Comment about Committee Scandals

I want to clear an issue up before we are confronted with it. As Patio said, the committee assignment system is subject to kickback exposure and scandal. This is not a bad thing because it regulates the committee system.

If enough Voters cry "kickback" the proposer will probably self-fail. I predict that at first none of us will expose the kickback since we want to get our Committee choices, but later "Committee Assignment Committee Meetings" will be increasingly likely to get sunk.

I stand corrected. The CACM do not contain a kickback, as the proposal does not specify what to do with the vote choices, a rule does. So CACM are not regulated by threat of scandal and I'm changing my mind - I think the PM should control them. If he doesn't do it in a timely fashion, we'll just start making freeform nomination proposals to get on committees.

Proposal: Committeering Democracy [Trivial]

In the Committees rule, change

Once every 48 hours, the Prime Minister may create

to

If there is no pending Proposal with "Committee Assignment Committee Meeting" in its subject, the Prime Minister or the Speaker of any Party may create

In the same rule change

The Prime Minister does not gain or lose any Confidence

to

The author of a Proposal with "Committee Assignment Committee Meeting" in its subject does not gain or lose any Confidence

Timed out; failed 1-4 (EV 1-10.) Failed 11/22 by Simon. -3 to Chronos.

Proposal: Ordered Law

If this Proposal passes, the Ruleset shall be given this order:

1 –10 – Unchanged
11 – Parties
12 – Chain of Command
13 – Caucuses
14 – Joining Parties
15 – Leaving Parties
16 – Party Fusion
17 – Protocols
18 – Platforms
19 – Electoral Votes
20 – Electoral Vote Counting
21 – Electoral Gain
22 – Supporters
23 – Corruption
24 – Scandal
25 – Ministerial Takeover
26 – Cabinet
27 – Committees

Self Failed. Failed by Orson. -3 to Chronos (at 0 limit).

Idle Me

See Title.

The college application crap is hitting the deadline fan.

Truman Capote idled. Quorum drops to 5. Sidebar "Warlords" changed to "Lords". Orson, Nov 19.

Proposal: Term Limit I [Trivial]

[This is identical to the previous Proposal of the same name. Lesson learned: don't be hasty to self-fail.]

In rule 29 Ministerial Takeover add this item to the list of conditions for a Lord to Request to become Prime Minister:

* He must have been Prime Minister fewer times than the current Prime Minister.

Time out 4-2 (10-6 EV). Enacted by Orson Nov 21. +4 to Orson. Applied -5 penalty to Jarrod, Patio11, Wildcard.

Proposal: Committee Assignment Committee Pre-Meeting [Trivial]

This is a pre-meeting to discuss the methodology of the Committee Assignment Committee.

Add the following to the Committees rule:

Once every 48 hours, the Prime Minister may create a Proposal entitled "Committee Assignment Committee Meeting [n]" where [n] is the number of the meeting being held, expressed in Roman numerals. Any Lord who votes FOR this Proposal may include the name of one rule that they would like to be on the Committee for. If the Proposal passes, then the Lords who voted FOR have the number of their chosen rule added to their Committee list. The Prime Minister does not gain or lose any Confidence as a result of the passage or failure of this type of Proposal.

You're all invited to the first meeting as soon as this passes.

Reached Quorum: 5-0 (13-0 EV). Enacted by Orson. +2 Confidence to Simon and Orson.

Note: Committee time limit expired

The paragraph allowing Lords to join a Committee expired before any of us chose one. We will need a method to do that now, since there is currently no way to get on a Committee.

Proposal: Term Limit II [Trivial]

In rule 29 Ministerial Takeover after this line:

After 24 hours of the posting of a Request to become Prime Minister, the current Prime Minister may Grant or Deny the Request.

add:

If the current Prime Minister has held the position for more than a week the Request is automatically Granted and any Lord may update the Gamestate to apply any consequences as if he were the Prime Minister Granting the Request.

[The Glossary defines a week to be from Monday through Sunday, so the current Prime Minister wouldn't run up against the time limit until Monday the 29th.]

Reached Quorum: 5-0 (14-0 EV). Enacted by Orson. +4 Confidence to Orson.

Prosposal: Term Limit I [Trivial]

In rule 29 Ministerial Takeover add this item to the list of conditions for a Lord to Request to become Prime Minister:

* He must have been Prime Minister fewer times than the current Prime Minister.

Failed: Self-kill by Orson. Would get -3 but he's at zero Confidence.

Admin Note: No More Fail Reward

The Call for Judgement: Deeper Fix passed, so Admins may no longer claim a reward for failing a proposal.

