Removals from the Regional Assembly

If I read Schnauzers correctly, it would be up to the AG to pursue the matter in court. He didn't speak to the issue of simply re-applying to the RA. I don't understand why that most expeditious of solutions would not be the preferred course of action.
 
imo, we rely on the courts too much in TNP. The simplest thing would be for officials simply to enforce the laws as they are supposed to, rather than saying "take me to court to force me."

However, it will be interesting to see what our next Chief Justice will make of this.
 
Regardless of what nonsense is being spewed out now, at the end of the Judicial elections the RA list must be updated, it is directly written into the law.

The law is quite clear on the matter of RA acceptance and removals, no one is exempt, no one is above the law. I will not tolerate abuses of power and I will not allow such a blatant violation to occur, the list will be updated correctly at that time and the Speaker will not extend a "special privilege" to himself because he feels like he's earned one.
 
I don't see what this talk of the Court ruling regarding abstentions has to do with anything. Far as I can tell the Court ruled that all majorities required are absolute, and therefore abstains are functionally no different than nay. They did not rule that an explicitly posted abstain did not count for activity requirements.

Govindia, your continued citation of tradition is irrelevant. Written law trumps tradition. You may be of the personal opinion that the law overriding this tradition is a poor and short-sighted one, but it is the law and so long as it's in force it must be followed. Likewise, just because the law was never enforced in the past and people broke it then, doesn't mean those people were in the right or that the law is any less the law.

The facts are clear. The law says that any person who does not vote in two consecutive votes started at least 3 days apart, will lose their RA membership. You did not vote in two votes begun 3 days apart from one another. Thus under this law you lose your RA membership. I have so far seen no good argument why the law doesn't apply in this case.

Govindia, do the right thing, accept that the law is the law, even when you personally don't like it, and remove yourself from the RA and just reapply instead of stalling.
 
Gulliver, Grosse gave his opinion.

Again, stop it with your personal vendetta against me. Do not come and start attacking me saying "the law requires this", because it is YOU who are applying the hypocritical double standards with previous speakers - even when Grosse was speaker and didn't force them out of the assembly. You can't even ask for public transpareancy and accountablity from your buddy the Delegate re: the appointments and then you demand it of me.

Stop your hypocritical double standards and show some respect for once. I will be removing the other people from the RA for missing two consecutive votes, but not myself because I followed the custom and general operationg rule previous speakers have followed without opposition from YOU or anyone else. I suggest before you preach about standards and the law to me, you preach about it to BW until he learns about the concept of public transparency and accountability.

Until then, my ruling stands. Deal with it. I"ve done my best, with Grosse's help to keep things orderly as Acting Speaker since Limi resigned and now you bring you petty 3 year old NS vendetta against me here. Grow up and get over it and learn to act like an adult. Stop your silly feud against that you and others had from Taijitu and elsewhere with your double standards and hypocrisy.
 
The following members missed both the Delegate Request for Foreign Intervention and The Order of Succession, Executive Officer Selection, and Abstentions Omnibus Reform Act (some are repeats of those listed earlier):

Govindia
A mean old man +
Greene2010
Aleksotopia
Kinetic
Mycan*
AnimeFreak*
UncleJughead*
Todd McCloud*

Those marked with a + voted abstain or present in one of the votes. Those marked with a * would need to have an admin check when they were given their RA masking to determine if they were even able to cast their vote.

These votes were started 3 days apart and there is nothing in the law stating that the votes cannot overlap in any way. If the votes were required to not overlap then this makes the requirement their start dates be 3 days or more apart irrelevant as the shortest period for a RA vote is 5 days.
 
Grosseschnauzer:
First, Govindia as acting Speaker has been following the custom of the Speaker not voting unless his vote makes a difference in the outcome or to reach quorum. Limi slightly revised that policy due to the Court's recent decision, but that did not affect the custom.

