SENATE STANDING COMMITTEE: Gov't Oversight and Reform (Recommendations)

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Aye
Aye

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The committee has voted to recommend that the Senate pass the Contempt of Congress Act or similar legislation designed to compell unbridled submission to our inquisitions from those called to testify. The committee has also voted to recommend that the torture be expanded to include non-officeholders by way of incorporating a voting ban when it reaches the Senate floor.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The next thing on the agenda is an investigation into gov't policies relating to the economy in recent times. Who all should we drag before us in chains?

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

The next thing on the agenda is an investigation into gov't policies relating to the economy in recent times. Who all should we drag before us in chains?

I think Shua would best be suited for that department, and maybe previous GMs as well.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

What about the SoIA?

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

What about the SoIA?

Him, too.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Officeholders              Ability to Testify


Game Moderators:
Purple State - Not Available
Badger - On Forum, not sure about Game
Marokai Blue - Available
Yelnoc - On Forum, not in Game
Shua - Available

SoIAs
NiK - Unsure
Al - Was he GM or SoIA?  Not in Game
Winston - See Al? - Not Available
Tmthforu94 - Available
Dr. Cynic - Unsure
20RP12 - Changes by the Day
Yelnoc - See above
Morgieb - Should be reachable.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Game Moderator

Shua
The Atlasian Almanac-Gazette
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=143807.0

The first post in Shua's thread contains all the previous GM threads, so we owe him a debt of great attitude and this will be taken into account when go somewhat easier on him (but only a little ). I trust all the members of the committee with have reviewed all this Game Moderator material by Monday, correct?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

SoIA

Morgieb
Department of Internal Affairs
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=157208.0

20RP12
SoIA Ideas
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=149729.0

2011
Tmthforu94
The Domestic TBD: Office of SoIA
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=145808.0

Dr. Cynic
Jack Layton Memorial Building - Offices of Internal Affairs
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=141456.0

Yelnoc
The Domestic Herald/Office of the SoIA
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=139258.0

Barnes
The Department of Internal Affairs - Aneurin Bevan Building
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=137826.0

Jbrase
Dept. of Internal Affairs - Jacques Necker Building
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=133126.0

Yelnoc
The Domestic Dispatch - Office of SoIA
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=134843.0

AndrewCT
Frank Drebin Building of Internal Affairs
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=132040.0

2010
Dr. Cynic
The Offices of Internal Affairs Department
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=127787.0

     regional visits: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=129621.0
     address to Seante: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=129152.0

Afleitch
Office of the SoIA
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=124188.0

2009
NiK
The Department of Internal Affiars (DoIA)
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=103679.0

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Mercy mercy me.  That'll take a while.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Mercy mercy me.  That'll take a while.

Yup.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

This is what oversight means. Accountability!

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

PS
August 2009    10%
September 2009
October 2009   
November 2009  8.68%
December 2009  8.83%  Slight Change in Methodology

March 2010     8.01%

Al
August 2010    12%

Badger
September 2010      9.2%
October 2010        8.5%
November 2010       8.8%
December 2010       9%
January 2011        9.1%
February 2011       9.1%
March 2011          9.2%


Shua
July, 2011     9.3%
August 2011    9.1%
Sept 2011      9.0%
November 2011  9.0%
December 2011  9.2%
January 2012   8.8%
February 2012  8.6%
March 2012     8.4%
April 2012     8.3%
May 2012       8.1%
June 2012      8.2%
July 2012      8.1%

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I have PMed our latest sheep, I gave them until Tuesday, which gives you guys until tuesday to scan that material.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I'm confused. What are you trying to do here?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Discover why unemployment is so high. What policies have worked, what hasn't worked, and what has made it worse. Not to mention what to do going forward.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I think they despise me already and I haven't even put them on the grill yet.


Damn it, I forgot to PM Jake.

[Marokai Backbeat]

What do you want from me, heartbreaker!

[afleitch]

Senators,

I was appointed as a replacement SoIA and served in the position for two months; September to November 2010. I am not ashamed of my actions during this time. In the course of the debate during for the Fix Our Roads Act I spoke to the Senate confrming my position that 'road repair is vital for the economy and can provide much needed employment.' I also offered the Senate more realistic figures for road repair for their consideration. I agreed with the Senate's proposal to amend the Financial Regulatory Reform Act of 2009.

I made direct representation to the Vice President with recommendations for the following;

1. I have assisted the Vice President with suggestion to increase employment in Atlasia. As a week has now passed and to promote accountability in government you may review the text below;

There are two ways to do this (promote job growth); first of all to increase employment for those who have recently been laid off and secondly to tackle the issue of long term unemployment; those who remain out of work regardless of the economic climate and employment opportunities.

If we are going to spend money it has to be spent on public works. I favour job creation in the private sector, but if the government is going to commit to creating jobs itself it has to do so under its own initiative. This of course incurs an administration cost (which can cost more than outsourcing to private or third party providers) so these have to be kept low. Secondly we need a 'quick win'; job creation has to be immediate. While training, adult education and skill provision is vitally important this takes time and costs money. I think we have legislation on the books to deal with this at any rate. Therefore the focus should be getting those who are laid off and skilled back to work. The Hiring Incentives Act goes some way to address this and some of the responsbility rests with my office. However the legislation itself has no expiry built into it, so it needs to be canned as soon as the economy picks up again under it's own steam.

