SENESCHÁL 2022: Debate me, Brenéir!

[Ian Plätschisch]

Reposting this here

Which restrictions prevented the Government from creating any kind of memorial, including the promised stamp, for Art Verbotten?

The Patriot Points program did not raise enough money for us to think that producing the stamp was prudent at this time.

So if I understand S;reu Perþonest correctly, about 50 usd was raised in stamp sales/donations last year.

On what basis does the government think it is realistic that 200 dollars will be raised this term (noting that a cosa term is less than a year)?

Also, what is the government's plan regarding the stamps now that it turns out 50 dollars for stamps may not be feasible?

Depending on the amount of donations received, we may deem it worthwhile to request the extra money for the full run of stamps, or we may decide now is not the right time to purchase that many stamps.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

I mean, firstly, I don't see where you get off criticising my covering for Txoteu when you're doing exactly the same thing for Brenéir.

Well, I guess one main difference is that Breneir is actively campaigning and leading the party -- plus he actually likes Talossa and does stuff.  He's doing things for fun, plus he's in charge of the party.  I mean, he came up with half of our platform and the video, he's organized the party and made all the "swag"... this is all public on Witt.  You know this, of course, and you're just being creative with the truth... but come on, you can see why this isn't going to work, right?  Txoteu only appears every month or so to make confident empty statements -- and he's still the Seneschal!

You guys lied to the people for months about Txoteu's leadership, as well as the other inactive ministers.  You propped up these people because it was embarrassing to admit it was all falling apart.  That's dishonest and wrong.  The Government works for the people, not the other way around.

Txoteu's term as Seneschál was not successful

Agreed!  This past term has not been a success.

As for the remainder of your list of places where the Government dropped the ball: I really wish more outgoing Cabinet ministers would chime in here to answer your questions about why they didn't do what they'd promised, because you know what? I'd kind of like to know what happened, in particular re: the Verbotten stamp.

Whoa whoa now, I was assured that the real impediment here was vague "red-and-green tape!"  What happened to that?  Give us some examples.

(Txoteu has done so, to his credit.) But that line about you basically had to do most things yourself, and you're just one person is a perfect prediction of what any TNC government would be like.

I'm not sure that "a TNC government would be almost as bad as this one" is quite the selling point you imagine, but I guess it's better for you than "this hasn't been a success" or "we have collectively failed."

[GV]

• We will issue ID cards for everyone.  Have a piece of Talossa to hold in your hands  -- and maybe even to show off to friends and family who might be interested!

...snipped, but only for brevity's sake

I'll own my part of last term yet again: in classic GV fashion, as Minister of Culture, I was not nearly as communicative to Cabinet about being more utterly burned out with Talossa than I thought I actually was.

As Minister of Defence, once I was informed - by you no less - the Zuaves genuinely didn't need much help at all from Defence, I let it go at that and didn't worry over it any more.

As for Minister of Culture, I was good until about July when I completely fell off the rails.  This is when I should have resigned from Culture, though I was right to keep Defence.

Betrayed.  Stolen.  Kept.

AD, I've always appreciated your enthusiasm for Talossa.  Since you first came to us ca. 2006(!), you have not, I think, ceased to be active in at least some way.  I still look to El Lex, as imperfect as some might rightly say it was, as your greatest achievement in Talossa - taking the bull by the horns to get done a project that JJ himself should have thought about doing back in the 1990s, though to be fair to JJ, he was still the greatest administrator Talossa ever had until MPF came along.

The reason why we rail at you so much, Alexander, is because we see you as nothing more than a mouthpiece for a mostly-absentee monarch who has since 2007 refused to engage with the liberal wing of Talossan society on any basis more than a cursory professional level, his generous handling of Reunision notwithstanding, but even that is seen in some quarters is not being so much as altruistic, but done simply because the Kingdom was incredibly stagnant at that time. 

