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Suggestion, remove elected

The President of the United States (POTUS)[8][note 2] is the elected head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces.

We should remove "elected" because Gerald Ford was President but he was not elected. Usually, the President is elected. I don't think people will think that the President is usually not elected but appointed by the Pope or Putin. Ok, some might think Putin, because that man is not Trump but rather wearing a plastic Mission Impossible mask having replaced the real Trump, ha ha. Just joking on the last part. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nywip (talk • contribs) 17:28, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

 Not done - The sentence is factual as written. The "Ford exception" can be stated in addition. Cheers. Drdpw (talk) 18:29, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
There's also Tyler, Fillmore, A. Johnson & Arthur. Also, T. Roosevelt, Coolidge, Truman & L. Johnson served non-elected partial first terms. GoodDay (talk) 18:46, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
True; they at least were elected as VP before assuming the presidency and finishing the elected president's term. Drdpw (talk) 19:02, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
The term isn't required in the lead. See President of Finland, President of Portugal, President of Brazil for a few examples. GoodDay (talk) 19:08, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
That by itself is not a compelling reason for deleting an accurate fact from this article's lead. However, given that the subject (of the POTUS being elected is mentioned elsewhere in the lead, I'll remove the word "elected" from the opening sentence and will add a sentence to the last paragraph in the lead noting that 9 PsOTUS entered office for the 1st time intra-term without having been elected. Sound good? Drdpw (talk) 20:30, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
Having it in the lead, suggested (erroneously) that one can't become US President without being elected to the office. Meanwhile, saying the US President is head of state & government without mentiong 'elected', isn't misleading. BTW: I didn't do two reverts, but merely a delete, then revert. GoodDay (talk) 20:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
I think we just had conflicting edits, while I was posting the prose I mentioned above. Hopefully we're on the same page now. Drdpw (talk) 21:02, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
We are :) GoodDay (talk) 21:06, 10 February 2017 (UTC)
The suggestion does make sense when you take into account the order of succession means that someone can become President without ever having been elected to any office by the public. Ford was at least elected to the House by the folks of Michigan's 5th district, so he at least held an elected position even though he was never elected President or VP. But what of someone in the Cabinet who is appointed by the President and approved of by the Senate. Say the VP is impeached and removed from office and the President, Speaker of the House, and President Pro Tempore of the Senate all die within a week of the VP's removal from office. That means the next in line is the SecState, someone the public did not vote for in any capacity. They might never have been elected to any kind of city, state, or federal office by the public but they can still be President without having been elected ever. -anonymous 3/5/2017 12:34 EST — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:18B:300:DBFF:0:0:0:6D3 (talk) 05:34, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

POTUS Most Powerful Person in the World

The POTUS is the most powerful political figure in the world as evidence by business insider and many other sources. Also if we all are to follow the sources then how come in the general secretary of Ch — Preceding unsigned comment added by Redom115 (talk • contribs) 02:37, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 5 July 2017

I am an Archives Technician with the Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum in Abilene, Kansas, and am requesting that our library be added to the paragraph of presidential libraries with grave sites, in addition to the Nixon and Reagan Libraries. President and First Lady Eisenhower are buried in the Place of Meditation on our campus, and the grave site is open to tourists. Our website is eisenhower.archives.gov. Thank you for your consideration! 207.245.177.20 (talk) 15:59, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

 Done I have included the link. Thank you for asking. Drdpw (talk) 16:15, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

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Renewable?

It's not an accurate way to describe two term limitation. Sumi Smorynski (talk) 06:21, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

I updated it from renewable to Limit two elected terms in office. Sumi Smorynski (talk) 07:32, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

Now how do I close this topic out? Sumi Smorynski (talk) 07:33, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 9 November 2017

I am a university student studying communications at National University online and request that I complete some proofreading for my school project. Thank you, I can be reached at msmhembree@gmail.com. I have done editing work for this site before for a film class project, whereupon I corrected mistakes about a film and old-time actress's biography. Please let me know when I can finish my project. Best regards, Marie Hembree MSH 11:40, 9 November 2017 (UTC)

@Msmhembree: The edit request template is meant for suggesting specific changes you want to see, in the format of "change X to Y". If you are reviewing this article and notice something that needs to be changed, please suggest it in that format on this page. Thanks 331dot (talk) 11:42, 9 November 2017 (UTC)

Gender-neutral language

I changed the phrase "He directs..." to "He or she directs" in the intro because it's talking about the office in general, and though all past and current presidents have been male, to only use "he" implies that future presidents will be male as well. I'm sure some folks find that offensive, and it's inaccurate. My edit was reverted by User:Thewolfchild as "not necessary". I think "he or she" or some equivalent rephrasing is indicated by Wikipedia:Gender-neutral language. Can anyone else weigh in? -- Beland (talk) 04:10, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

@Beland: - Yes, I changed it. I don't believe that having just "he" implies any misogyny on the part of the project. As you yourself pointed out, all presidents to date have been male, the current one is male and will be for the next 4 to 8 years. Even if he died today, you would have drop 15 spots down the line of succession to find a female replacement. But that said, I'm not against gender-neutral language, I just think "he or she" is needless and looks clunky. But if you feel strongly enough about it, how about changing "He directs..." to "The president directs..." ? Would that work? - theWOLFchild 04:31, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
I agree "he or she" is clunky compared to rephrasing to avoid gendered pronouns entirely. I'll implement your suggestion. -- Beland (talk) 16:57, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

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Andrew Johnson's party affiliation

In the Timeline of presidents section, Andrew Johnson is listed as being a Democrat. While he was a Democrat, Johnson was Lincoln's running mate on the 1864 Republican ticket. During that time, the Republican Party referred to itself as the National Union Party. I suggest that Andrew Johnson be listed as being a President of the National Union Party, because that would be a clearer description of his party affiliation. SMP0328. (talk) 00:14, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

 Implemented – The template has been changed. Cheers. Drdpw (talk) 03:29, 9 December 2017 (UTC)
Thanks. SMP0328. (talk) 03:51, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

Unreviewable authority

A claim was added about the president having unreviewable authority over immigration. The 3 sources used are: a Washington Post (WP) article, a National Law Journal (NLJ) article, and a circuit court ruling.

The WP article doesn't say anything about unreviewable authority. It just says that a recent executive order on immigration has "grave legal defects". Not sure why this source is being used.

The short news article by NLJ reports that SCOTUS will review the current president's claim that he can't be reviewed. Again, not sure why this is being used.

The circuit court ruling contains a summary of the current president's claim, which is that the president has unreviewable authority. The next page of the ruling goes on to describe SCOTUS's prior rulings against unreviewable authority. I'm sensing a pattern here.

The three sources make a good case that the president actually does NOT have unreviewable authority over immigration. The claim needs to be rewritten to actually reflect the sources. Thanks. KinkyLipids (talk) 06:01, 22 January 2018 (UTC).

