The Ogastein Show

The Ogastein Show
Groundhog Day in Europeia
Episode 2
Recently new Vice President Earth22 published a “plea” in the Grand Hall and called on all Europeians to take action and get more thoroughly involved in this administration. It seems that every call to arms this executive has made in the past has fallen on to deaf ears. You’ll recall during Rachel’s presidency her Vice President, Asperta, posted a similar “plea” in an effort to rile up the region. How’d that go for that administration? That’s right – they were voted out of office. Ouch. Hopefully this isn’t foreshadowing.

So this begs the question – When politicians make a plea for regions to get more involved; is the region the real problem? It must have been the region during Rachel’s term of limited results, right? Actually wrong, I highly doubt anyone would sensibly argue that one. Has anything changed since that time? Again, nope. It’s Groundhog Day in Europeia, folks!

Everyday when you log onto the forum, you’re welcomed by a very similar forum that you left the previous day. Nothing has changed since Rachel was impeached. Remember Sopo’s campaign slogan – A Bold New Change. Perhaps he spelled “bland” wrong? Where are the results? I remember a time in the region where we’d be out for blood! Surely I’m not calling for savagery, no. When you campaign on bold new change, however, you gotta have the results to back it up during the term. This administration has not provided us with very many concrete results so far.

If you break it down ministry by ministry, what’s really happened? In Foreign Affairs we saw a cross cultural conference collapse as the TUF severed relations. While there have been policy changes made and solidified, the most glaring event in the ministry this term was TUF saying, “No more” to Europeia. The Navy has seen a handful of raids occur this term which would have to be considered a success. Interior has seen our population almost drop below 700 for the first time in a while. Culture had one festival lead by Foreign Affairs. Information is nearly dead. (I’ve negated to mention Integration due to my former position.) Well that’s obviously a term of bold new change, obviously.

So when this administration pleads for the citizens of Europeia to help out, they must be in a pretty problematic situation. Their clocks must be flipping back over to midnight again and again as well. It’s clearly not just us. Shouldn’t it be the job of this administration to make improvements, though? At least halfway through her term, Rachel realized that there were problems and presented a plan to deal with them. She resigned shortly afterward. Ouch. Again, hopefully this isn't foreshadowing.

Where’s the plan, Mr. President? How are you going to fix our problems in the next few weeks leading up to an election? As this mundane day keeps repeating itself, we’re moving towards a dire state. Is it time for the hammer to fall? This just in! The groundhog didn’t see his shadow – is this term soon to end?
 
Ow! That nail just got hit right on the head!

Effective leaders can make things happen. We simply need policies that will get results. We need to start from square one on almost every Ministry and basically re-examine their purposes, functions, and how we can make that happen. We've been muddling through the same few ideas for the last several terms, let's innovate!
 
Ow! That nail just got hit right on the head!

Effective leaders can make things happen. We simply need policies that will get results. We need to start from square one on almost every Ministry and basically re-examine their purposes, functions, and how we can make that happen. We've been muddling through the same few ideas for the last several terms, let's innovate!
Yeah, that's a brilliant idea, let's wipe everything and start over with three weeks left in the term. Genius! Why didn't I think of it before?

Oh right; there are three weeks left in the term. You won't end up fixing the problems, you'll end up dismantling all the ministries to look at them, running out of time, and saying "Look, I'm only partway done dismantling and looking at the ministries, please vote for me again!"

Two months in office is a fairly short time, and regardless of how things are going right now, with three weeks left, dis-assembly will leave us no time for re-assembly.
 
Ow! That nail just got hit right on the head!

Effective leaders can make things happen. We simply need policies that will get results. We need to start from square one on almost every Ministry and basically re-examine their purposes, functions, and how we can make that happen. We've been muddling through the same few ideas for the last several terms, let's innovate!
Yeah, that's a brilliant idea, let's wipe everything and start over with three weeks left in the term. Genius! Why didn't I think of it before?

Oh right; there are three weeks left in the term. You won't end up fixing the problems, you'll end up dismantling all the ministries to look at them, running out of time, and saying "Look, I'm only partway done dismantling and looking at the ministries, please vote for me again!"

Two months in office is a fairly short time, and regardless of how things are going right now, with three weeks left, dis-assembly will leave us no time for re-assembly.
I didn't mean to dismantle the ministries, I mean create original policies. 3 weeks is still a very long time for a turnaround, and I don't know about you, but I expect my government to be working for the entire term, not to quit 62.5% of the way in. There's still almost 40% of this term left, why is it so unreasonable to believe that there could be some change?

If Sopo took a bold, fresh direction, I'd probably vote for him again. Only if I believed it was genuine and sustainable. If I saw that he was making an honest effort to turn things around, even if it wasn't instant gratification, I'd see his leadership at work and I'd probably vote for him. And again, I don't mean just stop everything we're doing, I mean keep the existing basic structure and implement new policies, through the Ministers, that focus on the basic ideas of each Ministry.

For instance, we've tried to create a sustainable CRC for eons now, I don't think it's ever really worked. In theory, it's a good idea though, so why not think about an action that reaches the same end through different means? We need to go back to the roots and build up our basics, or as Jon Huntsman would say, our core.

An administration that does that is one I would consider bold, new, and successful, and it's one that I'd vote for. So can he change the world in 3 weeks? Maybe not. Should we throw our hands up in defeat and continue to pursue old policies (i.e. Culture having a "-fest" every time things get dull) for the last 40% of the term? I think definitely not.
 