And guess what?  It was the same reason why the Republic-other-than-GV said 'yes' to Reunision.  It was getting to the point we were considering outright dissolution.  Rightly, the Kingdom had won the 'war' of the internet.

AD, you have always seemed to me to be an intelligent person.  You have read my diatribes of the past where I raged about King John.  You know the reasons why we didn't come back in 2005-2007, a terrible mistake in retrospect, but the Republic had good reasons to stay away.  After all, your mantra of 'Betrayed.  Stolen.  Kept.' fanned the flames of animosity towards us and actually kept us from returning the domains to the whole of the Talossan nation.

Imagine what might have happened had you not decided to follow your correct perception of the pathway to power in Talossa being being the avatar of Talossan Woollerianism.  You might have been the midwife of a 2008-ish Reunision or earlier.  We might have even had the opportunity to vote John in as King in March 2007.

And Talossa would have been far stronger.

To be fair, I well remember the broad strokes of your 2008 attempt at getting a Republic Wittenberg account.  You were rebuffed, and I still regret my small part in that.  I should have stood up for you.

And to be fair, I cannot and do not put this all at your doorstep.  The present king had to power to repair Talossa in one Wittenberg post, yet he refused to do so - a power you've never quite had through no fault of your own.  The quirks in our constitution prevent hasty wholesale change in giant scales, but as the country has found out, a few people are all it takes to be a mountain of obstruction.

In my opinion, you did the job as Regent you were supposed to.  The fact you were enobled for doing the job you should have done is not a travesty, but certain is a minor scandal.  You never should have been made a Baron, but you rightly received the appreciation of a grateful nation.

And I should never have been given Për la Naziun.  My work with the archives was epic (it really was), but did it truly save the country?  The PM at the time recommended me for a knightly order that had been defunct for many years.  I was not raised to that order, and I seriously considered outright refusing the honour altogether, as I felt not being made Order of the Flag was a spiteful move by the monarch - at least it sure looked that way.

I really do think John Woolley has always disliked all of us 'down south'.  I really do.  We don't need to be his best-buddy, but he never truly respected us.  I hope I'm wrong on all of this, by the way.

You and I in Talossa are getting old.  The day is coming when the country won't give a rat's a$% about the war for the soul of Talossa that has been raging since 1 June 2004.  I only ask the people of this country to remember the mistakes that were made - some worse than others - Ben's worst of all - and learn from them.

VOTEZ FREEDEMS - and show up GV and GET F&#(* INVOLVED!!

GV

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[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

As Minister of Defence, once I was informed - by you no less - the Zuaves genuinely didn't need much help at all from Defence, I let it go at that and didn't worry over it any more.

My goodness!  I told you that there wasn't anything you should do?  I really thought I gave you some specific suggestions, offered to help you further, and linked you to the available resources.  In fact, I'm fairly certain of that.  In fact, here's the quote.

@GV , the program for this Government lists a more active Zuavs as your first priority.  I know you have a lot going on, but I'd love to hear some initial thoughts on how that will look.

To be honest, how MinDef can help the Zuaves baffles me.  Who is the person (yes, I should know this!) with whom I can best discuss things?  The last thing I want to do is to go ahead unilaterally with some weird programme no-else else really wants.

I can tell you my intentions and how I operated, if it helps.  Here was my founding speech and here is the first recruitment thread, and here is the Witt thread I was using on this Witt after we moved over here.  The Wikipedia page also has a lot of this info, plus the list of enlisted when I left office.  I was replaced by ESB, and the current Capitan is our Secretary of State, who has more than enough to do around here already.

What I think needs to happen is just for someone to directly write each of the people enlisted, letting them know where to submit their achievements, and begin visibly awarding promotions and recruiting once more.  Obviously, not a lot will happen immediately, since it's a system based around rewarding activity.  But think of it like a big wind -- not enough to lift anyone into the air, but enough to give each set of wings a boost towards the sky whenever someone gives a flutter.