I agree with you that the statement about the president having unreviewable authority over immigration is not backed up by the citations provided. More seriously, it's just thrown into the section, seemingly haphazardly, and states a hotly contested assertion as fact (in contravention of WP:NPOV). Rather then attempting to refine the claim, I'd eliminate it altogether. Now, having said that, perhaps a couple sentences could be added to that section's paragraph on executive orders:

From–The president possesses additional powers to direct the executive branch through executive orders that are grounded in federal law or executive power that is constitutionally vested. Executive orders are subject to Judicial review by U.S. federal courts, which can find them to be unconstitutional. Additionally, Congress can overturn an executive order though legislation.

To something like–Additionally, the president possesses the power to manage operations of the federal government through issuing various types of directives, such as presidential proclamation and executive orders. When the president is lawfully exercising one of their constitutionally conferred responsibilities, the scope of this power is broad. Even so, these directives are subject to judicial review by U.S. federal courts, which can find them to be unconstitutional. Moreover, Congress can overturn an executive order though legislation.

That's my 2¢ worth; anyone else have thoughts on the matter? Drdpw (talk) 01:48, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
@Drdpw (talk · contribs): Thanks, that sounds great——on both eliminating the claim about unreviewable authority and making changes to the paragraph on executive orders. KinkyLipids (talk) 15:29, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 Implemented – I've made modifications to the subsection. Drdpw (talk) 03:26, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Presidential Seal

As it has recently come to my attention, I need to go through the proper channels.

Recently, I went through every article about a United States President and added the Presidential Seal in the infobox. All this did was simply add the seal to the infobox and would appear above their order of office. I also added the Vice Presidential seal to every President who also served as VPOTUS. I managed to add the seal to every presidential article with the exception of Donald Trump, as I do not have the proper editing privileges, before they were reverted.

One of the things that was brought to my attention was the size of the seal, and that it was too small to see when viewing the article on a smartphone or tablet. The size of the seal was 45px. However, simply clicking on the seal will open a larger version of it. The VPOTUS seal was the same size, as well.

The reason for adding the seal was to add something unique to the articles. As the seal is very specific to the US presidency, I felt it appropriate to add the seal to the infoboxes of the presidents. Similar to the articles on some former Presidents of Mexico.

I would like to add the seal back to the articles, but only if allowed. LordVesuvius (talk) 20:23, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Please see various replies on your talk page. Thanks for opening a central discussion here. Decorative pictures in WP:infoboxes are generally discouraged per the manual of style. If you look at {{Infobox person}}, there are reserved spaces for a portrait of the subject and for their signature. Seals, coats of arms, military decorations and the like are usually omitted. — JFG talk 20:49, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

"President of the United States" vs. "President of the United States of America"

Recently there has been a dispute about whether the title used at the top of the infobox should be "President of the United States" or "President of the United States of America." I think that the latter is appropriate, but thought it was worth discussing.

In particular, I think "President of the United States of America" is appropriate because

  1. It is the official title of the President in Article II, Section I of the Constitution. "The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America."
  2. It is used by the President in proclamations, nominations, and commissions in the form "NOW, THERFORE, I, N., President of the United States of America." E.g. President Trump's recent proclamation of Captive Nations Week.
  3. It is used in international diplomacy. See for example the UN Protocol and Liaison Office's list of heads of state and government.

--Dyskutant (talk) 03:34, 23 July 2018 (UTC)

I am inclined to support the addition “of America” for the reasons stated above. In addition it is the more complete and formal title. Follow-on usage should use President or President of the United States. Garuda28 (talk) 04:12, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
"President of the United States" is the common name for the office. SMP0328. (talk) 04:15, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
It is, but COMMONNAME only applies to article titles, not usage in the infobox. I think a more relevant guidence is at Wikipedia:Official names#Where there is an official name that is not the article title Garuda28 (talk) 04:23, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
The title of the Infobox should match that of the article, but the full name of the office could be included somewhere within the Infobox. SMP0328. (talk) 04:47, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
Can you give an example of where you would suggest putting it in the infobox? Garuda28 (talk) 02:35, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

Merger of Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces

Merge. This was a lengthy discussion, and not one that is easy to close. In essence, those supporting a merger find the Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces article redundant to this one, while those opposing a merger make two points; that a specific role of a given office holder can be notable enough for a standalone article, and that the content previously at Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces would be too much for this page, and would cause problems of due weight. All of these arguments are grounded in policy, and none can be dismissed out of hand. However, it has yet to be clearly demonstrated that this article would be overwhelmed by information from CIC, were it merged; this can only be demonstrated via a merger, or by showing that this article was in bad shape before the split. Also, I find the "topic is important, and deserves a separate article" argument somewhat weak, as the notability of the topic is not really in dispute; this is primarily an argument about where the relevant information should be placed. In sum, I find a weak consensus to merge. I note that a number of arguments in favor of the merger cite the absence of a length problem; if, post a merge, this article is in fact too long, the argument for a split would be strengthened (keeping in mind, of course, that attempting to create a length issue where none exists would be disruptive). Vanamonde (talk) 21:36, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I propose that this article be merged into the President of the United States article, as all of the information is covered in this article, specifically the section on Article II powers. Anything missing could be easily incorporated in. Furthermore, Commander-in-Chief is not a separate position, but rather just a role of the president, and as such should be covered in one comprehensive article. Garuda28 (talk) 15:52, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

