The People's Party: June Convention

[Ban my account ffs!]

The problem is... I feel genuinely that Alfred deserves to win over Simfan who just got allowed back onto the forum.

And knowing Nix's politics, I struggle to see how Simfan is a closer ideological match (he isn't).. so it comes down to personality.  And I place loyalty to people who have helped you out higher than personality when it comes to this game.  Because you don't have to vote for someone just because they're a friend.  But you should support the people who helped you get ahead in the game.

So Nix's vote was a betrayal.  And I have a right to criticize the vote itself.  The motives behind the vote.  And the person casting the ballot.

That's politics for you.  

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

The Party has always stood for independence, love, respect, quality and activity. These are the principles I founded the original Party on the same ones that Cinci and Polnut carry on to this day. This whole uproar is really very sad.

No one is to be attacked for a vote they cast. Votes are very personal choices that people make when they step into the ballot box. Shame on anyone who attacked our former President for voting the way he voted. Voting is your civic duty and a basic right you should ALL hold near and dear to your heart. No one should be afraid to vote their heart.

I find it interesting that the ex-President has had such a change of heart. We were such close friends, too.

Hey man, I had plenty of friends of mine vote against me in my glorious re-election campaign. That's life. Life can be confusing sometimes, but it's still beautiful. Don't lose sleep over it.

Oh, I didn't, I just injected a dangerous combination of drugs that could have gotten me killed. And this wasn't about Nix being a dear friend of mine. It's that I don't see any reason for him to vote for Simfan. Obviously there are quite a few reasons to vote for him - that's why I gave him my second preference - but not for Mr. Nix.

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

It's that I don't see any reason for him to vote for Simfan. Obviously there are quite a few reasons to vote for him - that's why I gave him my second preference - but not for Mr. Nix.

i think nix would be a better judge of that than you.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

It's that I don't see any reason for him to vote for Simfan. Obviously there are quite a few reasons to vote for him - that's why I gave him my second preference - but not for Mr. Nix.

i think nix would be a better judge of that than you.

I have asked him repeatedly to explain himself via PM (while he was online) and he has refused to do so so far.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

The Party has always stood for independence, love, respect, quality and activity. These are the principles I founded the original Party on the same ones that Cinci and Polnut carry on to this day. This whole uproar is really very sad.

With all due respect to you, Mr. Cincinnatus, President Polnut, I think we all (with the exception of a few bad eggs here and there) support love, respect, quality, and activity.

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

It's that I don't see any reason for him to vote for Simfan. Obviously there are quite a few reasons to vote for him - that's why I gave him my second preference - but not for Mr. Nix.

i think nix would be a better judge of that than you.

I have asked him repeatedly to explain himself via PM (while he was online) and he has refused to do so so far.

his choice, bru. although i would certainly be interested in hearing in what way tyrion, xahar, velasco, &c. are closer to deus than any of the other candidates.

[Lumine]

If we can please get over the usual discussions of betrayals and the usual "the centrist part has no soul!" argument that I've been hearing since at least September (and I'm absolutely sick of it, so I am going to ask whoever still wants to discuss that to do it on another thread), we should really just recognize that we lost this one, and that we just have  to move ahead and start working on what's left to do.

I formally offer the following amendments:

The People's Platform

You must be logged in to read this quote.

They are mostly devised to encourage discussion, since they are rather simple. I left out potential support for a national High Speed Rail (like the one enacted in the Midwest) and some environmental/foreign policy details for now.

[windjammer]

Lumine, I have a question, what do you mean by a "National High Speed Rail" exactly?

[Napoleon]

Lumine, I have a question, what do you mean by a "National High Speed Rail" exactly?

He's probably talking about what we already have.

[Lumine]

Lumine, I have a question, what do you mean by a "National High Speed Rail" exactly?

He's probably talking about what we already have.

Yes, we do have a High Speed Rail passed in 2009 and two regional High Speed Rails in the Midwest and the Pacific in construction (I believe the Mideast one was repealed, but I'm not entirely sure). The wording was not precise, but would like to see the High Speed Rail expanded and with several different routes so it can serve as a truly massive way of transportation.

[windjammer]

Lumine, I have a question, what do you mean by a "National High Speed Rail" exactly?

He's probably talking about what we already have.

Yes, we do have a High Speed Rail passed in 2009 and two regional High Speed Rails in the Midwest and the Pacific in construction (I believe the Mideast one was repealed, but I'm not entirely sure). The wording was not precise, but would like to see the High Speed Rail expanded and with several different routes so it can serve as a truly massive way of transportation.

Good idea Lumine!

[Simfan34]

We don't have a national system? I know they repealed the Pacific HSR- so we only have one in the Midwest? Yikes, we need to move quickly on this.

