RZ14: Contrâ
RZ15: Për
RZ16: Për

GV, Fiova

Houston Chamber Choir (www.houstonchamberchoir.org) is taking a tour of two of the Baltic countries plus Sweden.

Of course, I will want a massive Euro-Talossan presence at our performances.  As we get closer, I will have a firm itinerary.

@Ián Anglatzara, that means you.  :-)

@luc-troubleshooting Where do I go to make Witt and Wiki backups?

Many thanks! - GV, Royal Archivist

@luc-troubleshooting Where do I go to make Witt and Wiki backups?

Many thanks! - GV, Royal Archivist

[WITHDRAWN]

WHEREAS Lex D.8.9 seals Cabinet discussions for seven years following the demise of the government of the time of said Cabinet,

WHEREAS Lex D.8.9 gives the responsibility of preservation of those records for seven years to the Royal Archivist,

WHEREAS a stopgap needs to be in place in case of something happening to the Royal Archivist before said records are released under Lex D.8.9,

THEREFORE, the Ziu adds the following to El Lex:

D.8.9.2 The Royal Archivist may designate the current Monarch of Talossa as a Cabinet Deputy to the Royal Archives who is tasked solely with also preserving Cabinet archives per D.8.9. [end new text of El Lex]

The current Lex D.8.9 shall be renumbered Lex D.8.9.1

[end of proposed and withdrawn bill text]

GV, Senator, Fiova on behalf of the Royal Archives

Haha, Glüc...  Beat ya to it!

60RZ3 Contrâ
60RZ4 Contrâ
60RZ5 Contrâ
60RZ6 Për
60RZ7 Për
60RZ8 Për
60RZ9 an enthusiastic Për - long may Txec reign
60RZ10 Për
60RZ11 Për
60RZ12 Për - Duce!!
60RZ13 Për

- GV, Fiova

Since we've no Mencei just yet...

Për to both bills - GV, Fiova

If I remember rightly, Mencei should or must be from an opposition party.  Who wants to stick their hand up this time 'round?

GV, Fiova
Dean of the Senäts

I was unopposed this time.  Many thanks to all for your continued confidence!

- GV, Senator

First of all, my life outside of Talossa has been incredibly hectic in the past year, owing mainly to helping in taking care of my father, whom our family and with his voluntary blessing put into assisted living at least on 19 May of this year.  He is doing very well there, and I've moved into a friend's guest-room for six months to a year.

Hence the reason why today almost passed me by.

"A Nation Sundered" describes Mad King Ben in March 2004 accusing another Talossan citizen, Kane Cavier, of domestic violence, a charge I continue to believe to be utterly false, even if his long-ago record of petty crime to that point might give a different impression cosmetically.  I still believe Kane.

Ben by doing this wanted Kane out of Talossa, and he figured things would get so hot for Kane he would flee the country and the greater Talossan nation altogether.

Ben did succeed in driving Kane out of the country, but ten of us and more soon thereafter went with him to form the 2004-2012 Republic of Talossa.

Unfortunately, mistakes were made.  We never should have kicked everyone but us off of Wittenberg X.  Only Ben and Queen Amy needed to have been tossed out.  Had we done things that way, I think we would have gotten far more sympathy from far more people, but at this time, no-one was thinking with a clear head.

Moreover, talossa.com was in the hands of "one of us" and was redirected from the kingdom and to the Republic's new webspace. This should have been done with far more sensitivity, to be sure.  It is late, and I do not have the time to fully discuss that point other than to say we should have done something different with talossa.com

Both these mistakes affected innocent people, and for those mistakes, we have continually been sorry they occurred.

The colossal edifice of the history of the Republic vs. King John and so much else will be best told by others.  Moreover, even the Republic itself was anticlimactic.  When Ben falsely accused Kane of domestic violence online in a public forum, the situation became fully untenable, and "old Talossa" was irreparably damaged.

The healing of Talossa began on 1 June 2004, and it continues today.  In fits and starts, perhaps, but since Ben left, no Talossan has appeared with the same level of vindictive spite Ben Madison had toward those he didn't care for, even with his many, many good qualities both as a Talossan and as a person outside Talossa.

The 2004-2012 Republic of Talossa is a cautionary tale that ended miraculously with Reunision on 20 April 2012.  I still find it unbelievable so many of us "down south" came to the Kingdom who had never been in the kingdom before, and in my mind, Reunision was a nigh-on complete success.

May Talossa live on, and may it continue to be free, fun, and fair. - GV

Starting the thread immediately lest I forget to vote later on...

Për on the bill in question - GV, Fiova

Për to all bills - GV, Fiova

https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/legacyremembers/florence-yarney-obituary?id=35192717

Florence was a giant of Talossan history, serving as king from 1987-1988 when she abdicated in favor of Ben Madison, who was king again until August 2005.

She actually died in 2022, but when I got a death-anniversary reminder for John Eiffler, I thought to see if anyone else had passed away.  The one I could find is Florence, and the photo in the above obituary matches that I remember from seeing her in Ben's Talossan videos at Ben's coronation in 1988.