It is surely of importance, however the head of the U.S. military is the president. There isn’t a sepereate position (as there is in China and other states). It is unneeded duplication (as are many of the other articles that have been listed above). It doesn’t make sense to have an article about a component of a position while the position itself has a section that covers the component. Garuda28 (talk) 17:18, 9 June 2018 (UTC)
No the head of the U.S. Armed Forces is not the President but the President as commander-in-chief. The article never stated to be about a separate position, i think it clearly describes itself as a power of the President. And to accuse articles that exist since a long time of suddenly being bad is a bit cheap. Yes it makes sense because you can hardly compare the commander-in-chief role with other powers the President has. Colonestarrice (talk) 16:41, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
Precisely. They are one and the same, so then why have an article which makes them appear to be different? The commander-in-chief power is exactly like any of the other powers the president has. It doesn't make sense to create an article since he is described as "chief law enforcement officer" or "chief diplomat", so why have one for any other power? And most of those other CIC articles are very redundant, and could be easily merged into their own articles as well. Garuda28 (talk) 16:49, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
You're repeating yourself, I answered all of this already. I understand your point but don't agree with it. Colonestarrice (talk) 16:57, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
Colonestarrice - "No the head of the U.S. Armed Forces is not the President but the President as commander-in-chief." - Uh, would you care to clarify that, please? Thanks wolf 15:56, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
No reply. Got it. - wolf 02:16, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
I don't know why the other editor has not responded. But their answer was entirely correct. In a strict sense, the head of the American armed forces is not the U.S. president in their capacity of being president but because they are the Commander-in-Chief, a position that the constitution, as it stands, assigns to the office of the president. You might think this is semantics but it's not: The C-in-C is supposed to direct war efforts after Congress has declared war (see Article Two of the United States Constitution). However, this status has changed enormously since the time Article Two was written, starting with the practices undertaken in the Korean War. And the changes made during the Cold War have not been undone after it ended; in fact, the vagueness has increased. As recently as in 2017, Congress could not make heads or tails about where the executive's authority ends. (See here.) The C-in-C position is unique among the other "roles" and "authorities" the office of the president enjoys. And Wikipedia should reflect the currently and largely undefined limits of the C-in-C's powers. -The Gnome (talk) 14:41, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
All your meaningless arguments aside, you keep missing the point; all the content on this page is covered already by two other articles, the two articles where all the content was copied & pasted from, making this article entirely needless and redundant. - wolf 22:48, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
You asked to have explained to you the fact that "the head of the U.S. Armed Forces is not the President but the President as commander-in-chief" and this is precisely what was done. I'm sorry you ignored it and responded with a cavalier aside ("meaningless"), in italics too, probably to provide substance where there's none. So, (a) do not ask the questions if you do not want the answers. And (b) I'm obliged to explain; I'm not obliged to have you understand. Carry on. -The Gnome (talk) 11:21, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
P.S. If the text of article X is practically a duplicate of another article Y, this means that the two articles are potential candidates for a Merge. But that is not something automatically done! If the subject of article X and the subject of Y possess independent, separate notability on their own, they both can stay up, provided of course there is sourced material that makes the separate notability and encyclopaedic content evident and the two texts are rendered distinct enough. Just to rest this tired argument about "sooo many articles about the same subject:" They are not about the "same subject." -The Gnome (talk) 11:21, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
Oh, I didn't "ignore" anything. I read the reply and found it meaningless, as are your subsequent posts. There has thus far been no sufficient reasoning provided to retain this article. Just because you don't like hearing that, is not my problem. You have brought nothing new to the table with these on-going rants... (if article 'z' is a copy & paste of articles 'x' and 'y', there is no need for article 'z', and so on). So again, with the exception of new entries from new participants, I would suggest giving this debate a rest and awaite the forthcoming close, as has been requested at ANRFC. And, as I replied to you below, yesterday; I think we're done here, (unless you have some burning need to have the last word) - wolf 13:20, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
  • From a Wikipedia perspective, do we think the article's length will be "comfortable" (i.e. WP:SIZE) for readers if merged? Even though the position is vested in the president, a common cause for keeping two articles separate is the amount of content on the said topic. I understand the Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces article is newly created, but how much more content will be added? I can see this article has specific case studies about how the position was used in practice. This "could" be enough justification for having its own article. But ultimately, I think this depends on the length and how deep the article goes.  Honette 08:15, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
I don't see it expanding beyond its current state. The constitutional aspect is covered within this article. My big concern is that it makes it seem that "Commander-in-Chief" is a position separate from that of the president, which is not the case. Garuda28 (talk) 16:17, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
That it will never expand is pure speculation. As i already mentioned above, the article clearly describes itself as role vested in the President, so i don't see the concern here. Colonestarrice (talk) 16:49, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
Agree with Garuda28. The President is also Chairman of the United States National Security Council, are we going to have an article for that as well? He has plenty of other positions and titles that are all part of being President, they don't require separate articles. - wolf 16:54, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
If it's worth its own article why not? The U.S. Army is also just a part of the U.S. Armed Forces but still has its own article. Colonestarrice (talk) 17:05, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
@wolf: The National Security Council in the United States does not carry any kind of authority, military, political, or otherwise. Its mandate is to offer advice and information to the president. There are no executive powers invested in any member of the NSC, nor to the office of its Chairman per se. Therefore, there is a huge qualitative difference between the two positions. One seems worthy of an independent Wikipedia article about it, the other not. -The Gnome (talk) 11:46, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
But at the end of the day, it is just another role of the President. So the point still remains; are we going to create an article for every single role, position, title, etc., POTUS has aside from being POTUS itself (regardless of mandate, powers, etc.)? The answer is 'No'. (And the role of C-i-C certainly doesn't need a third article to describe it). - wolf 19:49, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
If it is just a role vested in the president, then why is there a full title for the page and an infobox for the position? It appears to be written as if for a position rather than a role. Garuda28 (talk) 16:53, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
What should we shorten it to "Commander-in-Chief of the"? Infobox names and their parameters are for internal understanding, no viewer-only will ever know that the template is called "Infobox official post". Colonestarrice (talk) 17:11, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
"Commander in Chief" is sufficient, I don't recall anyone, other than you, having any difficulty understanding the meaninging of the title. The infobox and page title are self-explanatory; if it's the US Navy or US Armed Forces, then that is what he is in charge of. Also, wp:commonname applies; when that title is used, there is usually no modifier attached on the end. The original link was (still is) sufficient as well, there is just no need for this redundant page with repeat info. - wolf 19:43, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

(break 1)