As to any other removals due to voting, many of these voting periods recently overlapped and therefore did not meet the definitional requirement that the two voting periods had to be separated by at least three days. When that change was adopted, it was specifically included to prevent overlapping voting periods from causing removals.

We also have the need to document voting in the elections in this overlapping situation, so I am overruling Flemingovia on this matter. If Govindia decides as Acting Speaker that they deserve removals, then he'll have that opportunity to make that decision.

Edited to note:
On 29 March, rufusexc posted a notice of an announced absence from the R.A. between 1 and 14 April see post in the Registration area

I will also note that there may be other members, recently admitted, who may have also missed two votes as well not included in the list raised by flemingovia. Again, for the time being, I will have to leave those for the Acting Speaker.
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quoting Grosse's original post.

Limi, you didn't vote either on things so by your own logic you should have been removed before you resigned.
 
As I said earlier there was 1 item opened while I was Speaker, I did not vote in this item. There were multiple items up for vote prior to me becoming Speaker, I voted in all of these. Therefore I only missed 1 vote before resigning and could not have been removed from the RA.
 
Until then, my ruling stands.
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I will be removing the other people from the RA for missing two consecutive votes, but not myself
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Admin note:

Since Grosse has weather issues and Eluvatar has gone walkabout, could you let me know precisely which nations are to be remasked as no longer in the Regional Assembly? I am getting rather confused as to exactly who is above the law these days.
 
Blue Wolf II:
This is perhaps the dumbest situation TNP has ever encountered. I have lost all faith in the standing laws and our ability to enforce them.
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Exactly. The law VERY clearly states that Govindia should not be in the Regional Assembly. And yet, because Govindia would like to stay in the Regional Assembly despite written law says ANY member missing two consecutive votes will be removed. Govindia has acknowledged that missing those votes results in removals by declaring that all of the nations who missed the votes besides himself would be removed. There is no distinction in the law that exempts the Speaker from this rule, again, the Speaker is inventing laws.

By removing Regional Assembly Members for missing the same number of votes as Govindia himself has missed, it is very clear that at the very least Gov has violated the ninth article in the Bill of Rights:
9. Each Nation in The North Pacific is guaranteed the organization and operation of the governmental authorities of the region on fundamental principles of democracy, accountability, and transparency. No action by the governmental authorities of the region shall deny to any Nation of The North Pacific, due process of law, including prior notice and the opportunity to be heard, nor deny to any Nation of The North Pacific the equal and fair treatment and protection of the provisions of this Constitution. No governmental authority shall have power to adopt or impose an ex post facto law or a bill of attainder as to any act for purposes of criminal proceedings.[/u]
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Emphasis mine.
The Speaker has decided that the law on removals applies to all members except himself, when there is absolutely know basis for such reasoning in the law. This, again, is laughably embarassing for a region that supposedly values its democratic and fair values.
 
Stop being stubborn Govindia. Apply the law, remove yourself from the assembly and reapply. You could have done this already, but instead you are wasting time by not doing so. Are you even eligible to be running for speaker, given your membership has lapsed?

No matter what you may want it to be, convention/tradition is not the law. Deal with it.
 
Topid, previous speakers, including Grosse, AMOM, Limi, etc. have not been removed for missing votes and they didn't vote in threads as Speaker. Explain that. It's double standards to apply it to me now and not them then.

This personal vendetta people seem to have really must stop Why else would people bring it up now?
 
It's not a personal vendetta, it's the law. I can honestly say I am not aware of any other Speaker being in violation of the Two Vote membership requirement rule and even if they were, it was not under my watch as delegate. Stop making up excuses for your mistake, just own up to it, and serve out the rest of the term with grace.
 
I think this has gone far enough, and there is nothing more to be gained by pursuing this matter. Govindia has made it completely clear that he is not going to obey the laws of the region, and that he is going to apply the law to others but not to himself.

