Election: President

[Ninot]

Trip and I are very pleased to announce this election is now ended.

Your Winners, by agreement

Ninot and Trip

We have come to the conclusion that this vote has gotten out of hand. The only reasonable conclusion is that you, the citizens, want both of us. A 1 vote difference for victory would be ridiculous in any case.

So for the best of the nation, Trip and I have decided to split the duties of President, and we will both serve you with the abilities we offer.

Thank you.

[Spiffor]

Ninot : you are definitely a man of dialogue

[notyoueither]

That is very good news Ninot. The alternatives are... unpleasant to think about.

I don't know about the rest of you, but something is very fishy around these parts. There are a few people on these boards who would have very little trouble creating DLs by the bucket load. Has anyone noticed that there are 32 new registrations on Poly so far today? That's fairly high.

What does everyone else think?

[Apocalypse]

Hmmm...a coalition government. This makes up for a partisan like Timeline winning the VP race.

[Ninot]

Originally posted by Spiffor
Ninot : you are definitely a man of dialogue

Trip was as well, dont forget

[notyoueither]

Anyone concerned about the integrity of our elections?

[Ninot]

I am slightly. It was fishy how much this vote was tied, but i think in the conclusion we reached, any lack of integrity is nullified in the fact that now the nation will be getting only the best from two sources.

But I don't point fingers as far as DL's are concerned. I know I didn't create any, and I am sure Trip never would think of making one either. Beyond that, its hard to control the integrity of the election very well.

[Spiffor]

As we can't know if the elections were cheatless, we can only hope no one used DLs. Maybe we could ask Ming, but I doubt he'll check all IPs of all voters

[notyoueither]

I have been discussing this with Ming. Unfortunately no help there.

re DLs. I trust that none of our own would do such a thing. I am thinking of some of the more... eccentric personalities who animate some of the other forums both here and on other boards.

/Edit. Ming was very quick to reply, and seemed genuinely helpful. Just he said it could not be done (check the voters).

[notyoueither]

No, I don't mean cfc either.

[Inverse Icarus]

Thats a damn lie and he knows it! it has to log the user ID or the Username so it can make sure u dont vote twice. a php script could be rigged up in no time.

[Moral Hazard]

Another conclusion is that the voters wanted neither of you ala Gore/Bush

[notyoueither]

UberKruX. It may very well be a site policy.

This is our democracy game. The gods may very well consider that managing ourselves is our own affair, not theirs.

If they get involved on this one, they might be inviting a storm of off site abuse which could bog us (and them) down.

[Papa Chubby]

So what you are doing is essentially throwing away the constitution that we the people have elected upon, because you believe that co=hosting presidency would be more fair. Ninot may have barely won, but he won nonetheless. Now don't take me as somekind of Ninot sympathiser, because I'm not, I actually voted for Trip. These things don's change the fact that Ninot won by a majority vote, no matter how close, it was a majority vote. Therefore Ninot should be president, Trip good run and liked having you as the president, but you should not be in the picture.

[notyoueither]

Actually Papa, the poll is still open.

Ninot anounced an agreement between he and Trip to minimize the impact of what is looking strongly like some kind of fraud.

[Moral Hazard]

Actually I have to agree with Papa Chubby. I don't believe a two person presidency is beneficial.

[Ninot]

Originally posted by Papa Chubby
So what you are doing is essentially throwing away the constitution that we the people have elected upon, because you believe that co=hosting presidency would be more fair. Ninot may have barely won, but he won nonetheless. Now don't take me as somekind of Ninot sympathiser, because I'm not, I actually voted for Trip. These things don's change the fact that Ninot won by a majority vote, no matter how close, it was a majority vote. Therefore Ninot should be president, Trip good run and liked having you as the president, but you should not be in the picture.

Trip is a very willing member of this community, and will continue to be.

I could have said no to Trip and waited to probably see the election tie again, and then one of us would pull ahead no doubt, and then it would tie.. and its a viscious cycle.

But when Trip and I agreed to go into a co-presidency, we did so with only one thought in mind, the well-being of the nation.

If you want to stick to whatever the poll gives as a final result, feel free to. If I win, I will most certainly share all my powers with Trip, and I believe if he pulls ahead, the same things applies.

But winning with less than 1% over 50 is an outrage.

[Ninot]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Ninot anounced an agreement between he and Trip to minimize the impact of what is looking strongly like some kind of fraud.

As NYE as pointed out, with this election so UNBELIEVABLY close after 121 voters, its hard to believe there werent one or two DL's in that mix. We could repoll, but that delays the decision. We could use what was proposed in an ammendment, but that ammendment hasnt been accepted by the people yet.

