Government Reform: Game Renewal:
1.- The Cabinet:
It has been said that the hardest challenge for a President is to put together a cabinet, and I want to take chance to change the way the cabinet works and push for some innovation here. I believe one of the reasons for the positions to be so unappealing is that they involve too much responsibilities that make it hard to know where to start. I seek a two phase plan that involves a early experiment with the cabinet through the first half of the term and a potential constitutional amendment in the second half depending on the results.
The current system, I feel, focuses too much on reducing the number of portfolios without any regard for how complex the tasks are, which is traduced on SoIA having… (drum roll) eleven departments. Phase One involves an expansion of the cabinet to split up the tasks, delegate, and make the jobs easier. It involves a huge risk since with a greater number of offices it might hard to fill them, hence why this is experimental and not a fully official amendment. To elaborate on the positions and my thoughts on them:
-Secretary of Internal Affairs (Renamed as "Interior and Treasury"): Essentially, focused on “problem-solving” in several domestic issues and especially in implementing the administration's agenda in a very active way, along with coordinating with the Regional Executives when possible.
-Deputy Secretary for Energy, Technology and Environment: To make the SoIA’s job easier and put emphasis on our commitment to reform in these respective fields,, this position will be in charge of overseeing the environmental proposals, create long term plans for energy and research and start the planned expansion of the space program.
-Secretary of External Affairs (Renamed as "State"): There's a lot to do on this area, so the SoEA will focus on his role as the nation's top Diplomat, travelling around the world to meet with foreign leaders and lead the efforts to solve the various crises ahead (the Ebola virus, ISIS, Ukraine, etc.)
-Deputy SoEA for Defense: He will gain the powers of the Defense Department, CIA and NSA, and he will focus on reforming the army and focus on its modernization, along with the potential reform of the intelligence sector of Atlasia.
-Ambassador At-Large: As of now I envision three key objectives: First, to pursue the dissolution of the GTO, second, to implement NATO reform and create an Asian-Pacific version of NATO, and third, to initiate efforts for reform of the Security Council of the UN.
-Attorney General: More than just merely reacting to cases, I want the AG very involved with the job of the administration, and so far I envision several areas for him to act, including the need to fight cyberterrorism, the recent surge in terrorist organizations and so forth.
-Deputy Attorney General: Not many changes here, I have envisioned the position as a "Wiki Secretary" that will help with the necessary updates.
Granted, they are many positions and most likely it will be impossible to find enough people interested in all of them, but I feel the experiment is worth a try and in the worst case scenario it will help us to realize the limits of activity in the Executive branch and the cabinet itself. I believe the Registrar General and the Secretary of Federal Elections are currently working in an excellent way, so no changes there. While the GM position does need reform, Dr. Cynic’s recent efforts in the Senate and SirNick’s proposals seem very interesting and I approve of them, so as of I now I want to see what happens over the next weeks before committing to an official road regarding the GM.
Now, should the experiment work, I would consider pushing for an amendment that could be based on ideas like:
-Moving CIA and NSA into the Attorney General.
-Rename SoEA into “State”. Specify the use of ambassadors and special envoys. Creating a Defense Secretary is also possible.
-Divide SoIA into “Treasury” (focused on handling the economy and perhaps providing economic data if necessary) and “Interior” (focused on domestic policy).
-Optional: Make it possible for the cabinet members to hire deputies to handle some of the departments and responsibilities.
2.- The Voting System / Elections:
Things have been a bit quiet on this front, especially after the failure of the bicameralism proposal. We have kept the same system for elections for several years, and while it has worked so far it can perfectly be argued that a new system or a return to old proposals might create a better one, or one suited to the moment.
Secret Balloting: The idea has been proposed several times and this campaign embraces it as an idea with a lot of potential to improve the way the game works and make elections far more exiting, eliminating most of the negative consequences of "strategic voting". However, I would be lying if I said that I have found a perfect solution to this, so if elected I will form a "Presidential Commission for Secret Balloting" formed by elder statesmen of Atlasia in order to discuss and come up with a concrete proposal.
An end to At-Large Senate elections: At this stage many have complained about the At-Large elections and how they make the game a bit stale by having predictable outcomes most of the time (although the past one had a good number of surprises). I feel it's time to seek a replacement of the At-Large method, and one of the proposals that seem to have a lot of merit is a return to District races like the early days of Atlasia.
3.- State of the Union/Constitutional Reform:
State of the Union: As many of you know, I have always supported having politicians speak to an address the voters in order to explain their proposals, so we can increase transparency in government. The State of the Union speech is no exception, and I introduced a bill that would have made them mandatory and monthly. Alas, the general consensus in the Senate was that such a proposal was unenforceable, and so it was dropped. While I will not be pursuing an amendment here I plan to make full use of the State of the Union and I plan to deliver at least once per month, in order to explain the agenda for said month, the progress made so far and overall the message the administration wants to send to all Atlasians.
Constitutional Review: It's no mistake that our Constitution faces major trouble. Through the past months we have seen many examples of the ambiguity that the Constitution contains, and I have myself tried to correct some of them (mainly with my War Powers amendment, which sadly failed to pass the regions). Overall, a Lumine/SJoyce administration will seek to review and then address most of this contention points and amend the Constitution so we can improve the way the game works and avoid the usual lawsuits. I would advise President Marokai to do a bit more of research, since I indeed signed the petition for a new Constitution in May 2014. I feel we need changes here because the Constitution is clearly not doing a good job in some aspects, but as my opponent pointed out this doesn't depend on the President. Thus, instead of merely waiting for enough signatures to appear, we pledge to get to work and start correcting the major weaknesses with the Senate through Constitutional Amendments as soon as possible.
4.- Consolidation, Bicameralism and the overall theme of Game Reform:
When I ran for President in October 2013 I was an enthusiast of Game Reform, and I pledged to fight for consolidation of the regions because at the time I believed it was a good idea despite major weaknesses. Yet, the debate soon turned into the proposal of merging the Midwest and the Pacific (which I have always opposed) and the proposal itself was defeated by the public. I was even more supportive of Bicameralism, as I saw a chance for invigorating the game, but said proposal was defeated once again. I say this without a doubt: I have no plans to pursue consolidation of the regions when it's clear that a majority of Atlasians is opposed to it, so a Lumine/SJoyce administration will indeed not focus on that particular issue. Overall, what we want is to shift the debate on Game Reform into making reforms that are more swift and easier to achieve, considering all the focus has been on bicameralism and consolidation and both, for better or worse, were rejected by the public. There are more than one or two days of improving this game, and surely there are many other proposals out there that could really help this game improve.
I have already talked at length about the role of the Presidency, but this serves to put emphasis on the fact that an active administration can do a lot of good for Atlasia. It won't be easy, it most certainly will be something full of stress, but I do have the confidence that it can be achieved. The commitment and the proposals are there, and it's worth a try. As always, this ticket is open to questions and happy to receive feedback. The Conventions are coming soon and we are going through a terrible moment right now thanks to the disaster in the White House, so I plan to make a statement/speech on that very soon. Thank you very much.
