The Examiner: Election Tracker

[Peter]

Even at this early stage in the election, it seems quite clear that Mr. Moderate is set for a convincing victory in the Presidential race strongly ahead of second placed Sensei - who has clearly received the blessing of former candidate Speed of Sound for stepping into the race. Conservative votes have split in multiple directionsand indeed dominate the combined voting lists of the other candidates.

Little surprising has emerged from the race so far, the only question remaining here is whether a 2nd round count will proove necessary.

Below is the unofficial Examiner tally of the race so far...

Candidate	Votes
Moderate	15	(Franzl; Alcon; MAS117; GM3; AndrewCT; Frodo; Colin Wixted; Verily; Hashemite; Ebowed; Conor Flynn; Friz; Mr. Moderate; bgwah; bullmoose)
Sensei	7	(Andy Jackson; Evilmexicandictator; Sensei; hannibal; Speed of Sound; Meeker; Lief)
Ernest	3	(South Park Conservative; Bacon King; BrandonH)
Supersoulty	2	(benconstine; Supersoulty)
gporter	2	(gporter; Inks.LWC)
NOTA	1	(DWPerry)
Invalid	1	(DWTL)

Updated Round 1 count:
Mr Moderate - 16
Sensei - 11
Ernest - 3
Supersoulty - 3
Gporter - 2

Final Round count (assuming that maximal eliminations are necessary):
Mr Moderate - 22
Sensei - 12

I still think that Sensei has the potential to make a comeback, however, I would be very surprised if this occurs. Some eliminations at least will be needed, though, because of the two horse nature of this race, it will come down to Sensei and Moderate.

[Peter]

Letter to the Editor:

Dear Jas,

I think the many voices who have spoken out against Inks are too quick to judge and hold him to an unnecessarily exacting standard. His "crimes" in the last election are as follows:

1. Opening the voting booth at a time completely allowed by Law, but not traditionally used. Whist he should have better advertised this fact, e.g. with a thread in the forum stating the closing time in the subject line, he did nothing different from other SoFAs in not giving advance notice of the time.
2. Closing the booth a few hours after actual ending time. Whist it is never ideal that a certification is delayed, we have had delayed certifications before, and it usually only makes people tetchy when there are ballots in dispute (as we had this time). Ultimately, as long as certification does occur within about 2 days, I don't think it actually matters that much.
3. The manner of counting votes for Sam Spade. He surely cannot be blamed for this - we have never had a candidate who deregistered just before the election (which could only be interepreted by voters as a move to withdraw, even if it didn't have that legal effect necessarily), and then go on to win. He was in untested waters, and picked a route which had some logic to it. OK, it wasn't totally legally sound and ultimately was overturned in the Courts, but in a certification situation, one has little time to seek out advice, you just have to pick a path and go with it.
4. His conduct during the case - having reviewed all of his posts during the period, I can find no outrageous conduct. The only thing I can find close to an accusation against Sam Sapde is this:

I'd just like to respond to Torie's response to my brief.  It could in fact happen.  In fact, it almost happened in this instance.  The only reason that Sam came back is because he realized that he had an interesting court case.

I would tend to agree that this is exactly why Sam came back.

The nominee is qualified - he has good knowledge of a complicated system of Laws that now govern our elections, and whilst it is not perfect, it will improve with experience. I believe the nominee is aware of his failings and will do his best to learn from them.

Yours sincerely

Peter

[Peter]

Its a comment clearly made at a time of typical Atlasian intensity. Inks is correct that Sam was making a false claim to the Court, however, I think that Sam simply misunderstood the situation at the time, and later withdrew that part of his case. I don't think it is so heinous that it actually matters.

[Peter]

¹ Not on the latest DOFA voter roll. Check underway for registration.

This could be something of a problem. The DoFA list states it is correct through 15 July - Bullmoose's party change is the last change accounted for in the list. We'll probably end up having to check every later registration ourselves.