It is the start of the term, and my old Cabinet has taken their leave, as appropriate. Many thanks to them for helping me out over the three months, for providing some crucial feedback and support, and especially for helping to keep our great democracy going in their own ways.
The confirmation votes in the Assembly are still ongoing, and so the Cabinet today is just OWL Director @EmC and myself. However, the old advisory councils still remain as they were, with the addition of @pronoun to the Domestic Advisory Council today so their service can continue in a lesser capacity. We’ll hold it down while we wait for the Assembly to complete its business, and I look forward to welcoming the newest Ministers to the Situation Room when they arrive.
Greetings to the Coalition, to legislators and citizens, to friends and allies, to all others.
This is the start of the end of one of the most interesting administrations that we’ve seen, if not controversial and groundbreaking simultaneously. From foreign policy incidents to massive legislative shifts, we’ve seen many an event involve us in some way and that demands our attention. That is, for lack of a better phrase, the life of a politician, that chooses to participate NationStates’ oldest democracy.
Our belief in democratic principles remains the cornerstone of our actions and outlook on the world. A Southern Cross, guiding our way through the foggy waters of foreign affairs and domestic struggles. It brings us from point to point, and we remain wholly confident in its ability to best serve the interests of the South Pacific. However, as much as democracy relies on the people to choose, it also relies on people to deliver, and this is where we are at now.
The priority for this term, my third in a row and the last one for at least a good long while, is on getting things ready for the future. Cleaning up the offices of all the SPIT glasses and tidying up the furniture from late night celebrations of successful liberations and SC resolution passages. Transcribing all of our notes into neat binders to pass on to successors, so that they don’t struggle with the same issues we had. Recruiting the best folks to be able to take our places, in time, to carry on our democratic traditions.
To that end, my ministers and I have outlined our agendas, to the Assembly and to the citizenry, detailing our intended actions beyond accomplishing the metaphorical. @Legend / New American Dictatorship is taking the lead on accomplishing the events we planned out last term, as well as continuing his advocacy for greater cross-platform cooperation. @USoVietnam / United States of Vietnam is doing the most cleanup of the ministers, reorganizing our integration software, ensuring all aspects of the community receive their due diligence in recruitment, and training up the next generation to take over integration duties. @Of_the_Ages / The Age of Utopia is serving a critical role as the voice of roleplay in the Cabinet, and will lead the way on interregional roleplay events.
@ConcreteSlab / Concrete Slab is rizzing it up abroad, to my outmoded understanding, and I’m sure is not causing any diplomatic incidents as a result. @EmC / Emagination will work with the Delegate on building our WA culture, the perennial goal of OWL, but we have confidence in their ability. @Banexet / Drew Durrnil is the moon of the Coalition, reviving the Tidal Force and washing away the crusty old paint we have on the boat. We have our plans, in motion at a brisk pace, and I anticipate seeing many of them come to fruition in one form or another. The future demands it.
It is an immense pleasure, and an honor, to serve the Coalition in this capacity once again. With the spirit of lampshades, and llamas, at our side, we shall do great things.
In my first post as the Minister of Culture, I announced that I’d be working with my advisory committee to explore the “Culture” side of MoC. As my responsibilities have expanded, I’ve decided that the time is right to delegate those responsibilities and give my advisors a chance to shine. That’s why I’m happy to announce that the one and only @North is being made my Deputy Minister of Culture! I have the utmost confidence in him, and I’m excited to see what ideas he brings to the position! In the meanwhile, I’ll continue to focus my attention on events, greater cross-platform activity, and the new task of the media.
Earlier this week, Johanneslanden, then-Foreign Secretary of South Pacific, a long time embassy region of ours, lodged a message on their RMB that detailed their discussion with Densaner, incumbent Delegate of South Pacific, over the holding of embassies with a fascist region. Included was a dispatch that served as their resignation, due to the government’s policy of allowing fascist regions to have an embassy with South Pacific.
This immediately concerned us, as South Pacific is a historic friend of the South Pacific, and was recently liberated just this year in a major action by defender forces. I reached out to Densaner on Discord, to inquire whether their policy is still standing, on the same day, but have not yet received a response as of writing. With that said, Densaner continued to post on the RMB defending their actions, as marked here.
Following an internal discussion with the Foreign Advisory Council, I have decided to order the closure of embassies with South Pacific and a cessation of diplomatic ties, effective immediately. We hope that they will reverse this policy decision sooner, rather than later.
Yours Truly,
Concrete Slab
Minister of Foreign Affairs of the South Pacific
Very briefly, I’ve done a little housekeeping in Cabinet and in Embassies recently, including adjusting pins, tags, and our Embassy and Consulate policy, which you can check out here.
