now, sitting here telling me the New York Times is getting the story all wrong. It's absurd. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:30, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Be very careful how you reply, if at all. You still have an iBan. I am not talking about the NYT, but about how it can be misused to leave a false impression. That's what we must avoid. It speaks of a very limited matter, so it must not be used to speak for more than it actually says. That's why I think it's best not to use it in the proposed manner. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:10, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

The source says "A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts."

It is pure fantasy on your part your own personal opinion unsupported by any RS analysis whatever that they are not talking about the collusion allegations, or that that there is some evidence of other collusion allegations that NYT simply forgot to mention. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:26, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Stating that BullRangifier is engaging in “pure fantasy” would appear to be unwise given your IBan sanction. O3000 (talk) 17:36, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Here is some additional context regarding why New York Times (and other top sources) have always considered the current public knowledge of evidence important: "Under the circumstances, many in Washington expected the agencies to make a strong public case to erase any uncertainty. Instead, the message from the agencies essentially amounts to 'trust us.' There is no discussion of the forensics used to recognize the handiwork of known hacking groups, no mention of intercepted communications between the Kremlin and the hackers, no hint of spies reporting from inside Moscow’s propaganda machinery."

Factchecker_atyourservice 17:50, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Sources

Why on Earth would Meuller publically announce what he knows about the people he’s investigating while he’s still questioning people? It would be liking playing Bridge with your cards facing the other players. We do not and should not know what evidence exists. O3000 (talk) 18:02, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

That piece is not directly about the collusion claims, I just quoted it because of the reference to eliminating public uncertainty. Of course Mueller shouldn't compromise his investigation. Yet the evidence is still a matter of public concern and that is why the sources report there isn't any known. Factchecker_atyourservice 18:13, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

There isn't any publicly known evidence because the investigation is ongoing. – Muboshgu (talk) 20:37, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Exactly, which is the reason this article has major problems - most of the claims are unsubstantiated allegations and there is no evidence of Trump collusion. FCAYS, it appears you are the target of WP:STONEWALLING which is highly disruptive, not to mention noncompliance with WP:NPOV and possibly even WP:CENSOR. I'm hard pressed to consider attempts to censor inclusion of such an important fact of no evidence cited to high quality sources anything but stonewalling, so I recommend calling an RfC, and avoid arguing with them. ^{Atsme📞📧} 20:48, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

If you have a problem with editors, take them to ANI and stop attacking editors on talk pages. O3000 (talk) 20:57, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

That's some fancy attempt at WP:WIKILAWYERING there. The dossier had been partially verified, nothing in it has been officially and completely discredited, and yet you and FCAYS are trying to make it appear that the information in the dossier is false. – Muboshgu (talk) 21:00, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

yet you and FCAYS are trying to make it appear that the information in the dossier is false. That's some nonsense, please strike it immediately. I am suggesting quoting what RS's have said about the collusion claims. Factchecker_atyourservice 21:05, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Hate to disappoint, Muboshgu but I'm not swallowing the bait. It doesn't take a law degree to see what's going on here. I'd rather pretend O3000 didn't say what he said about me and simply focus on the article. It would be far more productive if more effort was exerted in an attempt to resolve the issues with this article instead of preventing the inclusion of important well-sourced information. If you believe the dossier is partially verified, then create a section titled Verified claims and list them in numerical order - make it a simple, independent list - no editorializing, no conspiracy theories - say what the sources say and make it easy for our readers to find the info. Get rid of the verbose sections that attempt to justify the dossier and Steele - the fluff is overboard and so are the unsubstantiated claims. Just list the claims, note them as UNVERIFIED, and move on. We don't need all the opinions and speculations and conspiracy theories that have been published with click-bait headlines in RS that want to milk this cash cow dry. If I've got the story right, there are only 17 memos by anonymous Russian operatives in that dossier - ironic that Trump is being accused of collusion and condemned while the dossier itself may be nothing more than the product of Russian deceit. The lawsuits surrounding the Mueller investigation are far more interesting than the dossier, especially the Concord case, one of three companies and 13 Russians Mueller indicted in February. ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:59, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Favor to ask - I use syntax highlighting in edit mode, so when you use <p/> and <br/>, don't forget the forward slash to close them. BR, I apologize for messing up your numbers - I accidentally deleted a close bracket when adding the forward slashes to your breaks. ^{Atsme📞📧} 05:40, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

• Support inclusion and especially the proposed wording by Factchecker. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 16:19, 19 May 2018 (UTC)
• Support With the source listed and wording purposed. It's a high quality source that has done a lot of reporting on this issue and it related to the dossier. PackMecEng (talk) 17:42, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. This is basically just a comment that the investigation by the FBI continue. This is also a quotation out of context. "Nothing changed", what is value of this? My very best wishes (talk) 02:52, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Nothing was taken "out of context". An absurd claim. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:48, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Note: I requested this discussion closed here: Request closure of discussion and re-direction to open WP:RFC/ Request User:Factchecker_atyourservice warned for WP:Battle and WP:POV

Rationale is WP:Battle and WP:Fourmshopping. Casprings (talk) 23:00, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I think that's a good idea. There's nothing positive coming from this thread. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:20, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - That "no public evidence has surfaced" is not absence of evidence. This selective use of material from one source, out of context, would be misleading to our readers. It's also tangential to the article subject.- MrX 🖋 12:30, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

A pointlessly unconstructive straw man since nobody suggested saying "there is no evidence", at any point in time ever. Nor is it quoted in a "misleading" way, nor is it taken "out of context", nor is it "tangential" to the article subject. Nor is it used "selectively" since it is buttressed by numerous other sources. Every single thing you said was wrong. Factchecker_atyourservice 14:48, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

ARBITRARY BREAK

This is getting very long and convoluted.Slatersteven (talk) 12:35, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Lead sentence: There is "a great deal of public evidence of ties between the Trump campaign and Russian actors." based on Jan. 2017 article

Which sure sounds like confirmation of collusion accusations!