  • Support merge. There is no need for this extra page, it's redundant. All the info is already covered in the POTUS article and in Commander-in-chief#United_States article, (where "C-i-C" was already linked to in US military article infoboxes before suddenly being redirected to this new page by it's creator). This new third page just needlessly duplicates info found in the two established pages. - wolf 11:42, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Support merge. The new article is redundant. The new article's history section is cut-and-pasted from Commander-in-chief§United States and the description section from President of the United States§War and foreign affairs powers. Any new details on the president's role as Commander in Chief that might one day be added to the new article could just as easily be incorporated into the existing sections of those 2 articles. Some text could also be added to the relevant section of the Article II of the U.S. Constitution article concerning the Commander in Chief Clause, which is thin on the subject of the president's commander in chief powers. Drdpw (talk) 20:52, 11 June 2018 (UTC)
Along this line, I could see a new article emerging—not the redundant content fork under discussion here—as a Constitution subpage (constitutional clause article) titled something like Commander in Chief Clause or President as Commander in Chief Clause. Drdpw (talk) 02:14, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  • FYI - the page has been (repeatedly) moved to "Commander-in-Chief (role of the U.S. President)", but that shouldn't effect this discussion or it's outcome. wolf 00:39, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Support - Using the WP:SIZE as a guide, I think a merge is preferred. Guidelines suggest articles neither too long nor short. I believe the content merged to President of the United States will still have a comfortable reading length. If, however, the said section expands in future to the point where article length is of concern, perhaps an article split is appropriate. But until then, merging the two articles seems fair.  Honette 10:34, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
The "other stuff exists" argument is weak and unconvincing. (See Wikipedia:Other stuff exists) Drdpw (talk) 18:56, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
"Numerous other examples have already been provided above" - you mean the single example of the UK, in the only other 'oppose' entry here? (other than that of the article creator). As Drdpw stated, that WP:OSE argument is simply insufficient. This isn't really even an article we're discussing, but a needless content fork with redundant information, already covered by not one, but two other articles, that should be re-merged back where it belongs. - wolf 19:42, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment @Colonestarrice: - you can't have it both ways. If you're going to undo Garuda28's merge as improper, claiming there is no consensus, the discussion is still ongoing and he is involved, etc., etc., then you need to move the article title back to "Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces", as you had no business moving it (repeatedly) for all those same reasons. The article should remain at it original title and if you want it moved, post a proper move request. As for gauging consensus on anything, that needs to be done by an uninvolved, experienced editor (preferrably an admin) after a close request is posted at WP:ANRFC. - wolf 20:14, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
wolf, IMO, it wasn't cricket for you and Garuda28 to in effect declare consensus by redirecting the article and removing the tag from the POTUS article page, as you're non-neutral and directly-involved in this discussion. While I personally believe that, based on the reasons stated by a number of editors, the merge should go forward, the decision in this case to officially close the discussion and green-light (or not) the merge should be made by a neutral and not-directly-involved editor. Cheers. Drdpw (talk) 20:55, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
I saw the merge made on my watchlist and just fixed some links that's needed fixing. While I also agree with the merge, I didn't "declare" anything. It has since been reverted, so be it. I've since advised Garuda28 to request a close, but also suggested that if Col. wants to preach the rules, then he should also follow them. That, to me, is "cricket".
Cheers - wolf 21:19, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
Just want to chime in. I was not aware of the rules and will be requesting a close. Thank you for your guidance.Garuda28 (talk) 21:57, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose - There is enough stuff about the President as Commander-in-Chief to justify a stand-alone article. Merging into this article would simply add too much information which is specific to the other topic. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:30, 29 June 2018 (UT7C)
Yes, it would be a shame to undo all the effort you just put into it, but "enough stuff", especially when repetitive and redundant and already covered in not just one, but two articles already, hardly justifies yet another article. It seems the few "opposers" here, (other than the article creator), have failed to take this into account, and are simply saying "well, the article is there, might as well keep it". There doesn't appear to be an actually compelling reason, based on WP P&G to not merge this content back where it belongs. - wolf 00:06, 30 June 2018 (UTC)
"All the effort [I] just put into it"? Whatever are you talking about? I made four edits [1] to the C-in-C article, all of which went towards cleaning up the layout - I don't think I even touched content. In any case, whether or not I edit an article is irrelevant to me - I !vote the way that appears to me to be best for the encyclopedia. I've been known to clean-up articles that are at AfD and then !vote "delete", just so that if they're kept, they'll be better articles. In this case, the material in the C-in-C article is not completely redundant with the material in this article, as one would expect when comparing a survey article (this one) and an article on a specific aspect of the subject. This article has a lot of ground to cover, and it shouldn't be expected to cover with specificity all aspects of the relationship between the President and the military. Two articles are justified, and they should not be merged. Either this article would be overwhlemed, or encyclopedic material would be lost in the merger. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:34, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
"Two articles are justified" - Two articles... maybe, but certainly not three, all with the same info. This third article is unnecessary and redundant and therefore should be merged. - wolf 02:16, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
"the material in the C-in-C article is not completely redundant with the material in this article," The C-in-C article is redundant none the less, it's a content fork from 2 articles: as its history section is cut-and-pasted from Commander-in-chief§United States and the description section from President of the United States§War and foreign affairs powers. No encyclopedic material will be lost and neither article overwhelmed here. Drdpw (talk) 02:44, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
Yes, my goal was to centralize all of this information, by creating a main article about the CIC. Why exactly should we need several articles for the same topic? Colonestarrice (talk) 06:53, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
"Why exactly should we need several articles for the same topic?" - Exactly! We already have two other articles that cover this content, we don't need yet another one with just the same content from the first two pages (cut & pasted or forked) to create an entirely redundant third page. - wolf 19:49, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
Did you also read the first sentence of my comment? Colonestarrice (talk) 20:09, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
Yes. And...? - wolf 21:07, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

(break 2)

