Article: Government Changes

[J Bytheway]

The court section says that there is no limit to the number of terms served by a judge - does this mean that they are not subject to a limit of consecutive terms? If so, the articles are in contradiction.

How about using '(s)he' for 'he or she' - that doesn't break up the phrases so much. Some of these clauses are quite gramatically complex, and it would be nice to avoid unnecessary overcomplications.

We can't have a run-off poll in case of a tie because there won't be enough time - I thought that lengthening the time for the first poll was the main purpose in removing the second.

[Pedrunn]

We can't have a run-off poll in case of a tie because there won't be enough time - I thought that lengthening the time for the first poll was the main purpose in removing the second.

Exacly!!!
A run off poll will make the game halt what i dont think it is a good thing. Thats why i am for the other ways to decide. Not to mention that some time there may be times where there will be only two candidates. So a run-off poll will be reductant.

unlimited terms............ Why should we limit it?

About number of terms: I think a citzen can run as many times as a he wants for the same government position. But i do think we must limit the number of consecutive terms of a citizen.
Two or Three consecutive times is really ok for me but try picturing a single citzen in the government in the same position during four times or more!
It really is too much!!! I am against unlimited consecutive turns.
Other thing: if the number of consective turns has ended the citizen will be allowed to run in others governement positions if not the same. And this cycle is a good thing for our democracy.
By the way here in Brazil the max number is two like the american constitution (it used to be one but the current president got aproved an amendment to change to two four years ago. So that he could be re-elected. And he was.

How about using '(s)he' for 'he or she' - that doesn't break up the phrases so much. Some of these clauses are quite gramatically complex, and it would be nice to avoid unnecessary overcomplications.

We can use another anaforic word like "the cizen" or "The person". It will look much beter. I also agree on the not break of a sentence.

[H Tower]

pedrunn, can we get a new update of the article with the poll results of teh term limit poll added in. I think we should be holding an up or down vote on the acceptability of each article of the constitution by the weekend

[Gilgamensch]

Why should we bother about he/she, we can use OUR name:

Apolymurian

decided in this threat


And again I stay for unlimited as I don't see any reason to not allow somebody again, just because he has reached the maximum number of turns...........

It is really us deciding...... Not like in virtual life, where it is decided by somebody else..........

[Locutus]

I think '(s)he' is good. In fact, I tried to use (s)he as much as possible already but because I always pronounce that as 'he or she' myself, I screwed up here...

As far as number of terms go, it should be limited so people are forced to give up their position to someone else every now and then, but other than that it should be as flexible as possible so we don't get in trouble with filling the seats...

As far as tie situations go: if there is a tie for the position of Interior Minister, the new cabinet can just start working while the old Interior Minister stays in power until a new one is elected through a run-off poll(i.e. normally 3 days later). I don't see why that would be a problem.

Gilgamensch,
Actually, one of the votes in that poll was by a non-Citizen, so as far as I'm concerned, it's still a draw

[Locutus]

On part 2 of this article, which has so far not been discussed, I would like to change one thing: the order of (a) and (b) should IMHO be reversed: if someone is to be impeached, the Court should be requested to investigate if there is sufficient grounds for impeachment. If so, a Resolution poll can be held to decide on the actual impeachment. Some elaboration is also needed:

(a) Any Citizen may bring the case of impeachment of an elected Minister, President, or Judge to a member of the Court.
(b) The Court shall review the allegations made, allow an answer by the accused, and by a vote determine if there are proper and legal grounds to hold a Resolution poll to decide on impeachment. If the accusations are found to be without legal merit, the allegations shall be dismissed.
(c) Should a member of the Court be the subject of impeachment, he shall not take part in the decision by The Court. The President shall sit in his place for the sole determination of whether the impeachment has merit, and shall be considered a “Judge” for that vote only.
(d) If the Court decides there are grounds for impeachment, it shall start a poll in which it clearly states the person to be impeached and outlines the events that led to the impeachment. If the impeachment is confirmed by a majority of the voters in the poll, the officer in question can no longer practice its function.

The rest of that section seems pretty much okay to me.

[Pedrunn]

What if the people decides to impeachs a president just because he is not doing a good job? This has no legal grounds.
Unless you dont want to have this to be a cause for a impeachment not to generate hard-feelings.

[Locutus]

Well, if the people give him bad orders, is the President to blame or are the people?

If he doesn't follow orders, he can be impeached, if the people don't give adequate or plain bad orders, they should get their own mess sorted out first, before blaiming the president. Exactly why I think a Court investigation is needed before impeachment is started

[Gilgamensch]

Locutus,

you want to say that the new system is still not working !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So shall we wait for the system working or run another poll?