All of that aside, I have to say that I think this speech is a little misplaced.  I mean, it's interesting to hear this story in a new way, but I don't think this discussion was going quite so badly that it needed a rescue squad to change the subject.  I know the routine -- she gets to ditch the embarrassing bits and just reply to you with something personally insulting to me.  It's not great.  We were discussing the actual election and the actual issues, and you really need to swoop in to try to stop that?

No one needs to wonder what I thought of the Republic: I'm on the record for many years.  I thought that it was very justified for you guys to leave, and it was really lousy to take the website and forum when you did so.  And I was an enthusiastic supporter of Reunision, both then and now.  Since my private emails were even leaked publicly, you actually know what I said in confidence about the Republic and those who reunited with the Kingdom!  No one has to guess what I thought, since I made speeches lauding Miestra, you, and others in detail to members of the RUMP.

Neither the past nor this conversation is so malleable as all that, GV.

[GV]

Wow, I forgot more than I know.  I stand corrected AD, re the Zuaves, but stand firm in the roots of the Talossan divide and our role in it.  Both yours...and mine.  :-)

Upon coming to Talossa, you took to John's narrative as a duck takes to water.  This issue is still unresolved and is still at the very heart of why I think Miestra has had a beef with you for so long.  :-)

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

I mean, I heartily agree with this statement:

The new Talossan Renaissance keeps on building up steam!

But it totally flies in the face of this statement:

something needs to change.  We can't afford another two years of this grim slog.

I suppose the truly shameless and dishonest would suggest "oh, all these people are coming back into action because they're being galvanised by the TNC election campaign! And they'll go away again if we're not elected!"

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

I mean, I heartily agree with this statement:

The new Talossan Renaissance keeps on building up steam!

But it totally flies in the face of this statement:

something needs to change.  We can't afford another two years of this grim slog.

I suppose the truly shameless and dishonest would suggest "oh, all these people are coming back into action because they're being galvanised by the TNC election campaign! And they'll go away again if we're not elected!"

It is true that I'm a booster for the country, no matter who's in charge.  I'm always going to root for Talossa and urge people to join and do fun things, because I love it and I believe in it.

But it's kind of silly to pretend that suddenly everything is okay, or suddenly decide you guys actually did a good job.

Activity always picks up at election time.  It's been an ironclad rule of Talossa for decades: when it's time to vote, people remember to come visit and chat and do stuff.  It's great to see people like Antaglha and Afacat back here and active -- I'm glad to see them and glad when they get busy at doing Talossa.  But they've been gone since basically just during the last election.  There's nothing wrong with that, but it's part of a larger pattern in the country.

I mean, it was just last election when we went through this same thing, remember?  After a very quiet term and when immigration was at a dead stop, you decided that actually activity levels were very high and we didn't have any problems.  You said I was "gaslighting" about the problem.

Our activity levels that are higher than at any time since the Free Democrats have been leading government, as shown by the huge turnout of parties in the election?

I thought you'd stopped this gaslighting about how Talossa sucks these days and no-one comes here any more

But of course, you were singing a different tune right before the campaign, when you were talking about "a crisis of activity."

And not long after the campaign, when you admitted that "the Government we lead has dropped the ball. Seriously, and collectively. We have failed to actively pursue most of our programme. The country is now in a serious crisis of activity, and it is possible that Talossa will die within 6 months if something doesn't change."

The only thing that seems to change your perception of a crisis of activity is... well, your re-election campaigns!  Just as soon as you're running for re-election, you suddenly realize our problems have all been solved and the country should be grateful.

But people are getting active again because it's election time and some folks are pouring their energy into trying to do things and encourage others.  It is just plain foolish to waste opportunities like this, when the tide rises and we can furl our sails.  If we return to another term of do-nothing and broken promises, then we risk losing our chance to set sail for better waters.  And who knows how many more chances we'll get?  Someday, if we don't change things, the tide may not be able to lift us off the rocks.

By the way, and I know this is just an oversight, but you completely forgot to get into any of that red-and-green tape that tied your party's hands this past term.