Running for Congress, Complete Transparency

Day 673, 08:17 • Published in Ireland Ireland • by einberliner


I debated long and hard before deciding to run for congress this term but now that I am I want to do so with complete transparency. I am currently serving my first term and as you'll be able to see from Dash's tracker for congress members (http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/congress-member-performance-and-participation-tracker-951781/1/20) I missed only two votes from fourteen. Those two votes were both in my first week when I was still learning the layout and processes of the dail. I have in the meantime been made Minister of Community and helped to re-found the eIrish lottery (get your tix today, the draw's tomorrow!) and set up the org Irish State Community Fund, a communal bank account whose funding will be used for whatever the people of Ireland want it to be used for, it won't be the government's to spend.

I'm also currently running the eIrish Community Awards and in the process of having the Community Org friend every eIrish resident and citizen so that everyone has access to the org's shouts, meaning everyone has access to the competitions, news and offers that occur there.

As a TD I have participated in debates (I went from 0 posts on the forums to 60 this term, and all but one of those posts in the dails) and voted in all the on-game votes and all but two of the on-forum ones, as mentioned above. I have attended both cabinet meetings and visited IRC at least two or three times a week to just chat to people and get to know more of our community. I also self-funded ads for eIreland abroad and donated to the Community Org, the ISCF and most recently Banc Ceannais after the robbery. Not huge amounts but what I could afford.

Manifesto wise I stand by my original one, which you can find here: http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/einberliner-for-the-south-east-my-manifesto-906258/1/20 though obviously now I'm a little older and politically wiser in terms of executing things.

But I want to be entirely, completely honest. I'm standing because the general inactivity of some TDs - some - just astounds me and I know that I, at least, will work my rear off if re-elected. But I will be away for part of the term (I fly to RL US on October 12th) and while I will have possibly daily access while there I won't be usual Donut-levels of active, though by then my time as Minister will have lapsed so it will meant that ALL the time I do have will be given to TD duties. I can't promise to hit every vote and debate while I'm there and while I know I'm likely to be around a reasonable amount let's pretend for safety's sake that I won't be able to do anything, meaning I'll only be active for a touch over a fortnight. I wouldn't want anyone to vote for me not knowing that, I'm mostly standing to give people people an option they can know for sure will be an active one.

I stand as an Independent Voices candidate but in my time in office so far I have built good relationships with members of several other parties, and as I've stated in prior articles being non-partisan is very, very important to me. I will always vote as I feel is best for the country, and my PMs will always be open to citizens of the Southeast who want to raise questions or concerns about anything at all.

This article, I'll admit, may not be perfect. It was written fairly hurriedly because I'm heading to work soon but when I read over Dash's performance tracker I finally made my mind up over whether it was fair to stand or not, given a known absence is upcoming.

In addition, given I know my service could only be partial, the 5g recieved for becoming a congress member (which seems to be why a lot of the inactives stand) will be donated to the ISCF or Banc Ceannais, I will see which people rather come the 26th via an article on this paper and donate it across on the 27th.

There will be no hard feelings on my part if not elected this term - it's understandable given the condition I have to run on - but I will very likely stand again next month, either way.

Yours, as always, in service,
Einberliner (Donut)

ETA I will tomorrow be doing a run of 10,000 ads to publicise this article, just so anyone voting for me is aware of the situation before doing so.