Leader Statement on Current Status and Ongoing Vote

[Baron Alexandreu Davinescu]

After emerging from the last campaign with a rousing victory, the Progressive Alliance was faced with tough choices.  We fell short of a majority, commanding 87 seats in the Cosa.  If we wanted to form a Government and start to bring change to Talossa, we'd need support from another party.  There were three other parties with sufficient seats to make that happen: the Greens, the very new IDT, and the incumbent URL.

The Green Party wasn't seriously considered.  S:reu Tzaracomprada is one of the few people in our history to be condemned by the Ziu for his past behavior.  To this day, he maintains that he didn't do anything wrong when he sexually harassed another citizen.  And since the most important thing is that our citizens feel safe, it would be irresponsible to put him in any position of authority.  He's the only active member of the Greens; it would be impossible for him to hand off leadership to someone else.

Initially, we forged an agreement with the IDT.  While the only IDT legislator, S:reu Malt, had very different views from own, we firmly believe that even people with very different views can find some common ground.  For us, it was his enthusiasm for our language.  Accordingly, our agreement confined him to working exclusively on language issues unless otherwise authorized.

Unfortunately, this agreement was reached before he began expressing the full range of his ideas and acting in an erratic manner.  Specifically, he expressed sympathy for a known neo-Nazi and doubled-down on his support for autocratic policies.  This is not acceptable.  We spoke with S:reu Molt and made it clear that his behavior had made it impossible for us to entrust him with a position of authority or power over others.  Again, the most important thing is that our citizens feel safe.  There will be no coalition with the IDT.

S:reu Malt has since apologized for some of his statements, however, so there is some possibility of accepting his participation in a supply and confidence agreement.  Any such agreement would not permit him to be in a position of authority, but would accept his support in the Cosa under the express understanding that this support would not come with any policy or legislative expectations. 

Our last option was the URL.  Their initial request for a possible coalition entailed a very deep collaboration, ceding them five of the eleven Cabinet offices among other requests.  There was no appetite for working with the URL to this extent after the recent campaign.

The Progressive Alliance works hard to be positive, but that often put us in a position of simply absorbing insults and falsehood from the URL leadership.  We deliberately chose not to "hit back," since it was our view that nasty scuffles were bad for the country and not what our base wanted from us.  We tried to push back, but always tried to be constructive at the same time as we discussed our policy plans or larger goals.

At times, this was a challenge.

• The URL repeatedly and knowingly lied about our flagship Public Process Act, saying that it would allow their leaders to be prosecuted for innocent mistakes.  Even though it's impossible for a law to criminalize past behavior, thanks to the protections of the Organic Law, the URL attempted to deceive voters that we had promised to "weaponize the justice system to punish political opponents."  There's no other way to see it: this was a knowing falsehood, cynically stated for political gain.
• One of the URL leaders, our current Seneschal, took a phrase out of context from a private conversation in order to lie about its meaning.  She was messaging with a past ally to scold him for his decision to support the Progressive Alliance, and she demanded that he denounce me publicly.  He said in dismissal of such a demand, "we're trying to win an election here."  Since then, this phrase has been touted as evidence of wrongdoing, rather than a phrase torn from conversation and re-interpreted.  He didn't mean that, and she knew he didn't mean that.  This was shabby behavior.
• The URL also spent a considerable amount of time attacking the Progressive Alliance as an organization, saying we weren't a "real party," that we wanted to "backslide into Madisonianism" and "yearn for those days" and think that "democracy doesn't matter," in addition to direct personal attacks on individual Progressive Alliance members.

We don't begrudge the URL their particular brand of aggression, but it was a rough thing to endure.  We didn't respond in kind, though, and we made sure to acknowledge the URL as valid choices with passionate and decent Talossans in their leadership.  We still believe that's true.  Still, it's hard to work with anyone when you know that private conversations are impossible, when they've spent months aggressively attacking you in personal terms, and when you wonder at times about their good faith.  Nonetheless, we were open about the possibility of turning the corner, and so we are still open to a confidence and supply agreement (a more typical one in this case).

At this time, we are still voting on how to proceed, deciding whether to seek a no-strings no-influence confidence and supply agreement with the IDT, or seek a confidence and supply agreement with the URL.  The vote will conclude within the week, and then we will move forward.

Whatever happens, we will continue to try our best to live up to our ideals and help make Talossa a better place, and that will always be true.

-Baron Alexandreu Davinescu, Progressive Alliance Leader.

[Breneir Tzaracomprada]

Tough spot you're in. I send wishes for a wise decision by the PA, we might be headed for another election pretty soon.