Template talk:2016 United States presidential election series

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Elections and Referendums

This template is within the scope of WikiProject Elections and Referendums, an ongoing effort to improve the quality of, expand upon and create new articles relating to elections, electoral reform and other aspects of democratic decision-making. For more information, visit our project page.Elections and ReferendumsWikipedia:WikiProject Elections and ReferendumsTemplate:WikiProject Elections and ReferendumsElections and Referendums articles

Addition

Support Is there some objection to adding a link to Russian involvement in the 2016 United States presidential election? The reverberations from the whole affair are likely to endure for quite awhile, and seem far more significant that other events listed on the infobox already (such as the recount, which hasn't gone anywhere). Thoughts welcome. Neutrality^talk 01:55, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
- Just editing this to make it clear I support adding it. I would also add that the effects of this continue to snowball. Casprings (talk) 04:39, 16 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I concur. I suggest it is re-added. I think it is extremely significant.Casprings (talk) 04:56, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose – Undue weight at this point. The recounts happened, results are coming in, they deserve inclusion. "Vote pairing" was marginal, shouldn't be listed. Allegations of Russian influence have been peddled for months but never got real traction; let's see if they survive this week's news cycle before adding them to the notable record of this election. There are dozens of articles dealing with subjects gravitating around the 2016 election, so we must exercise editorial judgment to decide what should be mentioned in the sidebar. If this Russian affair goes in, then so should Wikileaks, Podesta emails, anti-Trump protests, SuperPACs, Bernie bros, electoral college, etc. — JFG ^talk 08:59, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Support inclusion of a link to Russian involvement in the 2016 United States presidential election. Worldwide coverage in thousands of secondary sources in multiple different languages all over the globe. Sagecandor (talk) 09:12, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per WP:UNDUE BlueSalix (talk) 09:15, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Comment WP:UNDUE says: "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources." This basically dictates we follow the prominence of reliable source coverage. Which is a lot. Sagecandor (talk) 09:31, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

See also WP:NOTNEWS and WP:RECENT. — JFG ^talk 17:31, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

By your logic of using NOTNEWS here we really shouldn't have an article on the election itself since it's just "news". Gimme a break, these are silly arguments. WP:RECENT is an essay. And NOTNEWS means we should not include something if its unlikely to have lasting significance! Not "it was reported in the news". Do you honestly think that this will have no lasting significance and will not be notable in a few years? This is more coming up with inane reasons to cast WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT !votes.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:14, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The recounts didn't turn out to have any lasting significance. All it took was two weeks for the recounts to fall from major, headline news with the potential to change everything to a historical footnote that changed nothing. The same can happen here. If it later turns into something indisputably significant, we can always decide to add the link then. Joshbunk (talk) 10:56, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Support, obviously. I'm surprised that anyone would object to including this unprecedented revelation. Arguments that it's WP:UNDUE are not only out of place in a discussion about including a relevant link a template, but completely absurd given the widespread, in depth coverage.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12].- Mr X 17:02, 11 December 2016 (UTC), 17:12, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - The article as it now stands is pretty much a WP:POVFORK of the DNC cyber attacks article. ^Falling_Gravity 17:27, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Then feel free to nominate it for deletion if you think that argument has legs, but it's not a valid reason for not adding it to a sidebar. The relevant guideline is WP:SIDEBAR, in case any one cares.- Mr X 17:38, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Even a cursory glance at the two articles shows that this is just simply not true.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:09, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I was considering doing that, but I figured that, since the most recent story is still developing, I would give it some time. ^Falling_Gravity 17:45, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note I have started a request for comment on what the WP:WEIGHT of the information contained in Russian influence on the 2016 United States presidential election in articles and templates that relate to United States presidential election, 2016. The WP:RFC is located here.Casprings (talk) 02:00, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose inclusion - seems WP:OFFTOPIC, neither part of the election process itself and lacking in WP:WEIGHT of association. Besides that, I'll mention that the target article is also a bit in dispute, and finally note the precedent of 1996 United States campaign finance controversy was not so handled. Markbassett (talk) 05:41, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
- This comment makes no sense. The title of the article has the "in the 2016 United States presidential election" part in it so how the hell can it be "off topic"? I'm sorry but this is just some flimsy excuse to cast a WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT !vote.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:10, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Include. Duh. I really can't fathom how anyone can argue in good faith for not including this. It's a huge story. It's about the election. It's all over reliable sources. What else is there to consider? Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:12, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose until the impact of the Russian interference is better understood, and per WP:NOTNEWS and WP:RECENT. Joshbunk (talk) 10:56, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose Per Joshbunk and JFG. Lets see if it has any impact. At this point seems like jumping the gun on a developing story. PackMecEng (talk) 19:01, 14 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Russia's hacking/leaking campaign is directly related to the election as it was an attempt to influence or manipulate the election process. As evidenced by a copious number of reliable sources, it is already one of the most historically significant aspects of the election. There's already a link for international reactions, merely including a link to Russian influence is hardly undue. gobonobo ⁺ ^c 01:35, 16 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Adding, now that this story had concrete consequences with the Obama administration expelling 35 Russian diplomats over Christmas. — JFG ^talk 12:24, 26 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
- Sure. Ethanbas ^(talk) 18:59, 26 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Vote pairing

The article on vote pairing strikes me as a marginal phenomenon, which wasn't widely covered during the campaign and which didn't have any measurable impact on the election. Therefore I removed it from this sidebar a few days ago, but Ethanbas placed it back, so let's discuss whether it should be here. — JFG ^talk 09:40, 25 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Disclosure: I wrote the vote pairing article, and was paid to do so (but I'm not getting paid for trying to keep it on the template; further details on payment on my user page). With regards to 1. Not widely covered, I wouldn't say it was covered less than some of the other things in the template, such as newspaper endorsements, international reactions, recounts, and faithless electors. With regards to 2. No measurable impact on the election, once again, things like faithless electors, recounts, international reactions, and newspaper endorsements also didn't have "measurable" impacts! I think that if vote pairing is removed, so should most or all 4 of the pages I mentioned be removed. If we look at this template for the 2008 and 2012 elections, it has far fewer items than it does in the current 2016 version. Ethanbas (talk) 09:50, 25 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

More specifically for impact, vote pairing changed more than 10,000 votes I believe (planning to write section on impact for vote pairing article). Good arguments can be made for how the vote pairing article is as significant as the 4 articles I mentioned. Ethanbas (talk) 09:55, 25 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

JFG, the above is my professional opinion. Again to be clear, I'm not getting paid for anything I currently do on Wikipedia. My personal experience is that vote pairing was *very* widely discussed among certain brands of young liberals in liberal cities. Vote pairing was in some ways the essence of just how far organized liberal action against Trump went in the 2016 election. I'll take into account other people's preferences if they chip in. Ethanbas ^(talk) 12:13, 18 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Ethanbas: Do you have sources showing that "vote pairing got about as much coverage as newspaper endorsements, faithless electors", as you say in your edit comment? Faithless editors were quite a big deal in this election year; vote pairing I never heard of until seeing the link here. — JFG ^talk 12:16, 18 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Whatever. I'll remove it for now. If you're wondering though, you can read the vote pairing article I wrote and follow some links, search some keywords on Google News, etc. Ethanbas ^(talk) 12:29, 18 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]