If a delegate acted in this manner, he would be called a Rogue Delegate. I see no reason to regard Govindia in any other way. I regard him now as a Rogue Speaker. Grosse will no doubt see things otherwise, but personally I will not be doing any remasking, admissions or dismissals at his behest. Nobody should be above the law.
 
I believe we should take this to the courts for it to be dealt with. As he should not be a member of the assembly, he also should be ineligible to run for speaker. I agree with Flem, enough is enough.
 
Govindia:
Topid, previous speakers, including Grosse, AMOM, Limi, etc. have not been removed for missing votes and they didn't vote in threads as Speaker. Explain that. It's double standards to apply it to me now and not them then.

This personal vendetta people seem to have really must stop Why else would people bring it up now?
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Gov, you're starting to sound like Kurds. There is no conspiracy theory here, it's not about you and really you're the one who has made this far more of an issue than it needs to be.

Limi didn't violate the law, as he has already explained, and historically clearly nobody has noticed that other speakers have violated the law - in hindsight they obviously did but as is usual in TNP nobody noticed. It has now been noticed and it wouldn't matter whether it was you, Grosse, AMOM or whoever was Speaker when it was noticed, they would have to lose their membership in the RA.

The fact that every previous speaker got away with it, doesn't mean that you can ignore it now it's been brought to light - two wrongs don't make a right and all that. You'd make life a lot easier for yourself if you just accepted that and got on with it and reapplied. Otherwise it's just going to get to the Courts for judicial review and they'll remove you instead. What is to be gained by making such an issue out of it, I think everyone realises now it's a stupid law but you guys enacted it and we have to follow it.
 
Oh I see. Gov is running for Speaker, and would be ineligible if he is out of the RA and has to re-apply. Hmmm.. I guess he'll just have to wait and run the next time. I'm sure he doesn't mind waiting, though it would be nice if he didn't have to.
 
Govindia:
Topid, previous speakers, including Grosse, AMOM, Limi, etc. have not been removed for missing votes and they didn't vote in threads as Speaker. Explain that. It's double standards to apply it to me now and not them then.

This personal vendetta people seem to have really must stop Why else would people bring it up now?
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Limi explained his term. There was only one vote during his term. You can't be removed for missing two votes, if there is but one. Most likely, no one ever looked at it before. No one ever noticed that even though the Grosse and AMOM posted they were not voting. Now someone noticed.

Regardless of if you think it is fair, you cannot ignore the laws of the region now. The law is the law is the law. Your choosing to ignore it tells a great deal about what is really important to you, your personal goal to hold the speaker position or The North Pacific's dignity and honour. Bad choice, in my opinion.

If Blue Wolf II ejected your nation today, would you accept the defense "JAL ejected a whole lot of nations in his term and he was not removed for it!" No. That is irrelevant. The law says it cannot be done.
 
Govindia:
Stop your hypocritical double standards and show some respect for once. I will be removing the other people from the RA for missing two consecutive votes, but not myself
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I will respond later today. I have some RL matters to attend to first.

Insulting me and not speaking to me in a respectful manner, is not going to help your case, for the record.
 
Blue Wolf II:
This is perhaps the dumbest situation TNP has ever encountered. I have lost all faith in the standing laws and our ability to enforce them.
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Or worse yet, when some of the laws are actually enforced.

Besides, stop questioning the status quo. You might present a security threat to the region for questioning the status quo...

:duh: :fish: :lol:
 
Govindia:
Insulting me and not speaking to me in a respectful manner, is not going to help your case, for the record.
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What case? The law has been thrown out the window. We're just lucky you're allowing those of us who observed your power grab have been allowed to remain in the RA, or have not had their application denied in my case. Once you've decided you're willing to ignore laws for a new term there is really no hope to changing anything.
 
Have any of you even tried to ask the Court to intervene?

Of course not. The elections will be over in three days anyhow.