Neither of us were in this race for the power. We're in it to help this nation. Having two of us can't be any worse than just one.

[Papa Chubby]

Ninot outrage or not, winning is winning. We agreed upon that the candidate would be chosen by majority vote, and whether you like it or not, winning by one is winning by majority. Why is that you might ask, because we, the community of Apolytania agreed upon this. You nor Trip have the authority to simply breach that agreement.

[Ninot]

Trip tried to pass an ammendment a week before the elections began.

It was shot down.

IN the ammendment, it was stated that the Presidency could never have more than 1 person in it.

Also, i believe it had a specific stipulation about what was required for a majority win in an election.. our current constitution has NOTHING about how much of a lead is needed to win an election.

[Moral Hazard]

Given that it is Ninot and Trip who want to share the presidency, I don't think that any real problems will arise. I just want to make sure that the two of you make sure that you delegate responsibility amongst each other. In my management duties I have never put two people in charge of the same thing, as it often allows things to fall between the cracks. Other reasons for avoiding dual delegation don't apply here, since you don't really have underlings. That is my only really concern.

As I stated before Ninot and Trip seem to comunicate quite well together, but even then miscommunications etc. can arise. I still would prefer a single president.

About the constitution I think that it actually says 51% So there is a loophole.

[Donal Graeme]

I think that we can all agree that some election reform is needed. I had not realized before that it was so easy to alter the polls. Perhaps something can be done, like using posts... no that wouldn't work. An Australian ballot is very important for Democracy, unfortunately it can also lead to fraud. Another thing, in the future we should realize there may be more than two candidates. This means we should amend the constitution to include a runoff feature should one candidate not get a majority. And I think that there really should be only one president. A Troika is not an effective governing systems, as the compromises neccessary tend to lead to indecisiveness. In a way, its very similar to the Soviet system of government, with no one truly in control.

P.S. For those who are not history majors... That is a bad thing.

[Robber Baron]

Originally posted by Papa Chubby
...we, the community of Apolytania agreed upon this. You nor Trip have the authority to simply breach that agreement.

I'm not sure I agree. My feeling is that some "electoral fraud" has taken place here (DL is so easy to pull off in this case -- doesn't take hacking) -- not just because of the tie, but because it kept reasserting itself. I don't see this election result as the "will of the people."
And I do see the leadership Trip and Ninot are displaying as a very presidential effort to craft a result that IS the will of the people. (After all, the mainstream in both parties support basically the same strategy, at this stage in the game.)
It's dangerous to go on a gut feeling on this sort of thing, I suppose. So I'll keep an open mind.
For now, I want to hear more people on the issue.
And meanwhile, I applaud Trip and Ninot for handling this so deftly.

[Moral Hazard]

Actually I double checked and it doesn't say a damn thing.

[Epistax]

I have no problem with this decision, although I miht feel a little sorry for the VP during the term. As long as they act in one voice, and don't slow things down, a legion of people could be the president.

[Papa Chubby]

Now lets get something straight right from the beginning. When I stated that Trip should be out of the picture if he lost. What I meant was that if he lost he should no longer have anything to do with the presidency.

Another thing I would like to say is that I personally have nothing against either of you, and am quite sure that either one of you would do a good job as a president. In fact it would not matter if I intenselly hated the guy that won, I still could not accept this deal between you two.

The next thing that you talk about is the co-hosting, well that might be true, but you ran against one-another as opponents. You should stick with what you initially chose. Another thing, maybe we never decided what fraction or percentage would constitute as a majority vote, but common sense tells us that majority is where the most people are, or in our case, into which corner the most votes are cast. We never defnined any minimum requirement for a majority, so anything that is not losing or even, is majority.

[notyoueither]

Papa. There is nothing I am aware of in the consitution that would prevent the person with the most votes from naming the other as a deputy.

[Robber Baron]

This scenario, btw, makes a great case for a judiciary -- if not to find the rules to apply, at least to cloak our co-presidents' admittedly ad hoc maneuver with some kind of legitimacy.

My great fear: are we creating a precedent that will encourage future episodes of election rigging? Worth considering. (I know -- I'm talking on both sides of the issue.

[Robber Baron]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Papa. There is nothing I am aware of in the consitution that would prevent the person with the most votes from naming the other as a deputy.

Don't have the constitution handy, but ...
Does the language describing the duties and responsibilites of the VP conflict with the notion of a "deputy" president?

[Nubclear]

Hmm.....This will definately make for an interesting write.