Talk:Steele dossier

Shearer dossier section?

The existence of Cody Shearer's dossier is getting more attention, and often in a manner which can confuse people into thinking it's part of this dossier, or a follow-up. I'm not sure there's enough of a story for its own article....yet. It's also part of right-wing conspiracy theories fueled by Nunes.

To prevent confusion and debunk conspiracy theories, and since it is nearly always mentioned in connection with this dossier (Steele did pass it on to the State Department), it deserves mention here in its own section. If it gets more coverage, we can then split it off into its own article. Right now it's a part of reality which deserves a home at Wikipedia, and this seems like a logical location.

Some sources:

• Second Trump-Russia dossier being assessed by FBI

• There's a second Trump-Russia dossier

• Nunes Now Planning to Shower America With Memos

• GOP puts Sidney Blumenthal in spotlight

• Devin Nunes is investigating me. Here's the truth.

• GOP Focuses on Russia Allegations That Reached Steele

• Congressional Russia investigators interested in 2nd Trump-Russia dossier

• An operative with ties to the Democratic Party has reportedly been crisscrossing Eastern Europe for months looking for dirt on Trump

• Devin Nunes' Next Memo Could Revive Old Scandals to Obscure Russia Probe

Opinions? -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:18, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Sources

I think there is enough here for a separate section. Reviewing the references: The January 30 Guardian report [2] was the original source and seems to be the basis for other stories; Vox, Mother Jones, and Esquire do not add any new information or independent confirmation, and the Esquire piece is highly opinionated. Additional info from CNN: Republican claims about how the dossier got to Steele. Additional info from WaPo op-ed by Jonathan Winer: confirming that he got the Shearer notes from Blumenthal and passed them to Steele (this is a primary source but valuable IMO). Business Insider confirms Shearer was searching Eastern Europe for dirt on Trump - in other words that his information is independently sourced from Steele’s. The ABC report says the Shearer info is mainly about the sexual allegations and that videos exist in several places. (Israel? How in the world would info like that get from Russia to Israel? That makes me inclined to doubt the whole thing but I guess the FBI is at least looking at it.) Someplace (forget where) said it is raw notes, six pages long, more of a memo than a dossier but that’s what people are calling it. I’d be inclined to skip the ABC, Vox, Mother Jones, and Esquire references and use the others. A section of one to two paragraphs seems to be in order. --MelanieN (talk) 18:04, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

That makes sense. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:30, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

Not directly on this subject, but the author was allegedly included in a hit list by the FSB [3]. My very best wishes (talk) 21:11, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN, this got archived prematurely, so I'm bumping it, as it is still pending creation. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:04, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

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 [4].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: [5] “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)

5. 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)
6. 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)
7. Support Direct relevance to the article. To exclude would provide POV.Casprings (talk) 03:38, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
8. 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)

9. 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: [6]. 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)

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)

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 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)

Mayer on Wikileaks

I'm removing the following content:

Main articles: 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak and Democratic National Committee cyber attacks

Mayer agrees with Steele that the Kremlin and WikiLeaks cooperated to release the stolen DNC emails, as stated by the U.S. Intelligence Community. On December 9, 2016, the CIA told U.S. legislators that the U.S. Intelligence Community concluded Russia conducted operations during the 2016 U.S. election to prevent Clinton from winning the presidency. Three U.S intelligence agencies concluded that people with direct ties to the Kremlin had sent hacked emails from the DNC to WikiLeaks.

References

Everything that follows the Mayer citation (#1) fails WP:NOR, one way or another. Either these sources don't mention the dossier – which is unsurprising as they were published before there was public knowledge of its existence – or the claims fail verification. The Time article is supposed to verify something that happened in December 2016 even though it was published in July 2016. "people with direct ties to the Kremlin" is even more problematic because the cited source says the opposite.

The Washington Post:

intelligence agencies do not have specific intelligence showing officials in the Kremlin "directing" the identified individuals to pass the Democratic emails to WikiLeaks, a second senior U.S. official said. Those actors, according to the official, were "one step" removed from the Russian government, rather than government employees.

Other sources I was able to find are consistent with the U.S. official's statement.

Comey's March testimony:

SCHIFF: This is a question I think you can answer. Do you know whether the Russian intelligence service has dealt directly with WikiLeaks or whether they too used an intermediary?
COMEY: We assessed they used some kind of cutout. They didn't deal directly with WikiLeaks. In contrast to D.C. Leaks and Guccifer 2.0.

Telegraph (about Comey's March testimony)

Mr Schiff, the top Democrat on the committee, asked Mr Comey if Russia had direct dealings with Wikileaks.
Mr Comey responded: "We assess they used some kind of cut out. They didn’t deal directly with Wikileaks."

CBS News (about Comey's March testimony)

Comey said that the U.S. believes Russian intelligence used some kind of "cut-out" in dealing with WikiLeaks.

Vox

Days before the Democratic National Convention, WikiLeaks releases 19,000 Democratic National Convention emails provided by "Guccifer 2.0" — a hacker who we later learn was a cut-out, or intermediary, for Russian intelligence.

Bloomberg

The report by U.S. intelligence agencies says Russia’s General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate, or GRU, gave the material to WikiLeaks through an intermediary.

CNN

US intelligence has said the Podesta emails were stolen by Russia and handed over to WikiLeaks through an intermediary.

Mayer's assertion "Kremlin and WikiLeaks were working together to release the D.N.C.'s e-mails" (per the source, while removed content says "Kremlin and WikiLeaks cooperated to release the stolen DNC emails) is unsubstantiated and I don't remember seeing anyone claiming that WikiLeaks was directly in contact with Russian intelligence services. At least after Comey testimony. In light of reporting in reliable sources, I would leave this section out unless there is some evidence of direct contact. Politrukki (talk) 12:07, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

• To the contrary, the text about the connections between WikiLeaks and Russian intelligence and propaganda must be expanded. But yes, it also needs to be better sourced and possibly described in more detail on other pages. Sourcing is not a problem. That was widely published. For example, CBS tells:

According to the the widely circulated January 2017 U.S. intelligence report detailing interference in the 2016 election, U.S. intelligence officials believe with "high confidence" that there is a connection between Russian military intelligence and the entities Guccifer 2.0, DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks that resulted in the deluge of hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton's associates hitting the Internet in the weeks ahead of the election. Clinton recently called WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange a "tool of Russian intelligence," and current CIA Director Mike Pompeo has dubbed it a "hostile intelligence service." ... The Kremlin's principal international propaganda outlet RT (formerly Russia Today) has actively collaborated with WikiLeaks," the report said."

And so on. Here, here, etc. My very best wishes (talk) 19:14, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't see any evidence of direct connection. Please show a quote that you think proves a direct connection. Remember for example that the ODNI report you cited came before, not after, Comey's public testimony to Congress, in which Comey mentioned the detail about "cut outs". If Comey's testimony has been seriously contested, I would like to know. But this is only for assessing how controversial Mayer's claim is. Any (hypothetical) additional material should be based on reliable sources that directly mention both Wikileaks and the dossier or, like you said, the material may belong to another article. Politrukki (talk) 10:39, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Ironically, the only direct connection to Russia that is verifiable and clearly evident is the connection between Steele and the Russian spies who provided the contents of his dossier on Trump. That is the only "statement of fact" that we can feel confident about publishing. Assange has repeatedly denied the allegations that the Kremlin was involved in the leaks. Several high-ups in the FBI have been fired or demoted, and there are ongoing criminal investigations. We need to stick to verifiable statements of fact and not get carried away with the conspiracy theories and unsubstantiated allegations that appear to be politically motivated. Our encyclopedia should not be used to support political disputes, or base entire articles on nothing more than speculation and journalistic opinion. Certainly it's fine to add a paragraph or two using in-text attribution to whoever is making such a claim, but when unsubstantiated allegations comprise the bulk of the article, we're getting into conspiracy theory territory and that is what concerns me most. Please let's not do that to our pedia. ^{Atsme📞📧} 11:08, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Parts of dossier "proven" false?

The only source I see that asserts parts of the dossier have been proven false is this from December 2017, which has been referenced in the article:

Certain parts of the dossier have either been confirmed or proven false

The source does not state what was proven false, but it's likely to be the assertion that Cohen met Russians in Praque, which Cohen "disproved" by showing his passport to Buzzfeed, revealing no Czech Republic stamp. Republicans assert this as "proof" here, but they omit this qualifying information from the source they cite:

Cohen’s passport would not show any record of a visit to Prague if he entered the EU through Italy, traveled to the Czech Republic, and then returned to his point of EU entry. A congressional official said the issue is “still active” for investigators.

And a few days ago we got this:

The Justice Department special counsel has evidence that Donald Trump’s personal lawyer and confidant, Michael Cohen, secretly made a late-summer trip to Prague during the 2016 presidential campaign, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

which discusses how Cohen could've entered the Czech Republic indirectly via a Schengen Area country.

Also, I have found The Hill to have a spotty track record and a seeming reluctance to issue corrections. I tend to avoid relying on them unless another source confirms their reports. So unless someone can provide another source that specifies what has been proven false, and that has not been contradicted, I recommend that this article not assert that anything in the dossier has been proven false.soibangla (talk) 03:49, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Agreed about The Hill. They can be shoddy and careless, sometimes with reports which are extreme left-, and more often extreme right-wing blog type "news" reports. That's not right. If it's an opinion article, that's fine, and we might use it and attribute it as such, but it shouldn't be confused with news reporting. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:23, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Cohen's denial isn't worth much at all. It's full of holes, and rich people can travel all over the world in private jets with no record at all. Only the flight, but not the passengers, are recorded. Trump traveled to the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow on a friends jet, with no record. If he hadn't shown his face, we wouldn't have known. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:25, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I've traveled across borders in Europe by car without even coming to a full stop, much less showing a passport. And I'm not rich.:) O3000 (talk) 11:15, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Same here. My passport shows far fewer countries than I've visited after the Schengen Treaty went into effect. It made traveling so much easier. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:20, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

No collusion. SPECIFICO talk 19:24, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

At this moment nothing in the text of the wiki article says that anything has been proven false. I agree that that The Hill citation should be removed as inaccurate (it doesn't even remotely back up that claim), since there already is an accurate citation to the sentence it cites. GreyGoose (talk) 04:11, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

The only things "false" are a few typos, and no one in their right mind considers such things as "false". So one could say minor errors, but we'd need RS for that. Thus it's better to not use sources which are wrong. I tend to agree with GreyGoose that The Hill citation can be removed until actual evidence is provided by a RS, and then we can use that source and mention the false information. "Unproven" is not "false". -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:23, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Even the things that have been called out as supposed typos are possibly not actually typos. "Alfa" being spelled "Alpha" by Steele is simply another transliteration from Russian. If you research closely, it's fairly obvious that some of the lesser companies in that group (owned or indirectly controlled by Fridman, Aven, and Khan) are still called "Alpha", even in their official UK/US names. Russian names (company names and people's names) generally have a variety of transliterations. GreyGoose (talk) 05:40, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Good point. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:58, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

SDNY court filing: The sum and substance of Mr. Muravnik's Report and his deposition is that the "best way to render the name . . . in English" is as "Alpha Bank," rather than "Alfa Bank." soibangla (talk) 18:37, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

"Even the things that have been called out as supposed typos are possibly not actually typos." – That might be true, but several reliable disagree with you.

1. Buzzfeed says the misspelling is a clear error.
2. The Independent implies that it is a "clear factual error".
3. Vanity Fair says "the repeated misspelling of the name of Alfa Bank—the largest privately owned commercial bank in Russia—as “Alpha Bank” does little to reinforce the report’s unsubstantiated charges of the bank’s illicit cash payoffs".
4. Newsweek says "there are several places where the author seems weirdly ignorant of basic facts about Russia. He or she refers to Alpha Bank rather than Alfa ... The author also misspells the name of Trump associate and Azeri real estate mogul Aras Agalarov.

All examples are from sources that are cited in the article. Politrukki (talk) 11:19, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Using the common spelling of the word 'alpha' does not 'prove anything false', it merely shows a missed detail or 'spellcheck' is working a little too well. C. W. Gilmore (talk) 11:39, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

It's an "error" per reliable sources. I've seen some sources (don't remember which and how many, maybe one or two) say that misspellings are (I'm paraphrasing) insignificant, but I don't remember seeing any source suggesting misspellings are not errors. Politrukki (talk) 12:24, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Such are certainly minor errors. Note that two of those sources were writing on the same day as the release of the dossier, and one two days later. One no longer hears of them as errors, except fringe sources which want to exaggerate such minor things into clear evidence of some massive attempt to perpetuate falsehoods. They are hardly worth mentioning, and definitely don't come close to the proven direct contacts by myriad Trump campaign people with Russians, and to the multiple charges filed, arrests made, and convictions. That's serious business. Convictions and confessions are in a different league than minor typos. Trump's own campaign officials are flipping on him. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:30, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

In another article, by different writers, The Hill writes "Some of the allegations appear to have been debunked, like a claim that Trump lawyer Michael Cohen travelled to Prague during the election to meet with a Russian official." [7] Frankly, I have no idea whether The Hill still considers the claim about Michael Cohen apparently debunked, but clearly that was not the only claim that appears to be debunked.

Is ABC News cited in our article a reliable source? They write "The infamous 'dossier' alleging collusion between Donald Trump and the Russian government is filled with inflammatory, uncorroborated and in some cases clearly false claims made by unidentified sources". What "false claims" refers to here is not explained, but in another article they say "ABC News was able to debunk some references to him in the unverified document, such as the assertion in the that his Ukrainian-born father-in-law had a vacation home, or dacha, near Russian President Vladimir Putin’s."

Has the allegation about Barvikha been rebunked (see [8], [9])?

