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Loyal readers,

I, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this, often have a hard time believing something unless it's written on a poster of some kind. So, to help articulate the argument that I'm about to make, I'd like to direct your attention to the following image:


Tradition: Just because you've always done it that way doesn't mean it's not incredibly stupid.

Like many proponents of archaic traditions, President Scrabman and his apologists would have you believe that he should be re-elected because he's already the President and he has been for a long time. Now, I don't consider myself to be exactly long in the tooth when it comes to eRepublik, but at 80 days of age, I'm not the bright-eyed, bushy-tailed eYouth I once was. For perspective's sake, I had been playing the game for little more than a week when the ouster of Scrabman's predecessor, UncleSam, happened. People newer to the game than I have literally experienced no other President than Scrabman. To these players, Scrabman is a tradition, and he would like them to treat him as such, to continue putting him in power because that's just the way it's always been.

President Scrabman would have you believe that the period of his administration has been all peaches and cream, but if you dig beneath the surface, you'll find that the peaches have molded and that the cream has soured. To be fair, though, many of the things he has done have put this country back on the right track. When he took office after the impeachment of UncleSam, he inherited a country fractured by a failed war of conquest in Mexico and plagued with government secrecy and financial fraud. Regular war games were a distant dream (though negotiations towards this end had been initiated by UncleSam) and the treasury was in shambles after thefts, military expenditures, and fiscal mismanagement. The ascension of Scrabman to the highest office brought with it some sweeping reforms, resulting in unprecedented governmental transparency, increased security for our nation's treasury, constant wargames, and a budget to apportion government funds to federal agencies. While he is not the sole reason behind these changes, he deserves a lot of praise for this.

That said, the madness to his methods have really taken the shine off his candidacy. I've chosen three episodes which I feel best document his preference for nepotism, strong-arm political tactics, and doublespeak.

Scrabman vs. the Board of Education
Prior to the last election, Scrabman went around to the other parties to "request" an endorsement for his re-election bid. Several parties, including the Libertarians and the Federalists, were targeted. As he made his pitch, Scrabman touted his multipartisanship, as he had done a wonderful job of including citizens from all the parties in his administration through his appointments. However, the détente was clearly at an end. Parties that were reluctant to endorse him were bullied, being told that without an endorsement, he would oust members of the opposition from his government. This is an executive privilege, but the phrasing reeked of megalomania, to the point where he took credit for any political successes each party had during the course of his first full term. Around this time, Scrabman spread a cryptic press release indicating that "something big was coming" but several days passed without incident, and the entire nation was engulfed in speculation (something eventually turned into nothing, before becoming the failed attack on the Far Eastern Region in Russia). At this point, Bill Brasky, a fellow Federalist serving at the time as the head of the Department of Education (DoE), was reported by one of Scrabman's cronies to have been "badmouthing the President in IRC" while speculating about the "big plans" and was subsequently dismissed over this hearsay. Thereafter, HeadmistressTalia, Party President of the Libertarian Party, was appointed to replace him. Coincidentally, the Federalist Party had just declined to endorse Scrabman in the looming election and the Libertarian Party had just relented to his demands and endorsed him. After this happened, the activity of the DoE ceased, going from one or two published articles a week to zero over several weeks, as Talia has been dealing with real-life issues. Scrabman insisted that citizen retention (the primary goal of the DoE) was one of his biggest priorities, and noted that he was aware of Talia's distractions. Until substantial Congressional pressure was brought to bear on him, he refused to appoint someone to fill in during her absence. Bill was very outspoken in pursuing the matter, but was dismissed as "sour grapes" despite the fact that other people from multiple parties were equally concerned about the lack of activity at the DoE. Talia herself wrote that she was too preoccupied with real life to pay attention to everything going on in the eUSA. Meanwhile, Bill continued to run the entire Citizen Mentorship Program (CMP) by himself and won a lot of well-deserved accolades for this. This incident showed that not only is Scrabman's multipartisanship a facade, but that he values sycophancy over competency. While I do not doubt his appointments are capable of doing their jobs, I am concerned that he may bypass better qualified candidates in favor of yes-men.

Scrabman "Reaches Out" to the Federalists
Fresh off the Bill Brasky firing, outspoken Federalists hammered Scrabman throughout the media for his actions. Dissent for any of his actions was alternately dismissed as "crybaby whining" or as "PEACE propaganda". Multipartisanship, indeed... so long as every other party fell in line with his agenda. On the heels of this political unrest, Scrabman appointed the AAP's Aren Perry as Interparty Relations Secretary, whose job was to act as a liaison between the President and the political parties. To quote his initial forum post, Aren joined our forums "to keep tabs on your desires and concerns regarding our nation and specifically our president in terms of his actions in Presidency." Interestingly, the only Party that was approached in this fashion was the Federalist Party, who were the most vocal opponents of Scrabman's tactics. When people within the party, including myself, voiced concerns about his presence in our private forums (before his access was restricted), we were accused publicly of being paranoid schemers who needed secrecy to plan more "slander". Are good interparty relations beneficial to the eUS public? Absolutely. Should they be mediated by an appointed agent of the President? Absolutely not, especially when dissenting parties are insidiously singled out as being "slanderers" when they are approached.

Scrabman Goes to Germany
Most recently, Scrabman declared the eUSA neutral in the conflict between Sweden/Poland and Germany, citing the fact that committing to either side would be a "resource sink" and would open us or friendly strategic territories open to PEACE attack. I have made no secret of the fact that I side with Germany in this matter, but also that the eUSA was best served by remaining officially neutral, while allowing citizens to "fight their conscience" using the MPPs activated by the Swedish and Polish attacks. In one of the last battles available to eUS citizens, Scrabman was infamously caught as being the Battle Hero for Germany for a period of time, having done over 2000 points of damage. When questioned about this, Scrabman's response was that, as President, he was a private citizen and could do this within that capacity without repercussions. In his words, "How can you act against your own orders?" He honestly claimed that, despite his status as one of the eWorld's most visible citizens, his defiance of his own request to refrain from fighting in Germany in order to be on guard for imminent PEACE attacks meant nothing. Furthermore, while he told the rest of the populace to conserve resources, he spent considerable (and, I would hope, personal) wealth to inflict over 2000 points of damage. PEACE needs not spread misinformation to confuse the eAmerican public, because Scrabman is doing their job for them! Put yourselves in the shoes of a freshly minted eUSA citizen, who first reads an order from the President not to fight for Germany, but then sees the President doing as much damage as he can for Germany! Sadly, this is not the first time that Scrabman has used doublespeak to suit his own purposes, but I pray it is the last.

The question lies with you, the informed voter: do you agree that Scrabman and all the baggage that comes with him is indeed the best man for the job? Should the eAmerican public continue to put him in office "just because we've always done it that way?" Are we to believe that this "last campaign" of his is really the last "last campaign" after he reneged on his pledge before the last election to step down after this term?

As our nation navigates the murky waters of change, he would have you believe that constancy is the only thing that will save us from utter destruction. I submit that now is the best time to make a switch. After all, if everything else is changing, why not the President too?

I thank you for taking the time to trudge through this mountain of text and encourage you to vote for Kyle321n on June 5th if you, like me, have had enough of this Presidency gilt in half-truths and hypocrisy.

Cheers,
Stbob
Mr. Manager
Congressman - South Dakota
Vice Party President - Federalist Party


NOTE: This article represents the opinions of the author alone and was in no way commissioned by either the Kyle321n campaign or the Federalist Party.