[Simfan34]

The problem is... I feel genuinely that Alfred deserves to win over Simfan who just got allowed back onto the forum.

And knowing Nix's politics, I struggle to see how Simfan is a closer ideological match (he isn't).. so it comes down to personality.  And I place loyalty to people who have helped you out higher than personality when it comes to this game.  Because you don't have to vote for someone just because they're a friend.  But you should support the people who helped you get ahead in the game.

So Nix's vote was a betrayal.  And I have a right to criticize the vote itself.  The motives behind the vote.  And the person casting the ballot.

That's politics for you. 

Well, Nix and I go back, before the TPP, before Labor, before all this.

Let’s talk. I have no set topic, but there are many occurrences in this nation of ours that I believe merit mention, in this important time of ours....

Speaking of the Senate, I shall like to make some further endorsements...

But then we have Senator Nix. The saintly Senator Nix. How can I begin to express my gratitude? Northeasterners, how can we! We are truly blessed to have this sprightly living legend of the Atlasian Senate represent us in Congress. Senator Nix has stood by us- stood by me- since time immemorial, to defend our interest and that of The People as a whole. When I left the Senate, he took my bills and fought for them as if they were his own. He went and helped me write them and get them passed. He even helped me in my own personal affairs, helping me to take actions I would have been too timid to do otherwise, and I am better off for it.

We are all, to the last, every Atlasian man, woman, and child, better off by having Senator Nix here. Some politicians are accused of conspiring against those who do not vote for them. I do not know if these are true, but I can assure you that no person who votes against Senator Nix’s re-election shall ever get my vote.

NIX ENDORSES SIMFAN FOR SENATE: "A CANDIDACY WORTH TAKING SERIOUSLY"

I am proud to be among the first to endorse Representative Simfan. His campaign's early emphasis on expanding access to quality education and rebuilding our infrastructure is ample proof that this is a candidacy worth taking seriously.

I share Simfan's belief that increasing and improving government investment in Atlasia's physical and human capital should be this nation's top priority. I have also worked with him over the course of three terms in office in the Northeast. I know that he is committed to improving his proposals through reasoned debate, consideration of diverse perspectives, and rational compromise. I know that he is knowledgeable and extremely focused on crafting quality policy.

The lack of activity in the Senate that we have seen over the past several months disappoints us all. Bills sit for days at a time. Senators routinely miss votes. Reasonable concerns about legislation are received with disinterest and arrogantly dismissed as frivolous. I want to change that. I have great hopes and high expectations for myself and the two other new Senators elected in last week's election. And I respect several of the Senate's current members, especially Yankee. With two of our most inactive Senators being replaced, we have the chance to make a significant improvement. In my view, Simfan represents Atlasia's best hope.

Hardly a surprise.

[Maxwell]

Snowguy's phony outrage (over a game he doesn't participate in and hasn't for nearly a year) is laughable.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I think there are very few things more annoying in this game than having to worry about explaining your vote to some candidate who thinks for whatever reason you should have voted for them. 

[Talleyrand]

The attacks on Nix are ridiculous and unwarranted. He never promised (at least in public) to vote for candidate, and it's no secret he's been close friends with Simfan for a long time (and had mentioned that he was an excellent Senator multiple times before).

...And the Zell Miller analogy is one of the falsest of false analogies I've heard yet.

The real person Alfred should have an issue with, if anyone at all, is Snowstalker, who invalidated his ballot days after he cast because of an altercation on the "Opinion of Bill Clinton" thread.

Just my two cents on this issue. Carry on.

[Lumine]

Lumine, I have a question, what do you mean by a "National High Speed Rail" exactly?

He's probably talking about what we already have.

Yes, we do have a High Speed Rail passed in 2009 and two regional High Speed Rails in the Midwest and the Pacific in construction (I believe the Mideast one was repealed, but I'm not entirely sure). The wording was not precise, but would like to see the High Speed Rail expanded and with several different routes so it can serve as a truly massive way of transportation.

Good idea Lumine!

Thanks, Windjammer!

We don't have a national system? I know they repealed the Pacific HSR- so we only have one in the Midwest? Yikes, we need to move quickly on this.

Huh, I missed the Pacific repeal, I thought we at least had two regions with HSR...

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

The real person Alfred should have an issue with, if anyone at all, is Snowstalker, who invalidated his ballot days after he cast because of an altercation on the "Opinion of Bill Clinton" thread.

Wait, what did Snow do on the Bill Clinton thread that invalidated his vote? How is that even a thing?

[Adam Griffin]

The real person Alfred should have an issue with, if anyone at all, is Snowstalker, who invalidated his ballot days after he cast because of an altercation on the "Opinion of Bill Clinton" thread.

Wait, what did Snow do on the Bill Clinton thread that invalidated his vote? How is that even a thing?