Pedrunn,

what is wrong with it?

According to the this the court would first have to decide on it and afterwards us.

And if he is really doing a bad job, let's start a revolution ahmmmmmmm I mean a poll. ( I still hope we'll never run into this problem )

general:

Some remarks:

2a was thinking of any citizen not involved into the impeachment..... but not sure about.......
2b Shouldn't it be first the senior judge, in case he is impeached the president
vote within in the court, being publish afterwards ? something like this........
2d person to be impeached and outlines the events of the impeachment and the defence of the impeached citizen............
also maybe a little change: poll, the office in question will be vaccand and new elections will have to be hold for it......

My idea for it.........

[Pedrunn]

if the people give him bad orders, is the President to blame or are the people?

What about the ministers? They do have some freedom of deciding what to do?

And if he is really doing a bad job, let's start a revolution ahmmmmmmm I mean a poll. ( I still hope we'll never run into this problem )

Exacly. And the resolution poll will be the revolution. I know you are exagerating but thats what i think from the beginning. The resolution poll is to give the power to citizen as if a protest/revolution. If the majority of the community accept it has to be accepted.

Resolution/Revolution. just a change int the 's' to 'v', See!!!

[Locutus]

Originally posted by Gilgamensch
you want to say that the new system is still not working !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No, not yet. I'll ask Markos to speed things up but in the end it's his call. We wouldn't want this kind of feature to be buggy and randomly disalllow people from posting or voting

So shall we wait for the system working or run another poll?

No, since we don't know how long it will take. If noone can agree on this, we may need to do a revote (I think some people were considering to change their vote, but I don't know how serious they are) or flip a coin...

2a was thinking of any citizen not involved into the impeachment..... but not sure about.......

You mean someone can't impeach himself?
Oh wait, you mean a Judge? I suppose that would make sense...

2b Shouldn't it be first the senior judge, in case he is impeached the president
vote within in the court, being publish afterwards ? something like this........

Not sure what you mean? The senior Justice should decide on his own if an Impeachment is legal or not? Hmm, I think the entire Court should be involved in an important decision such as this one. Of course, cases of impeachment should be filed to the Senior Justice and if he thinks they make no sense whatsoever, they can be dismissed off-hand, but if the filer of the case can give a good reason for impeachment, these cases should be taken seriously and looked at by the entire Court. Yes, all votes of the Court should IMHO be published in the Court report thread after they took place.

2d person to be impeached and outlines the events of the impeachment and the defence of the impeached citizen............
also maybe a little change: poll, the office in question will be vaccand and new elections will have to be hold for it......

Note sure what you mean here either. You first need to impeach someone before you can hold new elections. This section just deals with the impeachment part, as soon as someone is impeached, sections 2(c) and beyond of Pedrunn's proposal will take over to get someone else to take over the office.

[Gilgamensch]

Pedrunn,

Good one, didn't think about this one (s/v)


And the other: Yes, WE have the power

Locutus,

*whine* So I think we'll have to do a rerun............

Sorry , yes talking about a judge....

Yes, as you described, if the claim is 'rubbish' down the hill by the senior judge

NOOOOOO, it was some minor changes to what you wrote, just didn't want to type all........

So I redo:

(d) If the Court decides there are grounds for impeachment, it shall start a poll in which it clearly states the person to be impeached and outlines the events that led to the impeachment and the defence of the impeached (citizen). If the impeachment is confirmed by a majority of the voters in the poll, the office in question will be vaccant and new elections will have to be hold for it.

EDIT: typos

[Locutus]

Originally posted by Gilgamensch
the office in question will be vaccant and new elections will have to be hold for it.

I disagree. I want to keep 2(c), (d), (e) and (f) of Pedrunn's original proposal (in the first post of this thread) in place. So the Court may appoint some other Citizen and depending on when the election are, this Citizen will serve the rest of the term or be replaced by an elected official (otherwise we whould have to stop the game for a week, that's not a good idea IMHO).

[Gilgamensch]

Sorry, forgotten about this one. I think we have to get a new updated version about it, I lost a bit track.

But what you think about the other minor adjustments?

[Locutus]

Yes, I'm sure Pedrunn will update later. I agree on the other suggestions.

[Pedrunn]

Right after we decide the impeachment question:

There will have to be legal grounds or just the majority of the people is enough to make someone impeach?

better I start a poll?

[Gilgamensch]

Let's hope he will

[Locutus]

Well, start a poll if you must but if you can impeach people for doing a bad job and the only reason why people are doing a bad job is because they get bad orders, you sort of enter a repeating cycle that could potentially destroy the game. The legislative branch of the government should be the most powerful one but not omnipotent...