The Washington Post has debunked at least one allegation: "we do know that the Podesta emails were obtained through a phishing attempt, not by leveraging botnets, porn or bugs".

The BBC has commented the Newsweek article cited in our article as such: "Newsweek says it 'contains lots of Kremlin-related gossip' and points to factual errors and the misspelling of Russian names." Politrukki (talk) 12:15, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Elsewhere on WP: During the Soviet era, Barvikha was known as the site of the most desirable state dachas for government officials and leading intellectuals, and many of Russia's wealthiest individuals have built private luxury dachas here since the late 1990s soibangla (talk) 18:48, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm not persuaded, as that sentence is preceded by "Some examples are provided that don’t seem to be related to what happened to 2016" soibangla (talk) 18:40, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Newsweek specifically says Aras Agalarov was misspelled as Araz, but WP says it's the Azerbaijani spelling: Araz İsgəndər oğlu Ağalarov soibangla (talk) 19:00, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

(a) Wikipedia is not a reliable source and I don't see what the content you cited is supposed to prove. (b) That's not what The Washington Post says: you have mixed July and December reports. (c) Again, Wikipedia is not a reliable source (and there's no citation for Azerbaijani spelling). You are also cherry picking one part of the name from Azerbaijani spelling and another from English transliteration. Do you have any reliable sources that contradict the sources I mentioned? Politrukki (talk) 06:04, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Fixed by using the next ref and its wording. No need to use a source which was inaccurate. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:33, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

The Hill is a perfectly acceptable source for content in this article. Buzzfeed, not so much. No RS is above making an error from time to time, including the NYTimes and WaPo. A different topic - suggested reading: Argument from ignorance - I just read it, hurt my head...read it again despite the fog filling the empty spaces...applied it to the proving something false argument here, and well...read the article and draw your own conclusions. ^{Atsme📞📧} 15:25, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Amen! Many of those initiallly "ignorant claims" of "error" and debunking were made on the same day and days immediately after the dossier was released. There was a shock-and-awe sense of (ignorant) disbelief at the time. Critics were many, as ignorant criticism is cheap. Now, after so much has been confirmed, and myriad Trump campaign members who lied repeatedly about their many suspicious direct contacts with Russians have been charged, confessed, convicted, and are flipping on Trump...well, now we aren't so ignorant anymore. The argument from ignorance worked in the beginning, but now only for those who depend on unreliable sources. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:39, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

"Now, after so much has been confirmed,... what are you referring to, BR? The only thing I'm aware of that has been confirmed is the Russia to Russia communication. Please provide diffs to whatever else has been confirmed. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:47, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

It would be nice if you actually read the article and its sources for once. Start with Trump–Russia dossier#Veracity of certain allegations.

Then follow RS, rather than the spin on Fox News and other unreliable sources, which ignore or downplay the lies about myriad suspicious direct contacts and secret meetings between Trump campaign officials and Russians, the official charges and indictments of those people, their confessions, their convictions, and some are flipping on Trump.

That all contradicts Trump's denials of "collusion", and confirms the dossier's allegation of "a well-developed conspiracy of co-operation between [the Trump campaign] and the Russian leadership." For God's sake, Manafort has been charged, and a "Former Trump Aide Pleads Guilty to Conspiracy Against the United States". -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:02, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Do you have an explanation why at least four sources (one of them is actually from March) that make these "ignorant claims" are cited in our article? Has someone proved them wrong? Here's a part of coverage from January 2018:

1. "BuzzFeed posted the unredacted documents just 10 days before Trump’s inauguration, with a warning that the contents contained errors and were 'unverified and potentially unverifiable'." – The Guardian
2. "BuzzFeed published the dossier in January 2017, noting that the allegations were unverified and the report contained errors." – Politico
3. "BuzzFeed published the dossier last January, noting at the time that allegations in the document were unverified and contained errors." – HuffPost
4. "Buzzfeed's article also highlighted what it said were several outright errors in the document." – NBC News
5. "BuzzFeed published the 35-page document in its entirety in January 2017, noting that the 'allegations are unverified, and the report contains errors'" – ABC News
6. "Buzzfeed published the 35-page document in January 2017, along with a caution that its 'allegations are unverified, and the report contains errors.'" – Times of Israel
7. "Buzzfeed eventually published all the documents in early 2017, while noting that they contained errors." – news.com.au

I don't see any policy-based reason why "contained errors" should not be mentioned in the body and lead, regardless of whether individual editors think the errors are significant or not.

The ABC News report (that debunked some of allegations related to Cohen), another one that says "some cases clearly false claims", and The Washington Post analysis I previously cited in this discussion were published in May, January 2018, and October, respectively. Have they been contradicted? Politrukki (talk) 13:49, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

My very quick response (I have to leave) is that these mentions of BuzzFeeds original comments change nothing. They are just history. They are just documenting the statements made in January 2017. Even in 200 years, they would still be nothing more than a historical record. They say nothing about the current state of affairs. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:01, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

@Politrukki: if you'll pardon the interjection, I think it's pretty clear that by calling these claims "ignorant", etc., Bull's goal is to insult editors who talk about the claims, and get them to shut up, lest he launch into his speech about "Putin, RT, Sputnik, Fox News, Breitbart, Daily Caller, InfoWars, Townhall, Drudge Report, Hannity, Limbaugh, etc.", similar to the way he is just now berating Atsme above for what he imagines to be her views and reading habits. Factchecker_atyourservice 05:02, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

• Factchecker_atyourservice, I'm sure Politrukki won't mind the interjection, but I take issue with the tone of it. I'll drop an NPA template on your talk page (since not assuming good faith and ascribing motives is an example of a personal attack). Thanks, Drmies (talk) 16:40, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Lead - 3rd paragraph

The statement, Some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, while others "remain unverified" is misleading, and uses SYNTH to make the corroboration appear to be something it's not. That particular sentence was cherrypicked from passing mention in an article that focused primarily on Trump's tweeted denials and criticisms of the FBI, then ventures off to Obamacare. The WaPo article states: Trump began his day criticizing the FBI and claiming that the now-famous dossier containing allegations about his connections to Russia and possible coordination between his campaign and the Kremlin during the 2016 election is a "pile of garbage." The actual corroborated information is in the cited CNN article which clearly states: For the first time, US investigators say they have corroborated some of the communications detailed in a 35-page dossier.... The article further explains: None of the newly learned information relates to the salacious allegations in the dossier. Rather it relates to conversations between foreign nationals. The only corroboration according to officials involves intelligence intercepts confirming that ...some of the conversations described in the dossier took place between the same individuals on the same days and from the same locations as detailed in the dossier... The 3rd paragraph needs to be fixed. I suggest shortening and rewriting to satisfy DUE and NPOV and include actual statements of fact without the editorializing and SYNTH. ^{Atsme📞📧} 12:08, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Agree with Atsme. We have to be very careful to make sure we match policies and guidelines here. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 12:19, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't understand your objection. The sentence Some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, while others "remain unverified" seems to be correct, according to the sources you quote. Some allegations (about meetings) have been corroborated. Others have not. In what sense is this misleading or SYNTH? --MelanieN (talk) 15:38, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

See the more complex example in WP:SYNTH which actually demonstrates in their example something very similar except the sentences are reversed. The example states (my underline) "the first paragraph is fine, because each of the sentences is carefully sourced, using a source that refers to the same dispute". In our article, it isn't until later in the paragraph that a single source, CNN, refers to and clearly defines which allegations are corroborated, and not the more general (misleading) statement that "some allegations have been corroborated". The isolated sentence at the beginning of our paragraph does that by citing a different source in order to make such a general statement without naming the specific corroborated allegations, which may lead readers to believe that some of the Trump collusion allegations may have been corroborated based on the context of this article. ^{Atsme📞📧} 16:39, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I guess we can write "some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, but not the existence of the pee tape" if that is the concern here.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:36, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, the "salacious" allegation hasn't been confirmed yet, unlike many other allegations. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:45, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Proposed rewording #1

Suggested change: The media, the intelligence community, and most experts have treated the dossier with caution, whereas Trump has denounced the report as "a pile of garbage". In February 2017, some of the conversations between foreign nationals were corroborated to have taken place "between the same individuals on the same days and from the same locations as detailed in the dossier", but none of the information relating to the salacious allegations has been corroborated. (cite CNN) I chose to use Trump's own words as they reflect his lack of PC. ^{Atsme📞📧} 16:54, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose This is well established consensus. Please view RFC here . WP:DROPTHESTICK.Casprings (talk) 17:47, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Casprings - Wikipedia:Consensus#Consensus_can_change. In this particular case, the first sentence was recently changed. However, it requires more change to be policy compliant. Not my fault, but the only corroborated allegation in the dossier relates to Russian officials talking to Russians, and that is how it should be presented. Getting to that point took a lot of time to corroborate which is why RECENTISM is an issue, and why it's better to exercise patience and let these things incubate so we don't have to keep going back and updating the information. Oh, and btw - editor consensus doesn't override NPOV policy. ^{Atsme📞📧} 18:36, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

The sentence already IS policy compliant. It is not SYNTH, as the very sources you quote demonstrate. What the hell does "DUE" have to do with anything? Once again you are just randomly throwing out Wikipedia policy acronyms hoping something will stick, where as the actual motivation is a straightforward WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT. And yes, this has been discussed to death and it really is time to drop the stick.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:40, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

I assume you're suggesting that for the article text - not the lede? We could discuss it for the text, but it is way too detailed for the lede. The lede summarizes the situation in a single sentence, as it should, and does it well. --MelanieN (talk) 19:25, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) VM, I've provided evidence, and have explained my position to you multiple times. Your rebuttal is unconvincing. Please provide something far more substantive than accusations of IJUSTDONTLIKEIT. It's time for you to DROPTHESTICK, and stop beating up on editors who are trying their best to improve this article. BTW - valid arguments actually cite substantive PAGs that support their position as I have done - not just PAs against an editor you clearly oppose. If you cannot offer a legitimate rebuttal to my argument without resorting to PAs, please do not address me at all. We do have a civility requirement here.

Melanie - it is for the lead - see the section title. The body can provide more details. Perhaps an RfC is in order? ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:31, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

No, you have not. You've just repeated stuff that's been said, and shot down, many times before. That's why this is just another waste of time you've created.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:33, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

And Casprings already sited the relevant Wikipedia acronym. DROP. THE. STICK. There was an RfC on the matter for monkey's sake.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:34, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

^^^WP:BATTLEGROUND^^^ - I will not partake. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:38, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

^^^^^ Atsme, one of the many problems with your edits on Wikipedia is that what you say and what you do are two completely different things. YOU started this. Pointing out that the matter has already been discussed is NOT "battleground". Bringing up same stuff over and over and over again in order to try and force your way IS "battleground" behavior.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:49, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

This proposed text is unsuitable for the lede. Per our guideline, WP:Lede, "The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article." Briefly summarize. Not lay out the whole case for one small aspect of the subject. If you do start an RfC over your proposed text - which I don't recommend; an RfC is supposed to be for when there is genuine disagreement on the page, not when one party disagrees with everyone else - I predict everyone will say "not in the lede, discuss it for the text if you want." --MelanieN (talk) 02:07, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN, you said...We could discuss it for the text, but it is way too detailed for the lede. I've provided a side by side so you can see that it's the current text that is way too detailed, not my proposed changes. All I did was eliminate the editorializing: ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:45, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Current text

Proposed text

Some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, while others "remain unverified".[11] Some claims may require access to classified information for verification.[12] The media, the intelligence community, and most experts have treated the dossier with caution, while Trump himself denounced the report as "fake news". In February 2017, some details related to conversations "solely between foreign nationals" were independently verified. Some of those individuals were known to be "heavily involved" in efforts to damage Clinton and help Trump. The conversations "took place between the same individuals on the same days and from the same locations as detailed in the dossier", giving US intelligence and law enforcement "greater confidence" in the credibility of parts of the document.[13]

The media, the intelligence community, and most experts have treated the dossier with caution, whereas Trump has denounced the report as "a pile of garbage". In February 2017, some of the conversations between foreign nationals were corroborated to have taken place "between the same individuals on the same days and from the same locations as detailed in the dossier", but none of the information relating to the salacious allegations has been corroborated. (cite CNN)

Wait - you lost me. Are you now proposing your new wording to replace the TEXT content? So you want to end the current discussion, in which you are arguing to put it in the lede in place of the current lede sentence? That's what the section title says, and that's what you have consistently said. If you are done with that idea, please say so. Then we can start a discussion about whether to put it in the article text instead - if that is really what you are suggesting. --MelanieN (talk) 00:11, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN - it appears my use of current text is different from yours. I used Current text and Proposed text for the column headers in the table. In the column Current text is the last paragraph of the lead now. In the column Proposed text is my proposed text to replace the 3rd paragraph of the lead. My proposal has always been about the lead, not the body text. The details are already in the body text in the section Reputation in the U.S. intelligence community. That paragraph begins...On February 10, 2017,... Are we on the same page, yet? ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:54, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN, hello? You made the argument that the text in the lead needed to be simple and short per BullRangifer's agreement with you in his opposition vote below - but as evidenced by the table, the simple and short is the proposed text, not the current text that it's in the lead. Please weigh-in. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Atsme (talk • contribs)

