Confirmation Hearing: TyriontheImperialist for Vice President (Questioning)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Do you think Windjammer overextended and if so, would you still main the same level of involvement as say DemPGH's time under Nix's reign of terror?

Would you still run at least a handful of slots?

Also what about disputes concerning interpretation of rules, would you pursue an impartial approach to such?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I have not seen a response to Lumine's post. I don't know if this has been hashed out elsewhere nor do I have time to hunt for such.

So for now I will vote Nay pending a response on the matter.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Breaking ties was a constant problem during Matt's periods of absence, because as PPT I couldn't stand in for him in such capacity. I could do anything else of his duties, but not that because the Constitution does not name PPT as VP's successor or stand in. The Constitution empowers us to elect officers and the PPT is one of them and can succeed the VP only with regards to performance of those rules.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

In the absence of another thread, I would recommend PMing the Senators to ensure they notice this.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

In your term as VP, the massive rule overhaul will likely come up. First off, have your read both the packages composed by Nix and myself respectively (Senate Protest and Analysis Board)?

Then secondly what will your priorities or primary concerns be in such a debate and will you actively participate in said debate actively?

Would it be your objective to preserve the standards you helped craft for expulsions so as to protect a minority member (say we all gang up on Deus or Polnut) from being expelled for political reasons?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I hereby present myself.

In your term as VP, the massive rule overhaul will likely come up. First off, have your read both the packages composed by Nix and myself respectively (Senate Protest and Analysis Board)?

Then secondly what will your priorities or primary concerns be in such a debate and will you actively participate in said debate actively?

Yes, I have read them (see more commentary on them below), and I certainly plan on being active in debate. The VP is an important part of Senate proceedings and I definitely believe it's my duty to help facilitate or at least participate in debate around the issue.

I definitely do agree with both of you that we need to cut down on the fluff and improve accessibility. That's not a particularly unpopular opinion, of course, so let me outline my positions a bit further. First, I'll address your question:

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I would definitely like to avoid expulsion on political grounds; that would be simply undemocratic. I disagree with nearly all of JCL's views, for example, but he's an elected Senator now, and neither I nor the Senate as a whole should be able to expel him, or Deus, or Polnut, without a proper procedural and apolitical reason.

Here are some other points I'd like to weigh in on:

1. I plan on writing a combined version of the rules at some point. I've already started drafting.

2. I would rather scale up the words (keeping simple language and whatnot) if we can be very, very explicit about succession and acts in "bad faith", in order to keep the Senate running smoothly.

3. One point of "contention" between you and Nix was the use of the Vice President (I say "contention" because I know Nix is very open to commentary and was not at all confrontational about it). I think that's particularly germane to this confirmation hearing, of course. I think the VP's role in Confirmation Hearings is actually preferred, just due to my interpretation as confirmations being in relation to an act of the executive. I like that the seniormost Senator is in charge of the PPT vote; to avoid that being political, we should make sure we have succession in order so that we have a plan for when the Senator in question fails to open the vote (perhaps for fear of losing party control). Maybe we can just say that the vote is automatically opened in some other thread or something after 5 days if it hasn't already.

4. I am currently undecided on the clogging rule.

5. There is much, much more we can talk about here. Do you have anything you'd like me to talk about in specifics?

The area of disagreement was that he scales back the VP aggressively and I remember when the VP could not even be bothered to open a PPT election. I think it would be a mistake to go below that of DemPGH or Cincy in level of involvement. The specifics of what that is applied to can very, but I think that should be the minimum threshold, obviously debated between just PPT and Nomination votes is below that level.

 The clogging rule is necessary for in order slots to be functional, otherwise a Senator could fill the tree and even Nix has previously attached bill wait times to activity. Tree filling is an aspect of the real life Senate we are better off without.

My two other major concern regarding Nix's rule package is the override section. If we include limits on the use of expulsion for instance like you state a desire for on some level, then it would be necessary to exempt the expulsion section. The same should apply to the in-order introduction and clogging provisions.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

First and foremost of all, you should have been confirmed last time.

Secondly, do you feel that the VP role should be a more active entity a'la Windjammer, or are you more of the belief that the VP should only intervene in Senate procedure when absolutely necessary?

Well, I think that the VP can and should administer executive agenda slots and whatnot, similar to how things worked before Windjammer. Meanwhile...

That reminds me, doesn't Nix's package eliminate the executive slots?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The area of disagreement was that he scales back the VP aggressively and I remember when the VP could not even be bothered to open a PPT election. I think it would be a mistake to go below that of DemPGH or Cincy in level of involvement. The specifics of what that is applied to can very, but I think that should be the minimum threshold, obviously debated between just PPT and Nomination votes is below that level.

 The clogging rule is necessary for in order slots to be functional, otherwise a Senator could fill the tree and even Nix has previously attached bill wait times to activity. Tree filling is an aspect of the real life Senate we are better off without.

My two other major concern regarding Nix's rule package is the override section. If we include limits on the use of expulsion for instance like you state a desire for on some level, then it would be necessary to exempt the expulsion section. The same should apply to the in-order introduction and clogging provisions.

Yeah, and to your point about involvement, my history as a Senator makes me relatively interested in the body's goings on in the first place, so I certainly plan on at least talking a bit more than just during vote administration. I mean, I don't technically hold an office right now and I've been talking plenty.

Clogging might be necessary to prevent complete control of the floor; however, it does seem like a rule largely intended to impact TNF at this point.

I'm not sure what you're referring to on exemptions. If you mean that expulsions should be treated differently with respect to slot usage, then, yes, I certainly agree.

It was passed way back in 2009 and at various points TNF, myself, Lumine were all effected by it at one point in the Spring. It does shut itself down when no other bills are introduced and we had that happen in the June period I think where all other bills were completed. Plus there are other built in exceptions where I kept TNF at four bills at one time.

My wording strengthens that:

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Would you be more favorable at a 4 bill or more clogging limit?

To clarify my other point, I was talking about the bottom of Nix's proposal. The last section contains provision to override the entire text based on a 2/3rds vote. In my view, clogging, in order introduction slots and Expulsion should be exempted from that as they preserve access to the floor/Senate and we get back to the Deus/Polnut situation.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

AYE

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Been waiting a whole month for that.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I'm a situation

Single member from party of membership.

I was there all 2012 with the IB, whilst you partied it up with the largest party at the time. That's Atlasia.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Lumine, end this already. You could have yesterday.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I thought this was finally over. Don't scare me by making it look like it is not.