The Organic Law Party

[Viteu]

For too long Members of the Ziu have taken a laissez faire approach to the provisions of the Organic Law.  We have allowed this culture of enacting legislation for whatever the Ziu thinks is appropriate without virtually any consideration of the actual text of the Organic Law.   The Ziu acts like Talossa is a system of parliamentary sovereignty without a co-equal branch.  This is simply not the case. 

Therefore, I am announcing the Organic Law Party.  The primary goal of the Organic Law Party is to restore the Ziu to its proper place and Members of the Ziu when they steamroll over the Organic Law.  The Organic Law Party will fiercely and relentlessly defend the Organic Law and ensure that every transgression by a state institution is publicly known.

If you value civil liberties, constitutional order, and the rule of law, join the Organic Law Party.

On issues related to the monarchy, the Organic Law Party will be agnostic and defer to the individual members to vote and advocate their conscience. 

[Glüc]

Oooh, another satirical party. Nice!

[Viteu]

Oooh, another satirical party. Nice!

If you say so.

[Viteu]

Oooh, another satirical party. Nice!

No more a joke than the FreeDems.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

I thought I might put something on the record in case the public were thinking that Judge V quit the Free Democrats of Talossa in response to my conduct as Public Defender in the current case. In fact, he quit the Free Democrats of Talossa on May 1 this year, in response to Party President Üc Tärfa's arguments in favour of the Legal Repair Amendment.

On the 6th of May, a few days later, we saw this on his personal Facebook page:



I suppose we all get to see what "going nuclear" means now.

[Viteu]

_I

I thought I might put something on the record in case the public were thinking that Judge V quit the Free Democrats of Talossa in response to my conduct as Public Defender in the current case. In fact, he quit the Free Democrats of Talossa on May 1 this year, in response to Party President Üc Tärfa's arguments in favour of the Legal Repair Amendment.

On the 6th of May, a few days later, we saw this on his personal Facebook page:



I suppose we all get to see what "going nuclear" means now.

Fine. Let's do this.

Who wants to talk about how the 2017 Organic Law wasn't actually adopted?

[Viteu]

Love the games the FreeDems are playing. Let's do this @Miestră Schivă, UrN.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

So I suppose the actual name of the new party is "The 1997 Organic Law Party"?

[Viteu]

So I suppose the actual name of the new party is "The 1997 Organic Law Party"?

We'll see what others say.

[Sir Ian Plätschisch]

Fine. Let's do this.

Who wants to talk about how the 2017 Organic Law wasn't actually adopted?

Bring it.

[Viteu]

I, too, can post a screenshot.

Link

Because the FreeDems like to play games.

[Sir Ian Plätschisch]

Article XII.5:

The Covenants of Rights and Freedoms, being sacred and necessary to the defence of our free society, are entrenched provisions of this Organic Law. No amendment to the Covenants shall take effect unless approved by a two-thirds majority of voters participating in the referendum on the question of the amendment.


When the Org Law means to require an absolute majority, it says so. Here it does not say an "absolute 2/3 majority," so an abstention would have its typical meaning; the absence of a vote.

[Viteu]

90 people participated in the election by voting, therefore the number is 90.

Also, if abstaining is sufficient to count against two strikes, it inherently means doing do is participating in the vote. As the referendum was tied to the election, you needed an supermajority of participant's, ie 70.

[Sir Ian Plätschisch]

90 people participated in the election by voting, therefore the number is 90.

No.

Abstaining is by its very nature non-participation.

The fact that it establishes that the voter was present does not change that.

[Viteu]

90 people participated in the election by voting, therefore the number is 90.

No.

Abstaining is by its very nature non-participation.

The fact that it establishes that the voter was present does not change that.

No. If Abstention means participation for the purpose of two-strike, then it necessarily means participation in the referendum.

Not sorry, but your org law failed. And Miestra tried to hide it, like she took a few months to report CCX. After all, she sat on that since February.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Goodness.

It goes without saying that there seems to have been some shameful behavior here.  Apparently some civic leaders thought that the Organic Law was illegally amended on a broad scale, and decided to say nothing.  It is possible that this stuff was taken out of context, but the screenshot shared seems to show a pretty damning conversation where Dama Miestra and Viteu discuss the possibility and plan how to address it without stirring any scrutiny.

Maybe there's more context here?  It's possible the very next page of the conversation has Dama Miestra saying that she's sure that everything is on the up-and-up.  I hope so.

This is all the worse because I'm genuinely unsure what the answer is, here.  Usually you don't count abstentions against a 2/3 requirement's denominator, since an abstention is treated the same as not voting (even though it functionally indicates your presence at the vote).  But that's not the case if the requirement is something like 2/3 of "all voters present" or "all members at the vote," which does count increase the denominator.  And the language here is "two-thirds majority of voters participating in the referendum on the question of the amendment."  It seems to indicate it's talking about all who voted in whatever way, but also an abstention is considered not to be participating in a vote!  And I'm not sure there's any precedent either way with this specific language.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

Incidentally, while this is a pretty dire look into the ethics of some folks, and an interesting legal question, I don't think there's any practical concern here.  Someone should just hopper something to re-affirm the OrgLaw as it stands and irrespective of other amendments, just in case.  Unless someone files a suit to overturn stuff based on this revelation, I don't think the OrgLaw's going to get overturned.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

the screenshot shared seems to show a pretty damning conversation where Dama Miestra and Viteu discuss the possibility and plan how to address it without stirring any scrutiny.

There was no conversation. Judge V posted that on his Facebook page, after he had already quit the Free Democrats. He had never discussed the issue with me, or anyone I have ever heard of, before. I did not reply but simply reposted it to the Free Democrats group so they knew of his current state of mind.

I'm really fed up, Alex, about how you can't read or hear of anything involving me without leaping to the conclusion that I've done something corrupt and wicked.

I guess I'm very confused, then.  The screenshot Viteu posted looks like a back-and-forth conversation from Messenger. 

He messages someone -- I thought it was you, but you're not mentioned by name, so maybe it's someone else? -- to tell them he thinks the OrgLaw amendment didn't pass.  Since it amended the Covenants, it required the higher threshold to pass, and Viteu thinks it didn't make it.  The other person disagrees with Viteu.  They discuss how it would be hard to pass a completely new OrgLaw.  Then they say that the best way to handle the situation is just to address the accidental Convenant change by itself.

It's not the worse thing in the world, but it definitely doesn't look good.  But on the other hand, you're being very forceful in your denial, so now I don't know what to think.

[Viteu]

It was Miestra.

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

But if you thought the OrgLaw didn't pass, why haven't you said anything for all of this time?  You're a judge and an officer of the cort.