I’m currently working on organizing a joint festival with our allies in 10000 Islands, the Grey Wardens, the Rejected Realms, and the East Pacific, as well as some FA work with Slab with current and former embassy partners.
I believe you poked me in the wrong place, but that’s fine
MoC and DAC have been collaborating on an event that launches soon, I’ve been planning a media project and re-evaluating past events, and I’m also polling user spread as a resource for government officials (not just myself)
Excellent, I’m glad to hear that. Is this the same event that Legend describes working on below?
Care to elaborate on what that work is or how it is going? Also, why former embassy partners?
This tells me about military/battlefield accomplishments of the SPSF. Have any administrative MoD/PM-driven changes been started besides the revival of the Tidal Force (which, I’ll admit, is a significant accomplishment)?
Why are you not already aware of what other Ministers are working on? As head of government, you should be setting their direction and giving their marching orders, and getting updates back from them regularly on their progress.
Are any Ministers on declared leaves of absence or decreased activity?
Where were you poked. Why is that the “wrong place”?
Why have you not already briefed the PM on your ongoing work so that they can provide an update to a legislator when asked?
Care to elaborate?
What media project?
What past events are you re-evaluating and what does a re-evaluation entail? Why is this a separate item that you’re working on as opposed to something that we’re pretty much always doing as we move forward with planning events?
What is “user spread” and how are you polling it? I actually just don’t know what this means.
I assume it’s the discord, which I don’t have access to most of the day, which I’ve made clear. I have also made my work clear to both the public and the Prime Minister. I appreciate the critisism, but I’m afraid I don’t quite see where it’s comming from. However, if you’d prefer that I be more clear about it, I can be.
It’s meant to be a surprise until it launches, but you can expect it in December
I don’t know the right terminology, but I supose it’s like a monthly newspaper
Currently, just the potential of moving the debates that I had been running on the rmb onto the discord. Also, I don’t understand what you mean by that second part, please rephrase.
Sorry, that’s my bad. I’m running a poll on NS (although I pinged Games and Events in the announcements channel) to try and gauge where community members are spending their time
Is this the same one you referenced in late October?
If so, I do hope it’s big. If this is a project that takes over a month to plan, has there been any consideration of allowing the public to contribute? Why was the decision made to operate behind closed doors?
Especially behind the closed doors of the… Delegate’s Advisory Committee? Maybe it’s just me, but I thought the purpose of the Delegate’s Advisory Committee would be to, I dunno, advise the Delegate.
Is ‘re-evaluating past events’ something you don’t typically do and deserves a particular mention? When you plan new events, do you typically consider any lessons learned and feedback received from previous events? Or do you typically just pursue whatever events you’d like without trying to improve?
Why are you assuming about something that you said? You’re the one who said it, so you’re able to tell me what you meant, no one else can.
As a member of the public, who has asked questions and received mediocre responses, your work is not clear to me. You will need to be more clear.
When did you last brief the PM about your agenda and what kind of information was included in that?
Sure, you don’t have to tell us what the entire event is. But: what are things it might include? What platforms will it cover? Who is involved in planning it? When in December (we’re currently 18 days into December…) should we expect it?
I have zero faith in a project that is “like a monthly newspaper” but that you don’t know what to call it. Does it have a name? What is the goal of it? When is a reasonable launch timeline? What work is done so far?
Right now, it seems like no work is done, since you can only say what it might be like.
Ah, I understand now. That’s what I was asking: e.g. what changes were being considered.
What actionable information do you expect to get out of this poll?
I feel like that poll will obviously have a bias to the platform it is on which is fine, I don’t say that to say we should neglect the RMB (I like that you’ve generally prioritized it) but I’m confused why you expect this to give you a “good” read of things.
It is not, this festival is the replacement for Harry Potter and the Festival of Friends. Culture never provided me any names for folks who would be interested in planning so I’m doing it solo on behalf of TSP.
The North Pacific asked us for assistance with their Delegate transition last week, and we agreed to help. I asked the SPSF to support, but no order was issued by the General Corps. TNP did not come knocking on my door afterwards asking why we weren’t there, but their transition already occurred.
“Former embassy partner” refers to South Pacific, as elucidated above.
Aside from a brief conversation about rank renaming, which I am loathe to push without additional input from SPSFers, nothing more from the PM/MoD side of things. You’d have to ask the other Generals about what else is happening in the SPSF, if there is anything they would like to share in a public venue.