Proposal: Total Support II [Trivial]

When this Proposal is enacted, each Party's Speaker shall be given an increase in its Perc of Supporters. That increase shall be calculated as follow:

* Total up the CURRENT PERC, in a percentage format ranging from 0 to 1, of all Parties. This is the CURRENT TOTAL;
* Subtract that number from 1; This is the TOTAL INCREASE to be given to all Parties;
* For each Party, divide its CURRENT PERC by the CURRENT TOTAL, round down to the nearest hundreth. This is that Party’s CURRENT FACTOR;
* For each Party, multiply its CURRENT FACTOR by the TOTAL INCREASE. That’s the Increase, in a percentage format ranging from 0 to 1, to be given to that Party.

I've adjusted the GNDT so NPerc (which is not called Perc anymore due to a minor bug at the GNDT engine concerning updating a field that ends in "%") so it shows the percentage in the 0.00 form.

Reached quorum; passed 6-0 (EV 17-0). Enacted 11/18 by Simon. +2 to Chronos and Simon.

Cabinet member demotion: Knightking, Chancellor of the Exchequer

You've done a superb job of balancing the budget, and so I respectfully accept your resignation. Written on your behalf. By me.

Notice: I Accept

Since it's been over 48 hours since I posted my PM request, the votes are 12 to 8 in favour, and Chronos doesn't have the Confidence to stop me, I hereby assume the position of Prime Minister. Viva democracy!

Proposal: Drats

I was so ready to exploit this up as soon as the queue cleared, but I just got called to another three day conference, so in the interests of not having the Dynasty end before I get back I'll tell you what I was going to do, and how to stop it.

Wait until the queue is cleared.
Propose 6 (4 if you're not me) proposals containing kickbacks. Immediately self fail while identifying the kickbacks. Note that I snuck in a Trivial which prevents other people from immunizing themself by exposing after you self-fail.
Admin these proposals, which generates 6/4 Scandals for ALL Lords (you are the proposer, no other Lord exposed the kickback).
Immediately Scandal yourself 4 times. Your confidence should be pretty close to zero. Elect not to transfer EV from yourself.
Scandal all the other Lords repeatedly, transferring EV whenever possible. This will allow you to steal, effectively, every EV in the game as long as you stay within limits. Ideally, you'd be in a two-man party with a mechanism for transferring EV to your mate (to keep him within 3 of you). A Protocol could be used to swap EV around to keep you within limits, if necessary, or you could take advantage of the one-time offer in Electoral Gain. A Protocol to allow me to be Speaker of the NDP was crucial to my planned exploit.
Immediately do two things -- put a proposal on the queue to stop someone from doing this to you. I'd suggest that proposal be "Patio is allowed to declare victory. Repeal rules Scandal, Corruption, and EV Gain. All Lords in the NDP are transferred to the VRWC on passage of this proposal. Signed, all of my electoral votes."
Then request that the PM appoint you to his spot. He has 0 Confidence, you have more than half of the outstanding EV votes in your hands/that of your party if you've done this properly, which means even if he vetoes "I win" proposal you'll steal the Veto from him in 24 hours, when you can pass it again.

Now, what can people do to frustrate you? If there is a Protocol in place allowing EV redirection by an Enforcer other than the Prime Minister(no one has it), they can redirect EV from you to themselves if your Party isn't in on the scam with you. Everyone could quit your Party, rendering you a Maverick, which only entitles you to 1 vote -- but I think the rules would only stop you from moving your EV total again, so this is worthless.

Then, of course, if the PM vetoes your "I win" proposal they can respond by organizing the same scam against you.

Anyhow, here is the proposal. Replace the following language in Scandal :

any Lords who did not expose the Kickback

with

any Lords who voted on the proposal but did not expose the Kickback

Yes, five little words.

16-0. Reached Quorum (6). Enacted by Chronos.

On that, I went by the spirit of the Proposal and made the alteration to the Corruption rule, instead of the Scandals one.

Proposal: Wow, Now That is An Amusing Exploit

Modify the Rule 25 -- Corruption to read:

If a Proposal specifies Gamestate changes that act specifically on any Lord based on how they voted on a Proposal, it contains a Kickback.

When voting on a Proposal containing a Kickback, a Lord may expose it by including the word "kickback" in the comments with their vote, if their vote is not FOR. If the Lord later votes again on the same proposal, their vote is counted as an exposure if and only if the later vote is not a FOR and contains the word "kickback".

