Last year, we had some mullings about a possible Talossan "Tinkers' Union" -- a place for people to talk about their various projects. Well -- here it is!

Introducing what I am tentatively calling el Verbånd Talossan Cufabrichind -- the Talossan Tinkering Society. (I'd also considered el Verbånd Talossan d'Impreschtsch, the Talossan Society of the Toolbox. We can workshop the name, no pun intended.)

What this is: a sort of megathread for whatever projects you might be working on to maintain, repair, and improve...whatever! Be it automotive, electrical, plumbing, woodworking, appliances, electronics, knick-knacks, show your fellow Talossans what you're working on. Whether you want to show progress, get suggestions, or just give a summary of a successful (or maybe not-so-successful) project, this is the place to do it.

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I guess it's only fair I go first! As those of you who have seen me over our Zoom meetings (or on my Mad Chicken review from 2024) may be aware, based on the browline glasses and whatnot, I have a soft-spot for mid-century things. Old electro-mechanical stuff that's built to last, the aesthetics of the Jet/Atomic/early Space Age, etc. So it's probably no surprise that I bought a fountain pen recently. This is a Parker 45, and much like Talossa itself, it hails from Wisconsin! Parker, now headquartered in France, is originally from Janesville, a city in southern Wisconsin, near the Illinois border, about a 1.5-hour drive from the GTA. The 45 was introduced by Parker in 1960; mine dates from somewhere in the 1970s based on several characteristics.

Purchased for cheap on eBay, last weekend I disassembled it, gave it a bit of a soaking in some distilled water with a light bit of dish soap, and let it dry overnight. The next day I disassembled it further; several pieces around the pen's nib were stuck together by caked-on ink from a previous user and needed the first soak just to unscrew properly. Then I gave the parts another soaking, and let dry a second night.

The 45 comes with a "converter" (the internal refillable ink reservoir), but it also accepts Parker's long-running cartridge design, and that's what I've used here. I seem to still have a few mild issues with ink flow, but that may be due to a bit of soap residue affecting the ink -- or maybe there's still some old red ink in there somewhere. When this cartridge runs out I intend to buy a little bottle of pen flush and give it a good internal rinse to see if it can't be improved further.

Quote from: Baron Alexandreu Davinescu on Today at 02:10:46 PMMaybe we still need seat limits, just higher ones?  Tweak the formula instead.

The current formula for the seat limit is (10 * Cosă size) / turnout, rounded up. If we are to abolish the one-third off-lister allowance, I suppose the equivalent exchange would be to increase the seat limit by one third, i.e. (40 * Cosă size) / (3 * turnout). How much of an increase do you have in mind?

Quote from: Baron Alexandreu Davinescu on Today at 11:08:17 AMI do think that you're going to probably have to leave party leaders in control of submitting a list, subject to their internal processes, since I don't know how else you'd do it.

Aside from legislation mandating that parties follow democratic procedures and allowing legal redress if not, switching to a candidate-based voting system instead of one that strictly hinges on parties would also solve this problem. The power to set up and submit lists is much less serious if voters are free to defy those lists as they please.

Quote from: Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC on Today at 05:02:52 PMI don't believe that AD is only raising quibbles about reforms to defend his partisan advantage out of a system where people vote for a "blank cheque" for a logo. But if the Point is: "The current system makes the Cosa unaccountable to voters" and the Counterpoint is: "yeah, but it benefits my party", I beg the Baron to realize how his opponents might react to that. It is a simple psephological fact that conservative parties benefit from low-cognitive-effort, leader-focused systems.

It is a basic tenet of democracy that the outcome of the vote should reflect the will of the people as much as possible.  And I started this conversation because I'm interested in trying to find a solution that works well for that factor as well as others: reducing the arbitrary power of party leaders, working to ensure that voters know ahead-of-time who will be representing them, and making all the current features of our system flourish.  You will have to go elsewhere to pick a fight, I'm afraid.

Stage 21 Roma -> Roma

Jonathan Milan (CHX/GHS) finally wins a stage in today's final sprint, and that's mostly it - everything TCAT related went the most likely way as discussed earlier.

GHST gets an eighth stagewin, their most ever in a single edition but well short of the record (13 by BDC in Italy 2024). This is likewise the second highest ever winning score. Cyclohexane gets the second most daily points, but when EoT points get applied it falls back to fourth behind ITW, who therefore get a podium in their debut edition.

FINAL STANDINGS (with Stage 21 and End of Tour points)

Pos	±		Team	Final	Stage 21	EoT
1st	(=)		Gordon Hiatus Support Team (GHS)	10448	+370	+2320
2nd	(=)		Cézembre Caçeirs dals Mailintzarăs (BDC)	8618	+141	+2030
3rd	(+2)		Team In The Wind (ITW)	7765	+207	+1600
4th	(=)		Cyclohexane (CHX)	7718	+352	+1305
5th	(-2)		Els Talossaes Rexhital (REX)	7464	+184	+1140
6th	(+1)		Velociposse Florencia (VFL)	7151	+95	+1290
7th	(-1)		Maritiimi-Maxhestic Mençeis (MMM)	7111	+85	+1160
8th	(=)		Cézembre Fieschā (CFA)	5001	+124	+1055

Some stats and side results will follow soonish, but for now, thanks for playing in yet another edition of the Talossan Cycling Association Tour, and we hope to see you back in about a month for the big event - TCAT France 2026 mirroring the famous Tour de France!