No Ministers are on declared leaves of absence. The Minister of Foreign Affairs is on decreased activity until the end of the month, and that’s the extent to which I’ve been informed folks wouldn’t be active.
To that end. . .
Direction was issued at the start of the term, but I haven’t heard much of anything that tells me that our stated objections in the Assembly appointment topic are accomplished or close to it. Culture has been planning or discussing several in various random threads on Discord and has only published the RMB debates and the art gallery, neither of which were very successful, to my knowledge. Roleplay has done nothing aside from a minor WFE edit to remove a link to a now-inactive server. Integration accomplished a few unannounced items like adding more relevant quick links to the forum sidebar, collating government nation passwords in the Situation Room (so we’re not left on a wild turkey chase for a password to a nation that is mysteriously alive and considered under government control), and updating SWAN dispatches with newer endotarting methods.
Minister of Integration @USoVietnam will be stepping down as well, effective immediately. RL is taking him away from NS in a major capacity for a good while, and we have agreed it was the best course of action. In a minor role, he will become an advisor, similar to Pronoun.
To clarify the timeline here a bit, there were around six hours from the time we (the General Corps) received the request for support and the time the transition ended up occurring; decisions take time to make (and it takes time for members of the military to deploy), and it was not clear to us that an expedited deployment was necessary. To my knowledge, we haven’t heard anything about our support still being needed.
Because surprises are fun. Also, you’re ready assuming that the community can’t contribute to it, without knowing what it is. Also, as has been stated on the discord, “advisory committees” tend to have a greater role than simply “advising”, or else nothing would ever get done.
I mean, I was asked about what I’m currently doing,should I not have said what I’m currently doing? And yes, I do look back at lessonsn it would be silly not to. Let me just say this however: getting the community to participate in something , no matter what site, is easier said than done.
I’m sure you don’t mean it, but you’ve been comming off as very agressive about this, so let me make this clear. I can only assume it’s the discord, sinnce I cannot check it, but unless ProfessorHenn somehow got my homenumber and called while I was at school, it was a discord ping
You are not the first person to ask me about this, and I’ve already answered simmilar questions in the discord. Additionally, your questions prompted the PM to ask me questions themself. All of the planning areas are open to ProfessorHenn, per their request. I included what events/plans we have, simmilarly to what I’ve done here.
Moc and DAC have been planning it together, and are currently in the stages of final revision. It will preferably be able to cover aspects of all the platforms. I am not comfortable sharing the date publically, unless Griffindor would like to, but I’s be more than happy to tell you in a private message, with the understanding that you will not share that date.
You seem to misunderstand my methodology of work. I like to plan everything out first, and then work on it. Yes, it’s a newspaper, although I was hesitant to say so in case there was a better way to describe it. I know every section of it, have planned out the first release, which will be January 1st, and the goal is to inform TSP of thing happening around the region, give them the opportunity to add their own writing to it, highlight specific events, and promote positivity in their real lives by adressing issues they might be facing, especially if they’re in school. This will not just be a newspaper of my voice, but one that respects the public and encourges them.
That’s a very fair point, and one that I’ve noticed too. The main reason I ppsted it was to bring more bisabiloty to the other sites, sonce I want to move to off-site events after the cureent slate of near events are launched. If anything good has come out of it, at least it’s clear that a strong portion of the on-site communjty ud also frequenting the other platforms.
Minister of Roleplay @Of_the_Ages is stepping down, effective immediately, and will take on an RP advisor role.
I am relieving Minister of Culture @Legend and Deputy Minister of Culture @North of their positions, effective immediately. I have lost confidence in their ability to deliver on the agenda they were appointed to.
I want to thank the Ministers and Deputy Ministers for accepting my request to join the Cabinet, and wish them the best of luck in their future endeavors.
Ditto.
The only advisory committee we have is the Delegate’s. DAC and FAC are Affairs Councils, which include Deputy/Ministers of the Cabinet as well as advisors.
I sent a ping to all Cabinet Ministers at 2023-12-18T02:09:00Z with a link to HS’s original question.
I would like to thank @ProfessorHenn and the region for this opportunity to serve. While I disagree with the Prime Minister’s assessment of the situation, I trust that whomever is chosen as my successor will be more than suitable for the role, and I wish you the best of luck, and look forward to seeing your successes!
This is Legend, signing off for the last time
Godspeed!
Do you plan to replace the ministers in these specific positions? Or will the Cabinet portfolios / ministries themselves change as well? In other words, is this a Cabinet reshuffle or a Cabinet restructuring?
which is fine, I don’t say that to say we should neglect the RMB (I like that you’ve generally prioritized it) but I’m confused why you expect this to give you a “good” read of things.