When the Votes are tallied, if the number of Lords exposing the Kickback outnumber those that don't, the Proposal's author and any Lords who did not expose the Kickback become involved in a Scandal.

No exposing of kickbacks may take place after the proposing Lord has cast an AGAINST vote on his own proposal (i.e. a self-kill) or after the Prime Minister has VETOed the proposal.

Two exploits here. The first is more serious -- nominate one dummy with low Confidence/EV total (preferably one). Dummy proposes "All Lords who vote for this proposal gain 3 Electoral Votes." All Lords in your Party vote "FOR. kickback", immunizing them against the pain of the kickback but preserving their ability to get the EV if it passes (note that the NDP could pass this proposal today, if we wanted to, likely leading to an NDP win).

The second is just obnoxious. Say a kickback proposal has 5 Lords voting yes on it, without exposure. An admin could vote NO (kick), YES (kick), NO (kick) 100 times -- thus, the number of votes exposing would be 100. End with FOR, adopt the proposal, and slam Scandals all over the place.

Oh, take note, I now make kickback determined by # of Lords voting rather than EV totals. This might have been the intent of the original proposal -- in any event, its more fair.



16-0. Reached Quorum (6). Enacted by Chronos

Call for Judgement: Deeper Fix

[An Admin with an accomplice can generate points freely using just the core ruleset, by the self-kill/admin method Chronos describes. I don't think that this has ever been a problem in BlogNomic before because it is a lopsided gain by the Admin, but if there is a way to reward the accomplice (like protocols) then the exploit becomes a tempting conspiracy.

Removing just Protocols is not enough. Rule 21 could be used to gain 1 free EV a day if the Speaker is an Admin.

I think it is better to to close this loophole at the source. I think we should remove the reward for failing a Proposal. It is not much work to fail a Proposal and there is still incentive for the Admin to move the queue along to get to Enactable Proposals.]

If this Call for Judgement passes remove "Fail a Proposal or" from this line in rule 6 :

Whenever they Fail a Proposal or Enact a Trivial Proposal, they may claim 2 Confidence.

6-0. Reached Quorum (6). Enacted by Orson, Nov 17.

Call for Judgement: Infinity Scam

Researching a way to bar Simon’s Request to become PM, I’ve found a serious infinite Confidence/EV loop-hole in our current RuleSet:

Figure this scenario:

- I veto/self-kill all currently pending Proposals and Admin then.

We then start the loop:
- Orson, who has 0 confidence, posts a Proposal
- I veto/Admin it. He loses 3 confidence, cap to zero. I gain 2.
- We repeat those steps until I have 100 confidence. I spend the 100 conf to gain an EV.
- I we three (Orson, I and Knightking) have the same number of EV, then I use the new Prosperity Protocol to give that EV to Knigthking.
- If not, If I have more EV’s than Orson, I give it to him.
- If not, I keep the EV and start the process again.
- I someone posts a Proposal in the meanwhile, I Veto/Admin it also.
- When I find we have enough EV's, I keep the loop until I have 200 confidence, give it all to Knightking, keep it a little more, and end with another 200. Then we give some to Orson and we all end with 133/134 conf.

If this CfJ passes, the entire Protocols rule shall be repealed, as it’s the main engine of this loop-hole.

Timed out; 0-4. Failed 11/22 by Orson.

Caucus with Prosperity: Create Protocol: Solidarity II

Solidarity II
Prosperity
Party Reward Template
If all of the following conditions are met: The Lord who will receive the EV belongs to Prosperity, then the Lord who is giving the EV may transfer an Electoral Vote from a Lord in Prosperity who has more than one Electoral Vote to any other Lord.

Dear colleagues, this is part of the Strategy we've been discussing.

3-0. Caucus Approved. Enacted by Orson Nov 17

Proposal: Total Support [Trivial]

When this Proposal is enacted, each Party's Speaker shall be given an increase in its Perc of Supporters. That increase shall be calculated as follow:

* Total up the CURRENT PERC of all Parties. This is the CURRENT TOTAL;
* Subtract that number from 100; This is the TOTAL INCREASE to be given to all Parties;
* For each Party, divide its CURRENT PERC by the CURRENT TOTAL, round down. This is that Party’s CURRENT FACTOR;
* For each Party, multiply its CURRENT FACTOR by the TOTAL INCREASE. That’s the Increase to be given to that Party.

S-K. Failed by Chronos

Proposal: Committees

Add a rule Committees:

Each Lord may be a member of a Committee with special legislative oversight. Committee positions are tracked in the GNDT as a list of numbers corresponding to rules in the ruleset. The core ruleset is constitutionally protected; rules 1-10 or 99 may not be chosen for Committees.