  • Support per proposal. Also, the argument that the article about the president would get too long isn't very strong, article can be very long if there is a lot of important info pertinent to the subject. This would the case here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wikitigresito (talk • contribs) 10:34, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Comment: regarding article length; POTUS is currently not so long that merging the relevant content here would be a problem, so that is not a concern. Also, when this article was created, it appears the purpose was to redirect the link for "Commander in Chief" in all the US Armed Forces article infoboxes from Commander-in-chief#United_States to this page. (They have been reverted pending the outcome here). The content here is also sufficiently covered in that article, hence the reason that there is two other articles mentioned above, not just one. FYI - wolf 11:40, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose The functions, duties, authorities, and so on, of the C-in-C cannot be "easily" (the initiator's term) integrated into the main article about the US president without loss of important encyclopaedic information (or without creating an even bigger main article than what we already have). The article about the US armed forces C-in-C should remain independent in Wikipedia for a full, in-depth presentation. It's not about the person but about the office. -The Gnome (talk) 07:42, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
Can you please clarify, is it the office of the president or office as the commander-in-chief you are referring to? Garuda28 (talk) 13:53, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
The reference is to both positions. As indicated in the relevant article ("Commander-in-chief"), in most countries the armed forces C-in-C is the head of state. However, the authorities invested onto the C-in-C are not the same in every country. For instance, in Greece, the president of the republic is the nominal C-in-C but with quite limited authorities; practically, a symbolic, ceremonial position. In Israel, the elected government collectively acts as C-in-C. In the United States, the position is of full and independent substance, as evidenced inter alia by the infamous nuclear football carried around by the president's entourage. -The Gnome (talk) 16:05, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
"The functions, duties, authorities, and so on, of the C-in-C cannot be "easily" (the initiator's term) integrated into the main article about the US president without loss of important encyclopaedic information" - Actually, yes... it can. That is where the content came from in the first place. It was copied from two other articles that already cover this subject. Nothing in your follow up comment here supports the need for a third, redundant article. "as evidenced inter alia by the infamous nuclear football carried around by the president's entourage." - Exactly; the "President's" entourage, not the "Commander-in-Chief's" entourage. How this position is enacted in other countries is irrelevant here. This is about the position of C-i-C in the U.S., which it already covered in two other articles. We don't need the content of those two articles repeated in a third. - wolf 19:49, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
The infamous nuclear football, which is the means to start a nuclear war, is carried by the president's entourage, yes, but not in the same capacity as they are carrying their own suitcases, their own weapons or their very own dry martinis. The "football" is not theirs; they are simply carrying it. While, by using it, the US president, in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief, has the authority to unleash nuclear war at very short notice! This is a monumental authority. It conclusively distinguishes this particular attribute of the executive office from all others, without exception. You want to bundle all other positions of the office together, under one article. Well, the president is "also", yes, Commander-in-Chief of the US Armed Forces; but that is, shall we say, rather different from Chief of the Boy Scouts. -The Gnome (talk) 07:38, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
So, because someone follows POTUS around with the "nuclear football", you feel that justifies the creation of a third article with redundant copy & paste content? (And a fourth article overall, counting the President's emergency satchel page). Sure, it differentiates him from the Robert Baden-Powell, but it does not justify another needless article - wolf 08:45, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
Downplaying the colossal power invested in the office of the C-in-C through dismissive irony ("someone follows POTUS around," etc) does not a serious argument make. The justification for a separate article is based on the existence of separate, independently notable, encyclopaedic content for the separate article. The "nuclear football" is but a graphic emblem of the distinctiveness of the position of the Commander-in-Chief, which is why it was brought up. -The Gnome (talk) 09:44, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
Erm... pointing out that an aide accompanies the President most places with the "Emergency Satchel" is simply stating a fact, not "Downplaying..." blah, blah, blah, "...through dismissive irony". Your rather vacuous summation of my previous comment in no way diminishes the "seriousness of the argument" it presents. And while the remainder your comment does indeed confirm the relevance of this content, you still have not demonstrated a need to have said content repeated, again, in a third article. The two established articles from which the content was copied from are sufficient, which is why this completly redundant page should be merged back where it came from. - wolf 11:30, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
Actually, there was no summation, but practically a verbatim repetition of what you wrote back at you. Because someone follows POTUS around with the "nuclear football", do we feel that justifies the creation of a third article? That is what you wrote. I respond, Yes, I do feel we need a separate article for C-in-C, and I explained why, and the way you phrased the question strikes me as ironically downplaying the gravity of investing with such extreme power the C-in-C position. The way you phrased it is as if someone follows POTUS around with a change of underpants. That's all there was to it. -The Gnome (talk) 21:28, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
"Actually, there was no summation, but practically a verbatim repetition of what you wrote back at you." - Well, it's clear you don't understand the meaning of "summation" or "verbatim repetition". And while you may have gone on and on about about why you would like this article to remain, you have not justified (especially with your sudden and, quite frankly bizarre, interest in the President's underwear), the need for this completely redundant article. - wolf 22:48, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
If I wanted to do a "summation of your argument" I would have done so. What I did instead was quoted your verbiage back at you, practically word for word: that's "practically verbatim." The underwear of the president was enlisted to demonstrate the utter silliness of stubbornly refusing to acknowledge the obvious, i.e. the extreme importance of the C-in-C position as an independently notable subject. The Boy Scouts of America were used for the same purpose. -The Gnome (talk) 03:43, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
Right... this redundant article, a copy of two others is important and this is somehow demonstrated by "executive underwear". The problem is that I agree with the relevance of content (that somehow went right over your head), but I don't agree there is a need to take content and copy directly from two articles into a totally needless third. Nothing you stated here justifies that. Nothing. Sorry your little "tiff" isn't going well for you, but don't take it out on me. - wolf 04:29, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
See? You're unable to go beyond the simile. You still carry on about "executive underwear"! -The Gnome (talk) 07:56, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
Uh, the whole "underwear"-thing is your hang-up, not mine. Try discussing something relevant and on topic. For a change... - wolf 10:16, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
And BTW: Although you are a wolf child, it's time to realize there are viewpoints different than yours in the world. Reacting the way you do to them (a) does not advance your point of view, and (b) you may get to be obnoxious, which goes back to (a) again. -The Gnome (talk) 03:52, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
And BTW, with your juvenile little quip about my username, you surrendered any moral and/or intellectual high ground you think you may have had here with your little "tiff", and in the process made yourself look foolish. Focus on edits, not editors. - wolf 04:29, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
The refusal to accept as legitimate (not correct; simply legitimate) different viewpoints from your own, and discuss them seriously, is immature. That's the point. You seem eternally surprised (and angry!) that others do not see the "evident" truth that we have too many articles about POTUS. I mean, why can't everyone see things your way?? Well, number of articles are not the focus of an encyclopaedia; distinctive differences between terms and notions are. BTW, apologies if the joking reference to your chosen handle upset you. Jokes don't go over well online. -The Gnome (talk) 07:56, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
...aaannd again you have nothing substantive to offer in opposing this merge, and are instead continuing with puerile personal attacks. I think we're done here, (unless you have some burning need to have the last word). - wolf 10:16, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
I countered your empty argument (that you repeated at least 1 billion times) twice already. Not my article is redundant but these 2 are, because why exactly would we need two articles that cover the same topic, instead of one? And yes it is copy-pasted but how exactly does that matter? Of course I would’ve replaced the content of these 2 article sections with a link to the main article, I just waited for the community to accept my article, but as you can see this did not fully happen. Colonestarrice (talk) 11:53, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
With a couple of exceptions, all of my posts here are replies to comments directed at me, so your hostile sarcasm is misdirected, if not needless. As I've already pointed out, the two articles you copied from are established articles that aren't going to be deleted, merged or otherwise altered meaning that that your article is entirely redundant and unneeded. This is why "the community did not fully accept your article." Now, that said, I don't see a point in continuing to debate this. A close request has been posted at ANRFC, so I would suggest that those who have already posted here, leave this discussion be and await the outcome of said close. (jmho) - wolf 01:34, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
  • That's the thing i don't get, why would we need 2 or more articles about the exact same topic instead of one main article. That the U.S. Commander-in-Chief is a role vested in POTUS and should therefore be merged into POTUS is not an argument, that's like saying "the U.S. Navy is also just a part of the U.S. Armed Forces, let's merge their articles together". In my opinion the only reason to merge these articles would be if the U.S. C-in-C article was too short, which is clearly not the case. And stating the article is never going to expand is pure speculation. Colonestarrice (talk) 18:58, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
Your utterly faulty Navy/Navy Dept. analogy aside... I actually agree with you; we don't need 3 articles for this. But the 2 established articles on this subject that were in place before you created this redundant third article were already sufficient. They aren't going anywhere, they aren't going to be merged or deleted, and so there is no need for your article. It's just repeat content that needs to be re-merged into the articles it came from. - wolf 23:51, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

(break 3)