You confused me by saying “text”. I use that word to mean the article text, as opposed to the lede; you used it to mean the text, i.e., wording, of the lede. OK, I think I finally understand you. The changes you want to make: 1) You entirely remove from that third paragraph the first two sentences - Some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, while others "remain unverified".[11] Some claims may require access to classified information for verification.[12]. 2) You keep the sentence about treating with caution (with slight rewording). 3) You remove the sentence Some of those individuals were known to be "heavily involved" in efforts to damage Clinton and help Trump.. And 4) You delete the last part of the last sentence, namely giving US intelligence and law enforcement "greater confidence" in the credibility of parts of the document.[13] and replace it with the very specific disclaimer none of the information relating to the salacious allegations has been corroborated. (cite CNN). Have I got that right now? After I get your confirmation that these are the specific changes you are proposing, I will respond. --MelanieN (talk) 23:35, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Basically, yes...but I am open to tweaking as long as it doesn't become the heavily weighted, lengthy paragraph that we had prior to this discussion. If we stick to statements of fact in lieu of editorialized speculation, our readers will be far better served to know what has or hasn't been verified, not what might be/could be/should be verified. ^{Atsme📞📧} 23:50, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I'll respond below, possibly tomorrow. (I have hardly been online at all this week - just busy in RL.) --MelanieN (talk) 01:25, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose change. The current content in the lede is perfectly fine. Per MelanieN, we really should keep it simple and short. Details belong in the body. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:27, 23 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support The current text is ambiguous. We should not say "some ... have been corroborated" without explaining which. Page's share in an energy company, the "pee tape"? A reader doesn't know without reading the entirety of the body. Atsme's version is specific. Additionally, the conversations between foreign nationals "heavily involved" in efforts to "damage Clinton and help Trump" is cited to a single CNN piece. This seems significant enough that most sources would have reported it. Are there other citations? James J. Lambden (talk) 05:51, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose this specific change; that's too drastic of a rewrite for one very specific concern. Suggest instead simply changing the first sentence to 'Some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, while others, including its more salacious claims, remain unverified." or words to that effect. This is a simple five-word addition that clarifies the situation fairly accurately. --Aquillion (talk) 06:06, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support The purposed change above. @BullRangifer: since the change has been clarified after you had voted would you be interested in changing your vote since it has addressed your concerns? Keeps the lead even shorter and more to the point while keeping unneeded details in the body. Those last three sentences of the current paragraph are way to awkward. PackMecEng (talk) 13:43, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose — Here's how I'd write it:

Because of the difficulty in publicly verifying the dossier contents, the media and most independent intelligence experts have approached it with caution, while Trump and his supporters have denounced it as wholly false. Some of the dossier claims may not be publicly verifiable because they require access to classified information. CNN reported on February 10, 2017 that American investigators verified some of the dossier details related to conversations between Russian nationals, some of whom were known to be "heavily involved" in efforts to damage Clinton and help Trump. No other aspects of the dossier have yet been publicly verified or disproven. soibangla (talk) 23:00, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

According to Vox, during the fall of 2016, the dossier circulated in the media but news organizations largely failed to verify any of its key claims. To say they had "difficulty in publicly verifying the dossier contents" is editorializing unless you're quoting using in-text attribution. It also implies that the allegations may be true, and to that I refer editors to the application of sound editorial judgement - see Copi's quote in Evidence of absence, In some circumstances it can be safely assumed that if a certain event had occurred, evidence of it could be discovered by qualified investigators. In such circumstances it is perfectly reasonable to take the absence of proof of its occurrence as positive proof of its non-occurrence. — Copi, Introduction to Logic (1953), p. 95 ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:51, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Would "Because of the difficulty in publicly verifying or disproving the dossier contents..." allay your concerns? That would neatly dovetail with the closing sentence. soibangla (talk) 21:21, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

It's not that simple, and is in fact nearly always BS during a criminal investigation. We KNOW that Mueller is not revealing all the available (and coming) evidence, so the public absence of evidence is obviously not evidence of absence, Logic 101. At least be honest about that and don't imply otherwise. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:08, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

I am not so sure about that. Ever piece of information to date that has been remotely negative has been leaked, sometimes within hours of it being discovered. There is not reason to think they are holding some big bombshell close to the chest at this point. Even RS are starting to move on from Mueller as having nothing much on Trump himself. PackMecEng (talk) 20:35, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Either BullRangifer or PackMecEng could be write, but these are both just speculation. We follow the RSs, currently they have not revealed that Mueller has hidden some big bombshell do we don't include it for now but if it and is related to the Dossier then we should include it here. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:48, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

BR, it actually is that simple. We need to steer clear of conspiratorial theorizing. The fact that Mueller is keeping his investigation under wraps is exactly why we should not be editorializing content published in opinion columns, analysis, and/or commentary. In-text attribution is required if the material is considered to be worthy of inclusion. I refer back to our policies: NOTNEWS, NPOV, DUE, BALANCE and OR. Garbage in is still garbage out, and my primary concern is focused on sound editorial judgement to maintain the quality and integrity of our pedia. I can't justify inclusion of speculative material in an opinion piece. Having said that, I realize that I am a lone pebble on the beach and consensus makes the final determination...as long as editor consensus doesn't attempt to supersede NPOV. It is what it is - there is no deadline - let the allegations incubate and keep RECENTISM in mind. Simple. ^{Atsme📞📧} 20:57, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Soibangla, you asked above...Would "Because of the difficulty in publicly verifying or disproving the dossier contents..." allay your concerns? Well, it begs the question, who had difficulty publicly verifying the allegations? Was it the FBI who wanted to verify it publicly? Who attempted to disprove the dossier's contents? It leads to editorializing when we should be stating facts in a dispassionate tone. What we do know is evidenced in multiple RS - the bulk of the allegations remain unsubstantiated - and the reason for that, is quite simply...we don't know, yet. It may change in the near future...but until then, predictions/speculation makes us noncompliant with CRYSTALBALL, so the best option is to wait until the investigation actually proves whatever it is they need to prove. It doesn't appear to be Trump collusion (which isn't a crime)...lots of questions still left unanswered. ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:40, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

"who had difficulty publicly verifying the allegations?" Anyone, for any reason, by any means. There is no "they" or motives stated or implied here. This is an evolving current event, so readers come to the article now to discover where the matter stands now, and at some point in the future this article will become strictly an historical document. Until then, we need to dispassionately explain where we are at any given point, and I think my edit accomplishes that. I think you're reading into the edit implications that simply aren't there. soibangla (talk) 21:52, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

That's OR, and it is noncompliant with WP:NOTNEWS policy. ^{Atsme📞📧} 22:05, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

How is it OR? As someone else previously noted, you appear to have a tendency to toss out every WP rule you can think of in the hope that something will stick. soibangla (talk) 22:09, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

^^WP:BATTLEGROUND - I no longer wish to discuss this with you. ^{Atsme📞📧} 22:13, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

PROPOSAL: I recommend this language be adopted for paragraph #3 of the article:

Because of the difficulty in publicly verifying the dossier contents, the media and most independent intelligence analysts have approached it with caution, while Trump and his supporters have denounced it as wholly false. Some of the dossier claims may not be publicly verifiable because they require access to classified information. CNN reported on February 10, 2017 that American investigators verified some of the dossier details related to conversations between Russian nationals, some of whom were known to be "heavily involved" in efforts to damage Clinton and help Trump. No other aspects of the dossier have yet been publicly verified or disproven. soibangla (talk) 22:28, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Soibangla - starting another proposal while one has only been active for a couple of days is highly disruptive behavior - I recommend that you self-revert. MelanieN, it appears you have taken this editor under your wing - please advise him/her. ^{Atsme📞📧} 22:37, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

We disagree. If you would like another editor to advise me, please address your comment to that editor. I no longer wish to discuss anything with you. soibangla (talk) 22:42, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Greasy Granola, Atsme! The second proposal is an improvement that builds on the first to make an even more succinct and neutral statement. I like this alternative TWO. SPECIFICO talk 01:39, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

😂 I'm borrowing that one, SPECIFICO. ^{Atsme📞📧} 18:51, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Changing to an arbitrary break with the proposed rewrite by Soibangla. I believe Atsme is correct, another proposal is a tad disruptive, especially since it's only a few days old, but more importantly because so many have already voiced their opinions on the previous proposal. If we end up with no-consensus in a few days time, then maybe we can start an actual RfC with three possibilities. For now, though, to not cause confusion and to not encourage disruption, I think we should stick with the two choices.  -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 02:06, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

"so many have already voiced their opinions on the previous proposal" over a 72+ hour period, and the issue remains, at best, deadlocked. 126 page watchers have visited recent edits of this TP. I suggest this issue has been adequately discussed, and because it represents a primary linchpin of the article, we should move to a prompt resolution. soibangla (talk) 02:58, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

RfCs go up to 30 days. Why is this different? It's not a BLP, so we aren't risking a policy issue in that manner -- what's the rush? There's no deadline in Wikipedia. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 03:17, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

"BLP others" still applies. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:17, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

There appears to be a consensus that the current language is inadequate, and the first proposed revision does not appear to reach consensus. Because the dossier is now among the hottest topics of the day, readers come to the article now with one key question: is the dossier true? I believe my proposed edit is better than the current language, it is an accurate and succinct summary of what is now known, and we can improve it later as new developments warrant. IMO, this issue could have and should have been resolved months ago, as there has been no further illumination on the dossier's veracity since the CNN report of over a year ago. soibangla (talk) 21:32, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Let’s talk a minute about process. I had labeled Soibangla’s proposal as Proposal #2, but someone overruled that because of their impression that we are only allowed to have one proposal at a time. I disagree with that. I personally think our best and most productive discussions result from a process where the text is discussed and modified through discussion, rather than what appears to be the current approach - “this is the proposal, either support or oppose it exactly as written,” then do the same with another proposal, then another, until we finally refine it over a period of weeks or months, to something that either finds approval or is accepted by default through editor exhaustion. IMO that is not good procedure, but that is how this thread has evolved. Meanwhile, Soibangla is incorrect in saying “There appears to be a consensus that the current language is inadequate.” In this thread I see four people (five counting myself although I haven’t specifically said so) who think the current text is OK, and four who want to change it.

Anyhow, at some point it will become clear that Atsme’s proposed rewording does not have consensus. At that point I would like to throw it open to general discussion, rather than another take-it-or-leave-it, support-or-oppose-as-is suggestion. If people are OK with that approach I will propose as a starting point a synthesis of the current text, using some aspects of each proposal’s suggested changes. I would keep the current text, with the following changes, and maybe others that come up as this discussion continues:

• With regard to Atsme’s proposed changes: I do not agree with removing the first sentence, but I would be OK with removing the second sentence Some claims may require access to classified information for verification.[12]. I also agree with removing the fourth sentence Some of those individuals were known to be "heavily involved" in efforts to damage Clinton and help Trump. I disagree with her other rewordings. In particular I oppose specifically saying that “the salacious allegations” have not been confirmed, since we have actually not mentioned those allegations in the lede up to that point. If people really want to mention this, I would use Aquillion’s suggested modification of the first sentence, Some of the dossier's allegations have been corroborated, while others, including its more salacious claims, remain unverified.”
• With regard to soibangla’s proposed changes, I like their first sentence Because of the difficulty in publicly verifying the dossier contents, the media and most independent intelligence analysts have approached it with caution, while Trump and his supporters have denounced it as wholly false. better than what we have now, and I like their later modification “publicly verifying or disproving”. I would leave out the second sentence, as I said with regard to Atsme’s proposal; it’s kind of argumentative and it is implied already in “difficulty in publicly verifying the dossier contents.” Right now I don't think the rest of their proposal improves on the current paragraph. --MelanieN (talk) 17:16, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

A reader will read "Because of the difficulty in publicly verifying the dossier contents" and wonder "why is there difficulty?" which is answered in the next sentence: "Some of the dossier claims may not be publicly verifiable because they require access to classified information." soibangla (talk) 17:37, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I think we need to be careful about coming up with an editor-written characterization if it differs markedly from what lots of RS say. The sources generally describe the dossier as unverified, or mostly so and we should track that. Sorry if I missed it, but is there sourcing that says the media and analyst caution is due to the inability to publicly verify the allegations, as opposed to verifying them at all? Factchecker_atyourservice 17:53, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

The dossier was circulating among the media for weeks/months prior to the election, but no one reported it because they couldn't confirm it with public sources and had no access to classified sources. Also see paragraph on John Sipher in this article. soibangla (talk) 18:00, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

The New Yorker source doesn't say anything about the caution being due to the need to get access to records, and there were lots of other reasons to treat it with skepticism so this would seem to be a pretty POINTy unsourced claim unless I'm missing something? Factchecker_atyourservice 18:31, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Journalists tend to avoid reporting things they can't confirm. Well, good journalists, anyway. soibangla (talk) 18:51, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Without a source saying that something about accessing non-public documents was the reason for journalistic skepticism, you're just making stuff up, and since there are other reasons for skepticism, making stuff up in this particular instance would be especially misleading. Factchecker_atyourservice 03:28, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Fringe theories section for the conspiracy theories?

Should we have a section which outlines the basic conspiracy theories which run contrary to the RS documentation? They dispute:

1. That the Russians interfered in the election to help Trump win,
2. That the dossier is a serious piece of research which has been partially corroborated.
3. That numerous Trump campaign members, including Don Jr, held many secret meetings with Russians and lied about it repeatedly.
4. That they actively sought and accepted help and information from Russians working to discredit Clinton and help Trump.
5. That several Trump campaign members and friends, including Don Jr, were in direct contact with Wikileaks.
6. That the over 100 charges filed, confessions provided, and convictions obtained, are just.
7. That the Nunes memo has been debunked.
8. That Nunes has acted as an agent of Russian interests.
9. That the GOP leadership are compromised and complicit because they knew that the Russians were interfering in the election, but McConnell ordered the gang of eight to stay silent and allow it to happen.
10. That the investigations on Trump and Co. are not a witch hunt, but the legitimate exposure of a series of self-inflicted wounds.
11. That the FBI and intelligence agencies are doing their job to protect America from an attack on its electoral system, infrastructure, and democracy itself.
12. That Trump is counteracting their efforts by demonizing and obstructing them.
13. That Trump is attacking the very idea of truth and undermining a free press.
14. That.....(please add other elements).