Committee positions can only be changed when allowed by the ruleset. Whenever an Admin reorders the ruleset, they must update the corresponding Committee values of affected Lords. Whenever an Admin removes a rule, they must remove the corresponding Committee values of affected Lords. The Prime Minister's duties preclude committee participation; if a Lord is Prime Minister their Committee values are cleared.

When tallying Votes on a Proposal, if a Lord has a Committee position which corresponds to a rule amended or repealed by that Proposal, then the Electoral Votes cast by that Lord are doubled for the purposes of Failing or Enacting that Proposal only.

Lords may enter a single rule in their Committee GNDT entry if they do not already have one. This paragraph shall be deleted once all Lords have a Committee position, or 24 hours have passed since the creation of this rule, whichever comes first.

We can come up with real committee appointment rules later.

19-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Caucus with Prosperity: Create Protocol: Kleptocracy

Kleptocracy
Prosperity
Speaker Selection
A Lord in the Prosperity Party is Eligible for elevation to Speaker of the Prosperity Party if all of the following conditions are met: no Lord in the Prosperity Party has more Electoral Votes than the Lord to be made Eligible.

[Imitation is the sincerest form of laziness. Would another member of Prosperity call a caucus to repeal our defunct protocols? I can only call one caucus per day.]

3-0. Caucus Approved. Enacted by Orson Nov 17

Proposal: Moving at the Speed of Government

Sign here and here. Now initial here, here and here. No wait a minute, for this you'll need a twenty-seven B-stroke-six...

Add a rule called Bureaucracy:

A Lord may change the same individual entry (a single cell) in the GNDT no more than 10 times within the span of one hour. If a Lord is at that limit and is required to make another change to the entry, the Lord must note their inability to comply in a GNDT comment indicating "red tape" as the cause.

[I'm trying to make a speedbump for scams of the form "I do X 1000 times". Heavy-handed? Absolutely. Frustrating? Possibly -- but it is in theme!]

[Could a Lord abuse this rule to avoid making a change to a value by twiddling it harmlessly 10 times first? The ruleset doesn't prohibit a different Lord from making the GNDT changes caused by a rule, so I think other Lords could step in and make the change the abuser was trying to avoid.]

1-13. Can't be enacted without COV. Failed by Chronos

Proposal: Protocol Goodness [Trivial]

In Rule 28 -- Protocols, replace the text

A Speaker Selection Protocol must start with the words "A Lord in [Party] is Eligible for elevation to Speaker of [Party] if all of the following conditions are met: [conditions] ".

with the text

A Speaker Selection Protocol must be of the form "A Lord in [Party] is Eligible for elevation to Speaker of [Party] if all of the following conditions are met: [conditions] ".

Replace the text:

Except as explicitly outlined below, no Protocol may contradict any other rule not marked as allowing such a contradiction by a Protocol, cause any change of gamestate, cause any Rule to become edited, cause a declaration of victory, or allow any action not specifically authorized by a non-Protocol section of the ruleset.

with the text

Except as explicitly outlined below, no Protocol may contradict any other rule not marked as allowing such a contradiction by a Protocol, cause any change of gamestate, cause any modification of the Rules, cause a declaration of victory, or allow any action not specifically authorized by a non-Protocol section of the ruleset.

There is a bit of an edge case here. You START your Speaker selection protocol with the words outlined, and then you go on to tack on another sentence like "When this Protocol is added to the ruleset, add a new rule, "Patio is a bastard", which reads "No Proposal can pass if Patio has voted AGAINST it". This might avoid the restriction against having a Protocol "edit" a rule, since "Patio is a bastard" never existed to be edited.

15-0. Reached Quorum (6). Enacted by Chronos

Caucus with New Democratic Party: Create Protocol: Popular Soverignty

Popular Soverignty
New Democratic Party
Speaker Selection
A Lord in the New Democratic Party is Eligible for elevation to Speaker of the New Democratic Party if all of the following conditions are met: no Lord in the New Democatic Party has more Electoral Votes than the Lord to be made Eligible.

This prevents someone from losing EV if they get more than Simon, for whatever reason, without the expedient used in another Party which may or may not be legal (don't know if you can hold an EV up in the air while you change Speakership to yourself, and I don't want to find out after the fact that you can't).

