Q&A With the President
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by DylanB
Yesterday - Day 493 - I had the honor of being able to interview our current president - Scrabman. I was delighted when I found full responses to all of my questions that I sent to him. Below are the questions I asked, and the responses - Word for Word - No editing has occured except for minor formatting changes.
Q) I am pleased to see you taking action and placing a Q5 hospital in New Jersey. Keeping our population away from a strong concentration in Florida was a very smart move on your part. I am just curious as to whether or not plans for a more spread out population are currently being developed? If so, where are you planning to build more hospitals?
A) Right now there is talk about putting a Q5 hospital in California as well ... but I don't know when it will get built and I really don't want to see us get jerked around again. New Jersey was selected by Congress while I was in Congress so I can only take a little bit of credit for that ... the credit of a Congressman from WV ... one of many. As far as spreading the population out ... there isn't a real need for that at this point. If we were to be attacked that would change. For now people just life where they want to live. Freedom baby.
Q) There has been an extensive push for a union between Canada and the US. I, myself, am one advocate for this. How does this idea sit in your head, and do you think if we did this anything in our country would actually improve?
A) I think that a merge with Canada would be a bad idea. A large part of eRep is on national and local identity. For instance. Uncle Sam was talking about trading states with Mexico in order to do Resistance Wars perpetually like Indo does with Pakistan (they train up every day that way). But people threw such a fit he had to back away. I don't think that's a bad idea but it's hard to get people to see game mechanics and separate them from RL interests. Thus, I think a merger is doomed to fail and would never get past the idea of losing your national identity. I wouldn't like it either.
Q) Our military has started to rapidly crumble, and we are paying the price for it. What course of action are you planning to undergo to attempt to build up our military effectiveness and size?
A) I wouldn't say our military is crumbling. They are just less visible than they were when I was a Platoon Leader. I'm now a Major in the Army, as well as being Commander-in-Chief, but it's not like I control the military. It really does exist as its own thing and it isn't an in-game concept anyway. However, I would like to see us spending far less on tanks and letting soldiers have more fun by funding them to travel to wars overseas and to subsidize their costs in fighting. I don't know that we need to buy them weapons but there are lots of ways to make it easier and more fun to fight for those who would benefit most from training up.
Q) Who and/or What would you say is to blame for the extreme economic downfall we have encountered? If you feel you can pinpoint a culprit or two, what can we do as citizens to fix this problem?
A) Franco dispersing our treasury for one and all of our money going to tanks during Sam's Presidency. The thing I'm doing to fix this problem is making Congress take back its role of being responsible for earmarking spending. Up to this point the Congress would take money out of the Treasury and dump it into an OR controlled by the President where it would sit as a big salt lick that everyone could keep coming to when they wanted. My plan has Congress pulling that money out into a Congressional OR where they will then have powers to decide (without a lengthy 24 hour in-game vote that can be filibustered by another proposal) who gets the money and for what purpose. I think it will make us more fiscally responsible. Some of the military types have been worried that our military spending will be an open book. Not true. We now have a Select Committee on Intelligence that the Military and President can present their war budget to and then they can tell Congress how much money we need without getting too specific till later ... if at all. That way Congress is still involved in the decision. Lastly, this is a great way to use the new Quorum Voting System that ProggyPop came up with for out-of-game voting
Q) Indonesia, the eWorlds largest superpower, is always a concern in everyones mind, even if it isn't at the forefront. What do you feel we need to do as a country to start chipping away at their power? Does Indonesia even concern you? What do you believe are the chances that they could ever be contained?
A) Indonesia doesn't much concern me. They never really seem to care what we are doing but I would like to see them give up some of their territory. There isn't much that we can do about that now but I think it is disappointing to RL Russian, Chinese, or Australian people who come in and find that they don't really have a country because of how some folks play the game. The only way to chip away at their power is to work on getting power of our own. That just takes time and good planning. Not haphazardly starting war because it's fun.
Q) What is your stance on our current skirmish with Mexico? Also, how do you feel about Portugal holding some of Mexico's territories? Does it worry you that they could possibly start moving in from our south?
A) I don't think Portugal is interested in invading the US. As for how I feel about Portugal occupying part of Mexico. Well, someone asked me the question when I first took this office of President about what I was going to do to get our Mexico territories back. I responded that they really weren't ours and that the reason for going in originally was stated that we were going to liberate them for Mexico who had a takeover happen. Then Sam got all jazzed up and decided to go for conquering Mexico and played right into the hands of Portugal by opening up 3 additional battles that the Military had advised against (DessertFalcon recently wrote a very good article about this).
So we are to blame for why Portugal is there. If Mexico wants them out they can ask for our assistance. Right now we are negotiating War Games with Mexico and I signed a Treaty yesterday that will allow us to have structured war games enforceable by contract so we don't do what Sam did and just attack them and hope they will trust us. I don't know when it will get started but the Treaty is posted in-game if you want to look it up.