From that video and from all accounts, she seemed exactly as the obituary says she was: possessed of a keen and flamboyant style of teaching and much-beloved by all who knew her.

RIP, Florence.  I wish all of us in Talossa (including I) could have known you.

- GV

Talossa is worth fighting for, even as inactive as I am.

In a world that grows darker by the day, there has never been a greater need for an outlet of absurdity and fun.  At its best, this is Talossa. 

May she endure another forty-four years and far beyond... - GV

Not sure if I can legally get our voting going this way, but anyway...

RZ1 Për

GV, Fiova

Do I need to preside over the vote for Mencei or do something else?  Someone advise, plz.

Only now do I bother to open Witt2.7z that exists at www.libraryoftalossa.com and unzip the file.

Alexandreu Davinescu did the archive for us about 1.5 years ago, he has reminded me to see if everything on it works on my end, and in typical GV Talossan fashion, I promptly forgot about it, my Intel Mac Mini at the time not having enough horsepower to really work with the gigantic archive (at least 3+ GB - slowly uploading to iCloud).

The archive seems to be working unbelievably well and as AD intended all that time ago.

It is no secret during the days of the 2004-2012 Republic of Talossa, there was no-one 'down south' more monarchist and pro-reunification than I.  Even today as much as I dislike the way John has never held any real affection for Talossan 'liberals', I too cannot help but remember the times when his leadership has been critical to Talossa's continued existence: spring-summer 2005, the potential PR crisis resulting from the actions of I. Canun, and Ben Madison's snuffed-out attempt at making a Talossan comeback.

And from everything I've ever seen, heard, or read, John outside of this community is a stellar individual.  Often, I have wished I had known him outside Talossa.

John genuinely pines for 2005-2011 Talossa: the pomp, the ceremony, and the brilliant cultural renaissance the Kingdom went through after Ben's exit.  While we down south were wallowing in the real grief Ben caused so many, the Kingdom was having genuine fun for the first time since 1996 when Cybercit Talossa was still new and the people who would be such an abrasion for Ben Madison had not yet come on the scene.

And I think I can speak safely for him in saying the fact we in the 2004-2012 Republic did not return on 15 August 2005 is beyond the scope of logic or common sense.  Moreover, his abiding devotion to law and order could not fathom the inorganicity of the Republic.  He's not wrong.

I've said this before, and I will say it again: monarchial reform is not the root of the issue.  The root of the issue began on 1 June 2004 when Ben Madison began fostering and encouraging a societal culture in the Kingdom that discouraged any 'slack' given to the 'traitors'.  The fact we wrongly commandeered Wittenberg and talossa.com blinded the vast majority of the Kingdom who rightly reeled at those two actions without remembering the real-life provocation: Ben Madison falsely accusing fellow citizen Kane dal Nava of domestic violence in order to drive him out of the country.

Everything that came after Ben began this vendetta is ancillary - even the Republic itself.  Everything in Talossan history since is rooted in this moment: When Ben Madison began falsely accusing - on Wittenberg - in public - Kane Gruber of domestic violence, he broke Talossa.  Reunision aside, this Breaking of Talossa is still with us.

In spring 2005, John and Fritz (of blessed memory) began to see Ben's vindictiveness for the farce it really was.  That summer, they began calling Ben out in public, and made things so hot for Ben, the Mad King Ben did something very unexpected: he took his toys and left.

I cannot imagine John or anyone else would have been brilliant enough to know how to drive Ben off, and frankly, I never saw anyone in the Kingdom at that time call for Ben's expulsion, as we in the Republic so wanted to have happen.  Had Ben simply let the matter with Kane be and allowed the Talossan language to go out into the world, he would still be king and the Republic might have died of stagnation by now.

Ben's charisma and spin-mastery might have even driven John away, too, but too little did Mad King Ben reckon with 'Diplomacy John' who had something Ben lacked: a lack of vindictiveness.  That lack of vindictiveness on John's part gave him a clear head to fight whatever battles with Ben he cared to fight - and probably win! 

Could it be, then, Talossa has only ever been a game of Diplomacy for King John of Talossa?  In part, it would seem that is the case, but I think John is too much of a person for me to accurately paint him with such a narrow brush.

Clearly however, when Ben left the Kingdom, John saw an opportunity to remake Talossa in his own image.  Doubtless, he and others traded many emails and pints.  When the Conservative Loyalist Party saw its own raison d'etre go the way of Ben's reign, it folded, leaving a power vacuum.

Enter the RUMP. 

Clearly, John and company had been busy, and in retrospect, it can be well argued placing John on the Throne and keeping him there was their goal.

However, John also saw the clear anti-monarchist sentiment in the Republic.  I believe he felt this was a direct threat to the way he wanted to do Talossa (he was right), and he saw to it he was as aloof with the Republic as much as humanly possible.  The last thing John wanted was Kingdom affection for We Who Left.

And to be fair, We Who Left had no desire to make a return any time soon.  The mantra of 'Betrayed, Stolen, Kept' was true (at least in the last two instances), but was designed to throw off the Kingdom public on the possibility of saying, "Yeah, what they did was bad.  But what Ben did was way worse.  We want them home.".