Approved by New Democratic Party, 4-0 (quorum of 3). Added to Protocol rule by Patio

Request to become Prime Minister

My fellow Lords, we can do better. What Blognomic needs is firm leadership and vision. I, Orson of the Prosperity Party, have never made a mistake and if elected Prime Minister, I pledge to deserve that record. I'm a uniter not a divider, so rest assured, I will support the values of those who share my interests.

Also, my opponent is a smarty elitist who wears flip-flops. Need I say more?

I'm Orson and I approve this message.

Request denied by Prime Minister Simon, 8-8 against.

Cabinet Member Nomination: Patio11, Lord Great Chamberlain

It's yours again.

Proposal: No self-nominating [Trivial]

In the Cabinets rule change:

The Prime Minister may grant any Lord a Cabinet Portfolio, by posting an entry with subject: "Cabinet member nomination: [Lord], [Portfolio]". The Prime Minister may demote any Lord from a Cabinet Portfolio, by posting an entry with subject: "Cabinet member demotion: [Lord], [Portfolio]" or by nominating another Lord for that Portfolio.

to

The Prime Minister may grant any Lord, except himself, a Cabinet Portfolio, by posting an entry with subject: "Cabinet member nomination: [Lord], [Portfolio]". The Prime Minister may demote any Lord from a Cabinet Portfolio, by posting an entry with subject: "Cabinet member demotion: [Lord], [Portfolio]" or by nominating another Lord for that Portfolio. A Prime Minister may only post a Cabinet member nomination if no other nomination for the same Portfolio exists in the 24 hours before the posting of the new one.

This is to prevent what I just made

16-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Cabinet Member Nomination: Chronos, Lord Great Chamberlain

Just wait.

Proposal: Decorum [Trivial]

Now that we have Protocols for ousting Party Members, I think we can dispense with the barbaric custom of Banishment.

Repeal rule 14, Banishment.

14-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Wildcard is not Idle

In the same time I was verifying if Wildcard was really idle, he voted on two proposals, though after tallying and enacting of the same. Anyways I'm unidling him. I'll not revert the enactment of Exchequer Portfolio, though, as it's now with the current quorum of 6.

If someone disagrees, please CfJ.

Proposal: No Exchequer rotating [Trivial]

Add to the Cabinet rule, just before the list of current portfolios:

If there is a time limit on the powers a Minister is entitled to exert, that limit applies to any holder of that office, even if another Lord assumes the Portfolio in the mean time.

When this Proposal is enacted, any action taken since the passing of Proposal: Exchequer Portfolio that disagrees with this rule shall be reverted.

Minor loop-hole fixing, to disallow Exchequer rotating.

10-0. Reached Quorum (6). Enacted by Chronos

Proposal: Easier Idling

In rule 2, change

Some Lords are idle, and should be marked as such in the sidebar. For the purposes of rules other than 1 and 2, idle Lords are not counted as Lords. Admin may render a Lord idle if that Lord has failed to vote for more than a week, or if it has asked to become idle. Admins may un-idle a Lord at their request - the Lord's personal gamestate retains the values it had immediately prior to their idling.

to

Some Lords are idle, and should be marked as such in the sidebar. For the purposes of rules other than 1 and 2, idle Lords are not counted as Lords.

There’s a GNDT field tracking the last time a Lord voted. Anytime a Lord casts a vote, he or she may change that field to reflect his or her action.

Admin may render a Lord idle if the last time that Lord has voted, according to the GNDT, is more than a week before the time of the idling, or if it has asked to become idle. Admins may un-idle a Lord at their request - the Lord's personal gamestate retains the values it had immediately prior to their idling.

I know I'm doing 2 things that are usually frowned upon: messing with a core rule and creating a GNDT field. But it's very annoying having to scan the comments of an entire week of posts just to see if someone can be idled. I guess this solves that problem.

SK. Failed by Chronos

Cabinet Member Nomination: Patio11, Lord Great Chamberlain

a.k.a. Great bug fixer.

Cabinet Member Nomination: Knightking, Chancellor of the Exchequer

Hm?

Proposal: Secretary of State Portfolio II [Trivial]

In the Cabinet rule, add to the list of current Portfolios:

* First Secretary of State - Once a day, if the First Secretary of State is an Admin, he can enact or fail a Proposal as if that Proposal were the oldest pending one. That Proposal must still meet any other requirement extant for Enactment or Failure (for example, minimal Quorum and a majority FOR vote before Enactment).

SK. Failed by Chronos

Wildcard is Idle

Quorum is 5.

Cabinet Member Nomination: Orson, Lord Keeper of the Seal

I'll name Simon for this Portfolio and a member of NDP for Chamberlain if Simon's PM claim fails.