  • Support. I think the opposing argument does not lead me to their point of view. Even though this may close as no consensus, in my opinion there is enough justification (Commander in chief is a role of the president and other more detailed points above.) This is my opinion from seeing the other argument. Abequinn14 (talk) 06:08, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
  • Weak Oppose The commander-in-chief article, in its current composition, probably merits merger. That said, there is additional content that could (and should) be properly merged into it (e.g. National Command Authority) and which, if done, would make it inappropriate for the currently exhaustive President of the United States article. Chetsford (talk) 15:37, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
  • Proposal: I am still of the opinion that "The new article is redundant. The new article's history section is cut-and-pasted from Commander-in-chief§United States and the description section from President of the United States§War and foreign affairs powers." That said, given that this discussion appears to be going nowhere, I would like to propose that, rather then just merge/delete the new CiC article, the title be changed to something along the lines of Commander-in-Chief Clause. Like other articles on clauses of the U.S. Constitution, this article would have sections such as Text, Background, History, and Supreme Court interpretations. This would, I believe, transform the page from a content fork into a distinct article on the president's constitutional designation/role as the Commander in Chief. Drdpw (talk) 19:32, 14 July 2018 (UTC)
Proposal withdrawn from this Rfc discussion. Drdpw (talk) 21:18, 16 July 2018 (UTC)
I support this proposal. It takes care of my concern of the appearance of a separate position while focusing in on the constitutional basis. Garuda28 (talk) 19:37, 14 July 2018 (UTC)
  • Support the general direction of the proposal, since it'd be presenting the distinct and extremely important authorities bestowed on the C-in-C position (though possibly with a better article-title). -The Gnome (talk) 08:24, 16 July 2018 (UTC)
Withdrawing support, since the proposal already seems going nowhere, only to reproduce the RfC conundrum. -The Gnome (talk) 10:27, 16 July 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment - adding a proposal to create what is essentially (and would certainly need to be) a different article, when what is attempted to be determined here is whether or not to merge this existing page back to where it was copied and pasted from, can only lead to confusion and a derailed RfC. The proposer, Drdpw is already on record as "supporting" the merge proposal. I would suggest that this new proposal be made outside this RfC, so as not to skew the results. The proposer could create a new RfC, either now or after the conclusion of this one (a close was proposed some time ago, perhaps someone might want add an additional request to help prompt it along...?), or the proposer may want to just boldly create this new, suggested article, as these processes seem to just drag on and on without results otherwise. As for the proposal itself, I would potentially support it (as long as it has worthwhile content and is not just a repeat of other pages), instead of keeping this needless page, otherwise, as previously stated, the content here is already sufficiently covered in other articles. (imho) - wolf 09:47, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Altering talk page comments

@Colonestarrice: - talk page discussions serve as a record of what people had to say on a certain subject, as well as what others said in response to those comments. When you go and change your comments, weeks after you posted them, and especially after other editors have replied to them, it creates a misrepresentation of what actually transpired. It may undermine those who have already replied and mislead those who are reading through the discussion for the first time. It is both inappropriate and disingenuous. - wolf 14:12, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

I would have to agree about this. It is common practice to mark deletions with <del>...</del>, and insertions with <ins>...</ins>. Like thsithis. While the edits in this case didn't seem of bad intent (i.e. to mislead others about the subsequent replies), it does they do seem somewhat sketchy. Henry TALK 14:35, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

Infobox

@Colonestarrice: Creating a new infobox template for a single article, and such a narrow subject at that, aren't you getting a little carried away with page creations? (and also somewhat pointless, should that page get merged... ) - wolf 20:05, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

1788 vs 1789

@Drdpw and SMP0328.: I'm sure you guys can work out which year the US gov't started up here of the talk page. - wolf 03:02, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

The year isn't necessary for that sentence, so we could just have no year in that sentence. Referring to the presidency's formation is enough. SMP0328. (talk) 03:38, 30 September 2018 (UTC)
Okay by me. Drdpw (talk) 04:31, 30 September 2018 (UTC)
Well done, guys. - wolf 09:13, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

Succession & disability section

Section 1 of the 25th amendment, should be mentioned before sections 3 & 4. GoodDay (talk) 19:32, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Done. SMP0328. (talk) 19:49, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Capitalization of "president" on various articles

This section is in reference to a wider conversation that applies to the 45 presidents, and related articles, not just this specific article. I'm choosing to host the conversation here so we can set the precedent for using the rule correctly before applying it to other articles.

According to AP style, the Chicago style used by Webster's, and dictionary.com, "president" should not be capitalized unless it comes before a specific president's name. Wikipedia is for the most part not currently following this rule, as almost every president's article reads like this: "Abraham Lincoln ... served as the 16th President of the United States". I don't see a grammatical rule that supports this; it seems to be done out of misunderstanding. This article, and the list of U.S. presidents, shouldn't have the phrase "president of the United States" capitalized either. It's my belief that they were capitalized by mistake when referencing government documents, which also capitalize personified words such as "People" and "Order" as in the preamble to the United States Constitution. This is done for the same reason that fairy tales capitalize "Nature" and "Time"—making proper nouns out of words to personify concepts, which don't affect the way grammar works when referring to these concepts in any other context.

An exception to this rule includes pages such as the Executive Office of the President of the United States, which actually is a proper noun because it refers to an agency, not a non-proper noun lower-case president. UpdateNerd (talk) 21:44, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@SMP0328, the Chicago style linked above includes the full phrasing, "president of the United States", which refers to the same thing. By what grammatical rule does it apply differently here? This article should read like a normal encyclopedia entry for international English readers, not a governing document for members of the U.S. government. UpdateNerd (talk) 01:29, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
It's a proper noun, as it is the name of the office. Proper nouns are capitalized. SMP0328. (talk) 01:53, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
SMP0328, I've made the same argument before, but that's not what the style guides say. How is the "office" you refer to a proper noun, when this is not a U.S. governing document, and therefore shouldn't seek to personify the general position? If you are correct, than there should be sources other than the current state of Wikipedia articles to back it up. UpdateNerd (talk) 02:06, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
"President of the United States" is the formal name of the office. The Constitution gave the office that name. Proper nouns are capitalized. I'm not saying it should be capitalized because of the Constitution, but because it is the name of a specific government office. How is it not a proper noun? SMP0328. (talk) 02:22, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
How is it one? The grammar style guides don't call it that. Since you say it's a proper noun because it's referring to the office (by which I assume you mean rank), could you come up with an example for that's not referring to the office? Since the style guides say not to capitalize it, and you're arguing for specific cases where it is proper to do so, you should be able to clarify both when the office is/isn't being referred to. UpdateNerd (talk) 05:17, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
I'm not talking about rank. It's a proper noun because it is the name of a specific office, as opposed to a group of presidents or the concept generally. Just like the difference between "king" and "King of England". SMP0328. (talk) 05:36, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
I don't think the king of England should be capitalized either unless referring to a specific person. Perhaps your argument applies to when referring to someone currently in office, but when referring to the office generally, I don’t see evidence of its being a proper noun. UpdateNerd (talk) 05:44, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
The MOS says different. SMP0328. (talk) 06:00, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
You have a point! In this case I think it's the external style guides that need to be updated, not the MoS. However, on individual president pages when it is stated "Abraham Lincoln ... served as the 16th President of the United States", I believe the MoS indicates it should be the lower case form, since Lincoln is the subject of the sentence, not the office of U.S. president. Thoughts? UpdateNerd (talk) 08:40, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
That's correct.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:02, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

Repeatedly, in the past, a consensus to change President of the United States & Vice President of the United States to the lowercase version in the bios, wasn't reached. GoodDay (talk) 19:15, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Nope. See this RfC, among previous RfCs. No magical exception has been made for – out of all job titles in the whole world – these two. It sometimes just takes time for WP:P&G changes to percolate down to every single article. The facts that some editors haven't absorbed the change and make arguments that don't take it into account, and a handful of editors who argued against what the guideline says actively try to defy it page-by-page, isn't evidence of lack of consensus; the first is just proof that WP isn't run by robots, and the second is evidence of a WP:Tendentious editing and WP:BATTLEGROUND problem.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:02, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 February 2019

