We don't have a GSU, so I guess I'll do the assembly call.  Claim your seat in our provincial assembly by posting here.

I'm a little early by TST, but I wanted to be sure to wish everyone in our beloved kingdom a Happy New Year! May our nation live to see a thousand more!

I've been doing periodic "arms in action" posts about heraldry in different spots, but just wanted to check: are these actually useful and interesting to people?  They're fun, and I'll still do them, but thought it was worth a check on whether or not they were engaging to other folks.

If so, anything in particular you're curious about?

@GV , it's been about a year and a half since I put together an archive of old Witt for you, as you wanted.  Please open it and make sure it actually worked and confirm that you can navigate it.

I wouldn't ordinarily bring this up in an unrelated thread, but I've been asking in this thread for a year and a half for you to please do this: https://wittenberg.talossa.com/index.php?topic=731.30  I've tagged you and PMed you over and over, but maybe something's wrong with your account.  Hopefully this will work.

Please take the time to check if the archive worked.

Estimat MCs:

I'm just going to take the bull by the horns and start planning the Living Cosa now, since it's in a little over a week.  Please chime in on any of these points if you have a comment, criticism, or suggestion.  Our primary goals are: practicality, pomposity, and precedent.  We need to be practical in putting together an event for dozens of people, thinking about the logistics and what's likely to happen (including my own possible absence).  We need to be pompous and a bit silly, since that's fun (and inevitable anyway).  And we need to respect the fact that we're establishing precedent here (not the first LC, but the first in a generation).

I intend to set some basic ground rules and expectations for behavior during the LC, but we should expect that things will probably arise that we didn't plan on, and so decisions will need to be made on the fly.  Those decisions might not be perfect, but they do need to be in service to our primary goals and made in good faith.

Planned Agenda
I. Chair formally opens the Living Cosa and reviews rules very briefly.

II. Appointment by the chair of a Doorkeeper and Sergeant at Arms, to which the power to maintain order is delegated as necessary.

III. Appointment by the chair of a Chaplain, who will be invited to give an invocation (non-religious).

IV. Apologies.

V. Invitation by the chair to the Seneschal to address the assembled Ziu.

VI. Invitation by the chair to the Leader of the Opposition to address the assembled Ziu.

VII. Terpelaziuns

VIII. Clark Business.
    A. Reading by the chair of the current votes on the submitted bills, followed by voting on the bills.  Each bill is handled individually.
    C. Reading by the chair of the current confidence votes.
    D. Voting on confidence.

iX. Adjournment.


Rules
Rules are drawn from standard rules of order for organizations.

Any MZ may make a motion during an appropriate time by asking to be recognized by the chair.  Once the motion is stated, the chair will ask for a mick.  If there is a mick, then the chair will restate the motion and debate will begin.  Debate will continue until there are no more speakers who wish to be heard.  Debate can be ended by a motion to consider the previous question, if micked and affirmed by a majority of MZs.

The Clarked bills may not be tabled, sent to committee, or amended.

There is only one privileged motion.  At any time after a ruling of the chair, an MZ may move to overrule the chair.

At any point, an MZ may raise any of the following:

• Point of Order: Draws attention to a breach of rules, improper procedure, breaching of established practices, or so on.
• Point of Information: A member may need to bring up an additional point or additional information so that the other members can make fully informed votes.
• Point of Inquiry: A member may use a point of inquiry to ask for clarification on a matter of fact to make better voting decisions.
• Point of Personal Privilege: A member may use point of personal privilege to address issues pertaining to the comfort of the meeting, such as volume, muting, connection quality, or so on. Members may also use it to address the accuracy of published reports or the accuracy of a member's conduct.

These points may not be abused for personal commentary, debate outside of the established order, or other conduct not becoming a member of the Ziu.  The chair may decline to recognize a member in such circumstances.

All rules for terpelaziuns will be scrupulously followed, but members are warned that officials of the Government are not required to be present at the Living Cosa and will not be expected in case of their attendance to have every fact on hand.  Terpelaziuns which pertain to specific data or questions of fact should be lodged with the official in question through the normal procedure prior to the Living Cosa, so that the official may make inquiries.  The terpelaziun period shall be cordial and orderly.

This is apropos of nothing, but I just thought it was worth saying that I really appreciate the job you're doing, @Dr. Txec dal Nordselvă, GST .  Being SoS is a hard job, and you do it without complaint and consistently well.  Your errors are few and far between, and you work hard to fix them when they come.  It's one of the hardest jobs in the country, and typically thankless work, so: thank you, Txec!