By April 2005, the Republic had enshrined and ratified its Constitution - the result of months of blood, sweat, and tears.  Governance and governance done well was everything to us.  Moreover, Ben Madison had burned us utterly on the concept of Talossan monarchy, an institution we all saw as inherently corrupt.

I believe John knew all of this and wanted to keep us at-bay and out of the Kingdom.  This is why my pleas to him and Hooligan (Hooligan mostly) in the 2005-2008 period to genuinely reach out to us resulted only in crickets.

And to be fair, when A. Davinescu tried to get a Republic Wittenberg account in 2008, he was duly - and wrongly - rebuffed.  We saw him from the off as an intelligent and enthusiastic Talossan who rightly saw John as his key to Talossan power and influence.  John found in AD a willing and effective frontman, and a symbiosis was born.

I will always regret the complicit, though small, part I played in AD's not getting on our forum.  How much of an effect it had on pan-Talossan relations only he knows.

And to be fair, I've personally always gotten along very well with AD.  Even if after Reunision, the former Republicans should have insisted on a greater level of input with El Lex, the fact El Lex exists is due to AD's work - a project that was long overdue.  His work on the recent Living Cosa is a thing of beauty and a consummate example of how to run such a proceeding.  AD's dedication to Talossa is beyond dispute.  It's only with his treatment of the 'down south' culture and people that I take issue.

All of this has a point: in 2005, we didn't return to the Kingdom for one reason only: rightly or wrongly and even if we immediately 'returned' talossa.com and Wittenberg X, we felt we would have entered/returned-to a kingdom-community that hated us and would behind closed doors continue to hate us.  Who wants to be a part of a group that dislikes them?

Thus, the 2004-2012 Republic did not end until 20 April 2012, and at least de jure, Reunision was the last bit of business regarding the legacy of Ben Madison.  The return of Kane Gruber to the Kingdom of Talossa was a right slap in the face of Mad King Ben and was a true miracle.

That miracle was facilitated in part by John, though I'm quite sure it was as much for pragmatic reasons as anything else.  By the time Miestrâ initiated everything (because John and the RUMP never would have) in December 2011, the great momentum in the Kingdom surrounding John's accession was long over and both Kingdom and Republic were stagnant.  They needed each other, and to be frank, the Republic was on its last legs, anyway.  Something had to give.

Fast forward to August 2020.  The ratification via referendum of 54RZ28 (no more hereditary monarchy) had to have ticked off King John to no end.  Yes, he may have been real-life working non-stop, but to be completely incommunicado for two months thereafter and knowing his skills at organization, nothing else can explain his complete absence than that he was having a temper-tantrum.

Finally in October, I gave him a phone call which was clearly not wanted - lol!  "Are you well, John?"  "Yes, I'm well.", he replied.  This phone call of mine was a sincere welfare-check, but I think the last thing he wanted was for GV phoning him and finding him healthy and sullen.

Soon thereafter, he does the one thing he can think of that would piss off the Talossan left more than anything else he could or would do: appoint Alexandreu Davinescu as Regent.  AD was perfectly competent in the role, but when John finally came back a few months later, he made AD a peer for doing the sort of work with the level of competence most anyone in Talossa could have accomplished.

That and his veto of multiple attempts at reforming the way monarchs in Talossa are chosen clearly points to someone not recognizing the clear will of the people through their legislature, but rather an individual keen on preserving his exalted position.

In the end, however, with me, it goes deeper than vetoed legislation, proclamation crises, or ill-awarded baronies.

John has had nigh-on-eighteen years to truly reach out in genuine fraternity and friendship to the Talossan Left.  A single Wittenberg post from him made on our forum back in 2005-2006 could have derailed the Talossan Cold War right then and there.

John knew this.  Yet time and time again, he made the decision the way he wanted to do Talossa was more important than mending fences and offering a bit of slack and grace to We Who Provoked and Commandeered Wittenberg X.

For to offer that slack and grace would in Talossa destroy him politically, and his politics in Talossa matters more than friendship.  For he is a political king.

Thus, this king has to be put into retirement, and with much personal regret, I associate myself with the Free Democrats' wish to see him democratically dethroned within all bounds of propriety, decency, and Talossan law. 

He has had long enough to come 'round.

I will bring up to the Free Democrats of Talossa a proposal whereby this dethrone can be facilitated in a full-blown democratic referendum, the result of which to which I will gladly abide. 

And I pray I am wrong on all of this. 

Believe it or not, John and Hooligan, I *want* to be wrong.

GV, Senator from Fiova

RZ24: Contrâ
RZ25: Për
RZ26: Për
RZ27: Për

GV, Fiova
57c6 Nov. 2022

...and Elizabeth I of Scotland, as many Scots will readily point out.

I speak only for myself, but I know I echo the sentiments of everyone in Talossa in thanking all that is good, right, and holy for her long life and brilliant reign.  I'm sorry she did not surpass the Sun King in terms of length, but she seems to me to have been a far better monarch.

May Charles at least come somewhat close to that example - an example for all heads of state and all those in leadership in our world.

When one said, 'the Queen', everyone knew who they meant.

GV, Senator for Fiova