Proposal: Secretary of State Portfolio [Trivial]

In the Cabinet rule, add to the list of current Portfolios:

* First Secretary of State - Once a day, if the First Secretary of State is an Admin, he can enact or fail a Proposal as if that Proposal were the oldest pending one.

S-K. Failed by Chronos

Proposal: Foreign Affairs Portfolio

[Recently, I went on a holiday tour of a land the inhabitants call "B-Nomic". In its patchwork of territories I observed much hustle and bustle, and I thought to myself, what can I do to foster exchange between our great nations?]

Add to the Cabinet rule:

* Minister for Foreign Affairs – the Minister for Foreign Affairs manages foreign policy regarding other recognized nations. The Lord with this Portfolio may introduce another nomic game as an entity worthy of formal recognition by posting an entry to the blog with the subject "Recognize Nation: [Nomic Name]" with a description and location of the nomic. The nomic being recognized must be an active nomic and it cannot already be on the Recognized Nation list. An Admin may claim 2 Confidence by adding this information to the Foreign Affairs rule and increasing by 5 the Confidence of the Minister for Foreign Affairs.

Add a rule, Foreign Affairs:

The Parliament of BlogNomic recognizes these Nations:
(-nation list-)

[This would be the first step toward reaching outside our borders. At the very least it will promote a survey of other nomic games. One way we could treat with other nomics without getting entangled in their rules is to use a neutral, open wiki. I wonder if we could do some good at the slowly crumbling Nomic.net Wiki?]

Failed by Chronos

Caucus with Prosperity: Create Protocol: Plutocracy

Plutocracy
Prosperity
Speaker Selection Template
A Lord in Prosperity is Eligible for elevation to Speaker of Prosperity if all of the following conditions are met: That Lord has EV equal to the current Speaker and the Lord is eligible for an EV increase.

[I've been burned twice by the EV limit. Let's have a way to quickly shift Speakership to avoid those senseless losses within our Party.]

2-0. Caucus approved. Added to Protocols by Orson Nov 15.

Caucus with New Democratic Party: Fusion with VRWC, Become New Democratic Party

But Warlord, aren't we the opposite of all things New and Democratic?*gunshot*How many times to I have to tell you guys, its Speaker. Except it isn't, anymore. And I won't be able to shoot my staff.*weeps*

I botched an attempt at posting this (replaced word "Fusion" with "Merge") and, by accident, caused a non-legal Caucus, which is not an Official Post, so I can't edit the title to make it a Official post. But hey, since its not a legal Caucus, it doesn't count against my Caucus-a-day limit, and isn't a Official post, so I deleted it and posted this one. If you think my reasoning is screwy, CfJ away.

Reached NDP quorum; passed 2-0 (EV 7-0). Enacted by Simon.

Caucus with New Democratic Party: Join with VRWC, Become the New Democratic Party

But Warlord, aren't we the opposite of all things New and Democratic?
*gunshot*
How many times to I have to tell you guys, its Speaker. Except it isn't, anymore. And I won't be able to shoot my staff.
*weeps*

Proposal: Oh No You Didn't. [Trivial]

Change the first paragraph of Rule 30 -- Cabinet to read the following:

The Prime Minister is aided in his role by a Cabinet, which is comprised by various Portfolios. Each Portfolio is held by a Lord, named by the Prime Minister. No Portfolio may be held by more than one Lord at any given time. The Portfolio or Portfolios held by a Lord, if any, are tracked by the GNDT.

We're giving these ministers a heck of a lot of power -- I don't think concentrating it all in a recalcitrant PM's hands is a good idea.

15-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Proposal: Everybody Loves the Mavericks [Trivial]

Orson gains one Electoral Vote on passage of this proposal. He just lost one as a result of the parts of the rule that this will repeal not being in the rule wiki when he grabbed the EV, due to a minor admin error.

Change Rule 19 -- Electoral Votes so that it reads

Each Lord holds a number of Electoral Votes, reflecting how much power that Lord wields in the name of his people. This is tracked by the GNDT. When a Lord votes on a Proposal, they may cast any number of their Electoral Votes, with a minimum of one - this is signified by including the relevant number of vote icons in a single comment. (If a later comment from the same Lord uses a different number of icons, that takes precedence.) All Electoral Votes cast in a single comment must be the same. If a plural number of DEFERENTIAL votes are ever tallied, they will be tallied as a group (either FOR, AGAINST, or abstentation), as provided for in other rules. Regardless of the number of Electoral Votes a Lord is entitled to cast, there is only one, singular, result of his vote.