PshycoWeiner (talk) 20:35, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 Not done Please state the change you require. RhinosF1(chat)(status)(contribs) 20:38, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Article is biased

This article is clearly edited primarily by left-leaning individuals because their biases are really leaking through. This article should paint a positive picture of U.S. presidents especially the current one, President Donald Trump. Why can’t this article mention his many accomplishments and how he is helping make this country great again. Have a nice day, Wikipedians. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1000:B12B:14DA:2C7F:3840:2A73:E1C5 (talk) 19:09, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:08, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Looks like nomination is an April fools joke. Rmhermen (talk) 17:12, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

nuclear arsenal

the article should not effectively state that the nuclear arsenal of the United States , which the President commands, was "the second largest". the actual number of stockpile is subject of debate and speculation, as it is almost certain that the official russian figures are inflated and incorrect. it is highly likely that the United States actually possesses the largest stockpile in total, while that cannot be verified due to the delicate nature of the subject and information status, the claim of "second largest" should definitely be removed. see for example. https://www.ridl.io/en/russias-tactical-nuclear-weapons-a-reality-check/ ... and more with respect to general bogus claims and russian official numbers and data also see:https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-05/data-manipulation-more-likely-russia-just-has-poor-statistics https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5738077/China-Russia-authoritarian-countries-fudge-GDP-figures.html https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/new-study-shines-light-literally-on-chinas-and-russias-fake-gdp-data/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.203.154.135 (talk) 17:51, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

Timeline

@Drdpw: What are your objections to refactoring the timeline? I feel that the EasyTimeline version is rather garish. -- Scott Burley (talk) 20:25, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

I’m not a fan of shaded boxes unless essential, the year divisions aren’t useful, and the names off to the side are disruptive rather than informative, and a sidebar showing presidents parties is redundant so close to the existing table of presidents and their political parties. The existing table could be refined, there was no need to replace it. I’m interested in what others think. Drdpw (talk) 00:33, 17 May 2019 (UTC)
I have introduced a reformatted graphical timeline. This version is more informative than the replacement, and hopefully less "garish" than the original. Cheers. Drdpw (talk) 19:46, 26 May 2019 (UTC)
Both versions are informative, and I prefer the sidebar style as of this revision. — JFG talk 20:26, 26 May 2019 (UTC)
Tend to agree. The format currently used in the article[2] is better suited to situations involving a lot of overlap, i.e. things happening concurrently. The U.S. has never had two presidents at the same time. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:21, 26 May 2019 (UTC)
While I prefer by far the more compact Graphical timeline style (template), the current EasyTimeline style is used for other political timelines, such as Prime Ministers of the UK. (this comment is mostly here to add some useful links) ―XyKyWyKy aka raffriff42 (talk) 15:06, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Incorrect statement in the Election section

"As prescribed by the Twelfth Amendment, each state is entitled to a number of electors equal to the size of its total delegation in both houses of Congress."

The allocation of electors was defined by Article II and wasn't altered by the Twelfth Amendment. This error was fixed on the Vice President article, and I recommend the same fix for this article. Namely, the sentence should read:

"Each state is entitled to a number of electors equal to the size of its total delegation in both houses of Congress." 107.77.221.6 (talk) 15:23, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

Corrected that sentence so it refers to the right Constitutional provision. SMP0328. (talk) 18:48, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

Capitalization of "president" in the first sentence

It's very clear that the MOS:JOBTITLES guideline specifies that the word "president" in the first sentence of the article should not be capitalized. For those unfamiliar with the guideline, the relevant parts are:

  • bullet 3 (the word "The" is a definite article)
  • table column 2 example 1. "Richard Nixon was the president of the United States." — not "Richard Nixon was the President of the United States."

The guideline was revised relatively recently, I think within the past year, that revision arising from community-level discussion and consensus. It was understood that the revision was contrary to a majority of existing usage, which had not received close scrutiny at community level. Nevertheless, however, there is some disagreement as to whether this article should comply with the guideline. Some editors comply with the community consensus they agree with and ignore the rest; i.e. community consensus means little or nothing to them. I disagree with that, not only because it would mean that the massive editor time spent in these discussions developing community consensus is wasted time. Further, for those interested in site-wide encyclopedic consistency, I ask which is more likely to produce that in the long term: A common target provided in the guideline, or editors independently doing whatever seems right to them?

I'm seeking a local consensus to comply with the community consensus. Comments? ―Mandruss ☎ 17:31, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

First, I have not been following the changes to that guideline. I took a wikibreak for large parts of last year due to uncivil conduct on the part of User:Arrivisto and User:Jooojay which has been discussed at length elsewhere. The fact that revision was contrary to a majority of existing usage speaks for itself as to why the revision should be rolled back as not actually reflecting community consensus.
Second, I don't see that guideline as applying to this article. When read in context, the guideline is clearly referring to the use of the title as an adjective, not as the subject of a sentence that is introducing the subject of an article. --Coolcaesar (talk) 17:50, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
So we're talking about two competing and conflicting types of community consensus. First, we have what I'd call "implicit" community consensus represented by what editors do in articles, even if they do it without any discussion at all (which is the case far more often than not). Then we have "explicit" community consensus resulting from thorough, evidence-based scrutiny at community level. I know which type makes more sense to me. Wikipedia is not a democracy and the first type mostly represents the equivalent of democratic voting.
There is no adjective, or even adjectival usage, in "Richard Nixon was the president of the United States." So I'm honestly at a loss to respond to that argument. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:02, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
In this situation, I think WP:BOLDTITLE has a say in the matter. GoodDay (talk) 18:37, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
In the first example there, the capitalization in the bolded text is inconsistent with that in the article title. So I'd say BOLDTITLE does not speak to capitalization. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:48, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
It appears quite odd to have in the intro - president of the United States, followed by POTOS. GoodDay (talk) 22:45, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
I can't imagine why, considering that "all-terrain vehicle" is abbreviated as "ATV", "automated teller machine" as "ATM", "chief executive officer" as "CEO", and "personal identification number" as "PIN", etc, etc. To my eye, it would appear quite odd to say that "I rode my atv to the atm, where I entered my pin to get some cash for the ceo" merely because those terms occur in lower case when spelled out. In any case perhaps we can agree that there are more important considerations than what appears odd to us. In fact that's kind of my whole point: For Wikipedia's first 16 or so years, this has been done solely based on what "appears correct" to individual editors, not on examination of authoritative sources such as widely-recognized style guides. Editors' thinking was as follows: "It's a title. Capitalize it." Turns out it's a little more complicated than that. I think it's time we raised the bar, don't you? ―Mandruss ☎ 23:35, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