Quote from: Baron Alexandreu Davinescu on Today at 11:08:17 AMI do think that you're going to probably have to leave party leaders in control of submitting a list, subject to their internal processes

In my country - and I believe others with closed lists - there is a law saying that a party's internal processes for creating lists have to be democratic and that party members have standing to sue if their leadership is drawing up lists arbitrarily. I would support that in Talossa.

Quote from: Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial, UrGP on Today at 09:58:39 AMThe amount of copy-pasted invalid votes cast last election is genuinely concerning.

I'm less worried by the fact that there were a whole bunch of amount of copy-pasted invalid votes cast last election, than that most of those votes were for one particular party, the leader of which is doing his best to argue against reforms of that system. Those with very long memories might remember critics of a system where "I vote for whoever Ben says" was a valid vote, and King Robert I yelling at them as wanting to disenfranchise less-active or less-informed citizens. Or where the RUMP fought against the secret ballot for a very long time, and they were right (from a partisan viewpoint) to do so, because they lost their permanent absolute majority in the very first secret election.

I don't believe that AD is only raising quibbles about reforms to defend his partisan advantage out of a system where people vote for a "blank cheque" for a logo. But if the Point is: "The current system makes the Cosa unaccountable to voters" and the Counterpoint is: "yeah, but it benefits my party", I beg the Baron to realize how his opponents might react to that. It is a simple psephological fact that conservative parties benefit from low-cognitive-effort, leader-focused systems.

WHEREAS, the inclusion of any citizen on a political party's electoral list is currently and entirely up to that party's leadership; and

WHEREAS, it seems reasonable to ensure that the person involved should have some sort of say in their inclusion; then

BE IT RESOLVED BY THE ZIU that Title B of El Lexhatx, Section 2.3.2 is created to read as follows:

Quote2.3.2. The Secretary of State shall confirm to their satisfaction that all citizens appearing on a party list consent to do so. Only citizens so consenting shall be recognized as being on a party's list for the purposes of Lexh.B.2.3, and only said citizens will appear on the party's list as shown on the ballot.

Uréu q'estadra så:
Mic'haglh Autófil (MC - URL)

WHEREAS, Cabinet ministers may currently appoint Permanent Secretaries at any time, including in a "lame duck" or "caretaker" period following the close of an election; and

WHEREAS, this could conceivably permit an outgoing Government to staff ministries with Permanent Secretaries in contradictory ways to the desires of an incoming Government; and

WHEREAS, this seems an obviously unfair move that ought to be prohibited; then

BE IT RESOLVED BY THE ZIU that Title C of El Lexhatx, Section 1.1.1, which currently reads as follows:

Quote1.1.1. A Minister of the Cabinet may recommend to the King the creation of an Office within their Ministry and the appointment of a Permanent Secretary to that office based upon their qualifications, willingness to work and taking into consideration the applicant's performance in prior positions. All Permanent Secretary positions shall exist within the Royal Civil Service and shall be non-political appointments which shall be held until lawful dismissal, resignation or incapacitation.

Shall be altered to read:

Quote1.1.1. A Minister of the Cabinet may recommend to the King the creation of an Office within their Ministry and the appointment of a Permanent Secretary to that office based upon their qualifications, willingness to work and taking into consideration the applicant's performance in prior positions. No recommendations or appointments to a Permanent Secretary role shall be made in the period following a dissolution of the Cosă, until either a petition to name a Seneschal has been presented to the King, or the first Clark of the following Cosă term has opened, whichever occurs first. All Permanent Secretary positions shall exist within the Royal Civil Service and shall be non-political appointments which shall be held until lawful dismissal, resignation or incapacitation.

Uréu q'estadra så:
Mic'haglh Autófil (MC - URL)

Quote from: Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial, UrGP on Today at 11:28:34 AMImagine the minimum length was two. Now imagine a party with two candidates winning a landslide victory, and each candidate would get half the seats of that party. What would happen if one of the two candidates would immediately resign from the Cosă, or refuse to accept the seats to begin with? From what I can tell, without seat limits, all of the party seats would now go to the other candidate, who now controls the Cosă majority by themself.

What I'm saying is that I'd like some assurance that no single candidate could ever end up with a Cosă majority on their own.

That makes sense.  Maybe we still need seat limits, just higher ones?  Tweak the formula instead.

Quote from: Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial, UrGP on Today at 11:28:34 AMI'm saying that new citizen seats cannot be a means to replace and replenish Cosă members. In the current implementation, NCs only have one seat each out of 200, meaning they are always politically irrelevant and cannot replace elected Cosă members who usually have 5 to 15 times as many seats assigned on average. At the same time though, if we were to increase the number of seats held by NCs, they would introduce overly large partisan swings and create majorities contrary to the election results, which is a complete no-go.

No, sorry, those two aren't mean to go together.  The new citizen seats are just a way for new citizens to represent their "own" vote in the Cosa and get involved for fun, and they wouldn't be an effective method of replacing lost legislators (plus that would defeat the goal of ensuring everyone in the Cosa was elected to it).