I was under the impression that the EBC was a subsidiary of the executive. Shouldn't such criticism come from a private media outlet? I always saw the EBC as a way to rally the populace rather than bark at the administration which...employs it. Maybe I'm wrong.
 
Probably, but where was the last political pertinent activity in here? :p
 
I was under the impression that the EBC was a subsidiary of the executive. Shouldn't such criticism come from a private media outlet? I always saw the EBC as a way to rally the populace rather than bark at the administration which...employs it. Maybe I'm wrong.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corproation does the best journalism in the country, and is one of the only media outlets (well, CBC Radio at any rate, Mansbridge notwithstanding) willing to actually hold politicians' feet to the fire on anything. I'm not surprised it's a Canadian writing in the EBC doing a similar thing. :lol:
 
I was under the impression that the EBC was a subsidiary of the executive. Shouldn't such criticism come from a private media outlet? I always saw the EBC as a way to rally the populace rather than bark at the administration which...employs it. Maybe I'm wrong.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corproation does the best journalism in the country, and is one of the only media outlets (well, CBC Radio at any rate, Mansbridge notwithstanding) willing to actually hold politicians' feet to the fire on anything. I'm not surprised it's a Canadian writing in the EBC doing a similar thing. :lol:
I wish we had that in the US.

*looks at Faux News*
 
I was under the impression that the EBC was a subsidiary of the executive. Shouldn't such criticism come from a private media outlet? I always saw the EBC as a way to rally the populace rather than bark at the administration which...employs it. Maybe I'm wrong.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corproation does the best journalism in the country, and is one of the only media outlets (well, CBC Radio at any rate, Mansbridge notwithstanding) willing to actually hold politicians' feet to the fire on anything. I'm not surprised it's a Canadian writing in the EBC doing a similar thing. :lol:
I wish we had that in the US.

*looks at Faux News*
Oh, Jesus.
 
I was under the impression that the EBC was a subsidiary of the executive. Shouldn't such criticism come from a private media outlet? I always saw the EBC as a way to rally the populace rather than bark at the administration which...employs it. Maybe I'm wrong.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corproation does the best journalism in the country, and is one of the only media outlets (well, CBC Radio at any rate, Mansbridge notwithstanding) willing to actually hold politicians' feet to the fire on anything. I'm not surprised it's a Canadian writing in the EBC doing a similar thing. :lol:
I wish we had that in the US.

*looks at Faux News*
Oh, Jesus.
I know, most conservative Americans I know can't wrap it around their heads that a public broadcaster might actually be able to do a good job at anything, let alone journalism and holding politicians to account, but there it is.
 
My Governor just took PBS off the states airwaves, now my College bought it out. lol
 
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (our public broadcaster) is awesome. It hosts a variety of shows to interrogate and occasionally put politicians in a difficult spot (like the 7:30 report, and Q&A), but it also runs some of the very best other shows...its program lineup is leaps and bounds ahead of the commercial networks, and the fact that there are no ads makes it even better.
 
I was under the impression that the EBC was a subsidiary of the executive. Shouldn't such criticism come from a private media outlet? I always saw the EBC as a way to rally the populace rather than bark at the administration which...employs it. Maybe I'm wrong.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corproation does the best journalism in the country, and is one of the only media outlets (well, CBC Radio at any rate, Mansbridge notwithstanding) willing to actually hold politicians' feet to the fire on anything. I'm not surprised it's a Canadian writing in the EBC doing a similar thing. :lol:
I wish we had that in the US.

*looks at Faux News*
Oh, Jesus.
I know, most conservative Americans I know can't wrap it around their heads that a public broadcaster might actually be able to do a good job at anything, let alone journalism and holding politicians to account, but there it is.
I'm not saying that at all. I just felt in this instance, it was odd. That's all. My last post was more of a reaction to bringing Fox News into the conversation. :p
 
Fox News is a fascinating look at the Golden Mean fallacy, but I don't want to hijack the thread any further.
 
I'd like to quote the same thing I posted in the polling results. I think it applies here as well.

I've spent a lot of time giving speeches, apologizing, and making promises, but I think it's time to defend my record. Yes, there have been some drawbacks, but I believe a lot of good has been done. You may disagree with me, but there are some facts that cannot be denied:
  • Europeia is raiding. We've been on 6 operations in the past three weeks.
  • The Navy has grown considerably. Thanks to the recruitment drive, we now have a decent number of members to work with rather than the two or three we had before.
  • The populations is stable. Yes, it's not as large as it once was. Yes, it has dipped below 700. However, because of the work of a few stawart recruiters, the populations has not fallen off a cliff and instead has remained over 700 for nearly the entire term.
  • We've been sending bi-weekly updates. Thanks to the work of Earth and Oliver, we're getting our name out there at a level that hasn't been seen in months.
  • There are new members on the forums. After wondering what had happened to all the new members, we finally have some after being barren nearly all year. I point to JGlenn and Switz, as well as those chomping at the bit who have not yet been given citizenship, such as Dr. Tycho.
  • We had a successful Fest. It generated loads of activity. No, it wasn't run by Culture, but Earth made it happen, covering for an incompetent fellow Ministry in my hour of need.
  • Most of all, people are finally getting involved. New people and old people are recruiting. People are joining the Navy. People are signing up to be mentors. Finally, the people of Europeia are working to be part of the solution, and I commend them for it, and I thank them.
Europeians tend to see the bad before the good. Indeed, I am sometimes guilty of this myself, paying too much attention to the criticism and not seeing the things actually accomplished. Good has come to the region during this term, and whether I seek re-election or not, I will defend the successes and hold myself accountable for the failings of the administration.
 
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