The advice at MOS:JOBTITLES is pretty uniformly followed in WP, with a few president usages sticking out as sad counterexamples to consistency. It seems clear enough to me that we cap the unmodified title of high positions as it says there, but in more generic uses such as when preceded by "the" we don't. If people want to change that advice, shouldn't we be talking about it more generically, rather than just arguing to maintain this one exception in a few places? Dicklyon (talk) 20:09, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

@Dicklyon: A few randomly-chosen examples: Premier of the Soviet Union — President of India — Vice President of the United States — President of Ukraine. If this were a rare exception, you'd think I would have run across one lower-case example in the process of randomly choosing them. I don't think your line of argument is going to withstand scrutiny, and I much prefer mine. This was done without close scrutiny for many years, resulting in a massive amount of usage that ultimately failed close scrutiny. I don't know why anybody would consider that at all surprising—your average editor is not a language expert—and as far as I'm concerned it violates no sacred Wikipedia principle to work to fix the problem. We can't be expected to get all of these details right in the beginning, and widespread bad stuff cannot be protected merely because it's widespread. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:26, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
OK, presidents and premiers. Why not fix it by removing "The" and just write the opening about the title? Dicklyon (talk) 02:08, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Because the article is not about the title. ―Mandruss ☎ 07:18, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
FWIW, I believe we should follow the MOS, which has the benefit of deep scrutiny by the whole community. Habits can change. Newspapers in the U.S. used to Capitalize Every Damn Word in Any Headline (except "in", "the" and such, oddly), but today the trend in editorial style clearly favors capping only proper nouns, just like in regular prose. Likewise, the use of "the president" instead of "the President" only takes some getting-used-to. — JFG talk 12:31, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Related side note, I recently realized that some "the President"s had been decapped incorrectly, and I fixed that in the articles I had touched. ―Mandruss ☎ 16:11, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Earlier today I decapitalized the presidents of France and India. No pushback yet. Please do not misread as "decapitated", the French did that already. — JFG talk 23:24, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
I have a recollection that one of the "Nine rules of capital letters" (the answer to an 1890s school exam paper that circulates online) is something like "always capitalise 'President' and 'Presidency' when they related to the President of the United States of America". (It didn't clarify if this was a one country or a global rule and didn't stop to care about the Vice President.) Similar approaches with other country's leaders may have led to this particular one. Timrollpickering (Talk) 23:50, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

Why is it, then when an editor 'decapitalizes' here, they can't make the same effort at Vice President of the United States article. Is it SO DIFFICULT to have Prez & Vice Prez articles intros the same, concerning this matter? GoodDay (talk) 01:51, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

JFG has fixed it here and you have fixed it there. I'm not very optimistic about the chances of your edit holding, considering that your edit summary didn't link to the guideline let alone point out the specific relevant parts therein. Note that there is no community consensus that those two articles should be in agreement on this at all times, so "consistency with President of the United States" would be a far weaker edit summary. ―Mandruss ☎ 16:51, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
I just got around into looking up the history of this so-called "community consensus" you speak of. Nonsense. It was a series of unilateral edits to the MoS by User:SMcCandlish in June 2018 after premature closure of a RFC on one of the most important issues of English writing style. At a bare minimum, the RFC should have been circulated on the village pump to solicit additional comments several times over a number of weeks, and I see no sign of that. The largely anecdotal evidence presented by User:SMcCandlish of a purported trend towards lowercase was equally consistent with bad training or overwork on the part of the writers cited and was therefore unconvincing. Wikipedia core policies (WP:NOR, WP:V, WP:NOT) reflect a philosophy that Wikipedia follows, it never leads. It is inappropriate for an editor to attempt to unilaterally impose their novel views on the community and beg the question by referring to a nonexistent consensus. The logical result of adopting a bizarre capitalization style in the Manual of Style—one that does not reflect the style actually used in American English by most educated intellectuals—will be to alienate and drive away even more editors and lead to further deterioration of the English Wikipedia project. For example, Law of New York was vandalized last November, but the number of active lawyer editors on English Wikipedia is now so tiny that no one caught the vandalism for over nine months (until I noticed it a couple of days ago).
I note that User:SMcCandlish has elsewhere voiced disdain for certain traditions of American English. Too bad. There are other places for advocating change to American English, but Wikipedia is not one of them. Alienating Wikipedia users by trying to impose a nontraditional writing style is not a constructive contribution to the Wikipedia project. There's been a lot of news coverage over the past few years over how the English Wikipedia's active editor community is hemorrhaging editors like crazy, and this is definitely not helping.
Unfortunately, I'm far too busy this year working on class actions for the first time to initiate the necessary ArbCom proceeding to obtain appropriate remedies. But I will gladly support any editor who does so. I'm also going to cross-post this to the talk page for the relevant MoS section. --Coolcaesar (talk) 06:53, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
Please read WP:MULTI. Any discussion should be under the duplicate posting at WT:MOSBIO. ―Mandruss ☎ 11:50, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

Protect

I have noticed that there has been vandalism and undone edits recently. I was thinking that an extended confirmed protection might be needed to combat these problems. If an admin sees this, please let me know if this is a good or bad Idea. Thanks! --Wyatt2049 | (talk) 12:39, 17 August 2019 (UTC)

Doesn't it sound like a laudation?

"In contemporary times, the president is looked upon as one of the world's most powerful political figures as the leader of the only remaining global superpower.[11][12][13][14] The role includes responsibility for the world's most expensive military, which has the second largest nuclear arsenal. The president also leads the nation with the largest economy by nominal GDP. The president possesses significant domestic and international hard and soft power."

In my opinion there is no need to mention that the USA have the most expensive military and so on in an article about the office of the president. Agluszak (talk) 16:07, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

22nd Amendment

The article said that the 22nd Amendment says that if a person serves as president for more than two years of a term to which some other eligible person was elected president, then he can only be elected president once. But the text doesn't say that, nor does the text imply that the rule only applies if the original president was eligible to the office, so I have taken out the word "eligible", as it was inaccurate and original research. The inclusion of that word makes a real difference (but if you don't agree with me then it was a tautology). Suppose President A is elected, and after a year in office it emerged that he wasn't eligible after all -- say his birth certificate turns up and it proves he was under 35, or wasn't a natural born citizen. He resigns, and his Vice President serves the next three years as President B. The 22nd Amendment says President B can only be elected president once. But if you qualify the text by pretending it says that if you serve more than two years of a term to which another eligible person has been elected, then that would mean that since President A wasn't eligible, then President B can still be elected twice, and serve eleven years in total. That's clearly wrong, and illustrates the dangers of Wikipedia editors adding their own gloss to the constitutional text they are writing about. Richard75 (talk) 13:03, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Eligible, eligibility, reeligible are words used in the work cited; these words are used in various other scholarly articles on the 22nd Amendment. You present an interesting hypothetical here, an interesting, but extremely remote possibility. I have restored the word eligible. Drdpw (talk) 13:41, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
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