falapatorius:
Thanx for the thorough answers to the questions Roman. A little bit of history, diplomacy, and minimal evasion.
Didn't quote the post tho, too damn long.
Your theory of warfare brings to mind:
Art of War:
"Invincibility lies in the defence; the possibility of victory in the attack"
or
Book of Five Rings:
"You should not have any special fondness for a particular weapon, or anything else, for that matter. Too much is the same as not enough. Without imitating anyone else, you should have as much weaponry as suits you."
The quote from Book of Five Rings is essentially true in any endeavor, be it war, business or politics.
PaulWallLibertarian42:
R3n's campaign thread introduces the idea of a home affairs revamping the forum community to be more open and actively recruiting folks in the region to participate in the forum government.
Home Affairs
The North Pacific, does not need recruitment to bring nations to the region: we have 5,000 of them, and new ones keep coming without effort. Effort is required, however, to tap the potential present in this enormous pool of talent and workforce. During my delegacy, my team and I will emphasize this effort through a two-fold plan: 1) game-side recruitment; and 2) forum-side naturalization.
On the first front, we will engage the nations that are present in the region though all the means the game makes available to us: welcoming telegram, region-wide or other mass telegrams, world factbook entry, dispatches, and regional messaging board. We already make use of most of these communication avenues, but the content will be redesigned with a heavy focus towards advertising the forum government. Nations will be telegrammed a biweekly bulletin of government activity, monthly Ministry-specific recruitment campaigns, as well as more personal and targeted invites by myself and my Ministers.
On the second front, we will take measures to make the forum experience friendlier for newcomers and encourage their involvement in the government. We will rewrite the welcoming material and revisit the organization of the entry forums. We will create a welcoming team, to act as mentors for new members while they are still learning the ropes of the forum and government.
We will also expand the Executive Government with the creation of the Executive Staff. The goal is to address the current situation, where the Executive Government is relatively opaque to new members, and the opportunities to get involved are relatively limited. The Executive Staff will be a civil service of sorts, open to all members. Those who join will be assigned to specific Ministries, and assist the Ministers in implementing the agenda of their department. The Executive Staff mimics and expands upon existing services within Ministries, such as the Diplomatic Corps, that have proven successful in the past; those will be integrated in this new structure
I really like this idea, if elected would you impliment a similar program?
And what would you say to someone mulling over you or another candidate? What would you say to sway them? What do you offer that stands you apart from R3n, Kiwi, and Mall?
I like R3n's Home Policies. But there is one problem I see with it. Actually a few problems.
The first is that expanding the government by creating an 'Executive Staff' or any other bureaucratic expansion has always proved somewhat of a failure in the past. We don't don't need a duplication of services as per an Executive Staff that "
mimics and expands upon existing services within Ministries, etc." It's just another level of bureaucratic rigmarole that will never get 'fleshed out', and a wast of resources through duplication of services. The more logical thing is to make sure that the existing ministries are properly administered and appropriately staffed so that they can do their jobs themselves. No need for yet another layer of government that duplicated already existing functions and services. It is not efficient. We simply don't have the manpower to literally duplicate the entire government in parallel, nor would we want to duplicate it in parallel.
The other problem I see with R3n's policy as quoted is the methodology of communicating with citizens of the region by sending bi-weekly TGs to nations, etc.,,,.
Simply re-writing welcome telegrams to new nations is just doing more of the same thing that is already somewhat ineffective and is at best a zero-sum-game in practical terms. Having been MoC in the past (I've been just about everything else except Delegate and Vice Delegate) I have some experience in how to capture people's attention and engaging them in the whole process that is The North Pacific.
Nothing short of having a constant presence of the Delegate on the RMB (and the same for the MoC and everyone in that ministry) will suffice. What I will do is personally engage nations on the RMB and directly on a one-on-one basis wherever possible or needed rather than to rely on TGs and other periodic communications alone. I know how elaborate plans like composing regular publications usually turn out - they start out fine but they fade out into a whimper and in the interval become rather perfunctory, dry and uninteresting.