As an exercise, let's outline the basic elements in the conspiracy theory (actually cover-up and gaslighting by the Trump administration). Help by adding any elements I've left out.

1. That the Russians did not hack the DNC and that it was an inside job.
2. That Seth Rich was murdered by Clinton people to silence him.
3. That the dossier is fake and without any basis in reality.
4. That Steele is a paid hack who will do anything for money.
5. That the Nunes memo is the accurate version of events.
6. That the investigations on Trump and Co. are a witch hunt.
7. That the FBI and intelligence agencies are corrupt and part of a deep state plot against Trump.
8. That.....(please add other elements).

The sources which push this view are unreliable sources like Trump, Putin, RT, Sputnik, Fox News, Breitbart, Daily Caller, InfoWars, Townhall, Drudge Report, Hannity, Limbaugh, etc. We obviously can't directly cite most of them, but we can cite Trump and Fox News, and actual RS which do mention this conspiracy theory. Atsme and other editors here who hold this fringe view would probably love to provide sourcing which we can consider.

I'm really wondering if we should do this. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:33, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

What sources do you have? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:23, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Apologies, but I don't quite understand your question...please clarify. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:51, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

I want to read the sources before we create some section about fringe theories and/or conspiracy theories. Also Fox was not deemed as unreliable at the latest RS discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_238#Fox_News_reliability_RfC, someone claiming that this is unreliable could come across as a biased and POV pushing editor who is against the mission of Wikipedia. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 20:10, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

"Also Fox was not deemed as unreliable at the latest RS discussion" - ummm, the link you provide just shows that there's no consensus as to whether it's reliable or unreliable. The position that is unreliable does not indicate "bias" or POV pushing (frankly, it rather would show good judgement).Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:56, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Are we looking at the same RFC? Because the one listed by a 2:1 margin said it should not be treated any differently than other RS. Though it was withdrawn in less than half a day after the direction it was going became clear. (It shouldn't of been withdrawn imo, but here we are). PackMecEng (talk) 00:08, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

First, the actual RSN discussion is here. Note that many of the editors who discussed it there were not even aware of this RfC (I certainly wasn't). Second, like you said, it was withdrawn in less than half a day, which might have something to do with it. It's impossible to conclude any kind of consensus based on that. Third, not the "oppose" !votes claim that "it should not be treated any differently than other RS". At least two or three are procedural.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:15, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

I agree that it is not consensus since it was withdrawn so early, I was just confused when you said closed no consensus. Also several of the support votes were certainly, if I may use your catch phrase, WP:IDONTLIKEIT as well. Kind of balances out there. I would someday like to vote on a properly worded RFC to put an end to all this Fox stuff one way or another. I know like every source it is case by case ect, but general community consensus on stuff like that is helpful at times. PackMecEng (talk) 00:28, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

The list of items is missing a lot of evidence in the public domain that cast all sorts of doubts on the dossier and the whole Russia collusion narrative. Kim Dotcom claimed he was present when Seth Rich downloaded the files from the DNC. Dotcom offered to testify before Mueller, but was never contacted to do so. Former NAS director William Binney claims NSA could not trace data packets from supposed hack and also that download speeds of the data exceeded what would be expected in a remote hack. The case of corruption inside the FBI is under investigation by Huber as lead prosecutor. We already know here was fabricated evidence, such as the Trump server communicating with Alfa Bank. Alfa Bank asked the Justice Dept. to investigate and unmask a hacker believed to be located in the U.S. The story was pushed by a Clinton supporter who was sent a letter by Alfa Bank to preserve records. Also, Comey failed to tell Trump who paid for the dossier, then remained silent throughout the time Congress was trying to uncover who did. Several Obama administration officials were referred for criminal investigation in this letter, a few in connection with the conspiracy. There are also sources showing Nunes repeatedly requesting the intelligence leading to the Trump campaign counterintelligence investigation, which he finally got to see. This resulted in his claim that no official intelligence was used to start the investigation. The House Intelligence Committee is continuing their investigation. I have pages of references for all of this.Phmoreno (talk) 20:55, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Sources

"Kim Dotcom claimed he was present when Seth Rich downloaded the files from the DNC." - you serious??? Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Kim Dotcom has a long history of frauds and is currently a fugitive. What next? O3000 (talk) 23:25, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

What about Alexander Downer of the George Papadopoulos meeting at Kensington Wine Room being involved in this: Aussie Complaints Headed to FBI on Clinton Foundation’s Dealings Down Under Phmoreno (talk) 00:53, April 24, 2018‎ (UTC)

Lifezette is not a RS. Please stick to them. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:06, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Inspector General Horowitz is scheduled to testify before Congress on May 8, possibly meaning his long awaited report will be released before than. Sources say the report contains explosive revelations.Phmoreno (talk) 21:12, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Phmoreno, I trust you have numerous sources, but are they RS, the kind we can use here? -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 22:06, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

At this point in time it is too close to the Inspector General's report for me to be spending much time on this. Huber has been a special prosecutor for about 5 months now and the investigation has been very secretive. We probably won't know much more until a grand jury is convened. Phmoreno (talk) 22:34, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Should be written by critters with no more than 2 legs and published under a reputable imprimatur. Sounds like you're showing nothing like that. SPECIFICO talk 22:40, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Given your absurd claims and conspiracy theories you're spouting above, I seriously doubt it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Phmoreno, "it is too close to the Inspector General's report" has no bearing on whether you have RS which can be used to create a section which documents the conspiracy theories which sow doubt on the dossier, among other things. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:17, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

For god's sake, I'm giving all of you a real chance to document your conspiracy theories. If you can't do it without using unreliable sources, then your failure proves they are not true and not notable enough to be included here, and you should also stop advocating them on talk pages. Sheesh! Please, please, please make a serious effort to find RS to use. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:17, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

• I'm of the mind that if we simply add a section, Corroborated allegations, (provided there will be more than 2 or 3 sentences), readers can figure out the rest on their own. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:17, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

• We have such a section called "Veracity of certain allegations", that happens to undermine your conspiracy theories. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:09, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

• The main article for this is Deep state in the United States. No need to clutter this article with baseless conspiracy theories and speculation. We should stick to what RS say about the dossier. However, if a certain conspiracy theory surrounding the dossier has garnered significant coverage, then it should at least be mentioned here with proper context. ^Falling_Gravity 16:47, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

• Falling, I understand and largely agree. I just threw up a number of points, but not all of them are directly related to the dossier. It is those which would be relevant here. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:36, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

• No

1. Reliable sources report conflicting information. Many sources say the Russians only wanted to cause chaos and discord, paying for anti-Trump social media ads and organizing anti-Trump rallies.
2. "Serious [opposition] research" (sorry for the scare quotes) is not filled with false and defamatory claims, similar to Alex Jones' "serious research" into Pizzagate.
3. Meeting with someone who was born in Russia and lying about it is not in itself notable, other than the media meltdown that immediately followed.
4. Somewhat notable, though to a lesser extent than Clinton and the DNC not only sought help and information from the Russians, but paid for that information as well.
5. Only notable if the communications were nefarious or illegal in nature. I couldn't find any sources that show this is the case.
6. Wikipedia isn't the arbiter of justice, making claims as to whether any convictions unrelated to the election (such as tax fraud, money laundering, etc.) are good or bad.
7. Nunes memo hasn't been "debunked." DOJ Inspector General still investigating FISA abuses alleged in Nunes memo.[10]
8. No evidence for this. Likely a BLP violation. Need good, solid sourcing to essentially accuse a sitting congressman of treason.
9. See above.
10. No serious reliable sources would say whether or not the Mueller investigation is a witch hunt, as this is a highly subjective term dependent on one's perspective.
11. Not notable for this article. That has been part of the FBI/intel community's mission for decades before Trump became the president.
12. Again, no serious RS would say this due to subjective nature of these claims and reliance on perspective.
13. See above. "Attacking the very idea of truth"? Nowhere near appropriate for an encyclopedia.

I would be really surprised if saying the Trump administration is "gaslighting" and engaged in a "cover up" without any sources to support this isn't against one or many Wikipedia policies (even on a talk page) but see below:

1. Need multiple reliable sources that say the hacking was an "inside job."
2. Not relevant to this article.
3. Since almost all of the information has been disproven or unverified, the "fake" adjective is much closer to the side of truth than a conspiracy theory.
4. No reliable sourcing.
5. Too early to tell. We should wait for the conclusion of the DOJ IG's investigation into the allegations contained in the Nunes memo.
6. Again this phrase is not an encyclopedic term, subjective, and depends on perspective. You could say "Democrats have said the Mueller investigation is not a witch hunt, while Trump and Republicans have widely condemned the investigation as a witch hunt."
7. "Corruption" has a high bar for an encyclopedia. I don't think the Strzok-Page text messages, Andrew McCabe-James Comey-Loretta Lynch-Bruce Ohr-etc. OIG investigation qualifies yet. We really should wait for the conclusion of the OIG investigation for much of this content. WP:NOHURRY.

Sourcing information to InfoWars seems like a really bad idea for this article. Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 21:43, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

I can assure you that no one is suggesting we actually use unreliable sources like InfoWars. I'm asking for RS coverage of the elements of conspiracy theories related to the dossier. See my immediately previous comment in the edit history. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:39, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: you cannot simply shout about RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA AND INFOWARS every time you want to shut an editor up as you did to me on Jimbo's talk page (extended version here). I'm not aware of anyone mentioning such sources. All of the references to Infowars in the talk page archives are you giving your Infowars speech, and in any event I practically begged you to use New York Times and Washington Post instead of the crap that is being used to exaggerate the prominence of a lot of these accusations, and you explicitly defended the use of low quality sources to push only these anti-Trump POVs in a one-sided way. You've deleted my comments altogether after I spent hours trying to detail the gargantuan problems with this article. Problems that have taken well over a year to accumulate under your, uh, careful 24/7 stewardship, and you're deleting my lengthy comments six frickin days after I post them, while leaving up your own comments including ones that hadn't gotten a response since April 3rd. And now here you are posting your own unsourceable thoughts and theories on political events as if they belong in the article. Beratement about non-existent references to propaganda and conspiracy theories, shutting down attempts to get outside feedback, and this constant supposition about what other editors think or read—is all disruptive and contrary to civil collaboration. Factchecker_atyourservice 04:23, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: could you please acknowledge this and promise that you will stop berating editors based on your own totally fabricated ideas about what views they hold and what newspapers they read?

Let others discuss things—no more deceptive shouting about Infowars and Russia Today and all the rest. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:57, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

You might want to take a brief respite. Law of holes. Just a friendly suggestion. O3000 (talk) 17:28, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I think it would be better if we could have a talk page where editors are allowed to talk about views and sourcing without being shouted down with irrelevant and insulting verbiage that has nothing to do with the views or sourcing they are talking about, e.g. right here in this same talk page section Bull is barking at User:Atsme to "follow RS, rather than the spin on Fox News and other unreliable sources". I am quite sure from reading her comments that Atsme knows how the RS policy works, and it is frankly none of Bull's business whether or not she watches Fox, which I have never seen her mention a single time. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:33, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Mark Penn, redux

The restoration of the Mark Penn opinion (if it belongs at all, it belongs in the Nunes memo section) is a discredited defense of the Nunes memo, and also an attack on the dossier. It is also a basic defense of this conspiracy theory. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:33, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Right now this particular one does not belong at all, as its notability has not been established.Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 15:37, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Conspiracy theories do not belong in our encyclopedia...period. Ask any skeptic who watches the chem-trail articles. ^{Atsme📞📧} 19:53, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Not true. We document them if they have received any attention in RS. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:07, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

If you're referring to something similar to Chemtrail_conspiracy_theory, then yes. And when I add it means I'm joking. ^{Atsme📞📧} 03:15, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

I agree. This looks like deep state conspiracy theory, and is undue weight. Sławomir Biały (talk) 12:04, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Allegations have been made that this is an "attack" on the dossier and a "conspiracy theory", yet throughout this article the dossier is presented as some neutral non-political document instead of what it really is - opposition research paid for by the opposing political campaign. As far as notability it is published on TheHill website (a reliable source). More importantly: Mark Penn worked for Hillary Clinton during her 2008 presidential campaign and is a very prominent political pollster and advisor. He also worked for many years for both of the Clintons and was an executive at Microsoft. His clients include former presidents Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, and also Bill Gates. I understand that many users want to make this about a "conspiracy theory" but Mark Penn is not exactly a fringe conspiracy theorist. PZP-003 (talk) 12:33, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

PZP-003, you violated the DS conditions by restoring without consensus. Don't do that. You can be blocked. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:02, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

You write: "the dossier is presented as some neutral non-political document instead of what it really is - opposition research paid for by the opposing political campaign." That's nonsense. None of that is true. You must not have read the article. Even though Steele didn't know he was actually working for the DNC and Clinton campaign, he did have a non-neutral assignment, and that was to find answers to this question: "Why did Mr. Trump repeatedly seek to do deals in a notoriously corrupt police state that most serious investors shun?" He set out to do that and used his well-established network of sources. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:02, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Penn's article is filled with the conspiracy theory talking points pushed by Trump and the unreliable sources which try to undermine what RS have documented and portray Trump and Co. as the innocent victims of a witch hunt. You are not the only editor here who believes elements of the theory, such as that Steele got his information from "Russian spies who provided the contents of his dossier on Trump."[11]. These are speculations not based on fact. Steele's methods, the ones which have given him success in the past and won him a sterling reputation as an excellent researcher and spy, are described in the article. The ones trying to get information from active Russian spies seeking to undermine American democracy were Trump and Co. From the article:

• "Steven L. Hall, former CIA chief of Russia operations, has contrasted Steele's methods with those of Donald Trump Jr., who sought information from a Russian attorney at a meeting in Trump Tower in June 2016: "The distinction: Steele spied against Russia to get info Russia did not want released; Don Jr took a mtg to get info Russians wanted to give."[196]"

Steele was playing the Russians, while the Russians were playing the Trump campaign, and they knew it and willingly colluded to steal the election with Russian help. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:22, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Thx for providing the diff of my argument, BR. Here's a NYTimes article we can share, and another Newsweek article, and since op-eds, like what's in National Observer, are cited in this article, here's the other side of the story, except this op-ed was published in WaPo. Bottomline, until actual evidence is brought forward to prove one way or the other that collusion (which is not a crime) or something worse has occured, it's nothing more than allegations, and partisan fighting for control of how to spend your money and making laws that allow them to do it legally. 😂 ^{Atsme📞📧} 17:31, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Have Mark Penn's opinions/views on the dossier received any attention in any reliable secondary sources? A single op-ed in The Hill does not indicate great significance. ^Falling_Gravity 15:56, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

This is an invented standard. The "allegations" section is filled with allegations that haven't been discussed in RS, let alone discussed in an RS piece that was then discussed in other RS pieces. Factchecker_atyourservice 04:47, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I see citations to news reports in The Guardian, The Independent, Business Insider, and Vox. These seem to be reliable news sources, not opinion editorials. Sławomir Biały (talk) 22:34, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

And sources like The New York Times and The Washington post make up a disproportionately, and appropriately, large percentage of the rest. Whether use of a source is appropriate or not is entirely based on how it is used. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 22:46, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 24 April 2018

(Redacted) Vixinews (talk) 08:54, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

 Not done - This template must be followed by a complete and specific description of the request, that is, specify what text should be removed and a verbatim copy of the text that should replace it. "Please change X" is not acceptable and will be rejected; the request must be of the form "please change X to Y".- MrX 🖋 11:47, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Sourcing and POV issues

This article has outstanding problems with weak sourcing and one-sided POV presentations. I attempted to outline these problems in both general and specific on the Talk page. The comments were deleted by another user but anybody interested in exploring whether they agree can look at the comments in the Talk page archives.

1 2

Thanks. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:45, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Factchecker_atyourservice, you are correct that the article is one-sided POV.Phmoreno (talk) 18:10, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Please cite the specific POVs you see. soibangla (talk) 18:13, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I believe a good first step would be to go through and remove all marginal sources. Treason is one of if not the most severe crime and BLP demands high-quality sources. James J. Lambden (talk) 19:53, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, somebody tried removing, e.g., the numerous fact citations to Paste: The Best Music, Movies, TV, Books, Games, Beer & More, and it was promptly reverted, presumably by one of the same editors who is objecting to any mention of the fact reporting below by The New York Times. Factchecker_atyourservice 19:58, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

If Paste is the sole source for any BLP claim it should be removed immediately. I am catching up on other talk page posts at the moment but will review. James J. Lambden (talk) 20:00, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I didn't go over the list in detail but I recall that (1) the allegations about Carter Page coming up with the Wikileaks leak "for plausible deniability", and (2) the claim that the DNC hack was carried out "with the full knowledge and support of TRUMP and senior members of his campaign team" were essentially ignored by reputable sources. Meanwhile (3) the claim that the hacking of the DNC servers was performed by Romanian hackers ultimately controlled by Putin and paid by both Trump and Putin appears to have been discussed only by Luke Harding, the guy trying to make money with his book making explosive claims about Trump, and a colleague of his at Guardian (Julian Borger) who makes explosive claims and is cited twenty-seven times in this article—yet serious American-based fact reporting, such as this McClatchy report discuss the claim of FSB recruitment but completely ignore the accusation that Trump arranged and paid for the hack. Factchecker_atyourservice 21:53, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Criminal referrals connected to dossier

The article is also out of date now that criminal referrals of several people connected to the dossier have been issued. Specifically named are: Hillary Clinton, James Comey, Andrew MCCabe, Sally Yates, Dana Boente and Christopher Steele.Phmoreno (talk) 18:13, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

If you believe that criminal referrals are relevant to this article, please add them. soibangla (talk) 18:30, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I think I might see some BLP/NPOV problems with a document suggesting potential criminality of many persons signed by eleven members of one party and zero members of the other party. O3000 (talk) 18:36, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Regardless, the criminal referrals are a matter of record. Apparently there is enough evidence of violations of specific laws to recommend an investigation.Phmoreno (talk) 18:58, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't understand why people come to talk pages and insist things should be added instead of adding it themselves and seeing if it withstands challenge. soibangla (talk) 19:00, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

This sounds like legitimate content, maybe in the section we have about litigation. We cover this kind of thing. Go for it. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 22:20, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

I see that this was added, but still using primary sources. That's OR. You must find secondary sources. I'm sure they exist. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:53, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Wrong. Go read the policies on primary sources and OR. Maybe you meant to say something about DUE, that's at least an argument you could make. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:40, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

To address the "primary source" concern I would like to restore this section with addition of the following sources: Fox News, The Washington Post, and Vox:

An April 18, 2018 letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions signed by several House Republicans referred James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Sally Yates, Dana Boente for criminal investigation related to use of the unverified information in the dossier in a FISA warrant on Carter Page. Hillary Clinton was named for failing to properly disclose payments to Fusion GPS in violation of Federal Election Commission law.

James J. Lambden (talk) 19:52, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

A bold addition of RS fact and opinion coverage regarding the collusion claims

Hello all. Pursuant to my earlier talk page comments I have made a BOLD addition.Factchecker_atyourservice 01:49, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

....really, already, it's been 10 minutes, are you kidding me User:SPECIFICO ? Factchecker_atyourservice 02:02, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• That was one hell of a batch of commentary. I don't know what Specifico thought the problem was, but what I see is basically a ton of reliably sourced speculation which crosses the NOTNEWS boundary. Drmies (talk) 02:06, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• The huge addition was generally a mess, IMO, but the problems with it are too tangled and diverse to discuss without dissecting it first. The little appendix I reverted, that there's no evidence to suggest "collusion" is unsourced and is contradicted by many parts of the huge addition. SPECIFICO talk 02:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Uh, what you reverted didn't say "there's no evidence to suggest collusion", it said there was no publicly known evidence that collusion actually occurred, i.e. in the real physical world where people are stuck to a giant rock because of mass n stuff. Which is what the sources said, right? The lead sentence was a summary of the sourced material below. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:24, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

"Speculation" is the way you would characterize that material?

What SPECIFICO reverted was a lead sentence saying "To date there has been no public evidence of collusion with Russia to influence the election or a direct Trump link to the Kremlin" which was a summary of the below RS fact coverage. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:08, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I strongly suggest you revert everything you've added and break it down into smaller homogeneous units that can be discussed in an orderly way. If you force an up or down vote on the whole thing, none of it's going to survive. That's just a fact about how our process works. Nobody is going to start manually copying and pasting and cutting and tracking refs in order to fine tune what is on the whole a gross misrepresentation of the mainstream reporting. SPECIFICO talk 02:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

"Gross misrepresentation of the mainstream reporting" seems like a fantasy on your part but I am open to being shown wrong! Factchecker_atyourservice 02:19, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@SPECIFICO: please strike your false claim about "gross misrepresentation of the mainstream reporting" now that you have had some time to discover that you were wrong. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:30, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

You need to get it off the article page and break it down into workable clumps here on talk. Otherwise somebody else will just revert the whole thing and not be inclined to discuss it in the entirety and you'll get frustrated and any good stuff will get lost in the gruel. SPECIFICO talk 02:23, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't think anybody's going to revert it. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:25, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Issues not directly related to the dossier are beyond the article's scope.Phmoreno (talk) 02:28, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

All the same I will wait for another editor to take the initiative to remove it from the article, and it won't hurt my feelings if it's you. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:32, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Do not support this edit Edit is POV based to push a pro-trump push. If you want to make such a change, please get consensus.Casprings (talk) 02:38, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Sooooooo since the whole point of the dossier is to accuse Trump of collusion does anybody think it is acceptable to mention the fairly unanimous fact reporting that there is no public evidence of collusion? Factchecker_atyourservice 03:36, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

And what, ignore the source after source that shows that 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

So no, we shouldn't ignore multiple WP:RS and public evidence and scream "no collusion." If you want this edit, please seek a consensus by the wider community with an RFC.Casprings (talk) 13:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@Casprings: This response simply shows you're not paying attention. None of the above is a fact reporting source contradicting anything I wrote. The material I wrote not only included numerous opinions that collusion had occurred, but I actually included an EXPAND tag in that section inviting editors to add even more commentary arguing that collusion occurred. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:29, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I do. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 03:44, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• Support I see no reason why not. PackMecEng (talk) 03:45, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Support - the material is cited with quality RS, it is compliant with NPOV, it is informative and factually accurate. I see no reason for it to have been reverted. It is highly relevant to the dossier and contains important information for our readers. It could be tightened a bit, but I'd rather remove the conspiracy theorizing, innuendo, speculation and attempts to make the dossier credible (veracity) that inundate this article now. And now there's this. ^{Atsme📞📧} 06:23, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. It's the whole impossible-to-prove-a-negative thing. No matter how many single articles we round up that have particular stances, there have so far been multiple indictments and guilty pleas related to the slow-moving Mueller investigation, and just today there is an announcement in multiple major news outlets that there is significant evidence of collusion: [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], also [17]. Since the Mueller investigation is still ongoing, there is no reason to pre-emptively suggest that the "no collusion" news reports were the final word. At the very best, we would have to put "As of [date] [X news reports] (or "a number of news venues") have reported that _______." GreyGoose (talk) 09:28, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support. I did not notice any obvious lapses in neutrality. I imagine others will want to edit it for content and tone, but that seems very unlikely to happen if it is removed entirely. Also, the issue of "no collusion" is extremely important to the article, in light of the recent, highly exculpatory (if also quite partisan) House report. I think a separate discussion is warranted on whether the last two sections of the added content are DUE, being sourced primarily to opinion pieces. Sławomir Biały (talk) 10:56, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support There has never been any evidence of collusion. Clapper is on record saying that a year ago. Several others on both political sides have said they had seen no evidence of collusion. When the still classified document that started the FBI special counsel was finally released to the committee it was learned that no official intelligence was used. We now know some of the suspicious activity is suspected of being planted, fabricated or set up as sting operations. Except for the Trump server, I am not proposing adding fabricated evidence and sting operations here; that belongs in the Russian interference article. Phmoreno (talk) 12:58, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
• Support Dude who endured weeks of shouted abuse about Infowars and spent dozens of hours picking apart the problems with this article and researching real source material covering its central issues, obviously supports some form of inclusion. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:28, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose – This quite large edit appears to be a concluding summary of an investigation that hasn’t concluded. We haven’t the faintest idea of what evidence exists, nor should we at this point, even if all of the evidence was unencumbered by secrecy classifications. WP:NOTNEWS O3000 (talk) 17:38, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose to "bold addition" by Factchecker_atyourservice. At least some parts are an obvious misinterpretation of the situation as described by RS in general. Try making small changes, one at a time. Maybe some of them can be accepted. My very best wishes (talk) 04:04, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Threaded discussion

• @GreyGoose: I suppose you have a lot of RS commentary claiming that the reason top sources are reporting no evidence is because it's impossible to prove a negative? Nope? Well then what's your point? Note, those sources you just cited are talking about the democrats claiming there is significant evidence of collusion—a viewpoint I covered and attributed quite adequately. Also, guilty pleas mostly about lying about non-criminal conduct and violations of obscure statutes that are typically never enforced doesn't even really hint at collusion, much less serve as a smoking gun, and even if it was a smoking gun we don't crystal ball, we track source material. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:31, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
• @My very best wishes: "an obvious misinterpretation of the situation as described by RS in general"–respectfully I don't think you can provide even a single example supporting this claim. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:06, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Clapper leaked details of dossier

Partly sourced from House Intel report. Expect to be hearing more about Clapper and some of his allies in the near future.

Phmoreno (talk) 02:46, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Not an WP:RS.Casprings (talk) 02:52, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

There are a few more coming now. Business Insider and The Hill. PackMecEng (talk) 03:48, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

• House Intelligence Committee report accuses James Clapper of 'inconsistent' testimony on the Steele dossier, Business Insider
• GOP report: Clapper told CNN host about Trump dossier in 2017, The Hill

Sources

Challenged information cited only to desantis.house.gov

Continued from #Criminal referrals connected to dossier

Phmoreno added a paragraph cited only to desantis.house.gov, a primary source, here: [18]. I removed it here as lacking independent third-party citation. Phmoreno re-added it here: [19], and I removed it I again here [20] reminding him to get talkpage consensus for challenged material. He re-added it a third time here [21], with an edit summary of "Already agreed upon in Talk". Can someone show me where this material cited only to desantis.house.gov is agreed up on this page? GreyGoose (talk) 03:52, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

From what I can tell it is this section. In the collapsed sources part, but I have no idea if it had consensus. I would also say it would be a good idea to self-revert, even if there is consensus this article is 1RR as well. PackMecEng (talk) 03:57, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't see any consensus whatsoever for addition of the precise sentences Phmoreno added which he cited only to desantis.house.gov. My understanding on these sanctioned Wikipedia articles is that any material removed as challenged must have specific talkpage consensus before restoration. Phmoreno has now restored the material twice without a single talkpage discussion. GreyGoose (talk) 04:07, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Phmoreno Please, revert. I also do not agree with your edit.Casprings (talk) 04:20, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Phmoreno, I see that this was added, but still using primary sources. That's OR. You must find secondary sources. I'm sure they exist. I'm going to remove it as misuse of primary source. That's OR. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:56, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I still support the basic idea of including this content, but from secondary sources, and most likely in the litigation section. My original "go for it" was made while viewing this on my little cellphone screen. I didn't notice it was only sourced to primary sources. When that is fixed, bring it here for consensus. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 07:07, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Although WP does not prohibit primary sources when there is no possibility of alternate interpretations and does not require secondary sources in such cases, those do exist and I was going to add some when someone reverted my revert. Here are a few secondary sources

Phmoreno (talk) 13:35, April 28, 2018 (UTC)

The challenged content:

An April 18, 2018 letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions signed by several House Republicans referred James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Sally Yates, Dana Boente for criminal investigation related to use of the unverified information in the dossier in a FISA warrant on Carter Page. Hillary Clinton was named for failing to properly disclose payments to Fusion GPS in violation of Federal Election Commission law.

