> To me am opinion is a belief you have that's not based on facts.

> Why do you want your government to have a belief not based on facts?

There's some kind of fallacy at work here, you're establishing what your personal definition of something is then arguing with OP while taking your personal belief as fact.

"Opinions are not based on facts" definitely isn't a universally accepted definition of an opinion. An opinion doesn't have to be based on facts but it's not precluded from it.

An opinion is a belief which is not itself objectively factual. Factual information can certainly be a basis for them. If we go back the advertising example, we could take two objective facts about advertising:

* online advertising allows consumers to learn about new products and services

* advertising incentivizes user data collection in order that it may be more effective.

From just these two facts one could easily come to a pro- or anti-advertising position based on their values and the relative weights they choose to put on each fact.