[Gilgamensch]

It will be up the court to decide, so there will be have to be legal ground.

but again somebody could claim: President did not follow order 152 a.b

[Locutus]

Exactly: if someone claims that, the Court will investigate. If it's false, the case will be dismissed. If it's true and the violation is serious enough to warrant impeachment (unless it's something really trivial this should usually be the case), the Court can start an impeachment poll and then the people can decide if it's actually enough to warrant impeachment or whether it should be tolerated...

[Pedrunn]

UPDATE: I will start a poll about the impeachment issue.


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2) Impeachment, Resignations or Assassination.

(a) The impeachment of an officer in a government position is decided with a resolution type of poll accordingly to the rules for it in the polling article.
(b)If a member of the Court is the subject of impeachment, he shall not take part in the Court decision. The President shall sit in his place for the sole determination of whether the impeachment has merit, and shall be considered a Judge for that vote only.
(c) If confirmed by the Court that an officer was killed or an impeachment resolution is confirmed, the office in question will be vaccant and new elections will have to be hold for it.
(d) If an officer resigns it will be asked to him to keep in his function until the end of the new election to decide who will replace him. Therefore overrruling paragraph 2-(e).
(e) Until the end of election poll the citizen for the vaccant office, the Court will choose a willing citizen to takes its place. The Court shall give preference for one of its member or the citizen who disputed the office with the impeached person in the last election. This chosen will have the name temporary before the name of the government position.
(f) If the officer term that no longer can practice its function, was going to end in less than two weeks. The temporary officer will keep in the power until the end of the government position term. Otherwise a new election process for the position in question shall start and the temporary officer will be in power only until a new officer for the position is not chosen.
(g) The temporary officer will not start a new term. So it shall not be considered a new governemnt. Therefore the temporary officer government wont be added to the count explained in law 1-(f) and 1-(j) of this article.
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Did i miss anything. It really is becaming hard to follow the stuff discussed.

[Gilgamensch]

2e ??????
2f ???????

Sounds a bit like for those two you lost yourself a bit :wink:

2d: I guess you mean:
If an officer resigns, s(he) will be asked to stay in office until the end of the new election, deciding who will replace him, therefore overrruling paragraph 2-(e).

In 2e, we might want to shorten the phrase:

This chosen will have the name temporary before the name of the government position.

to:

This choosen will have the name temp(orary) before the name of the government position.

[J Bytheway]

I suggest the following (mainly grammatical, again) changes to clear things up:

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2) Impeachment, Resignations or Assassination.

(a) The impeachment of an officer in a government position is decided with a resolution poll according to the rules for it in the polling article.
(b) If a member of the Court is the subject of impeachment, he shall not take part in the Court decision. The President shall sit in his place for the sole determination of whether the impeachment has merit, and shall be considered a Judge for that vote only.
(c) If confirmed by the Court that an officer was killed or an impeachment resolution is confirmed, the office in question will be vaccant and new elections will have to be held for it.
(d) If an officer wishes to resign (s)he will be asked to remain in the office until the end of the election to decide who will replace him. This overrules paragraph 2(e). If the officer is unwilling to remain in office then paragraph 2(e) applies.
(e) Until another citizen is elected to fill the office in question, the Court will choose a willing citizen to fill that office. The Court shall give preference to its members or the citizen who disputed the office with the impeached person in the last election [I'm not sure about this sentance. Do you mean: "those citizens who were candidates for the office in the last election"?]. The chosen citizen will have the word temporary as a prefix to the name of the office (s)he holds.
(f) If the term of an office filled by a temporary officer will end in less than two weeks the temporary officer will remain in the office until the end of the term. Otherwise a new election process for the office in question shall start and the temporary officer will remain in the office only until a new officer for the position is elected.
(g) The time spent as a temporary officer will not count as a term in office, and will not be added to the count explained in law 1-(f) and 1-(j) of this article.
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You've started using 'officer' - this is a rather strange term, but I think I like it, given that they are in an office. In any case, I think we might need a glossary of terms to make it clear the difference between the different classes of citizen (minister, judge, officer, etc.) so as to make future articles coonsistent.

What is assassination supposed to refer to? It is never mentioned in this article.

Also, when a judge is impeached, does the President have any say in the replacement chosen by the court?

[H Tower]

How often were we planning on having terms for again? 1 month? or was it 2 months?

Because If its only one month, i think that 2f is unecessary, but if terms are two months or more, then I like the fact that 2f exists.

Just a few little bumps and the conversations jump into high gear

[Pedrunn]

UPDATE

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Article: Government Changes

1) Elections.