There are some boundaries about the number of Electoral Votes a Lord may hold. These boundaries shall be listed here and any action that would bring the number of Electoral Votes held by a Lord to violate those boundaries may be done, but the change shall be capped so the resulting Gamestate doesn’t violate those boundaries:

A Lord must not hold less than 1 Electoral Vote.

The difference between the Electoral Votes held by the Member with the highest number of Electoral Votes and by the Member with the lowest number of Electoral Votes within the same Party shall not be greater than 3

parties are good. Failed by Chronos

Request to become Prime Minister

Are you tired of the conspiracies inherent in the modern right wing? Are you angry that your life is secretly controlled by the Illuminati, the Stonecutters, and the Microsoft corporation? Of course you are. Elect Simon, the Speaker of the New Democratic Party, as your Prime Minister. He's not afraid to take on these secret special interest groups and deny them funding. And he likes kittens. I'm not saying that if you're against Simon, you're against kittens and democracy, but I mean come on! Kittens! Also, Simon kind of looks like a young Ed Broadbent with hair.

I'm Simon, and I approve of this message.

12-8 Request Timed Out and automatically Granted, as Prime Minister didn't have enough Confidence to Deny it.

Proposal: Great Chamberlain Portfolio [Trivial]

If there's not a text reading "Currently, the Portfolios are:" in the Cabinet rule, add that text to its end.

Add to the Cabinet rule:

* Lord Great Chamberlain – the Lord Great Chamberlain is entitled to have 6 Trivial Proposals' worth of Proposals pending. This conforms to and supersedes the specific portion of rule 4.

16-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Proposal: Exchequer Portfolio [Trivial]

If there's not a text reading "Currently, the Portfolios are:" in the Cabinet rule, add that text to its end.

Add to the Cabinet rule:

* Chancellor of the Exchequer – Once a day, the Chancellor of the Exchequer is entitled to take 1 Confidence from each Lord, except the Prime Minister and the High Lord, if one exists, and distribute that Confidence between any Lord or Lords, except himself and the Prime Minister.

12-0. Reached Quorum (5). Enacted by Chronos

Proposal: Support's too slow [Trivial]

In the Supporters rule, change

Each time a non-speaker member of a party has a succesfully passed non-trivial proposal, their party may gain 1% of the population. Each time a speaker has a succesfully passed non-trivial proposal, their party may gain 3% of the population.

to

Each time a non-speaker member of a party has a succesfully passed trivial proposal, their party may gain 1% of the population. Each time a speaker has a succesfully passed trivial proposal, their party may gain 3% of the population.

Each time a non-speaker member of a party has a succesfully passed non-trivial proposal, their party may gain 2% of the population. Each time a speaker has a succesfully passed non-trivial proposal, their party may gain 5% of the population.

It's not that hard for an Admin to enforce it.

15-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Proposal: Seal Portfolio [Trivial]

Add to the Cabinet rule:

Currently, the Portfolios are:

* Lord Keeper of the Seal – The Lord Keeper of the Seal is entitled to, as if he were the Prime Minister, apply the Imperial veto to any proposal which is pending for more than 24 hours and which has not a FOR vote cast by the Prime Minister.

14-0. Reached Quorum (7). Enacted by Chronos

Notice: Proposal Party Discipline incorrect enactment

Proposal: Party Discipline mandated to "Replace the first paragraph of Rule 19 -- Electoral Votes". When Simon enacted it, he replaced the entire rule. I've just edited the rule and reincluded the following text:

A Lord may not hold more Electoral Votes than the Speaker of his Party. At any time, if a Lord holds more Electoral Votes than the Speaker of his Party, that Lord’s Electoral Votes shall be reduced to comply with this rule.

There are some boundaries about the number of Electoral Votes a Lord may hold. These boundaries shall be listed here and any action that would bring the number of Electoral Votes held by a Lord to violate those boundaries may be done, but the change shall be capped so the resulting Gamestate doesn’t violate those boundaries:

* A Maverick Lord may only hold 1 Electoral Vote.

* A Lord must not hold less than 1 Electoral Vote.

* The difference between the Electoral Votes held by the Member with the highest number of Electoral Votes and by the Member with the lowest number of Electoral Votes within the same Party shall not be greater than 3

If anyone disagrees, please CfJ.

Proposal: Expand Kickback Definition [Trivial]

In the first line in the rule Corruption, replace "each Lord" with "any Lord".

