New year, new word suggestion. Without further ado:

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Talossan word: grefierïă
English translation: scribery
Part of speech: Noun (feminine)
Context (e.g. citations for use, word origin, etc.): Chancellor --> Cantzeleir, Chancery --> Cantzelerïa, Scribe --> Grefieir, Scribery --> Grefierïa

Quote from: Sir Alexandreu Davinescu on January 03, 2021, 11:27:57 PM
Nothing to fix at all, then!

Think about what I said. I want to hear your opinion on it.

Just for the record:

My ideal Real Cosa would have 20* seats, with ten of them being constituency seats and the other ten being list seats. Each province would correspond to one constituency seat, except Benito and Florencia which would correspond to two each instead due to their population size.

20* seats specifically because it would be conveniently exactly a tenth of the status quo, and youd roughly need 3 votes to get a shot at a list seat which IMO is reasonable. Its not very hard to get 1 or 2 people besides yourself to vote for your one man party, in fact, small parties surpass this hurdle all the time. The asterisks here are supposed to mean that 20 should be understood as the minimum number. Overhang and levelling seats are regular occurances, so wed have to be ready to have Cosas with more than 20 seats pretty often.

The 10-10 split instead of the perhaps less convoluted 8-12 split is me copypasting the German system pretty much: here, the split is half-half as well so it just makes the most sense to me.

I should mention that this idea is somewhat of a pet project of mine, together with dals cosăs glheþeascăs. Ive been thinking about a possible MMP Real Cosa for a while so Ive had the time to consider all possible edge cases (I didnt elaborate on them at all here because itd be a long, technical rundown of what could happen and how to resolve possible issues and typing essays on my phone in the middle of the night isnt my forte), but I had shelved the whole thing until now because I wasnt sure if Talossa right now would be active enough to fill a 20*-seat assembly at all without repeats (plus maybe keeping the Senäts, I dont care if the Ziu was unicameral under this arrangement or not). Im still not sure if activity levels are high enough but I wasnt the first one to bring this up again and I just couldnt stay silent about this. I hope thats okay with everyone.

Quote from: Açafat del Val on January 03, 2021, 02:18:55 PM
MMP requires constituencies. That's the whole point of "mixed-member" in "mixed-member proportional".

You might not know this, but I live in Germany, so I already knew beforehand how the voting system here works, thanks. I even learnt that in school and everything. My point was that MMP wasnt necessary to shrink the Cosa. Speaking of which:

QuoteIf we had a closed-list proportional system but only 15 seats, like is being suggested, then we run into the problem that was already pointed out: small parties get shut out. By creating constituencies we ensure the possibility that smaller parties still get a fair crack at gaining seats.

Speaking from personal experience (since again I witness the effects of MMP at least a few times per year), it is MUCH more difficult for small parties to win constituency seats than list seats, its FPTP. You can look up maps of constituency seat winners and youll see instantly that the big parties will win way more than their fair share every time. It only works as you intended if small parties are big on local levels, but looking at election results in Talossa, this doesnt seem to be the case.

QuoteI would never want to see Talossa become a nation of two parties. We're already almost there. We should do every effort to make the Cosa accessible, so that "everyday citizens" can enjoy a meaningful role in the lawmaking process.

...proportional systems do not lead to two-party systems, unless the number of seats was somewhere in the lower single digits. Thankfully no one is arguing for that.

QuoteI am basically articulating that the status quo should remain, or we go all in for a unicameral Ziu with 15-20 seats using MMP. Everything else feels like a broken half-measure compromise that creates more problems than solves.

Since you seem to think having more voters than Cosa seats is generally a bad idea, at the VERY least we could make the two numbers the same instead? Its not my first choice, having one seat per MC and local representation in the Cosa is a much more fun (there I said it) and realistic (there I said it again) system in my opinion, but hey, having one voter = one seat would still almost halve the number of seats in the Cosa, *and* the result would always be truly perfectly proportional since you wont have any rounding errors!

Quote from: Açafat del Val on January 02, 2021, 02:32:37 PM
On the other hand, if we reduce the Cosa seats to 15, then we should just commit fully to the idea: one member, one seat. To make that work, though, we would have to abandon the perfectly proportional seat allocation that we have now and replace it with electoral districts. Is Talossa ready for that? And wouldn't that conflict too much with provincial Senators? We could try the mixed-member proportional (MMP) system that the German Bundestag and, poignantly, the New Zealand House of Representatives use, but how much of these new constituencies would overlap fairly or unfairly with the provinces? Imagine a scenario where Talossa all but implodes on itself because the new constituencies gave some (un)fair advantage to a particular political party.

This is a strange leap in logic. Why would reducing the number of Cosa seats from 200 to 15 necessitate any kind of districting system at all? Nothing would stop us from continuing to use closed list proportional voting.

Besides, if we were to adopt MMP, proportionality would be unaffected; thats the point of MMP after all (at least the German kind, the Kiwis havent adopted levelling seats yet...).

Quote from: Açafat del Val on January 02, 2021, 02:38:52 PM
Sorry that I am responding so late.

To give hope to all those skeptics out there, I wanted to share an idea. We could amend the Organic Law such that Talossa remains a kingdom nominally, but the throne is permanently vacated and its functions exercised by a Regent / Consul / First Citizen / whatever title we want who just so happens to be elected nationally every 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 years.

Something like...

Quote
1. The nation of Talossa is a Kingdom.
2. The King of Talossa does [insert functions here].
3. The Throne of the King of Talossa is permanently vacant.
4. While the Throne may be vacant, its Powers and Duties shall be exercised pro tempore by a Regent.
5. The Regent of Talossa shall be elected nationally by all citizens for a term of two years.
6. No person shall be elected consecutively as the Regent of Talossa.