The Regional and Local Fiscal Relief Act has distributed funds based on regional unemployment as it stood. Presumably the $100 bn has been spent (?) Or indeed has it given that responsibility rests with the regions. Now while the bill allows us to make use of any rejected money, it is not clear what we can do if any regions have not enacted legislation to spend it. I don't think the law allows us to claw it back however we can use a 'stick' approach and reduce any further regional assistance planned through stimulus by the amount not spent.

The number one target for investment should be construction. Now there was a fair number of bills passed on large construction projects for example the High Speed Rail Act. In reality despite being passed over a year ago, it would still be in the planning stages, however route clearance, demolition and preperation should be at least in part underway. It is the biggest construction project in Atlasia and I would propose pumping funds into it to get it moving; it really should be providing jobs for construction, maufacturing, steel works etc for years.

In days of old you could pump money into building relief roads but those days are gone. It could be possible to fund local light rail projects to boost areas with localised high unemployment.

However a major new piece of legislation that could dwarf even the high speed rail project would be the renewal of city water pipes and sewerage systems. In older cities this infrastructure is nearing 100 years old (excepting the work undertaken to provide work during the last Depression ) and is in major need of overhaul. However this would result in major traffic disruption (as it requires digging up the road) and disruption to water supplies. This is why most cities in America and Europe are unwilling to undertake it; its not even a cost issue its the political fallout from disruption.

High Speed and Water Infrastructure renewal will keep construction and manufacturing ticking along nicely.

These recommendations to my knowledge were not taken on board by the administration which ended with President Fritz's election in November. This may have been due to lack of time rather than due to dismissal.

[Marokai Backbeat]

As the Vice President at that time, I suppose I should explain why those recommendations weren't taken action on by myself personally. Around that time, Purple State and I were discussing what we privately termed our "second wind" brought about after feeling like the middle of our term had begun to stagnate a bit. As part of that, we focused on immediately bringing the Constitutional Convention to a close, delegating more responsibilities to the GM and SoIA (then Afleitch), and I was tasked with coming up with another basic set of economic legislation.

Within a couple days, though, my grandfather suffered a stroke and I immediately had to take some time away for family reasons, and asked some Senate friends and PS to consider putting together a bill or two. By the end of September 2010 I had my own health scare, which ended with September being quite the nerve-rattling month that led to be deciding against running for President, despite everyone assuming I was the next in line for the JCP. Lost in all of that kerfuffle, I had been too personally occupied to write the legislation we had planned and for that I apologize.

[afleitch]

As the Vice President at that time, I suppose I should explain why those recommendations weren't taken action on by myself personally. Around that time, Purple State and I were discussing what we privately termed our "second wind" brought about after feeling like the middle of our term had begun to stagnate a bit. As part of that, we focused on immediately bringing the Constitutional Convention to a close, delegating more responsibilities to the GM and SoIA (then Afleitch), and I was tasked with coming up with another basic set of economic legislation.

Within a couple days, though, my grandfather suffered a stroke and I immediately had to take some time away for family reasons, and asked some Senate friends and PS to consider putting together a bill or two. By the end of September 2010 I had my own health scare, which ended with September being quite the nerve-rattling month that led to be deciding against running for President, despite everyone assuming I was the next in line for the JCP. Lost in all of that kerfuffle, I had been too personally occupied to write the legislation we had planned and for that I apologize.

I don't think an apology is needed for something beyond your control. There was no reason why the following administration could not have picked up where you left off. To it's credit the Purple State/Marokai administration and the 38th and 39th Senates were heavily focused on the economy. A glance at the bills presented and passed proves that. Their effectiveness will no doubt be discussed by the Committee. The following administration passed the 2011 Federal Stimulus Act which did allocate sum monies for projects that the PS/M administration proposed.

[morgieb]

I can state that I did not know anything about these numbers, and haven't really done anything as SoIA.

With this crisis though, I will work with the President, Napoleon, and the GM, Shua, to get results for Atlasia. This country will bounce back.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

I can state that I did not know anything about these numbers, and haven't really done anything as SoIA.

With this crisis though, I will work with the President, Napoleon, and the GM, Shua, to get results for Atlasia. This country will bounce back.

Can you explain why, since being confirmed nearly two months ago, you haven't done anything?

[morgieb]

I can state that I did not know anything about these numbers, and haven't really done anything as SoIA.

With this crisis though, I will work with the President, Napoleon, and the GM, Shua, to get results for Atlasia. This country will bounce back.

Can you explain why, since being confirmed nearly two months ago, you haven't done anything?

Well, I realise it's been inexcusable. But it hasn't helped that no-one's asked me about any queries.

[AndrewTX]

I forgot I was SoIA. I was probably the best one ever.