Clarifications
Boy, I hate the discourse around economic ideologies. Not here in particular, it's actually been shockingly civil for what I expected, just in general trends that reflect here. Now, to clarify some things
:
The vote regarding ideologies is determining what political party controls your government at game start. They aren't parties yet. They will shortly become parties. Furthermore, and this is a big one:
ideologies include the platforms of the previous ideology within their own. The political spectrum is at the moment a mass of reformists, with everybody screaming at the person on their right, "
YES, BUT YOU'RE NOT GOING FAR ENOUGH!" Observe:
the Social Democrats add to the New Capitalist agenda with a push for a government guarantee of adequate housing, food, and water to all citizens
modern socialism is focused on giving the state the power to care for all citizens, and claims that the modern Social Democrat platform does not go far enough in pursuit of this. It also calls for a massive investment into healthcare
Their modern platform, in this setting, is centered around the absolute implementation of workplace democracy in addition to the same welfare and legal measures proposed by other movements. The aims of the American Communists in the present day are to break the concept of private ownership of businesses
I hadn't actually thought I needed to be
clearer, but there is significant confusion on this point.
Also, I feel like many people are underestimating how much work there is to be done in rendering your economy capable of resisting foreign influence on its own strengths. You are...
shockingly weak right now. When the more extreme leftist ideologies pitch themselves as bonus protectionism, that's intended to be a
serious benefit you need to trade off against the potential of foreign trade. Your economy is both tiny and weak in absolute and per capita measures. Chicago and its compatriots are in a terrible economic position right now, and if not approached very carefully, foreign markets could easily subsume yours once they intersect.
The vote regarding how much the new Constitution favors any given ideology is admittedly fuzzy phrasing on my part stemming from my desire to be technically accurate and not use, "parties," when talking about the not-yet-parties. It is determining how much power
political parties have to stomp
their political opponents. Basically, the political parties get to enshrine
their specific agenda in foundational law, the higher up on the scale you go. Sedition laws and such still exist; Victorians are not going to appear in your government unless they're hiding. And that's an intelligence problem, not a legal writing problem.
Rules for Legitimacy are now in the Rules Screen.
And now, replies.
I'm uncertain whether or not I'll include the Socialist option in my approval voting. It seems to me that it does allow privately owned businesses. Could you elaborate on this
@PoptartProdigy? In particular, I'm interested in whether or not the state is allowed to forcibly appropriate businesses in an arbitrary manner or if certain criteria must be met for the implementation of workplace democracy.(and if so, what those criteria are?)
The state is only allowed to seize private property and redistribute it to wider groups of people under Communist ideology. Socialist policies merely stack the deck in favor of cooperatives.
@PoptartProdigy Just because there's some debate in the thread at the moment, can you please clarify as to whether or not we start at neutral legitimacy, before the constitutional decisions are made? If not, can you please tell us what our starting legitimacy is.
In addition, can you please clarify a bit further what our legitimacy rating will represent? As in, what is the difference between having a legitimacy rating of 0 versus +2, and so on. It would be nice to know what issues would come from being simply neutral, as opposed to either positive or negative.
As stated, legitimacy is how credible your claim of being an American successor state looks. Radical departures from old American ideals obviously tarnish your image as a successor. As a Revivalist movement rather than an established faction, you begin with -2 Legitimacy (it'd be worse if you were Resistance, because
hoo boy). In general, Legitimacy is something I compare between factions; it comes into play when people are trying to decide what they think of you.
The faction with the highest Legitimacy (currently New York) is the benchmark; anybody short of that is viewed as meaningfully less legitimate as a successor of the old USA. This, incidentally, is why New York is the favorite charity case for old American allies but gets nothing from the rest of the world; old allies liked how things were when America had a pulse, and they want to keep the thing that most resembles it around. In case of future revival, you know? Meanwhile, the rest of the world doesn't remember America fondly enough to care to invest in a city squatting under a sword of Damocles.
That said, Legitimacy is most useful to a
strict Revivalist faction. If you actually
want to build something intensely different from the old system, low Legitimacy is beneficial to you over the long term, assuming you go about this remotely honestly. Low Legitimacy means that people let go of some of their preconceptions. You clearly
aren't a USA successor, so nobody expects you to act like one. While it also means some will be inclined to see you as illegitimate usurpers, it clears your plate of having to play a part you may not necessarily want to play.
