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ssomo









Hi kids!

Today I'll be speaking with our Grand Poobah of UIP, ssomo! He's our new PP!


I know, I've used this before. But it's so damn funny!



A Little Background

A five time member of Congress. Former member of the JCS. Head of the US Home Guard, during WW3. He has served on the Economic Council with One Eye, Jewitt, Pearlswine, and Publius. Also served as the budget committee chair during the earliest budgets under Scrabman.

And he likes kittens & puppies!


My guess is the cat just fartted.

If you want details, he's so famous ssomo's got his own wiki page!



Now Let's Get To It!

Dill: Thank you for taking the time to answer a few questions. I know you must be very busy, this being your first day in office. Let's get right to it!

Dill: First off, what is your take on the UIP PP race yesterday?

ssomo: It was pretty crazy; not what I expected. LOL. I was pretty much the 'establishment' candidate because I won the forum-only primary & had support from Pheno, JMC & Kaz. I knew Ath had support outside UIP. I expected Medy to have plenty of support from all over.

I didn't expect several things. One was open calls for outside voters. Another was the whole bizarro Cavalry PTO rumor. Last was how alarmed non-UIP were about the sudden spike in UIP membership.

Dill: Does this have an adverse effect on the UIP?

ssomo: No, quite the opposite. Athanaric knows he's made a lot of people in the UIP angry. He and I have hugged it out already, but he's got a lot of trust to rebuild. Medy and AndraX spearheaded that awesome recruitment drive, and it's breathtaking. Finally, MelissaRose and Pheno went into overdrive clearing rumor from fact with a whole array of people in top 5 parties, Cavalry, and even POTUS.

We never called anything a PTO. We kept the FEC out and we persuaded important people -- most notably Hadrian X and ligtreb in the USWP -- to step up and say "Stay out. Let the UIP choose their PP. We'd want them to do the same for us."



Dill: I understand that you can only divulge public information and can't discuss internal matters. What can you tell us about changes that will be made in the UIP to correct this situation?

ssomo: I imagine all top 5 parties do something similar, but UIP holds a 'PP primary' on the forums each month to pre-select a winner before the in-game PP election on the 15th.

Now, this PP primary is written into the UIP Constitution, but (a) the wording is imprecise and (b) the PP primary has not always been conducted according to the wording. So there was a lot of back and forth the last two months about how and whether to honor the results of the forum-only PP primary.

So we need to go back and revise the UIP constitution. I really only view the forum-only primary as a backstop in case of a genuine non-UIP PTO candidate sneaking onto the ballot at the last minute. IMO, the in-game vote should be the real vote -- but we still need the forum-only vote in those extreme cases where an outside threat exists thanks to piss-poor game mechanics.

Dill: Again, I know you can only say so much, but there has been quite an influx of new UIP'ers. What is up with the recent membership spike?

ssomo: All glory and praise belong to MedyPi and AndraX for the membership spike. They represent the vision and innovation that independents everywhere aspire to.

There are two articles on this. The best one is AndraX's article. Also Pheno's article, which describes yesterday's misadventures.



Dill: What direction is UIP headed?

ssomo: We are going to focus on fundamentals. UIP is a non-ideological political party. We value individuals as individuals. We make decisions and take action based on our own judgment after doing our own homework. We want to retain & inform our new members & build them into the UIP and eUS leaders of tomorrow.

Dill: What will be new/different in UIP?

ssomo: There's been a fair amount of turmoil the last two months. Ath has generated a lot of commotion & I'm hoping to simmer things down. UIP is family to me, we have a lot of talent, and I hope to create an environment where everyone is excited to help the UIP in general and support each others ideas individually.

Dill: How has all of this affected you personally?

ssomo My bandwidth was already limited. Now it's non existent. But the events of yesterday made me proud of all these people & I look forward to guiding their efforts as best I can.

Dill: What do you envision for the party in the future?

ssomo: A lot of opportunity. The sky's the limit.

Dill: Thanks again, now go save the nation!





Well, we've said our piece. Now what do you think?