I'm sure we can do better regarding sourcing. Townhall is not a RS, and for political content Fox News is generally deprecated, especially if we can find better sources, so let's try to do that. I'll start searching. Something like this must be mentioned in multiple mainstream RS. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:34, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Regardless of anyone's personal feelings in regard to Fox, it's still a reliable source. I'm sure there's more than one individual reading this discussion who believes that, as for political content, CNN and the NY Times is "generally deprecated", yet...they are also considered a reliable source. What is it so many here love to say when content supported by proven to be Left-leaning sources is challenged? Oh, yeah: "we follow reliable sources". If Fox has posted it as a news item, that should be sufficient for inclusion. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 14:53, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, it's a RS when it faithfully reports the news also found in more mainstream sources. Otherwise be careful, because it's a GOP source wholly beholden to the RNC and Trump, not an independent reporter of news. It's part of Fox Entertainment, has an extremely poor record for fact checking, does not retract errors immediately, pushes conspiracy theories, etc. It is not in the same category as real news organizations. Therefore, discerning editors of all persuasions will use more mainstream sources when available. If it's only in Fox and even more extreme right-wing sites like Townhall, then that's a sign it's fringe and doesn't carry much weight. Then we wait for more reliable coverage, and when it comes we use better, non-partisan, sources. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:05, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Oh, bullshit. MSNBC is part of NBC entertainment, is it not? ABC News is part of ABC entertainment, is it not? Same for CABS. My gawd, respected editors support using The Wrap as a reliable source in politically-based articles, but it's a freaking entertainment-based blog that refers to it's writers a "Hollybloggers". Vox is about as anti-right biased in it's reporting as you can get, but it's considered a reliable source and the majority of Wikipedia editors don't bat an eye when it's the only source to support controversial content. If The Wrap and Vox can be trusted without question, so can Fox (based on your biased description of it). -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓

Haven't you noticed that punditry and news reporting are clearly separated on those other sites? There is no real separation on Fox News, with the exception of Shep Smith. Study the history of Fox News and why Roger Ailes created it. He expressly created it as an unofficial voice for the GOP. As for use of sources, when it's opinion we attribute it. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:08, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm sure you know this, but ultimately practically any source, including sources on our blacklist, can be used as a source, depending on how it's used, but we do prefer more RS over less RS when possible. Sometimes only a fringe source can be used to document its own POV on its own article, and then it can be used.

If an opinion article is used for only its mention of a fact, then it doesn't need attribution and is a RS for that information, but if it's used for its opinions and interpretation of that fact, then it requires attribution. Again, it all comes down to how the source is used. Both uses are legitimate when done properly. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:13, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Okay, here are four solid RS:

• Trump allies urge criminal investigations of Clinton, Comey, Lynch
• 11 House Republicans call for prosecutions of Clinton, Comey, Lynch, and others
• House Republicans refer Clinton, Comey, and other top FBI officials to the Justice Department for criminal investigation.
• GOP lawmakers demand Sessions investigate Clinton, Comey

BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:42, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

At first I thought this should be in the Litigation section, but it is only a "call for" something to happen. It's not part of the Nunes memo either. Maybe the Reactions section would be the best place for it, assuming there aren't other issues. I'm waiting for objections based on NOTNEWS, RECENTISM, etc. Should we include it now, or wait to see if it gains any traction and charges are actually filed? -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:50, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

This type of content would have to be included: "Democrats and others have argued that those representatives are seeking to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election." "The push represents the latest counter-attack from the right against the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 campaign — an investigation that Trump continues to rail against."

Here's a full list of the names: "Along with Comey and Clinton, former Attorney General Loretta Lynch, former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe, former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates, former Acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Boente, and FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page were named in the letter."

BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:58, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

"Haven't you noticed that punditry and news reporting are clearly separated on those other sites? There is no real separation on Fox News, with the exception of Shep Smith."

BullRangifer, haven't you noticed the punditry and news reporting are clearly separated at Fox News? Guess not. Because if you think Shepard Smith is the only exception there (and why - because he's a Liberal?), you really haven't been paying attention. Chris Wallace gives Trump zero breaks. Bret Baier is very balanced in his reporting. As are Martha McCallum, John Roberts, Bill Hemmer, and Jon Scott. And Brit Hume ... certainly tried, tested, and trustworthy from his long career in (real) news and journalism, pre- our 24/7 news and opinion cable news reality. Heck, even Dana Perino frequently questions the Trump Administration and agenda.

"Study the history of Fox News and why Roger Ailes created it." Has nothing to do with today, sorry. Look at the history of CNN and why Ted Turner created it. It's a far, sorry cry from the original vision and intent. -- ψλ ● ✉ ✓ 18:47, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

BR, please use the sources-talk template following the last of your cited sources. It's much neater and doesn't follow us all over the TP. I also want to mention that reverting the material added by Phmoreno was unnecessary. We can use primary sources when including specific facts: Although specific facts may be taken from primary sources, secondary sources that present the same material are preferred. I did not detect any OR in the added material. Regardless, if there is an issue with the use of a primary source, we don't automatically revert the material - we use an inline tag such as the primary source-inline or better source templates. Also keep in mind that Winkelvi is correct in that FoxNews is an acceptable RS for citing that material, so please stop referring to the leading news network as unreliable. Granted, some of the things the network's political pundits say are questionable but that applies to all political pundits regardless of the network. Let's not conflate it with news. ^{Atsme📞📧} 15:50, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Sources-talk template added, because without any form of reflist, they all ended up at the bottom, instead of only at the bottom of this thread. I placed it at the bottom because I assume we're going to be adding more sources here. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:55, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

The content can now be developed further with better sources and NPOV coverage, noting that nothing has happened yet, and that this is yet another GOP effort to undermine the investigation. It's apparently quite newsworthy in fringe sources, with few mainstream sources giving it coverage yet, but I did find those few, so we can move forward, so work your magic on making a paragraph that will gain consensus. As noted above, I tend to favor inclusion when this is ready and if no objections of RECENTISM and NOTNEWS are resolved. I note you haven't raised those objections.... -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:00, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Frankly, while some may believe the GOP is trying to undermine the Mueller investigation, there is no evidence to substantiate such a claim, so please stop repeating it. Keep in mind that there is also a possibility that the opposite is happening, such as the Democrats attempting to sabotage a sitting US President. We simply do not know at this point in time. Our job as editors is to leave our biases at check-in, and see that our readers are provided all significant views from a NPOV. Attempting to prove the dossier has more veracity than what has actually been corroborated is an exercise in futility until more evidence surfaces to substantiate the allegations. Former CIA director Brennon said the dossier did not play any role whatsoever in the early investigations, which is extremely important because if it did, more heads may roll, including Brennon's. If it did not play a role, which is highly questionable based on the FISA warrants, then it's not a biggy and the FISA allegations go away; however, it still begs the question about the dismissals and demotions that took place in the FBI. The IG's report is supposed to come out in May, so we sit and weight...this article properly. 😉 RS have indicated that the bulk of the dossier is unsubstantiated - we've been over this time and time again, BR - we are not supposed to push a particular POV or conspiracy theory. The fact of the matter is that right now, the Democrats hold the minority view (fringe view?) on the Intelligence Committee and that is not going to change unless there's a big upset in the 2018 midterms. Of course, anything is possible. In the interim, let's do our best to get the article right, and present quality work that strictly adheres to BLP and our 3 core content policies. After our readers have read an article, they should be able to walk away wondering if WP leans left or right...and that's how we'll know we did a good job. ^{Atsme📞📧} 17:59, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Sources

Overlinking was fixed

This addition of a tag was promptly and properly reverted as "tendentions tagging--disruption" by Drmies.

We need to avoid this situation. What Factchecker... probably doesn't realize, is that each allegation used to have a long list of sources, but because of legitimate complaints about overlinking (sometimes there were 5-7, IIRC), most of them were removed, leaving only 2-3 for each one. Does anyone really want them all added back? It can be done... In fact, more can be found, if necessary. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:23, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Are you actually trying to pretend the removed sources were better than the ones that remain? For some reason you or somebody else decided the sources needed to be trimmer, and you decided to keep the bad ones while deleting good ones?

Then restore the good citations and remove the trash ones. Definitely go find more sources if you think they exist because I found multiple of these claims that were only sourced to garbage sources.Factchecker_atyourservice 16:25, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

BR, I don't see tagging as disruption. If that were the case, NPP and the many WP gnomes would be in a world of hurt. In fact, NeilN recommended doing just that for this article. Drmies, please help me understand why you believe the tag was disruptive. I've been going through the sources, and considering the volume and unverifiability of that particular section of exceptional allegations, thinking all along that our policies require exceptional sources for exceptional claims. I barely got half-way through it, and tagged one that wasn't even sourced, and found the repeated use of questionable sources (and opinion pieces by not so exceptional authors) including but not limited to the following:

Paste (magazine) , a monthly music and entertainment digital magazine is cited repeatedly. Others that are cited repeatedly include The_Week, Business Insider, an opinion piece in the National Observer by Sandy Garossino, a media commentator (who privately owned 3 Vancouver taxi companies, and is a global investor primarily in Asia), and so on. That entire section needs some serious citation cleanup.

It also appears that the following paragraph is noncompliant with SYNTH as it pieces together these allegations using different sources: That Cohen, together with three colleagues, secretly met with Kremlin officials in the Prague offices of Rossotrudnichestvo in August 2016,[100][75][43][101] where he arranged "deniable cash payments" to the hackers and sought "to cover up all traces of the hacking operation",[42][24] as well as "cover up ties between Trump and Russia, including Manafort's involvement in Ukraine".[3] (Dossier, pp. 18, 34-35) Keep in mind, what we actually consider RS wouldn't touch the dossier, and may help explain why that tag was necessary. Thank you for your attention to this matter. ^{Atsme📞📧} 16:55, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Atsme: "tagged one that wasn't even sourced". Good catch! I fixed it and the edit summary explains what happened. Specific tagging is useful, whereas general tagging is not. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:50, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: General tags are useful, POV-pushy removal of them is not. General tagging alerts editors of the need to inspect the section and place specific tags. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:52, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

It doesn't "use" the sources for that purpose, only that various sources make special mention about different aspects of the whole allegation. I found that better than just writing the whole allegation and adding all the sources at the end. Many sources do mention the whole allegation, and we could just write the allegation as written in the dossier, which says essentially the same as included. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:33, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

That is "using" the sources, Bull. Unless a claim is talked about in multiple real sources, not crappy partisan blog posts and weak off topic sources. The fact that something has been mentioned in a crap source does not mean it should be copy pasted into a WP article. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:44, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Don't forget Natasha Bertrand, an inexperienced 25-year-old business school grad writing for a second-rate online-only business-related publication founded in 2009; publication and author are both weak and off-topic, yet she's cited twenty-three times in this article simply because she's a member of the #Resistance. We shouldn't be cherry picking crap quality sourcing just because they support a POV that is popular among WP editors. Policy explicitly says we require multiple high-quality sources for important claims. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:26, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Because of her consistently excellent coverage of this matter, Natasha Bertrand recently joined The Atlantic, a quite prestigious publication. She's a fast-rising star in journalism who has been all over this story. IIRC, Woodward and Bernstein were mere cub reporters on the city desk when they got a big break. Just sayin' is all. soibangla (talk) 23:00, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

The Washington, D.C. city desk of The Washington Post, you mean? Yes, a teensy bit more serious, credible and competent at political reporting than Business Insider. I would have no problem reflecting Natasha Bertrand columns from The Atlantic just not her many copypastes from BI.

More to the point, and with all due respect to her credentials and career, anything truly important will have been talked about by sources which are nonetheless better than her, and if there's anything where she is the most credible source out there, it doesn't belong in an encyclopedia article. These are issues of global significance and if top sources ignored certain claims then that is a sign that we should do likewise. Those are not a high-quality reliable source. Factchecker_atyourservice 01:21, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Removing the tag without actually fixing anything, totally ignoring the previous discussion, which was archived prematurely, is disruptive. Are Paste magazine, an opinion piece in National Observer, and a report in The Independent (which some rejected as source for citing a claim that the dossier contains errors/falsehoods, see #Parts of dossier "proven" false?) really the best sources for exceptional claims about living persons? I'm not much interested how many inline citations there are in the article, but rather than how many sources support the quotations overall. Could someone make a list or take out the garbage? Politrukki (talk) 12:02, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

"Removing the tag without actually fixing anything,"?? Above you'll find this: "Atsme: "tagged one that wasn't even sourced". Good catch! I fixed it and the edit summary explains what happened. Specific tagging is useful, whereas general tagging is not." -- BullRangifer -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:27, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

I believe Politrukki is talking about the fact that Drmies removed the general tag, but did not fix any problems, described on the talk page, that the general tag referred to. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:40, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

"misuse of primary source. That's OR"

User:BullRangifer reverted material with the edit summary "misuse of primary source. That's OR".