Neutral Legitimacy, which in practice is, "Less than the Free City of New York's, but not critically so," means that, as a faction, you really just fail to stand out. You're another faction emerging out of the chaos. Neither the old Country born anew nor some radical, (potential) dark mirror of Victoria.
I wouldn't recommend trying to game this too hard; Legitimacy shifts constantly as other factions make decisions, and given the nature of the system, the value of a single point of the stuff won't stay stable. It's meant to quantify your polity's RP comparative to others', not serve as a super-crunchy stat. That said, at game start, FSNY leads the rankings with Legitimacy 9, and Victoria is the bottom finalist with Legitimacy -12.
I'm not actually super familiar with approval voting in quests; how does it work?
Vote for everything you would not be disappointed to see win, and all of those votes are counted.
I'm actually kinda wonder right now how the internet is doing.
Probably dead in North America, but I wonder how present it is elsewhere in the world?
Good question, and basically correct in its assumptions! Local areas sometimes have local networks -- unifying yours is an early-game project -- but North American internet is mostly gone. The internet worldwide suffered a lot from the collapse of the American portions, but they have rebuilt with nearly lunatic determination and have something which actually surpasses pre-Collapse technology, albeit denuded of much of the data stored in American servers.
(also
@PoptartProdigy what do we know of the Russian Monarchy? How old is Alexander? Who is his heir? does he even have one?)
Alexander was a high-ranking member of the Russian military prior to Russia's period of civil strife. I know precious little
about Russia's military, so that's as far as we take it. Alexander is fucking ancient, barely clinging to life at this point. He has seventeen children by a variety of women, of whom two are legitimate. Alexander's advanced age, declining health, and fragile line of succession are all factors in Russia's recent distraction. The Empire is not operating at historical peak capacity.
There is a very significant chance that we will be engaging in both conventional and unconventional warfare, which means that a strong security state is at least temporarily necessary.
@PoptartProdigy I'd suggest for the legal authority against dissent we have another option:
That is an excellent idea, but I'm afraid I've preempted you.
All documents this congress forges will have emergency powers written in for times of war or other exceptional crises; this in gameplay will shake out to giving you more actions per turn and decreased need to deal with the legislature (update on Rules Screen status: nearly done, by the way!). The current delegations are all quite agreed on the level of threat they face.
This might sound stupid, but wouldn't it be possible to write a constitution with an expiration date?
Something like "every 30-50-100 years the constitution should be rewritten from scratch, in agreement between all parties currently existing", as a way to make certain the document doesn't become outdated and actually represents the current views on ethics, morals and/or political views?
Basically a way to allow things to change without the need for revolutions/civil wars and to combat political inertia.
I recently read an article that made some good points about reasons for every law to come with an expiration date, and i thought " why don't we take it to the logical extreme?
@PoptartProdigy would that be possibile?
While searching I also found this
Thomas Jefferson believed that a country's constitution should be rewritten every 19 years. Instead, the U.S. Constitution, which Jefferson did not help to write (he was in Paris serving as U.S. minister to France when the Constitutional Convention was held in Philadelphia), has prevailed since 1789.
"Jefferson thought the dead should not rule the living, thus constitutions should expire frequently, but the fact is that the U.S. Constitution quickly became enshrined by the public and is the oldest constitution in the world," said Zachary Elkins, a professor of political science at Illinois.
...very possible! I also see this garnering a fair amount of discussion. Can you all work out an agreement on a final version to support, and tag me with it?
No, I mean. The "scrap constiution, start over" option explicitly says it taps into the spirit of revivalism. Which means that it helps us with whoever's set up in Cairo (where the Ohio and Mississippi rivers join) even tho it's Legitimacy --.
To clarify, it taps into
a spirit of revivalism. Specifically, and as noted, it appeals to the hard reformists while sacrificing goodwill with traditionalist sentiments. It will help you with
elements of whoever is in Cairo, and only
maybe with their political leadership.
Marching Home.
[Excerpt from Mending The Broken Eagle: The History of the 101st Airborne and the Rebirth of the US Military .]