You would have won by 2 had he not edited/invalidated his ballot a couple of hours before the polls closed.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

The real person Alfred should have an issue with, if anyone at all, is Snowstalker, who invalidated his ballot days after he cast because of an altercation on the "Opinion of Bill Clinton" thread.

Wait, what did Snow do on the Bill Clinton thread that invalidated his vote? How is that even a thing?

You would have won by 2 had he not edited/invalidated his ballot a couple of hours before the polls closed.

Well, I would have won by 2 had a lot of things happened. It just so happens that the minimum number of things went wrong.

[Sec. of State Superique]

Sorry for my delayed speech. It is coming!

[Lumine]

Bump! It's been almost a month already since this convention started...

[Potus]

I would like to ask the People for their endorsement in the Mideast Governor's race.

[Sec. of State Superique]

The People's Speech - Part I

Secretary of External Affairs Superique arrives at the Convention to show why he stands up for centrist parties and to show what he expects for the future of The People's Party.

Members of The People's Party, I now join you on this beautiful event while listening the IV Movement of Beethoven's 9th Symphony and I hope that I can bring a valuable contribution to this Convention.

I will tell why I have always been a member of centrist or center-leftist parties in Atlasia; I have always been a member of radical centrism and pragmatism because I have this important understanding that both the stringent laisser-faire economics and the excessive intrusion of state, usually related with socialism, can be harmful for our society. While the first usually leads to unsustainable and terrible social inequalities and sets up an extremely divided society where empathy is non-existent, the other is usually followed by authoritarianism, by strong concentration of power on the hand of a few bureaucrats and by a series of imperfections that harms the capacity of the economy to generate wealth and to improve the standards of living of all citizens. After analyzing both Extreme Forms of Capitalism and Socialism, I noticed that this sort of radicalism on both sides of the aisle is not productive for our Society and for The People.  

As a young politician, I also liked the idea of a middle ground between the two ideologies, why shouldn’t we keep a capitalist structure while having socialist values of democracy, social fairness and absolute freedom in mind? To me, certainly, the Third Way of Tony Blair, Pre-Atlasia President Bill Clinton and Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso were good developments when it comes to ideas. Even so, they were not able to move further than simple triangulation and they were never effective on putting policies that could be cited as strong examples of what the Third Way really was and that was in many ways frustrating.  They failed to add something to the debate, I prefer Blair rather than Thatcher or Michael Foot and I strongly prefer FHC rather than Lula or Collor, but still, I had this feeling that we needed to move beyond simple middle ground.

I wanted and I still want something more than this simple mix of policies or this silly Red vs. Blue discussions, I want to see a Party that moves beyond those borders of traditional political spectrum. I want a Party that can work on an alternative to both Socialism and Capitalism, a post-Capitalistic approach. That’s what we need for this game and that’s what a future People’s Party can stand for! Atlasia needs a Progressive-minded, pragmatic and futuristic centrist party that understands that we are living in a whole new world and that the 21st Century needs adequate answers this whole new area. We need a People-centered Policy, we need a whole new way of thinking society, the economy, state, trade and diplomacy and we need to be a center of ideological innovation in this country!  

But you guys must be wondering? What the hell is Superique talking about? Well, I don’t have all the answers for our society’s problems but I still believe that a good set of values and perspectives can guide this Party and this nation to unprecedented progress.  

I believe in a post-Capitalistic Society with Humanitarian Values and Principles as its north.  This post-capitalistic society will have many varied forms of property; we will have cooperatives, private properties and state property.  Globalization, Technological Renovation, Free Trade will not be used as means of control of The People, we are going to control it and use it for the advantage of every single person on this world.  The concept of a market economy will be kept as markets are the best form of understanding The People’s demands as well as they are the best way of generating wealth.  However, this new society will have mechanisms of income redistribution since we ought to give every single citizen of Atlasia (and why not the Earth?) good standards of living and, more importantly, equal opportunity.

[Sec. of State Superique]

The People's Speech - Part II

With The People getting sleepy, Superique procedes his speech showing his willingness to promote human dignity and better standards of living for all.

Too see this new People-oriented system sprung up, we will have to reform a series of structures of the current Capitalist system that we have in Atlasia. We need to bring change for the base (the relations of production and the means of production) and for the superstructure (everything of our society that is not related with production) to see a new way of living and of organizing ourselves come up. There are some main issues that we have to rethink and revaluate to see change happening and those are the ones:

At first, I believe that we must rethink the traditional concept of growth. In a world limited by its own physical and environmental limits, we ought to understand that capitalism is becoming saturated in a great part of the developed world, which means that maybe a focus on traditional growth is not the right path to the global community. While most nations of the world still need to develop and create wealth in order to deal with a series of social problems, Atlasians and Europeans enjoy good levels of income and there are not many places to see capitalism expanded.  The financial lunacy of the 2000s have shown us that there is no easy path anymore for unprecedented growth and that’s why I believe that maybe we should reconsider how do we measure economical prosperity. Now it shall be the time to Governments in the Developed World be more worried about our living standards, our happiness, our emotional sanity and our environmental problems rather than being heavily concerned only with traditional metrics of development such as the GDP and other data. 