This appears to be a total misinterpretation of policy. The policy says All analyses and interpretive or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary or tertiary source. The removed content is neither analysis nor interpretation nor is it a synthesis of source materials to form a novel claim. If there is some argument about DUE, it has nothing to do with supposed "OR", or with the document being "misused". Factchecker_atyourservice 16:23, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

This is the third thread on this topic. Please move this up (with my comment below) and include it at #Challenged information cited only to desantis.house.gov.

Maybe OR isn't the exact, and definitely not the only, policy to cite, but we aren't allowed to cite only a primary source, such as that report, or a court transcript. That is often called OR. OTOH, when secondary coverage is found, then we can use it and also provide the primary source as backing. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:49, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

The DeSantis letter is an official government document. Citing specifically what is says is not OR.Phmoreno (talk) 16:53, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: It's good that you're starting to think about what WP policies mean. That is a positive development and I can only say, keep up the good work! Wikipedia can be a constructive environment, if you allow it to be. One thing that is important is to not let yourself get bogged down by misconceptions about policy. Secondary sources are always needed to comment upon primary sources, but they are only sometimes needed to substantiate the importance or mere existence of an official government action or statement. When official acts by congressmen are memorialized in an official document that is discussed by secondary sources, that is a sign of importance and the secondary source is thus a better source than the original government document. But that means you simply replace the primary source with an easily-located secondary source rather than deleting the material altogether with a contrived and incorrect claim of OR. Factchecker_atyourservice 17:14, 28 April 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 [22] 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 [[23]].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)

• 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)

• 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)

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: [24] 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 [[25]], which was referred to here [[26]], 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)

Removal of paragraph dealing with Republican dossier allegations

I have removed the following paragraph:

Contrary to assertions by Trump and his supporters that the FBI investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections was triggered by the dossier, the Nunes memo confirmed the investigation began with a tip from Australian diplomat Alexander Downer regarding a conversation he had with Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos in a London bar in May 2016.

The first source, NY Times, does not address the Republicans' allegation and the second (NPR) is not faithfully represented. My understanding is that the Republicans allege the dossier was used to support the FISA warrant on Page, which the NPR source confirms: "The document alleges that the FBI and Justice Department relied on the unverified Russia dossier [...] to obtain court approval for surveillance on [...] Carter Page." This is distinct from the claim that the dossier triggered any and all investigation by the FBI into Russian interference.

I believe the Republican allegations and relevant circumstances and contradictions should be included so my removal is temporary pending accurate and consensus wording. James J. Lambden (talk) 20:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

This goes back to the claim and argument that the warrant would not have been issued without the dossier.

For some reason, we don't even mention the fact Gowdy went on CBS Face the Nation and asserted this claim, but we do mention some random talk-show trivia where CNN anchors argued about whether a law professor was correctly interpreting earlier media reports about the dossier and warrant application process. Once one of the committee members came out and explicitly said the dossier was the deciding factor on issuing the warrant, it became fully irrelevant what people were speculating before official statements came out.

Of course, not mentioning Gowdy's claim, while going out of our way to "discredit" the law professor (in BullRangifer's words) did have the effect of making Trump sound worse than the news coverage did—a recurring theme at this article, as we've seen. Factchecker_atyourservice 20:24, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Off topic misunderstanding by an editor

:: Factchecker_atyourservice, ummm....try reading the article: #Subject of Nunes memo. The Gowdy/Face the Nation content has been there a very long time. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:02, 29 April 2018 (UTC) @BullRangifer: please learn to read. Please learn to read. Please do not waste my time with your lack of reading comprehension. Please do not reply to comments if you cannot understand them. The Gowdy view I describe is not even mentioned. @BullRangifer: please pay attention or do not talk. Factchecker_atyourservice 16:46, 29 April 2018 (UTC) Please stop making WP:PAs. As well as being against guidelines; they do not convince. O3000 (talk) 16:53, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

NPR reference states: "The memo undercuts another aspect of the narrative that some Republicans have pushed — that the Steele dossier was the sole foundation of the FBI's Trump campaign-Russia probe. But the memo says that was not the case."

NYT reference states: "Once the information Mr. Papadopoulos had disclosed to the Australian diplomat reached the F.B.I., the bureau opened an investigation" soibangla (talk) 22:21, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't know if that's a reply to me or Lambden, but those sources don't contradict Gowdy's claim at all. Factchecker_atyourservice 22:24, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't see why Gowdy's claim needs to enter into this. We're talking about the dossier in the context of the Nunes memo, and the cited references address that. Perhaps James J. Lambden did not see "The memo undercuts another aspect of the narrative that some Republicans have pushed..." which appears later in the NPR story? soibangla (talk) 22:31, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps, but the source doesn't connect that argument to Trump. The NYT source meanwhile does connect that argument to Trump, but it is not about the memo and predates it by 3 months. I can see your point, but I think the prose may need to be adjusted. Factchecker_atyourservice 22:55, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Change "Trump and his supporters" to "some Republicans" if you like. Otherwise, the order in which the references are displayed is the only other possible source of confusion I can see in the edit, so maybe we can just reverse them. soibangla (talk) 23:05, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

References

This has been in the article for a long time and should stay. Why this matters: because there is a Republican meme, often referred to by Trump and others such as Hannity, that the Democrat-funded dossier was the whole reason why the investigation was launched. In other words it was a setup from the beginning, a witch hunt, a Democratic plot against Trump. The NYT reference does refer to this claim, saying the memo confirms that the origin of the investigation "was not, as Mr. Trump and other politicians have alleged, a dossier compiled by a former British spy hired by a rival campaign". The New Yorker also spells it out: "The right-wing argument goes that Clinton operatives cooked up a scandalous piece of fiction, got Steele to pass it along to some Trump-haters in the F.B.I., who then persuaded their bosses at the Justice Department to open an investigation, and here we are, eighteen months later, with Robert Mueller and his investigators hounding an innocent President."[27] That’s why it’s important that a Republican-issued memo specifically pointed out that the dossier was NOT the reason for launching the investigation. I suggest readding the material to the article, with the addition of the New Yorker reference after the first clause. In other words,

Contrary to assertions by Trump and some of his supporters that the FBI investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections was triggered by the dossier, the Nunes memo confirmed that the investigation actually began with a tip from Australian diplomat Alexander Downer regarding a conversation he had with Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos in a London bar in May 2016.

References

Thoughts? --MelanieN (talk) 23:47, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Just a few comments. First and foremost, as a strictly factual matter and not getting lost in all the different things people have argued, we need to separate at least 6 arguments among what the sources say, not that we necessarily talk about them all but just so we're not mixing them up: (1) that the Russia investigation would not have occurred at all without the dossier, (2) that there was political influence on the conduct of the Mueller investigation, (3) that the dossier had significant influence on the Mueller investigation, (4) that Carter page would not have been investigated at all without the dossier, (5) that the Page FISA warrant would not have issued without the dossier, (6) that the Page FISA warrant would not have issued if the Clinton connection had been fully disclosed.

All of these arguments are out there in sources, some are pretty roundly refuted, e.g. #1 is denied even by Trey Gowdy and #4 is at least undermined, if not necessarily contradicted, by reporting that Page was on intelligence agency radars before the dossier. For reference, those are the claims that no investigation would have occurred at all claims and those are the ones that are clearly refuted.

That said, there's a big difference between an investigation existing and it blossoming into what it has blossomed into, and it's various forms of this latter blossoming that most critics are talking about when they complain about political influence and use of the dossier. So, that still leaves the other claims which, roughly speaking, all amount to the dossier being used to intensify the existing investigations, e.g. by allowing a wiretap of Carter page which, again according to Gowdy the House Intel Committee guy, would not have occurred without the dossier.

In order to fully understand why these claims are being made, first, a word about legal analysis of factual causation. This is just so we can understand it as editors, mind you, in a topic where a good chunk of the commentators are prosecutors or other government attorneys (once upon a time, most FBI Agents had law degrees). In the law, in analyzing the question of whether one thing caused another, if X would not have happened unless Y occurred, then Y caused X, even if Y was not the only factor that caused X. That is what people mean when they say the FISA warrant was caused by the dossier—as Gowdy said on the CBS interview program, the warrant wouldn't have been issued without the dossier. That's a paraphrasing of baseline legal logic known as "but-for" causation, i.e. no warrant "but for" the dossier. That means, if Gowdy is correct, then without the dossier, the Page investigation might have never amounted to anything more than a collection of files on a DOJ share drive rather than a federal wiretap on a campaign operative of the political opponent of the person who (at the time, secretly) paid for the dossier, during campaign season—something that can fairly be regarded as an intrusion into the political process if there is some sign of influence in the process by which the intrusion was authorized.

Anyway the point of all this is that not all these claims are refuted and some are being made by prominent figures. For example positions 2 and 3 have been espoused by, e.g., the nat'l security expert and USA Today board of contributors member James S. Robbins whose opinion I reflected in the opinion section of the prose I added. Likewise from my prose, Richard A. Epstein, a well credentialed senior think tank fellow, argues in Newsweek, essentially rebuts the Democratic argument that the Clinton association was duly disclosed: "To be sure, the FISA application that relied on the Steele dossier did say that some political sources were involved in the case, without naming the Clinton campaign. Unfortunately, that partial disclosure only makes matters worse. A half-truth in a setting that requires full disclosure is deliberately deceptive and akin to a complete lie."

Yes, these guys are Republicans and Republicans are "right wing", but it is important not to characterize people like this along with Hannity, or to conflate refuted arguments with reasonable ones. I think it would also be nice if we could avoid characterize any of them as "ignorant" or dumb, as has been commonplace on articles such as these, and worse, making assumptions about who believes what, which is just pointless. Factchecker_atyourservice 01:02, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Can we just stick to the point here? The Nunes memo disproved claims that the dossier was the original reason for launching the investigation. That can be said in a sentence, and should be. --MelanieN (talk) 01:47, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes of course Melanie, I wouldn't want to talk about any larger issues that take a lot of verbiage to talk about, but while reflecting rebuttals of Republican arguments is grand, mentioning some of the arguments might also be pretty cool. Factchecker_atyourservice 02:30, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

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. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 01:52, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Keep: well sourced and relavent to the article. This page seems to be under attack from editors pushing a pro Trump narrative.Casprings (talk) 02:56, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Keep - this is longstanding material, and I do not see any reason for deletion. Also agree with NeilN. Hence restored. My very best wishes (talk) 04:12, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm going to restore it, with one additional reference as I proposed above. I think it's possible that the latest removal of it was accidental - that intending to revert one small edit, someone also reverted this paragraph. --MelanieN (talk) 04:33, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Oops - I see that MVBW already restored it. I will just add that one additional reference, then. --MelanieN (talk) 04:36, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

@MelanieN: You added an opinion piece without in-text attribution, which is not nice. Moreover, BullRangifer thinks that Cassidy is not a reliable source: "John Cassidy....is unreliable. Politrukki (talk) 12:11, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Politrukki, I just wanted a reference to confirm that Republicans have been claiming the dossier started the whole investigation - since someone said that is insufficiently documented. Would you prefer The Hill - “Allies of President Trump have claimed the Russia probe began with the so-called Steele dossier that was paid for in part by Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee (DNC).”? If so please insert it instead. --MelanieN (talk) 14:09, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

I would, but soibangla and BullRangifer don't think The Hill is a reliable source, see #Parts of dossier "proven" false? You provided wrong URL (you must have meant this). Both of your sources support the notion that "investigation ... was triggered by the dossier" is a Republican/conservative claim, but that's already supported by NPR citation ("the memo undercuts another aspect of the narrative ..."). I would support soibangla's proposal changing "Trump and his supporters" to "some Republicans" and then you should remove the additional citation (Cassidy) before someone thinks three inline citations is overciting, and removes one of the solid sources. BTW, I did not receive a notification because the mention was not on a new line. Politrukki (talk) 12:33, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

No official investigation

[responding to MelanieN (14:09, 29 April 2018)]

Melanie - what should be included is the fact that there was no official investigation whatsoever that started the Russia investigation. Nunes said it was "based on a review of “electronic communication” from the FBI and the Justice Department" which does belong in this article. The role of the Steele dossier appears to be headed in an entirely different direction. Let it incubate. ^{Atsme📞📧} 17:39, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

That is not was Nunes said. He said his assertion that the investigation began with “no official intelligence” was "based on a review of “electronic communication” from the FBI and the Justice Department," not the investigation itself.soibangla (talk) 18:59, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

What exactly are you talking about and who are you addressing, Soibangla? My summary that there was no official investigation whatsoever that started the Russia investigation, or are you referring to the quote from the source that said "based on a review of “electronic communication” from the FBI and the Justice Department"? ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:02, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

As indicated by the indentation of my post, I was responding to what you just wrote. The Newsweek source you provided does not say what you contend it says. soibangla (talk) 22:10, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

What does it not "contend" - be specific. I quoted from the source - see the quote marks? ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:33, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, you quoted the source, just out of context. Read better. soibangla (talk) 03:23, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Atsme, you wrote: "...there was no official investigation whatsoever that started the Russia investigation,.." (I believe you are summarizing there.)

There were myriad pieces of information which raised suspicions and led to the investigation: The multiple, Trump campaign encouraged, Russian-related communications and contacts involving Papadopoulos and Carter Page (Page made a five-day trip to Moscow in early July), the hacking of the DNC, the June 9, 2016, Trump Tower meeting, other secret contacts between Trump campaign members and Russians, together with intercepted conversation between Russian nationals discussing their contacts with Trump campaign members, and other information shared by friendly foreign intelligence sources, all these were factors in the start of the investigation before the dossier even mentioned Carter Page, and it never mentioned Papadopoulos.