[Interview with Base Commander Ron Taylor. Base Commander of Fort Falcon about 30 miles south of Chicago.]
"Screaming Eagles is perhaps the best way to describe the mess you find yourself and you nation in General Taylor, you and your forces.
/You Fought Victoria-"
Taylor: I fought the fucks who ruined my Nation twice Sir...I saw Atlanta get nuked and I served in the Last war for Old Glory!!
/ So what happened after Atlanta was destroyed...how did you and one of the most experienced fighting forces in US history, camping outside of Chicago.
Taylor: Nazi's. They ran me off the road and left me for dead...Then I called the boy's and killed them all.
/So let me get this straight….you watched your country die twice, had to vote whether to die or give up and get killed by Viks…
T:You can guess which one we picked. It was a long haul, made it to the Mississippi and went north. Made a base, killed some Nazi's, witch was the easiest fight we had in years, they cried like little bitches.
/So what are you going to do now Ron...Old Glories dead, so's most of the guys left fighting.
T: They didn't get us
/Pardon…
T:The Revolution is alive son. Don't count old Glory out yet/
/So..what is your point.
T: This whole revivalist movement is America...You know how the army was the Revolution, well the Movement is America. As as it exists America will never die, least we discard what made us great, our values.
/Some people want to throw out the constitution make something new.
T:Then America is lost….The Constitution is not just a document filled with archaic laws and ideas from another time.
It's the Soul...A document that built a 300 year legacy that I'm still fighting for, Sure it needs some honest updating, but abandoning what we've fought and died for, something that might not even work...The American experiment is still here son.
/Some want us to go socialist..what do you think about that?
T:Son...My Granddaddy fought commies and fought in Cambodia, dispel such notions of left wing brotherhood, socialism is folly when not held in a capitalist stew, little by little, Too much will kill you, too little and well, you can live life well without a safety net, if your smart.
/So we shouldn't?
T:Son...America had its problems, believe me...it had its problems, I still shudder when I think about the VA. But it is the best base to use.
Don't discarde what your ancestors fought for, you'd be pissing on their graves...adapt it to today and make sure it can stand for tomorrow when we're both gone and in the grave.
T: It's not perfect. But fix it if there is a problem.
AN: A Little thing I wrote up to answer a plot Bunny that came to me.
Did the 101st Airborne defect to someone sane!
I say they ran to us, as an Old Glory serving boys that trained up the Militia into a somewhat capable army.
Also an Old guards reaction to the Constitution problem.
Enjoy.
For various reasons, non-canon, but I liked this! Have an Apocrypha threadmark!
@PoptartProdigy
So Victoria had a squad of almost magical hackers in the novel, that's just propaganda right?
I hate that plot point so much. It is not an
absolute fabrication. Russia loans some cyberwarfare experts to Victoria, which is incapable of producing them. That said, their presence has been scaled very far back in recent years.
Whatever, you're as boring as New Capitalism. Let's talk about flags instead.
Things have been shockingly civil up to now. Let's please continue to attack arguments rather than people.
I just wish
@PoptartProdigy added more flavors of Capitalist rather than pretty much one. The other three options are various flavors of escalating socialist
Or atleast a Soc Dem option that had the Capitalist attitude towards the type of business.
Honestly the Soc Dem is what i want, except I don't want to favour Workplace or Private.
The political spectrum has shifted very hard to the left due to Victoria's presence. Most flavors of capitalist have had to condense down to maintain relevance.
So poptart said that none of the economic ideologies are mechanically superior or inferior. This means that workplace democracy only is equally as good as all the Foreign investment and legitimacy we'd be getting from new capitalism. The only way that works out, to my mind, is the greater productivity of the coops really telling and making up for the lack in the FDI and legitimacy departments.
I acknowledge that I could have phrased this a lot more clearly, but that is a grand reach from what I was trying to communicate. Each ideology is as effective as the others at creating a functioning economy. Trade I count as part of, "people reacting to your ideology," although that may admittedly be part of my bias in interests towards diplomacy over economics. I will clarify my writing. As clarified above, bulk commerce with foreign powers trades off against the possibility of economic subordination. It does not indicate an opinion on the super-effectiveness of cooperatives when I have
explicitly noted a desire to avoid such statements or implications.