You get nations interested in joining the forum and staying involved not only by perfunctory and periodic communications in their in-boxes (which most people don't really pay much attention to for the most part) but by actively engaging them. When you actively engage people in a personal and lively manner, they get to know you as a real person and not some remote and impersonal entity called a 'Delegate'. If anyone can talk up a storm and get people to interact, it's certainly me. I run a number of message boards and such not related to NS and I know how to market ideas and engage people in conversation, not only with me but with each other (with each other being the key process here).
Once you entice people to interact with each other on the RMB, they will realize that the RMB is limited in scope as per personal interactions between TNP residents and citizens. When that happens (and it will) the forum needs to be simultaneously marketed as a more efficient and user friendly format than the RMB.
I view the RMB as a marketing tool, not a be-all and end-all for engaging TNP citizens and keeping them informed. And to do this the Delegate has to be active not only in the regional header, but in the ongoing conversation that the RMB is. Believe me when I say that I can get people onto and become active on the forum. I know a few things about product and service marketing - and the regional forum is a product and a service. All we have to do is to use the RMB as a tool in a simple marketing strategy.
With all due respect to Kiwi's, they are fine in theory and principle, but they will run into problems when reduced to practice. Why? Because it is essentially the same strategy and practice that has been used in the past to no lasting effect because it is the same thing that has always been done which leads to no lasting increase in activity. Again, the only activity duplicating government ministries in the form of an Executive Staff is the activity caused by duplicate paperwork. And duplication of services will ultimately cause conflict between multiple agents of the government doing duplicate administrative staff jobs. Eventually either the 'Executive Staff' or the actual ministries will slack off because there is always someone else to do their respective jobs. Ultimately it results in everyone slacking off and nothing gets done, or one or two people end up doing everyone's job but their own. With government expansion we end up with, to use an old expression,
too many Chiefs and not enough Indians. A heavy bureaucracy always collapses under its own weight.
I remember a few instances in which our government in TNP had so many functionary positions that in periods of general inactivity, the government literally screeched to a halt and could not function at all according to anything resembling a constitutional mandate. Increasing the bureaucracy with new and duplicate positions will result in the same dysfunction should an even lesser period of inactivity (in comparison to what has happened in the past) happen again (which it will from time to time).
"And what would you say to someone mulling over you or another candidate? What would you say to sway them? What do you offer that stands you apart from R3n, Kiwi, and Mall?"
I would say that I tend to be, or try to be, a minimalist. I like to avoid over-complicating matters such as administration and government. My view of expanding bureaucracies and government is that too much bureaucracy and government is a royal pain in the arse that serves no other purpose than to make 'busy work' in multiple copies. I know how to get things done and how to get people to cooperate for objective goals. I've served in nearly every function and position of government in TNP and have always been a citizen of TNP. My loyalties are not divided with any other region and have never been divided with any other region. I know how things work in TNP, and more important, I know what things do not work. I do not like to re-take ground, to use a military analogy.
If I can run a regiment/battalion sized unit in RL military efficiency, I can run the TNP efficiently (and make it entertaining for all involved). My sense of duty and obligation is firmly centered on TNP and TNP alone. I'm not afraid to take on as much as I can and accomplish the goal of improving our region and leaving it in a better state than when I became Delegate. I'm hands-on in what I do to improve things, but also hands-off where things are working just fine.
punk d:
Roman - you will have my vote if you get the court to settle the matter regarding TD. A review request that has taken 3 months and going to resolve.
I will definitely not vote for you if this matter continues to languish in the courts.
This is as serious a matter as can be brought before the court and there appears to be no direction or sense of urgency from the court. That's very disappointing.
We're getting to your request as we speak. I understand the time-sensitive urgency of the situation. We will get an answer to you ASAP on this matter.