From your own link, this was the previous proposal:

> Visitors entering the country under the Visa Waiver Program, which allows citizens of some countries to visit up to 90 days without a visa, would not be required to list their social media accounts, and the forms would not ask for passwords.

> The department said that while it does not consistently examine social media accounts of applicants for visas or immigration, it has a list of nearly three dozen situations in which social media can be examined to screen applicants.

They say they didn't ask for passwords, which is the main objection, and also said it was optional (see also the same thing in this very article). How does it make sense to call it the same idea?

That wasn't the same idea; the bill in Congress, which also came from the time of the previous administration, was.

Except this is the trap.

Most people involved in federal agencies don't get purged and replaced at every election; they have long careers in their chosen agency, regardless of who's in the White House. So it's easy to find someone who's been there through a few administrations and say "this guy has consistently proposed this idea under multiple administrations", but present it as "this idea dates to the administration I want to falsely paint as identical to another one".

The related trick is the West Wing bit with the reporter who keeps asking the press secretary to give an answer on whether the President has considered calling a lame-duck session of Congress: the reporter knows, and the press secretary knows, that if she asks the President whether it's been considered then it'll be true that the topic came up in a discussion the President was part of, and the reporter will be able to spin that to claim "PRESIDENT CONSIDERING LAME-DUCK SESSION" without an outright lie being involved.

So the emphasis is specifically on the word time, rather than administration?

On both, actually - to show that it isn't an idea emanating for the aforementioned insane cheetoh.

I have to say that makes no sense to me: it's his administration, and therefore his (administration's) responsibility. Could it be that it's a distinction without a difference: after all, people are opposing it because they think it is a bad idea, not because it came from him. If so, what exactly is your point? I don't understand.

(I wish you wouldn't call him names, it's a little uncivil.)

Generally it's best to read the post being replied to if you want to make sense of a reply.

stuckagain wrote (above) that "Now we have insane cheetoh in office and we're getting insane cheetoh policy ideas", I was pointing out that while he may support it, this idea didn't came from the current POTUS, there was even a bill proposal during the previous administration.

Isn't that a kind of a narrow observation? I don't think the main objection to it that he came up with it, surely? Indeed that post didn't criticize the idea just because it came from him, it claimed that the idea was bad much like all the other things he believes. I think you misread that post completely.