Win-win scenario for everyone. We stay a Kingdom on paper while in practice we have an elected head of state.

This seems to be identical to Eðo's proposal. Leaving the Thone permanently empty is a cop-out (see page one of this thread).

Quote from: Txosuè Éiric Rôibeardescù on December 20, 2020, 07:31:35 PM
And your saying that goodness can only come from elected officials? Ever heard of the USA, land of the free, home of the brave? Ever heard of Donald trump who has presideded over the worse Pandemic in modern times and has killed thousands upon thousands. Nixon was corrupt and rasict and put in place mass incarceration of people of colour, hoover presided over the wall Street crash, James Buchanan basically started the civil war. And that's just the USA. Need I go on?


You cannot claim that elected heads of state are inherently more vertious when history is littered with horrendous ones

Democracy really is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried, isnt it? Obviously no system is absolutely fool- or tyrant-proof, and you'll never be able to guarantee that only virtuous people will get into office no matter which system you use,

but,

could you imagine what wouldve happened if any of these people you listed had been monarchs for life instead? Four years under a horrible president are, well, horrible, but infinitely better than decades upon decades under a horrible monarch.

Quote from: Eðo Grischun on November 30, 2020, 08:02:44 PM
However, at the same time, swearing fealty to a Monarch or a Royal Family is falling out of fashion.  A perpetually empty throne would allow for the symbolic/ historical/ traditional while having the Head of State be a Steward of the Throne rather than be an actual Monarch eliminates the requirement for Talossan citizens to swear fealty and oaths of allegiance to some person; instead making those oaths to the symbols of Talossa and its laws.  That's my thinking on the issue anyway.

I believe this is a false dichotomy. Nothing prevents us from having a Monarch and also redirecting oaths towards the State. I know you know this because you advocate for an empty throne -- de jure keeping the Monarchy -- and redirecting oaths towards the State, so we're in agreement!

QuoteOn top of all that we also need to consider the powers of the Head of State.  Do we still think it is right for an unelected Monarch or Regent to be wielding a legislative veto or to even be wading around in the Hopper?

Of course, if the Monarch was elected and term-limited they wouldnt be unelected anymore, so that point would be moot immediately.

QuoteI think I understand the question you are asking.  You are seeing this is a simple choice between Monarchy vs Republic, or King vs President, right?  My position is more nuanced than that.  I'm saying keep Talossa as a Kingdom with all its traditions and ceremony and whatnot, but go for a permanent interregnum.  Then use popular election as the method of selecting who acts in tutelam over the Throne, and that person being "first among equals" meaning we don't swear allegiance to that person, rather that person swears allegiance to protect the nation, its symbols and laws, and its peoples. 

Also, by having the position be an electable one we cool down the hotness of the Head of State playing around with a veto.

This too would be moot immediately if the King was elected and term-limited. I think the main thing you and I disagree on is what to call the future elected Head of State. While you want them to be the Steward watching over a perpetually empty Throne, I think that new Head of State should still be called the King. Elective monarchies are nothing new, in fact Talossa has always been one de facto, the only change that I am proposing is limiting how long the King can reign thus forcing them to abdicate once their time is up, which as far as I can see would already solve most if not all the problems that Republicans have with the current Status Quo. Let me know if I missed something.

What's the point of keeping the Throne around if it's supposed to stay empty for all eternity? If Talossa does want an elected Head of State, either be thorough and abolish the Throne (either with or without replacement; Botswana does fine with combining the posts of President and Prime Minister into one  thing), or turn Kingship into the elected office in question.

Impose a term length on the King, like 5 Cosa terms or so, and limit consecutive terms to 2 or 3.

I have no preference for the voting method, as long as its not one round of FPTP of course.

Quote from: Eiric S. Bornatfiglheu on November 08, 2020, 04:07:02 PM
Though would it encourage you to team up with an author who would write the English language version and you provide the translation?

I've translated articles for free in the past (see: Zoneu Auþorisat), I'm always happy to assist.

Quote from: Eiric S. Bornatfiglheu on November 02, 2020, 08:38:58 AM
It is not the government's intention in this case to set up a competing magazine.  In fact, the honoraria money is intended to commission Talossan language articles (with translations) for La S'chinteia.  My assumption here in these honoraria is that "if you won't do it for love, will you do it for lucre?"

I would already be doing that for free if I knew how to write articles, but I dont, so I dont. Money wouldnt change that.

Quote from: Iac Marscheir on October 28, 2020, 11:26:12 AM
Voice or video chats on the Discord server, and someone makes a screen recording on their computer.

Alright, so we have a "what" and "how", whats missing is the "when", and maybe the "who".

Quote from: Dr. Txec Róibeard dal Nordselvă, Esq., O.SPM, SMM on October 29, 2020, 11:42:53 AM
This was very informative. Are there other documents out there that are similar that would help people beside just the rexhaint?

Not yet. If you can think of certain words or phrases that you want translated, I can produce another such document for you.

So, how would we go about this? Any concrete plans or suggestions?

Quote from: Miestră Schivă, UrN on October 24, 2020, 06:42:48 PM
Let me be clear: I might consider being elected Head of State, but not if it comes with the title of "King". I'm allergic to that. "Regent" I could just about handle.

(Talossan conservatives suddenly switch to insisting we keep the title "King" to keep me out of it :D )

You'd seriously pass up the opportunity to become the second female King in Talossan history? Who knows, maybe you'd also get a province named after yourself eight years later! It'd also be a fitting end to the Republic arc, imho.