And I find this interesting, specially since it appears to be a defacto application of what I observed earlier: Limi's suggested list of potential removals

There are a couple of spreadsheets, Limi, as you know, and I have taken the colorful one I originally set up to track votes, and the one Elu set up to track RA member verification with links, downloaded them, updated them through the present, and sent them to Gov. The one for verification has all of the R.A. admission dates listed, as does the one thread in the registration area.

When Elu first did his reorganization of the forums a few weeks ago, he had the membership link go to a version of the spreadsheet, rather than the one thread. I'm confused by that. But the thread did include the most recent admission date for those new members, and the one spreadsheet I originated has the voting period for all voting (in elections and everything else) up to the current voting that has been underway.

Speaking of which does anyone actually know what is going on with Elu? It weird because although he hasn't logged onto these forums or hasn't had any action with his NS WA nation that's in TNP, his NS nation in Taijitu at nationstates.net has had activity in the last two days. Very, very strange.
 
Oh, Elu is still around somewhere, I just talked to him today, he's probably just busy with work.

In any case, this isn't a Court matter, its a procedural matter, on which the law is quite clear. All the Courts are going to do is confirm what we already know, that the Speaker is not except from the laws. After we'll probably have to put forth a Recall or bring Gov up on charges as I fully expect him to claim that everyone is bias against him, overuse the phrase "for once in your life" and refuse to step down.

I don't want this to last months when we are well within the ability of the law to fix it now.
 
I feel there is no other option. Govindia is showing a clear disrespect for our regional laws. Grosse is simply encouraging it. It is completely unfair and improper to choose which laws apply to others but not yourself. Customs do not overrule codified laws.
 
Topid:
Govindia:
Insulting me and not speaking to me in a respectful manner, is not going to help your case, for the record.
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What case? The law has been thrown out the window. We're just lucky you're allowing those of us who observed your power grab have been allowed to remain in the RA, or have not had their application denied in my case. Once you've decided you're willing to ignore laws for a new term there is really no hope to changing anything.
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By case I mean argument. BW's antagonising and trolling of me and the situation does not help make me listen.

If you're going to speak to me or kindly ask me to do something, do so in a civil and respectful manner. Aside from RL work matters, I haven't done anything much because of the lack of respect and courtesy given to me from primarily members of Elu's party. Attacking me, personally insulting me, mocking me, trolling me, and other forms of cyber-bullying isn't going to make me do anything you tell me to do. And that's how I feel people have been treating me at times, even before I became speaker.
 
I have been respectful towards you this entire time Govindia, as have many others, but you continue to ignore our questions and disrespect the law.

I have made a request that the court investigate your actions. I hope you lose this election, as not only should you be ineligible, we do not need someone who disrespects the law in such a position. How can you scream 'tradition!!!' over and over again, when you violate tradition by voting for yourself in the election. Shame on you.
 
Govindia:
Topid:
Govindia:
Insulting me and not speaking to me in a respectful manner, is not going to help your case, for the record.
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What case? The law has been thrown out the window. We're just lucky you're allowing those of us who observed your power grab have been allowed to remain in the RA, or have not had their application denied in my case. Once you've decided you're willing to ignore laws for a new term there is really no hope to changing anything.
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By case I mean argument. BW's antagonising and trolling of me and the situation does not help make me listen.

If you're going to speak to me or kindly ask me to do something, do so in a civil and respectful manner. Aside from RL work matters, I haven't done anything much because of the lack of respect and courtesy given to me from primarily members of Elu's party. Attacking me, personally insulting me, mocking me, trolling me, and other forms of cyber-bullying isn't going to make me do anything you tell me to do. And that's how I feel people have been treating me at times, even before I became speaker.
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How is how you feel people have treated you relevant here? Creating sympathy also does not exempt you from the law. Unless you can point at a place in the law where it says you as speaker have the legal ability to miss more than two votes without being removed then regardless of how victimized you are, regardless of what old tradition used to be, you cannot expel others for doing what you also did, without expelling yourself, as you have done.
 
