Thus Moderated the Speaker

Day 3,211, 20:59 • Published in USA USA • by eUSA Congress

Dear eUSA,

Well as it turns out I find a few moments tonight to entertain you all with the latest kookery from Congress.

Congress really is a nutty place, actually. Like, it's a giant slice of high fiber bread with chunky JIF spread all around, topped by Nutella, then sprinkled with crushed filberts. Genuinely Fagalic. (Perhaps it is the indehiscence of the place that makes it so nutty... not sure. "Indehiscent" means "not opening at maturity", so probably that's the wrong word since Congress never really seems like all that mature a place to begin with. So scrap the whole nut analogy.)

Congress is juvenile.

Anyhoo, like I said it's a real head-scratcher sometimes, so if it looks like I'm developing a bad case of seborrheic dermititis on my scalp and forehead, trust me my skin is fine. It's just Congress again.

Like, we have literally three proposed budgets to vote on, and it's looking a lot like none of them will pass?

Why won't congress pass a budget? I am not really suggesting that you asked that question. I'm saying I've had to ask myself that question because being Speaker of the House means I've got to babysit all these budget proposals and votes and the jovial banter that amounts to several pages of discussion mostly revolving around horses and (no I am not making this up) One Dollar.

Does Congress not understand that the Speaker of the House gets paid the same whether we have 1 Budget proposal to vote on or 13? I hope we don't have 13 budget proposals to vote on, but I will make this promise with you, eUSA, if we get to 12 budget proposals I will personally propose #13 just so you can say you heard it here first.

Well, It's been like 5 minutes since I started writing this, and with all the riveting exchange of ideas going on I better check things out to see what useful moderating I can do. Did I tell you about moderating? Hang on, let me go look into the Congress threads, count up some votes, then I'll come back and talk about moderating as SoH.

...

YES!

It looks like we are on the verge of a 4th Budget proposal. I can't wait.

Now.
I said I was going to talk with you about moderating.

I really don't know how to do it, but I got to try some yesterday.

It seems that Franklin Stone was not informed that he did not get elected to Congress. I suppose that can happen sometimes, you know? Like, you're not really double checking all of the complex game mechanics that you need to master to know whether or not you signed up, got put on the list, got enough votes for your party, signed in, and probably a bunch of other really high level complex clicking.

Well, poor old Frank got confused. Perhaps it was the fact that he still had his Forum Congress Award. Someone sees that and thinks, "Hey, I'm in Congress!" So that's probably what happened.

Anyway, he posted something about the budget and what changes needed to be made in order for him to be willing to support it. Normally this would be great because Congressmen need to know what changes to make to stuff in order to gain support from other Congressmen who might or might not vote for a proposal based on this or that detail and whatnot.

Problem is, Frank can't vote.

He's not in Congress.

Buuuuuuuut he posted that bit anyway about what needed to happen with the budget in order for him to be willing to support it. Crazy thing about Congress, though, is that if you aren't actually in Congress, you can't actually post in Congress which is another one of the maddeningly complicated game mechanicsy things that take a long time playing this game to completely understand.

Now I am not saying that Congress shouldn't care about whether or not citizen Franklin Stone "supports" a particular budget, and heavens to betsy there are plenty of budgets for ole Frank to consider, but in this particular case, because actual Congressmen have to debate actual details in order to gain actual support leading to actual votes for or against, the inclusion of a not actual Congressman's commentary on the thises and thats of whichever one of the four (probably five by now) Budget proposals it was that Frank was commenting on would have really derailed things horribly.

So I deleted his post.

And that is what it means to moderate Congress.

I'm getting pretty good at this, you know?

This is the Speaker of the House, Gnilraps, signing off.