This is from this section: Trump–Russia dossier#FBI's Russia investigation:

• "In late July 2016, "the CIA had set up a special group with the NSA and FBI... to investigate the extent of Russian intervention in the presidential election." Former CIA director John Brennan then "ensured that all information about links between the Trump campaign and people working for or on behalf of Russian intelligence went to the FBI."

This is an especially good source. Well worth reading. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:38, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

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

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)

Challenged edit about lawsuits

I added the following:

Within the first year of publishing the dossier, BuzzFeed was sued on three separate occassions for defamation related to dissemination of the dossier. The first lawsuit was filed in February 2017 by Aleksej Gubarev, a Russian internet businessman, the second was filed in late May 2017 by Russian bank, Alfa-Bank, and the third was filed in early January 2018 by Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney who also sued Fusion GPS in a separate lawsuit. Cohen dropped both of his lawsuits in late April 2018 after he became the subject of a criminal investigation for his business dealings.

Sources

My edit was reverted with the following edit summary: (this does not belong in this key paragraph of the lede, which remains under discussion for consensus, and the edit is highly disruptive to reaching that consensus, and it certainly doesn't deserve this degree of detail here). I disagree with Soibangla's argument, or that it is in any way disruptive, or that is has anything to do with any consensus discussion that may be taking place. The material I added can stand on it's own. Will it be necessary for me to call an RfC? ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:00, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

This is important info that must be included on the page. But it is already included in the body of page (could be even expanded if you wish). The objection by Soibangla was about including it in the lead, and I think that was a reasonable objection - I tend to agree with Soibangla. My very best wishes (talk) 00:11, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

The lede is a summary of what's in the article - (my underline) lead serves as an introduction to the article and a summary of its most important contents. The lawsuits very important and highly significant to the dossier overall, and it should be mentioned in the lede. To omit is noncompliant with NPOV. ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:43, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

The suits are far from among “the most important contents” of the article. Many suits are frivolous harassment suits designed to intimidate/silence adversaries and bury them with big legal bills, before the suit is withdrawn or dismissed. Trump is notorious for “winning” that way. Your edit might belong in the lede if a suit were actually won or lost with material impact. As it stands, your edit is a thinly-veiled POV to create an impression that plaintiffs have a valid dispute when that has not been established by a verdict, or even by much press coverage. soibangla (talk) 18:09, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

• Not in the lede. The lawsuits are well covered in the article, but they are not important enough for the lede. Especially not in this much detail. The lede is supposed to reflect the relative importance of the material in the article text; the subject gets a four-paragraph subsection which reflects its low-to-mid-level importance. If you want to propose a single-sentence summary ("Several lawsuits" type of thing) then we could talk about it, but my reading of the relative importance (as per WP:LEDE) is that we should not mention it in the lede. --MelanieN (talk) 01:22, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Why not, Melanie? We're not talking about a scandal (except for scandalous material that is in the dossier itself). Those lawsuits are a verifiable fact and it's inclusion is compliant with DUE. To leave it out of the lede and have it only in the body would be noncompliant - the lead is supposed to summarize the most important aspects of the topic. We included the fact that some major media outlets refused to publish the dossier, and the 3 lawsuits support that they made wise decisions. Better yet, I'll just call an RfC when the other one is finished because I sense that May will be bringing a whole slough of new revelations when the IG presents his report. Incubate... 🐓🥚🍳. 😊 ^{Atsme📞📧} 01:57, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Because we have only a small subsection about litigation. My very best wishes (talk) 02:23, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

It can't get any smaller than saying a defamation suit was filed, who filed and the date. If that's too much detail, what shall we call the rest of the lead - a novel? The details of the suits are in the body text. ^{Atsme📞📧} 02:40, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

"The material I added can stand on it's own" Yet you appended it to a completely unrelated graf that is being actively debated for consensus, thus complicating the debate. At most it deserves a one-sentence graf, but even then, the topic does not warrant being in the lede, it's a minor item soibangla (talk) 02:57, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Well, yes of course it can stand on its own - it also provided BALANCE needed for the POV peacockery claim that verifying Russian to Russian conversations has given US intelligence and law enforcement "greater confidence" in the credibility of parts of the document. What I'll do when the time comes is suggest removal of that fluff and replace it with factual information. ^{Atsme📞📧} 03:17, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Not in lead One, the Cohn lawsuit was dropped. Second, they aren't noteworthy. People can sue in America. Nothing noteworthy has come from these lawsuits. WP:UNDUE, especially for the lead.Casprings (talk) 03:21, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

I really don't see this beyond a sentence in the article. You mean someone filed a lawsuit in American? Wow. DO WP:RS think these lawsuits are a big deal? Are they covered widely and often? No. Therefore, that should reflect in WP:WEIGHT.Casprings (talk) 03:30, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I think "litigation" section should be made shorter because lawsuits resulted in nothing. But one phrase in the article is probably not enough. A few phrases. My very best wishes (talk) 14:04, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

My very best wishes...I wasn't aware that the litigation for the lawsuits concluded. Please provide a link so we can include the results. ^{Atsme📞📧} 15:51, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Doesn't belong in the lead for the reasons others have stated. There's no independent significance to a private party filing a civil lawsuit—it literally takes submitting a complaint and the filing fee to the court—so I don't see how the material is important enough to belong in the lead, nor how it could be argued to provide balance. Dyrnych (talk) 16:03, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

I see two different discussions going on here, and they are getting mixed up. Some people (including Atsme's initial proposal) are talking about the lede; some are talking about the lawsuit section in the body of the article. Please let's make it clear, when we make a comment, which we are talking about. 1) What, if anything, should be in the lede about the lawsuits? Should there be a detailed description of each lawsuit as Atsme proposed, or a single sentence summarizing the fact that there have been civil lawsuits filed, or no mention at all in the lede? My preference: no mention. 2) Should the existing four five paragraph "Litigation" section in the article text be retained, or should the section be made shorter because "lawsuits resulted in nothing"? My preference: retain, and update as new developments occur. --MelanieN (talk) 16:56, 30 April 2018 (UTC) P.S. Re updating: Somebody please add the fact that Cohen dropped his lawsuits.[28][29] I don't have time to do it myself. --MelanieN (talk) 17:01, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

I agree with you on both points, i.e. nothing in the lead and retain lawsuits section. It does not mean that lawsuits section can not be slightly shortened or improved. My very best wishes (talk) 17:50, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Everybody seems to sue everyone these days. If suits don’t result in some action that is notable, they aren’t notable. Nothing in the lede and one sentence each max in the body. O3000 (talk) 17:02, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

MelanieN - just to clarify, I did not include "details" in the lead proposal - I summarized, so please stop referring to it as details. I simply stated the cause for all 3 lawsuits (defamation) and the names & dates of the 3 petitions. I did not detail each cause with a summary of what was stated in the complaints. For O3000 to dismiss such a very important litigation (which challenges the veracity of the dossier) would be akin to saying opposition research is not notable, therefore the dossier is not notable - all politicians conduct opposition research and unless the allegations are substantiated, they are not notable - delete the article. I don't see that happening anytime soon, and the same should apply to including the litigation in the lede. We do not/should not include anything in the body text that is not summarized in the lede. That little rule of thumb was tattooed on my back in 2015. ^{Atsme📞📧} 17:17, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Isn't this precisely backwards? Nothing should appear in the lead if it's not included in the text of the article, but it doesn't follow that we can't include body text that isn't reflected in the lead. Dyrnych (talk) 17:42, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Atsme, two points. One, the names and dates of the three petitions are too much detail. At most we could say something like "Several civil lawsuits have been filed against Buzzfeed and Fusion GPS." THAT is what a summary looks like. Two, Dyrnych is correct. (That's what comes of looking at one's tush in a mirror; it comes out backwards.) There is always lots of stuff in any article that is not summarized in the lede. Only the MOST IMPORTANT ideas or concepts are summarized in the lede. The existence of a couple of civil lawsuits is covered in the article, but the coverage is a minor part of the entire article - not significant enough for the lede. --MelanieN (talk) 18:07, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

😂 - good 'un Melanie - is that the true definition of ass backwards? Anyway, I was using a 2x mirror, so now I know why such a bare-all view is called "mooning" - it has to do with craters. Re: my comment about the lede & body - apologies for tripping over what I was actually trying to relay regarding the importance of the lawsuits in the lead. WP:LEAD tells us the lead should include prominent controversies and also states Apart from basic facts, significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article. Further down MOS:LEADREL it says: ...although not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text. If you can figure it out, let me know. Anyway, the litigation appears in the body, and it is significant information. How about something along the line of "three defamation lawsuits were filed against BuzzFeed and one against Fusion GPS"? We can wait until the lawsuits are settled to further define or remove. ^{Atsme📞📧} 22:11, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Agree. My rule of thumb is that if something is notable enough for its own section, it most likely should be mentioned in the lead. See WP:CREATELEAD. A sentence should do the job. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 22:29, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm struggling to see how the fact that lawsuits have been filed, without more, is significant enough for the lead. Also, note that other topics at the same level as the lawsuits—e.g., the death of Oleg Erovinkin and specific allegations in the dossier—are also not mentioned in the lead. Dyrnych (talk) 22:38, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

At first glance, I’d say that is a difficult argument to ignore. OTOH, Roy Moore just sued everybody claiming he lost because of a grand conspiracy. My point is that a lawsuit, in the political arena, is just another method of denying an accusation, albeit more dramatic and expensive. That’s OK. But, we have already included in the lede Trump’s denials. There is no need to also include lawsuits in the lede, which are often based on seriously complex arguments that are beyond the scope of the lede. A simple mention of lawsuits may be redundant and misleading.O3000 (talk) 00:29, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

The lawsuits are not Trump's, so I don't see why his denials have any bearing on it. ^{Atsme📞📧} 04:55, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

• Not in the lead: excessive detail for the lead. K.e.coffman (talk) 01:21, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

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)

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[30]. 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)

Frida Ghitis opinion about collusion

BullRangifer - Hanh???? per request to talk, well did you maybe goofed or duped or are in flux edits since you reverted two edits in a row with the same tagline ???

• as of 03:53, 3 May 2018 Undid revision 839392343 by Markbassett (talk) 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.

• as of 03:52, 3 May 2018 Undid revision 839346655 by Mr. Daniel Plainview (talk) 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.

My edit was not on a longstanding content, but I'm here per request.

My change was removing the bottom most section of Reactions, on basis of appears as a later speculation not a reaction for the dossier, and also seemed a photobomb or quotefarm or maybe remnant of recent edits.

• |Revision as of 03:39, 3 May 2018 rmv last para - not about the dossier, just a photobomb or quotemine. "Collusion" is a later dog whistle, not a dossier item.

That content is not present and there is a major difference of section the end of January 2018 (or similar for at least 8 months before ...)

The section gets a lot more content/edits and this specific subsection gets appended by the end of February

After what looks like lots of BullRangifer edits in a couple months ... The Reactions section is much much larger and different by 28 April 2018

But seeing the 2 May version, I see the Reactions subsection "Reactions to specific allegations" has only the subsubsection "Allegation of collusion with Russia" with only one paragraph of a Frida Ghitis quote, one where she seems saying forget the dossier content we have a bigger topic now.

To me that's a remnant bit and now thin content to have two levels of section, so maybe a remnant. In any case, it seems not a reaction to any specific allegation of the dossier so does not match the section titles, and does not seem a significant part for the dossier article -- seemed just a stray quote of nto large note.

So ... delete ? Still oppose ? RSVP. Markbassett (talk) 05:25, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Ummm.....that's a whole lot of confusing talk. Try to boil it down to the essence. Only your edit deleted long-standing content. The other one was the goof. User:Brian Everlasting has deleted it again, in violation of the DS restrictions, so I left a message on their talk page. You can read my reasoning there. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:37, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

It speaks to the basic theme of the whole dossier, that there was a conspiracy/collusion going on: "The most important question the dossier raises is whether Trump colluded with Russia...." Most, but not all, of the allegations fall under that umbrella. She's aiming at the central "meta" allegation of the whole dossier, not just one isolated allegation, and tying that into the question of kompromat and how a compromised President can be pressured "to act in Russia's interest." The prostitutes aren't even necessary. The act of secretive collusion alone creates kompromat. The salacious allegations are just spice, they are not the cake. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 06:17, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

• This section with content was on the page dated April 8 [31] and possibly before (I did not check). So, it is long-standing content. The removal is a violation of the "consensus required" editing restriction. Please self-revert (I am talking about this edit). My very best wishes (talk) 13:29, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
• This text represents stable consensus content and should be restored. It can be challenged or discussed or enhanced via a new talk page consensus. SPECIFICO talk 14:28, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

My very best wishes and SPECIFICO, the only reason I haven't restored it is respect for 1RR since I've already done it once. Anyone else can do it since the deletion is a DS violation. Go for it. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 14:39, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

However, speaking in term of content, I am not so sure. This is just a commentary, and a trivial/obvious one. Looks like a low-importance something, possibly a repetitive content. Therefore, I would not restore it, but do not mind if someone else does. My very best wishes (talk) 22:19, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

BullRangifer - please, no requesting help to get around 1RR -- just wait the day out and meanwhile TALK. This is about you did two deletions in a row with the same tagline so I asked why mine (the second) that removed the final section and para since the tagline about NeilN was not making a lot of sense, so I came to TALK as the tag said, to ask about what is going on.

Basically we have a section "Reactions to specific allegations" that has been edited down to almost nothing left, just has a subsection "Allegation of collusion with Russia" that has only one paragraph. And that paragraph seems not particularly substantial or prominent or even responding to any of the dossier allegations. 'Collusion' seems a dogwhistle that came later and not presented in the article as said in the dossier. (Though mostly the article is all about he-said she-said gossip rather than dossier content.) So BullRangifer, please clarify why this revert, and I'd suggest maybe just letting it go?

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)