Gulliver, Grosse gave his opinion.
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Which is neither legally binding nor necessarily correct.

Again, stop it with your personal vendetta against me. Do not come and start attacking me saying "the law requires this", because it is YOU who are applying the hypocritical double standards with previous speakers
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I wasn't even around for previous speakers.

You can't even ask for public transpareancy and accountablity from your buddy the Delegate re: the appointments and then you demand it of me.
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He never did anything which was in violation of the law, even if you personally didn't approve of it.

[...] now you bring you petty 3 year old NS vendetta against me here. Grow up and get over it and learn to act like an adult. Stop your silly feud against that you and others had from Taijitu and elsewhere with your double standards and hypocrisy.
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I could as just easily accuse you that the only reason you're being so obstinate with me is because you have a grudge and vendetta against me. Baseless, speculative and ultimately unprovable accusations like this won't accomplish anything.

The unfortunate fact is that you were simply screwed over by a badly thought out and overly burdensome law. You're not the first and you won't be the last until it's amended. Yes it'll suck having to wait to get back in because of the ridiculous rule about shutting down all applications mid vote or election, but I survived it.
 
mcmasterdonia:
I have been respectful towards you this entire time Govindia, as have many others, but you continue to ignore our questions and disrespect the law.

I have made a request that the court investigate your actions. I hope you lose this election, as not only should you be ineligible, we do not need someone who disrespects the law in such a position. How can you scream 'tradition!!!' over and over again, when you violate tradition by voting for yourself in the election. Shame on you.
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What questions ? I haven't seen people ask any. If people did, then I apparently missed it with BW's continued trolling.
 
OK, here is a simple one for you, and it the question pretty much everyone is asking:

"Since the law is clear that anyone who misses two votes which do not overlap should be removed from the list of Regional Assembly members, and since the law is also clear that this rule includes officials, what LEGAL (not custom or tradition or precedent) reason do you have for exempting yourself from that law?"
 
I should have mentioned this the other day, but I'll correct it now.

I've already posted my view on I would address the issue, but I'll add this:

This was the post announcing approval of the current Constitution in December 2007, during one of my earlier terms as Speaker (This is the link to the quoted post)

It appears that under the terms of the amended Cabinet Inactivity Law, both the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General have become inactive. Monte Ozarka has not even logged into the forum since November 15th, and the Deputy Attorney General, Southwest Asia has not posted in the Cabinet or Ministry areas since that time.

Accordingly, I have to find that no vote will be cast on these matters from the Attorney General.

Second, since there is no Prime Minister at this time, the Cabinet is empowered to cast the Prime Minister's vote by a plurality of the participating Cabinet members. Under that standard. the Prime Minister's vote is cast in favor of the Monte Ozarka's proposal to revise the Constitution, an d the Hoar Chall proposal to create the current Declaration of Rights as a separate Bill of Rights.

The Cabinet vote on the two measures is as follows:

On Monte Ozarka's Constitution Revision proposal
Prime Minister YES (5-0)
MIIA YES
MoEA YES
MoD YES
AG not voted
MoC not voted
MoAE YES
MoCE YES

It passes the Cabinet by a vote of 6-0 and stands ratified.

On Haor Chall's Bill of Rights proposal:
Prime Minister YES (4-1)
MIIA YES
MoEA NO
MoD YES
AG not voted
AoC not voted
MoAE YES
MoCE YES

It passes the Cabinet by a vote of 5-1 and stands ratified.

Accordingly, as both proposals take immediate effect, the current elected Delegate, Great Bights Mum assumes the duties and powers of the elected Delegate as conferred under the constitutional revision until elections are held. I assume the Cabinet becomes a caretaker Cabinet until elections.