WHEREAS the monarchy is a good thing for Talossa, and the Talossan people have repeatedly affirmed that they want to maintain a strong, stable, and active monarchy, yet only the people should be the ultimate arbiters of power, through their democratic assent, and

WHEREAS this issue has consumed Talossans for years, often causing bitter rifts and exhausted partisans, and neither the restoration of the hereditary monarchy nor a regularly-elected president has the support of a majority of the people, and a middle path which embraces the virtues of both traditions might be the way to go,

THEREFORE Article II, Section 3 of the Organic Law, which currently reads

QuoteThe King of Talossa is King John I, until his demise, abdication, or removal from the throne. Should the King at any time renounce or lose his citizenship, that renunciation or loss shall be deemed to imply his abdication of the Throne. Upon the demise, abdication, or removal from the Throne of the King, the Uppermost Cort shall be a Council of Regency.

shall be amended to read

QuoteThe King of Talossa is King John I, until his demise, abdication, or removal from the throne. Should the King at any time renounce or lose his citizenship, that renunciation or loss shall be deemed to imply his abdication of the Throne.

FURTHERMORE, new sections 5 and 6 shall be added to Article II, with succeeding sections renumbered accordingly.  The new section 5 shall read

QuoteWith the advice of the Sabor, the King may select any Talossan citizen of his choice, and submit them to the people by referendum for confirmation as crown prince or crown princess.  Should this referendum succeed, the confirmed crown prince or crown princess shall be the heir apparent to the throne.  Upon the serving King's demise, abdication, or removal from the throne, the crown prince or princess shall be promptly crowned as the new King by the serving Seneschal.

The new section 6 shall read

QuoteIf the confirmation referendum described in section 5 should fail to achieve a majority any three times, or upon the demise, abdication, or removal from the throne of the serving king at a time when there is no confirmed crown prince or crown princess, then a nationwide election shall be conducted by the Secretary of State.  Any Talossan citizen may be nominated by another citizen as a potential crown prince or princess during a period of one month, after which any citizens who accept their nomination shall be submitted to the people in an open election conducted by Instant Runoff Voting. In case of a tie between two or more candidates, the Chief Judge of the Cort pü Inalt shall break the tie.

Uréu q'estadra så:
Alexandreu Davinescu (MC-TNC)

WHEREAS we want a website and we need to pay for it regularly and don't want to mess around with that,

THEREFORE the Ziu hereby authorizes the annual and ongoing expenditure of <INSERT AMOUNT HERE> by the Burgermeister of Internal Revenue for the specific and sole purpose of paying for the annual domain name registrations of <INSERT DOMAINS HERE> and for such associated webhosting services as selected by the Seneschal or their designated representative.  All payments made under direction of this authority should be reported as according to normal procedure by the Burgermeister.

I fed the Midjourney art AI the simple prompt "Talossa," and this is the best of what I got:





If you've never heard of these sorts of things (DALL-E is the most famous), it uses artificial intelligence to sample millions of existing artwork and associated keywords to create new algorithmically generated art.  How did it decide this is what "Talossa" should look like?  No idea.

"Patriotic Talossan poster in vintage style" didn't return much interesting, illustrate the limitations of the technology -- this is a good sample of what it created.  Not enough reference in its dataset for the mystery word "Talossan," I think, so it just sort of slapped together blocky imitations of letters and vaguely flag-like shapes.



Now "Talossan National Congress propaganda poster in constructivist style."  Not sure how it came up with these or what it might mean beyond random mishmash of constructivist hallmarks, but it's cool.



Last but not least, "Vintage cartoon-style poster of the glorious leader called The Seneschal fighting off many enemies."



Pretty rad!

Just a quick note to the nation that His Majesty has been ill recently with the coronavirus.  All is well and he's better, but just thought it was worth a public announcement from your friendly local guaír.

Continuing my monthly efforts to show different heraldry in different contexts, so we all can learn and judge, we have Ireland!  Ireland is a proud and egalitarian republic, and so any citizen of Ireland may apply for an achievement with the Chief Herald.  In fact, even someone who is only entitled to claim citizenship may apply, even if they don't intend to immigrate.  So anyone with a grandparent who was born in Ireland is eligible!  Pretty nifty, even if the cost is steep at ℓ6750 (€4400 or $4500)!



The pelican is interesting here, because it represents an unusual choice.  The pelican was wrongly believed by antiquity to feed its young on its own blood, and so the "pelican in her piety" is a very old charge found in many achievements, depicting a pelican piercing its own breast to feed three chicks with blood.  Here, almost an excess of specificity is needed to ensure that there are no young depicted in the achievement.  I'd imagine it's because the charge is only in one quarter.  Side note: the word "vulning" is amazing.