GDP and GDP per Capita are not enough! Are you healthy? Are you feeling well? We need to rethink growth!

There are many ways that traditional “stagnation” wouldn’t necessarily mean an economical problem! In a not so distant future, we may very well see some sectors of our economy become increasely less powerful, such as our automobile sector and our heavy industries, while others, such as the world of technology and services, becoming increasingly stronger.  And after all, this could lead to a net 0% growth but it would still not be a significant problem for our nation and for our People, if we can provide with our government the tools necessary to The People and workers to adapt to new economical realities.

Secondly, I believe that we must rethink that very necessity of being full-time employed. In a world of automation and in a world where many sectors of the economy may reduce their significance, it’s more than time to understand that we are going to face higher unemployment levels but that we can deal with it in a much more sustained and realistic way. Rather than talking about full-employment or saying that unemployment is not an issue of a Government’s concern, why don’t we agree that we are going through a whole new Era where less people will work full time?

The automation shall be a mean of protection of The People's dignity, not the opposite!

A People’s oriented policy shall design a society where work is not the sole priority of the Human Being. For the first time after the first industrial revolution, we may see a big opportunity where technological developments will not demand higher working hours, au contraire, it will demand less time in work.  Our main aim should be the respect of human dignity and we can do this by ensuring that every single Atlasian does not have to work on a stressful and physically oppressive sort of job.  Life should follow the Buddhist Principle of the Middle Way, which means that we shall not focus excessively on work nor shall we stop being productive. There should be time for work, there should be time for leisure and there shall be time for rest. If we understand this, we will see a world with stronger families, happier children and definitely more productive workers.  The People’s Party shall understand the importance of the Middle Way and use programs like the Basic Income Guarantee to achieve such objectives.

Thirdly and finally, we’ve got to understand that we live in a beautiful and naturally designed Gaian world, which means that we are part of a huge community of life forms and physical landscapes that made possible the sustainability of living conditions. The mountains, our seas, the Algae, the Fungi, the Microorganisms and Animals have mutually evolved and have gradually ensured for all of them, including us, close to optimal climate conditions to sustain life. We must be grateful for those sophisticated regulatory tools that Gaia has ensured for us during all those millions of years and we must understand the importance of protecting our environment if we still want to live in a hospitable planet.

The crazy rithm of development has it costs...

It’s for this reason that we must courageously move forward by advancing on the combat of global warming and, more importantly, on the protection of our Gaian regulatory system. The People’s Party must be committed to ensure this and we need to realize that there mainly two forms of power creation that can reduce our CO2 emissions while also preserving our natural landscapes and those are Solar and Nuclear Energy! That doesn’t mean that we must abandon other forms of power generation and all other sorts of fuels, the only thing that this means is that we need to focus on those two sources. Solar is one the cleanest forms of energy production while Nuclear, if sufficient investment is made, can provide cheap and trustable power while having minor impacts on our environment. We can also improve our water treatment system and ensure a clean air for every Atlasian.

Furthermore, we shall use taxation as a mechanism of incentive to light-saving measures, energy-efficiency improvements and the respect of our environment. I’m not saying that we should only focus on tax credits, because if we really want change to be made, then we’ve got to target with taxation some specific and irresponsible actions taken by our citizens and especially by our companies.  We must aim the negative externalities and make sure that companies pay for them; we need to make sure that The People recognize that production and growth does have a cost and it has to be paid. By doing this, we will ensure that measures of efficiency are made since there will be finally a cost for taking from our environment, for hurting Gaian Regulatory systems. A Stronger Carbon Tax will be the proper incentive to see environmental measures being taken by companies themselves and this will not necessarily mean that the taxation burden must raise. What we ought to do is reduce the environmental hazard made by industries so we can increase the Carbon Tax while decreasing taxes that effect the Common Man and Women of this nation.

The respect of the human being, the respect of our environment and the respect of our liberties should be the guidelines of our party. The People’s Party shall be the leader of innovation in this country, the leader of new ideas and the leader on building up a new and bright future for our nation. I have this feeling that we can change Atlasia and that we can change the whole world but in order to do this we’ve got to be open to renewal, to rethought and to a serious revaluation if it’s not time to move forward from the traditional political spectrum. Let’s move forward from traditional capitalism and communism! I’m standing up for change and for a renewal; will you stand up for it too?