All other entities of the former constitution remain in place until elections, or until a law is passed prior to elections that implements a part of the new Constitution. If a question of procedure arises, it is my opinion as Speaker, that the procedure previously followed provides guidance as to the procedure to be followed until specific new procedures are enacted.
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The R.A. has never voted to change the practice of the Speaker reserving the right to not cast a vote or absention on a particular matter or not posting. This was the practice under the prior Constitution, and it has never been changed by a R.A. vote. Because the R.A. has never voted to change the practice, it's a fair reading of the matter that the R.A. has never intended to change the practice and has continuously accepted it.

That's about all I can add to this; I almost dug this out the other day, but I didn't feel it was necessary, but my response to the ultra-literalists out there would be that we'd have to have a constitution the length of the last Constitution in order to make them happy.

This is one of those instances where the lack of legislative action can amount to legislative action. That's my opinion in response to the ultra-literalists running around. And I seriously wonder if this would have come up if anyone other than Govindia had been acting Speaker? A lot of this seems to be reflective of the animosity that exists with a lot of the "ultra-literalists" and Govindia, and it does not belong here. I'm starting to wonder if Govindia was being set up for an assault on him when Limi appointed him as Deputy Speaker, and then shortly thereafter resigned. I'm not going to defend Govindia's position, and if any of y'all actually read rather than skim, you will find I've harshly criticized both Limi and Govindia over this, and I still feel a proper application of the Court's opinion would have avoided this matter. And given what I've just posted above, I'd like someone to show me when the R.A. has ever voted to change the common custom, usage and practice that the chair does not vote except to establish a quorum, or to affect the result of a vote. (In fact, that is exactly what I did when the current Constitution was adopted; had I not voted, the current Constitution would not have been adopted, and we'd be under the previous Constitution. Here's the link to that post: (link)
Abstain.
In order to bring about a settlement of the issue, I've changed my vote to "AYE."
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Maybe the literalists would like to make the practice totally retroactive to that vote, and we just go back to the Constitution that came out of the Constitutional Convention? After all, if we take their reasoning to the rational limit, that is exactly where we'd end up.

One problem here is the ultra-hype from the ultra-literalists who are pushing this issue for some political motive of their own. The fact that they're refusing to take the question to the Court is proof enough that this is a political move in their minds, and not a legal matter. Otherwise, they would have asked the outgoing Attorney General to take it to the Court. Which they have not.

Edited to add additional link and quote.
 
flemingovia:
OK, here is a simple one for you, and it the question pretty much everyone is asking:

"Since the law is clear that anyone who misses two votes which do not overlap should be removed from the list of Regional Assembly members, and since the law is also clear that this rule includes officials, what LEGAL (not custom or tradition or precedent) reason do you have for exempting yourself from that law?"
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The R.A. has never voted to change the practise of the Speaker reserving the right to not cast a vote or abstention on a particular matter or not posting. That was how it was done under the past Constitution, and under the current one, it did not change, so unless the RA voted to change it, it was accepted all these years.
 
there has been a request made for a judicial ruling, I believe.

However, Grosse, if I understand you and your parrot correctly, The current constitution contains no law regarding the Speaker abstaining, but the former constitution did? BEcuase if Govindia is simply still drawing on tradition then it does not matter how far the tradition goes back, it is still against the law.

So will either of you please quote the relevent law under the old constitution?

When Gross himself was asked to explain the last paragraph, he explained it thus at the time:

In other words, the Court, the RA, the NPA, etc. can continue to function until the RA votes on new laws to implement the new Constitution or until elections are over. The procedure that's been in place are npt law, but can be used as guidance while every thing's worked out.
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(bolding mine). In other words, the old constitution gave some guidance during the transitional period, but was no longer law. It was never meant to imply that the old constitution would be used five years after it was voted out.

Even so, here we have a situation where there IS new law, which is clear. The final paragraph does not apply.
 
The regional assembly DID vote to end the practice of the speaker not voting by passing a law that ALL regional assembly members will be removed if they miss two votes in a row. This is reaching JAL levels of disregarding the law, Gov.
 
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