Interesting choice to be specific as to what division represents what constituency!  This diocese was created from separate Meath and Kildare dioceses in 1976... took a long time for them to get around to asking for arms!  Guess they're getting new china.




A classic "name some virtues" motto (*coughcough* guess I shouldn't talk...).  Also an interesting boar on the crest, depicted with unguled tusks -- that is to say in a different tincture than the rest of the body.  Here, the boar's tusks are unguled because they are all Gules... presumably with blood!




A beautiful escutcheon here, with the divisions cleverly creating the illusion of multiple banners.




If you're an organization, you get your grant in both English and Irish.  The Irish version of the blazon (laboriously transcribed with many missing diacriticals) is as follows: Ar Airgead caislean le tri tuir dualdaite saorsithe dubh ar an larthuir bachall agus ar foluain ar dheis uaidh sin meirge le armas le Mareschal.  Beautiful!  Maybe we should do grants in Talossan, too?

I can't say I'm a big fan of including another escutcheon as a tiny flag on a charge -- seems likely to be an unrecognizable multicolored blob in most contexts!

-NRH

Estimat Seneschal:

I believe the Zuavs is an important Talossan institution.  I designed it and led it to some significant success, and I was hoping that my successors would be able to keep it going.  But as soon as I left office, it became utterly stagnant and nothing happened with it.  Nothing happened under Ministreu Börnatfiglheu, who didn't have the time.  Okay.  But I didn't want to see it neglected, and so I began urging the next Ministreu dal Zefençù, Gödafrïeu Valcádac'h, to do something with the Zuavs.  I began asking for this starting in October, nine months ago.  The Government told me directly that something would be done in January, whenever Ministreu Valcádac'h was able to get to it.  Every time I brought it up, I was told that action was imminent.  But nothing happened, and then I was told that it was election time and nothing could happen.

I was stonewalled for the entire 56th Cosa.

Okay.  Well, there was an election.  A fresh start (sort of) and a new beginning.  I let the whole thing go and hoped for better things in the future.  And in May, you appointed outgoing Seneschal Txoteu Davinescu to your Cabinet as Ministreu dal Zefençù:

Quote from: Ian Plätschisch on May 22, 2022, 05:58:42 PM

FROM THE OFFICE OF THE SENESCHAL

Fellow Talossans,

I hereby make the following appointments to the Cabinet:
...
DEFENCE - Txoteu Davinescu
...
Signed,
Ian Plätschisch, Seneschal

Okay, well, everyone deserves a second chance.

Unfortunately, nothing happened afterwards, and it didn't appear that there was any activity.  The Ministreu dal Zefençù didn't post on Wittenberg at all.  That's not necessarily terrible, since a lot might have been happening behind the scenes.  I think that everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt, and we should try to be as understanding as possible.  We all know that folks can get temporarily busy or sick.

In early June, MC Breneir Tzaracomprada, Leader of His Majesty's Loyal Opposition, posed a terpelaziun to the Ministreu dal Zefençù about his activity, asking what he planned on accomplishing.  The Ministreu replied with a list of items:

Quote from: Þon Txoteu É. Davinescu, O.SPM on June 04, 2022, 04:06:29 PMMy apologizes for the delay as my industry has been insanely busy in recent weeks with all the storms in my part of Maricopa. Now, to the Ministry's plans for the coming term:

1) Work with the College of Arms for an Achievement to be granted to the Zouaves incorporating a crown, crossed bedposts, and the official name in Talossan,

2) Work with the current active members of the Zouaves to develop a working, formal structure that will allow efficient, internal management of the Guard,

3) Work with the Ziu to get legislation through to both correct the spelling in all formal documents as well as enshrine both the Zouaves and the rest of the Talossan military's formal ranks into law,

4) Develop a formal system of awards and honors for the Defence Ministry, encompassing military and civil awards for service in the Ministry and to the Crown,

5) Move forward with the selection and approval of ranks/insignia of the Zouaves ( https://talossamainstreet.weebly.com/ranks.html ) or something of the like.

Fair enough!  Many of these sound like useful goals, especially if they are accompanied by active management of the Zuavs.  But by the end of the month, none of these goals had been accomplished.  The Ministreu dal Zefençù didn't actually post on Wittenberg at all after answering the legally-mandated terpelaziun, and the Zuavs sat stagnant.

This was disconcerting, and I asked you about the status of things:

Quote from: Baron Alexandreu Davinescu on June 19, 2022, 11:30:23 PMThe Ministreu dal Zefençù has only posted once in the past couple of months, and nothing at all has happened in that ministry as far as I can tell.  Recent applicants to the Zuavs don't seem to have gone anywhere, and are not reflected on that organization's rolls.  The entire thing seems to be defunct once more.  His lone post was in response to a terpelaziun, and said that he was busy at work -- okay, but surely after the last eight months we can't be expected to give him the benefit of the doubt, right?