There you have it. The interview with our current President, Scrabman.
I can't say that I totally disagree and dislike his plans. I think they are amazing and well thought out, and I do think that these plans could help us turn our country around, and start functioning the way we know it can.
All in all, Scrabman can expect my vote for the next Presidential Elections.
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Comments
Nice, you chose some good questions
Scrabman will get my vote if i see that resistance war treaty put into action before election. And if they are frequent.
Fabulous article. Wow, what's a quorum? Never heard of that before. Heh. Voted and subscribed, excellent first article.
Scrabman is brilliant. What is even better is that he is level headed, something that was lacking in the Uncle Sam Presidency.
The primary difference between Scrabman and past presidents is age.
Great interview!
Excellent article. Voted, I still support Scrabman for president also. Looking forward to the upcoming month of in-game experiences.
Finally, a Presidential Q&A I actually want to read...
I figured it had to be at least of slight coincidence that right after scrabman becomes President a Q5 hospital spings up in New Jersey. Although, scrabman is apparently shaping up to be the President we've all been waiting for.
On the union with Canada: I must disagree with the President. His mention of Indonesia and Pakistan disproves his ideas on eRep nationality. He says that it's a bad idea but mentions the Indo/Pakistan practice... while at the same time previously clarifying that eRep is MOSTLY local politics. In such a paradigm, I would suggest that while a union between the eUSA and, say Brazil, is a bad idea... a union between America and our half-brother would be a GOOD idea. Other than the eUK, I can't think of a better candidate for such a policy.
On the crumbling military: I filled out a National Guard application two days ago but have yet to receive a response. I have learned from other citizens that the NG used to make a habit of introducing themselves to new citizens. So far, I'm a veritable free agent who could move anywhere to fight because I don't have that national pride that one gets when one's own national military makes such a personal offer. I would suggest that THIS is more important than any welcoming committee that Princess MedyPi absolutely has to control. Why not use the QMG to literally hand out weapons. They'd be losing dough (duh) but they'd benefit by upping the impact of every n00b fight from 7 to 20. This builds national strength at the cost of money. Fine with me.
The rest is par for the course. I completely agree. Hell, I'd suggest that Indonesia be offered the rest of China for corresponding Russian states. I mean, Russians might join eRep and become disheartened, but... does RL China even allow eRepublik?
With all of that said, we finally have a real prez. My vote might as well be counted already.
Scrabman is like the eObama.
Thank you for your comments. I still think that there would be far too much opposition with in the citizenry to merge the USA and Canada. While it seems like a good idea from all of the arguments on paper I don't think it would work in practice. People in the free world are too tied to their sense of national identity (and I'm not saying it's without cause ... I'm proud of my American status too).
The military used to have a good recruiting mechanism and was very structured. I liked that military. I was a platoon commander in that military. The current Joint Chief of Staff is Joeph Cole and before he assumed that position he was a great Division Commander. I'm not sure what happened though. Further, the NG used to be very good at recruiting. This is part of why I've chosen Moishe as my VP. I think he will help with these issues as he was an excellent General of the Armies when I was a young player.
If scrabman is like the eObama then I guess eveyone should sell their businesses before the government takes them over.
excellent Q&A, Scrabman. Voted
great Q&A. scrabman has my vote. However, i am concerned with Portugal being on this side of the pond. together with Mexico we should get them out as soon as possible.
@Bklynzorro, I wouldn't worry about Portugal. The reason they can stand up to us is because of their MPPs. If they attack us then our butt load of MPPs will trigger as well pushing the favor back to us. They are there to act as a deterrent should we be "evil" enough to try and take over Mexico again. They are slowly relinquishing territories back to Mexico as it is.
Thats really great and I am glad he is very transparent with his ideas unlike Uncle Sam.
Voted and subscribed.
Good, hard-hitting questions, and thoughtful responses.
I hope America votes for continued stability and prosperity on April 5.
Excellent questions. I'm a new citizen and have been researching the candidates; Articles like this are very helpful.
@Longbaugh, I must to some extent agree with your decision on the National Guard. I have applied and eventually gotten a reply and admittance, but it took a while. I am currently attempting to get an XO position, with which i hope to help out brand new players (which I was not too long ago) and hopefully expedite the process of amalgamation into the military. You should look into it as well, we need politicians, but we also need soldiers.
I hope scrabman is re-elected. Voted
BTW: you need to be level 6 to vote,Jack Stafford
Damn. Any chance I can make level 6 in the next few days? 🙁
Nice interview. As a "noob", I'm still learning as I go. Right now I'd say my vote will either go to you Scrabman or to Desertfalcon.