Proposal hits 6 Lord quorum, Shadowsliver's votes proxied to Simon (Speaker of NDP), passes 11-0. Enacted by Patio, 2 Confidence each to Patio and Orson.

Caucus with Prosperity: Create Protocol: Solidarity

Solidarity
Prosperity
Party Reward Template
If all of the following conditions are met: The Lord who will receive the Confidence belongs to Prosperity, then the Lord who is giving the Confidence may transfer a positive amount of Confidence less than the total amount possessed from any Lord in Prosperity to any other Lord.

The way the reward template was written is very weird, but I guess this Protocol allow a member from Prosperity to give an amount of Confidence to another member

2-0. Caucus Approved. Admin by Orson Nov 14.

Proposal: Glossary Changes [Trivial]

Trying these changes again, as a Proposal this time.

Remove this line from the Glossary: [Why is it there?]

When a Call for Judgement is resolved, any Admin may make an appropriate addition or alteration to this rule based on the result of the Call for Judgment.

Change the first entry in the Glossary to: [Stripping out the last reference to individual blogs.]

References to "a day" (as an entity rather than a duration, eg. "Sunday") refer to that day in the timezone of the BlogNomic blog.

Add an entry to the Glossary list:

A keyword defined by a rule supersedes the normal english usage of the word. A keyword defined in this glossary supersedes that defined by a rule. (eg. A rule specifying "Bananas are Blue" cannot be overruled by posting a dictionary definition or a photo of a banana, and a rule specifying "every day is Sunday" will be overruled by the glossary entry above.)

Reached quorum of 6, passed with 11-0 by Patio. 2 Confidence each to Patio & Orson.

Proposal: Core Ruleset and Glossary Changes [Trivial]

The purpose of this change is to answer the "can I change my post?" question in the ruleset and also to provide a place to list all locations which track gamestate data.

Change the name of Rule 8 to Gamestate Tracking, and add this text to the beginning of it:

Proposals, Calls for Judgement, and other official posts, as well as specific gamestate information, shall be tracked by the BlogNomic blog at http://blogspot.blognomic.com. Any Lord may post to the blog at any time, but may only make official posts to the blog when the ruleset allows it. Posts following the format specified by a rule are considered official posts.

If nobody else has commented on it, an official post may be altered or removed, otherwise this can only be done as allowed by the ruleset. The Admin processing an official post is allowed to append to the post to reflect its new status.

A non-official post may not through editing of the blog be changed into an official post.

Voting and comments are tracked by backblog, accessible through the link at the bottom of every post.

Simplify the last Glossary Entry to read [since this information has been moved to rule 8]:

"Posts" and "comments" refer only to those made to the BlogNomic weblog at blognomic.blogspot.com.

Proposal reached 6 Lord quorum, EV 11-0. Enacted by Patio. 2 confidence each to Patio and Orson.

Question About Blognomic Norms

This is prompted by the Prime Minister seat being recently thrown open to the public. The PM has a veto, and since it can't be overrided except by CfJ thats a pretty weighty stick to have. What circumstances warrant a veto? Would protecting the narrow interests of the PM be enough (say, Veto a rule which he thinks will eventually harm him personally)? If someone were to gain a commanding lead in EV and pass a rule allowing them to declare victory, would that be appropriate to veto? If someone were to propose a rule that proposed a fairly radically altered the flow of the dynasty (say, abolished EV) would that be appropriate to Veto?

Just asking, because I hope to be Prime Minister one day (sadly, looking at the fact that I only control less than 5% of the EV out there, it probably won't be anytime soon -- maybe in the next dynasty, or the one after that).

Proposal: No Pocket Veto [Trivial]

If there exists a rule Ministerial Takeover, modify the text

If more than half of the Electoral Votes cast on the Request are FOR it and the current Prime Minister Denies the Request anyway, he must lose 5 Confidence for each FOR Electoral Vote it has. The current Prime Minister may not Deny the Request this way if he has not enoug Confidence to lose.

to read

If more than half of the Electoral Votes cast on the Request are FOR it and the current Prime Minister Denies the Request anyway, he must lose 5 Confidence for each FOR Electoral Vote it has. The current Prime Minister may not Deny the Request this way if he has not enough Confidence to lose. Additionally, if the Prime Minister would not have enough Confidence to pay the penalty, and the Request expires at 48 hours with a majority of votes cast FOR, then the request is automatically Granted instead of being Denied.

In the current rule, "this way" allows the PM a loophole -- he can just let the request expire, take the Confidence hit, and have it Denied automatically.

13-0 - Reached Quorum (6) - Enacted by Chronos