But we can't have fact reporting from May 2018 or March 2018 or February 2018 or January 2018 talking about the lack of evidence of collusion, anywhere in the article? Gosh this must be one of those things that I am deceptively dishonest for complaining about. Factchecker_atyourservice 05:55, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Maybe that is because most of the sources you used said "we have no seen any evidence" which is not saying "there is none". And we do have claims that the dossiers assertions are dodgey. There may be an argument for expanding this area, but only as long as we accurately reflect what the sources are saying.Slatersteven (talk) 09:08, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

There is evidence that Democrat operatives set up members of the Trump campaign to create suspicious situations involving Russians: fake dossier, agent provocateurs Halper, Misfud, Downer, Fusion GPS, Veselnitskaya, setting up Trump associates, computer fraud that made it look like Alfa Bank's server was communicating with a Trump email server so that a FISA warrant could be issued. None of this is mentioned in the article but will become part of the lede as more evidence emerges, which will happen soon.Phmoreno (talk) 11:51, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

When it does I am sure we can include it.Slatersteven (talk) 11:55, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

OK as your comment (after I had replied) was altered, what evidence is there at this time (remember it has to be from RS)? Also (remember) this is evidence we are looking for, not accusations. Slatersteven (talk) 12:07, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Everyone is now aware of the FBI spy or spies in the Trump campaign. Regardless of who they were, the circumstantial evidence surrounding some of the contacts of various people with the Trump campaign are more suspicious than any meetings that Trump associates had with Russians.Phmoreno (talk) 13:50, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

So accusations, not proof.Slatersteven (talk) 15:08, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

And how is that different from anything else in this article? All accusations, no proof.Phmoreno (talk) 15:17, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Nothing, but then I have no said that what there is is proof of anything. So which of your sources say that this was a Democratic plot to trick the Trump campaign into making contracts with Russians?.Slatersteven (talk) 15:24, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

RS commentary is not putting it as sensationally as Trump's people, but it's on the radar, e.g. this law prof op-ed in The Hill:

In response to the New York Times report, Trump declared that the FBI planted “at least one” spy in his campaign to frame him. Trump counsel Rudy Giuliani ratcheted up the rhetoric and said, if the story is true, that former FBI Director James Comey should be prosecuted.

The record does not currently support such a criminal conspiracy. However, if Trump and his counsel can be accused of overplaying the known facts, the media can be equally accused of ignoring the implications of the known facts. It should be a serious concern that the Obama administration used secret counterintelligence powers to target officials in the campaign of the opposing party. That is a practice we have widely criticized in other countries from Turkey to Russia to Iran.

Worse yet, the New York Times wrote that the decision was made to use the secret FISA court and counterintelligence personnel to conceal the operation for political purposes. According to the report, FBI officials consciously decided not to seek conventional criminal warrants or pursue a criminal investigation because it might be discovered and raised by Trump during the campaign. Thus, as Trump campaigned against the “deep state,” FBI officials hid their investigation deeper inside the state. FISA was not designed as a convenient alternative for the FBI and the Justice Department to avoid political costs or scrutiny.

Factchecker_atyourservice 15:50, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

What has this got to do with the dossier?Slatersteven (talk) 15:52, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

You asked "So which of your sources say that this was a Democratic plot to trick the Trump campaign into making contracts with Russians?", and my comment was a reply to that. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:06, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

"None of this is mentioned in the article" because it's nonsense and conspiracy theories from extreme right-wing unreliable sources. It's part of the cover-up and Trump/Putin/GOP pushback against the evidence published in mainstream RS. Most of those things mentioned have logical and better explanations which these extreme sources ignore.

Phmoreno, you have used such sources before. Please stop it. Here's a list of unreliable sources we should not use. Study it and then stop using them at all, in real life, and never use them here again. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:27, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Just trying to keep everyone informed. Will all break soon.Phmoreno (talk) 15:40, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Talk pages are for disusing how to improve articles, not as live news feeds.Slatersteven (talk) 15:46, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Back on topic -- Bull, could you explain why you want to use a quote from a 16-month-old blog post to refer to "a great deal of public evidence of ties between the Trump campaign and Russian actors" right in the article lead—but you think it would be misleading to say "A year and a half later, no public evidence has surfaced connecting Mr. Trump’s advisers to the hacking or linking Mr. Trump himself to the Russian government’s disruptive efforts", anywhere in the article, based on timely news reports from the top newspaper in the United States (and other recent high quality news reports)? Factchecker_atyourservice 15:45, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Please put down your WP:BLUDGEON. O3000 (talk) 15:51, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

The question of the state of "public evidence" is a moving target and only part of the story. I assume that is a large part of why there are objections from so many as to how that content should be framed. There are not real objections to the sourcing, but the framing, and it's difficult to frame a specific statement about a dynamically moving target. Such a statement must necessarily be quite vague/general, and not very specific. (I note that you're using the exact quote from the NYT, and not the more general wording you originally proposed, so that's a separate discussion I'm not going to get into here. I'll let others discuss that with you, although you might want to drop the stick...just sayin')

By contrast, the proven, and indisputable, fact of myriad secret and suspicious contacts and meetings between Trump campaign officials and Russians is what it is. The only thing changing about that is more being discovered, more being indicted, more confessing, and more turning state's witness. The statement is simple, short, sufficiently vague/general, and indisputable fact. That shouldn't be controversial. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:07, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Sources