And you replied that you expected the Ministreu dal Zefençù to begin doing his job the next week.

Quote from: Ian Plätschisch on June 22, 2022, 09:24:33 PM
The Minister of Defense has assured me that he will soon be getting a lot less busy at work, and will proceed to tackling one of the coalition agreement items for his Ministry every week. He will also start more actively managing the Zuavs. He will gladly answer additional Terps directed at him.

Quote from: Ian Plätschisch on June 22, 2022, 09:54:47 PM1. Based on the conversations we've had, I expect the Minister of Defense to begin work next week.

I accepted this reply, satisfied that you were actively managing the situation and we could expect some activity.  Unfortunately, again there was nothing, and soon it was July.  Again, this isn't unforgivable, but we're starting to strain the limits of credulity.

MC Tzaracomprada followed up with the Ministreu dal Zefençù, again asking when he expected to get to work.  The Ministreu answered that he would get around to it next week:

Quote from: Þon Txoteu É. Davinescu, O.SPM on July 07, 2022, 10:44:35 PMI plan on getting together with the Captain next week to go over development ... To be discussed with the Captain next week. ... Thank you again for your question. As to curating & promotions, these will also be discussed with the Captain next week.

It's been almost two more weeks since then.  And nothing has happened.  Since the start of his time in office, the Ministreu dal Zefençù has posted only twice, when he was legally compelled to do so.

I am sure that the Ministreu dal Zefençù has the best of intentions, and that you do as well.  I know it is hard to find anyone to work in this Government at this point, and I respect that your limited resources are stretched thin.  But I think we deserve to actually know what's going on, as opposed to more promises.  I think the Zuavs are actually important and useful, and we need to know if the Government actually thinks so, too.  We're way past the time when we can reasonably still be giving the benefit of the doubt, especially given the past.

I am disinterested in just letting this slide for another entire term.  I am dissatisfied as a Member of Cosa with the way things are being managed.  And I am disinclined as a citizen of Talossa to accept this treatment by my Government.

Estimat Seneschal, the Government promised that "Cabinet Ministers who fail to carry out their agreed duties will be required to give an explanation to the Ziu, or else resign."  This promise might ring a little hollow after last term, but I still feel compelled to ask with this terpelaziun:

How have you addressed this issue with the Ministreu dal Zefençù, who was absent as Seneschal most of last term and now appears to be absent in his new office?

This is probably going to be a quick question, but I just wanted to check something.

S:reu Ministreu, I have noticed that you have been linking prospective citizens to the new citizen's guide that's on the wiki.

Quote from: Ian Plätschisch on July 16, 2022, 07:40:49 PM
Azul! Make sure to check out the new citizen's guide: https://wiki.talossa.com/TalossaWiki:New_Citizen%27s_Guide

And that's good, but I just wanted to be sure that prospectives are also getting the new information packet that I wrote six months ago?  I assumed they were getting it by email, but thought it was worth checking up.

In 2015, our Greatest of provinces almost merged with Vuode.  A couple of years ago, we polled the issue, and it was still affirmative here.  Should we get discussions going again?  The terms were mostly sorted in 2015 with a possible constitution written by Vuodean Etho Grischun -- essentially the two provinces would remain independent on the national level, with their own custavais and senators, but provincial-level matters would be handled by a joint legislature.  Thoughts?

The official symbols and flags for the Cosa and the Senats were chosen in the seventeenth and twentieth Cosas, respectively.  Here they are, below:

Cosa

   

Senats

   

As you can see, they have a pretty good design.  But there's an issue: they're stolen!  Not just the design, but the specific image is stolen from the official UK parliamentary logo!



I think this is sort of a problem when it comes to legal reasons -- but it's definitely pretty embarrassing, even if it's legal!  We need our own symbolism, or at least our own visuals for it.  This isn't something we can make happen, but we can formally advise the Ziu about it and make a recommendation.

Any thoughts from the rest of the Coletx?  Agreement, disagreement?

-NRH

I have begun assembling the information for the next honours, since I believe we have enough for a ceremony again.  If I missed any, please let me know, brethren of the College.


Grant of achievement for the Royal Zuavs: Quarterly, argent and azure. In first and fourth a fez gules tasseled of the first. In second and third, two bedposts couped of the first, saltirewise.
Grant of achievement for @Carlüs Éovart Vilaçafat :Per fess potenté, argent and vert. In chief two roses proper and in base a cinquefoil or.
Grant of achievement for @Antonio Montagnha, Ed. D. : Per bend sinister azure vert, above a scarpe argent, the sun in his splendor or.