(a) The Court is empowered to oversee all elections and is empowered to resolve any election disputes according to the rules in this Constitution.
(b) An election for a given government position is started if the term of the position has ended or the person in the position can no longer perfom his duties.
(c) If the reason for an election is the end of a term, the election process must start seven days before the end of the given government position term. The previous official will remain in office until the end of the term or until a new candidate is elected, whichever is the later.
(d) If the reason is the decision that the person in the government position can no longer perfom his duties, the election process must start immediately after this decision is made. Until a new candidate has been elected, the other members of the branch of government in question will appoint a substitute to temporarily take over the open position, allowing the game to continue.
(e) At the start of the election process, all citizens who wish to be candidates for an office must publicly express their candidacy. For this they have two days. No citizen may be a candidate for an elected office if such candidacy might cause him to be in more than one elected office simultaneously.
(f) Once the time in which citizens may express their candidacy for a given elected office has expired, the Court will create an Election poll (see Article II, section 3.I) for the office, with the names of the candidates as options. The poll shall expire in five days.
(g) If only one candidate is available for an office, a Yes/No poll shall be held to decide if this person may serve in this office. This poll shall expire in five days.
(h) The candidate who received the majority of the votes and the election thread expires, this person will be declared the new holder of the office for which he was a candidate.
(i) In case of a tie in the election poll, the other elected members of the same branch of government position in question will vote again to decide which one of the tied candidates will take over this position.


2) Impeachment, Resignations or Assassination.

(a) Any Citizen may bring the case of impeachment of an elected Minister, President, or Judge to a member of the Court.
(b) The Court shall review the allegations made, allow an answer by the accused, and by a vote determine if there are proper and legal grounds to hold a Resolution poll to decide on impeachment. If the accusations are found to be without legal merit, the allegations shall be dismissed.
(c) Should a member of the Court be the subject of impeachment, he shall not take part in the decision by The Court. The President shall sit in his place for the sole determination of whether the impeachment has merit, and shall be considered a “Judge” for that vote only.
(d) If the Court decides there are grounds for impeachment, it shall start a poll in which it clearly states the person to be impeached and outlines the events that led to the impeachment. If the impeachment is confirmed by a majority of the voters in the poll, the officer in question can no longer practice its function and a election poll must start to decide who will replace him.
(e) If an officer wishes to resign (s)he will be asked to remain in the office until the end of the election to decide who will replace him. This overrules paragraph 2(e). If the officer is unwilling to remain in office then paragraph 2(e) applies.
(f) Until another citizen is elected to fill the office in question, the Court will choose a willing citizen to fill that office. The Court shall give preference to its members or the citizen who disputed the office with the impeached person in the last election. The chosen citizen will have the word temporary as a prefix to the name of the office (s)he holds.
(g) If the term of an office filled by a temporary officer will end in less than two weeks the temporary officer will remain in the office until the end of the term. Otherwise a new election process for the office in question shall start and the temporary officer will remain in the office only until a new officer for the position is elected.
(h) The time spent as a temporary officer will not count as a term in office, and will not be added to the count explained in law 1-(f) and 1-(j) of this article.
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- Chapter 1, Section about the maximum consecutive number of turns a citizen can run for the same government postition was removed since the citzens voted that there shouldnt have such a limit

- Chapter 1, section i merge of others sections and totally changed the process of untie an election.

- Chapter 2, sections a to d completely re-newed to fit the Locutus idea of impeachment voted by the majority.

- Chapter 2, J ByTheWay gramatic corrections added.

[H Tower]

i'm looking at 1i, and that provides a temporary solution to the problem, but it offers no advice on to fix it.

or is that described in the polling article?

all the overlap makes my head spin

[Pedrunn]

oops, the "temporarily" was a mistake. Actually, The ministers votes will decide the definitive (that will go til the end of the term)oficer for the gov position.

[H Tower]

now that that is fixed, I think this article is ready to be presented to the people.

one last final question though, you and locutus have both proposed a different order for the articles, which was decided on, and do the references in this article refer to the correct article?

[Gilgamensch]

I know Pedrunn, you gonna shoot me

1d)

(d) If the reason is the decision that the person in the government position can no longer perfom his duties, the election process must start immediately after this decision is made.

So, let's wait another day and start to poll about

We get moving

[Pedrunn]

What!!! Did you invented another mistake in may perfect article

Dont you have sense of danger!
If you do that again you are going to take a ride in a ambulance



BTW, good point! It is fixed now

Actually, if i make the constitution waiting the mistakes to happen since i am not a native english speaker.

I believe we are finish with this article.