Congratulations to new Fellow(s) and Heralds, with issue of letters patent to:
@Dr. Txec Róibeard dal Nordselvă, Esq., O.SPM, SMM  as the Rouge Elephant Herald (correcting an error)

-NRH

Estimat Seneschál del Regipäts Talossán:

The Ministră dal Cúltură recently announced that her only planned event, a Twitch trivia contest, was postponed indefinitely.  Nothing else seems to be planned or happening.

The Ministreu dal Zefençù has only posted once in the past couple of months, and nothing at all has happened in that ministry as far as I can tell.  Recent applicants to the Zuavs don't seem to have gone anywhere, and are not reflected on that organization's rolls.  The entire thing seems to be defunct once more.  His lone post was in response to a terpelaziun, and said that he was busy at work -- okay, but surely after the last eight months we can't be expected to give him the benefit of the doubt, right?

The Ministră à Savanar da Talossa àls Ultra-Fiovaes Folăs and Ministră dal Tec'hnoloxhà recently announced in a lengthy speech that there are a ton of problems, but that she didn't really want these jobs and lacks the skills to fix most of those problems.  She also doesn't seem to have the time to attend to the tasks that are within her capabilities.  She has made three edits to the wiki this year, and doesn't seem to have ever worked the social media.  Those are her direct responsibilities, and she possesses all the technical knowledge necessary to attend to them -- to tweet something, put something on Facebook, to keep the bare minimum on the wiki updated.

In other words, you seem to be doing your job, and Distain Ministreu Autofíl seems to be doing his job with ID cards.  But no one else seems to be.  So I suppose my question is this: is there a plan for otherwise improving the state of affairs?  Have you, for example, given the Ministreu dal Zefençù a warning?

Does anyone happen to have, for whatever reason, an address for Iac?

WHEREAS currently the entire status of much of our legal system is possibly itself illegal, since the Ziu's ennumerated powers do not include any power to write criminal laws at all, nor to regulate any aspect of the legal system, meaning that most of Titles A & J are very much in doubt if challenged in cort, and

WHEREAS this means that basically none of our criminal laws or rules about the cort system actually work, and

WHEREAS currently there does not appear to be any sunset on appeals, so something can be appeal even after ten years, and that's not okay, and

WHEREAS we have a law permitting sanctuary on the books, even though it's extremely unclear how that could possibly work,


THEREFORE the third section of Article VII of the 1997 Organic Law shall be amended to include these additional provisions:

Quote20. Criminal justice designed to protect the personal and property rights of citizens.
21. Administrative matters incidental to the functioning of the justice system.

FURTHERMORE a new provision shall be inserted in the first subsection of the third section of Title G of el Lexhatx, reading

Quote3.1.1 There is a 90-day statute of limitations on all judicial appeals.

FURTHERMORE, the Scribe is directed to renumber the third section of Title G in a sensible fashion.


FURTHERMORE the tenth section of Title A of el Lexhatx, which currently reads

Quote10. The Ziu hereby recognizes the historic right of churches and other religious organizations to offer sanctuary to individuals in dire need.

is hereby stricken in its entirety.

FURTHERMORE, the words "Except as provided in A.17," shall be struck from section 16.

FURTHERMORE, the Scribe is directed to renumber Title A in a sensible fashion.

Uréu q'estadra så:
Baron Alexandreu Davinescu

WHEREAS there is a large legal loophole that would permit virtually any crime, including very serious crimes such as threats of sexual assault, theft, bribery, or anything else, and

WHEREAS the problem lies with the fact that we're offering unlimited and unqualified sanctuary under terms which clearly reference the medieval Christian practice of offering church protection from secular law, thereby allowing anyone to claim the right of sanctuary if accused of crimes, and

WHEREAS it's hard to find any other way to interpret this bit of the law so that it makes sense, and so therefore this reading probably is going to be a valid one, or at the very least would be an incredible complication that might make it impossible to prosecute someone, and

WHEREAS no one has yet taken advantage of it, but there's no reason to think that will last forever,

THEREFORE the tenth section of Title A of el Lexhatx, which currently reads

Quote10. The Ziu hereby recognizes the historic right of churches and other religious organizations to offer sanctuary to individuals in dire need.

is hereby stricken in its entirety.

FURTHERMORE, the words "Except as provided in A.17," shall be struck from section 16.

FURTHERMORE, the Scribe is directed to renumber Title A in a sensible fashion.

Uréu q'estadra så:
Baron Alexandreu Davinescu