Prime Ministry/President

Okay, well i could be jumping the gun here, but as the Referendum is about a day away from closing and the Prime Ministery/Presidential option is about three votes om the lead i am thinking it is the option that will win.

so i thought we would start our next big, which one out of Prime Minister/President do we want?

now this may seem to be something that the only things that matters is the name, but in reality it is not.

there are alot of differences, while on paper are small, but in undertaking mean alot.

the most important difference is that a Prime Minister is also part of the Assembly, and so are his cabinet members.

This means teh seperation of powers are a little bit sceward.

In a Presidential system, the President and his cabinet are not also members of the Assembly, which means while they can influence members, and try to get their laws passed through the legislature they have no power to vote on those motions or propose them theirselves.

Also in a Prime Ministerial system, political parties/factions usually mean more then the individual, and in a Presidential system it is opposite, which while it does not directly mean anything means that a individual Prime Minister may not have as much manuveering room as an individual President when it comes to policy and choosing his cabinet and the like.

Also usually in a Prime Ministerial system you should be nominated by one of your peers, and seconded by another before you can appear on the ballot and choose a running mate.

in a Presidential system you can nominate yourself and the like.

now of course we are a region unto our own and can do pretty much what we want (i.e have a presidential system and call our head a Prime Minister/Premier, or have a Prime Ministerial/Premier system and call our head of state the President)

but through out my career and study these are usually trademarks of the institutions.

so what do you guys think?

Personally, I would go with the Prime Ministerial system, at least insofar as not being able to nominate yourself.

I'm not particularly enamoured with the title President. I would vote for Prime Minister.

Now before I'm take to task for what I have just said, let me say that we do not have to follow the generally accepted rules for these offices IRL as Serenel has already stated. We can include any provisions that we like in this document.

First, I believe every citizen, elected, candidate or not, is entitled to cast a ballot. This should be one of fundamental freedoms here in TDS. While we may have political parties here in the future, there is a long standing tradition in NS allowing independent candidacy and office holding.

Secondly, as to participation in the Legislature, I believe that the Chief Executive may address the Legislature and discuss proposed Legislation, but he cannot vote on said Legislation. The DPM, as the Speaker of the Legislature, can only vote to break tie votes. ATM, due to the low participation on the forums, I would allow the Ministers/Secretaries to fully participate in the Legislature.

As to declaring an intent to stand for election, I would say that the candidate need only to post his/her intentions to stand in an appropriate thread that the Founder should open as needed.

Mind you, when we have 30 active posters here daily, we will have to rethink and amend this, but this should see us for awhile. But I have to say, the general "life" of a Constitution in NS is a year to two at the most. Some regions rewrite their's annually just for the activity that it brings to their boards.

I would not rewrite the constitution, but i would definetly be open to amendments and the like of course.

also i agree wholeheartly that every citizen should be allowed to cast a vote, i do not think i ever stated otherwise, and will always fight dearly to keep such a right intact in any region/government/administration i ever take part in.

Essentially I propose that we closely follow the model of the American president.

I believe that individual nations may announce their own candidacy for office.

The Head Exec should not have membership in the assembly, but instead uses their influence to direct legislation. Further, the veto power will be carried by the Head Exec.

Finally, I propose that we use the title of 'Premier', as the official title for our Head Exec.

oh, also i foregot an important bit.

if we choose Prime Minister, they can not have veto power, but a President can.

With an active Legislature, a Constitution can become so "Amended" that it's too cumbersome of a document. Hence, the rewrites.

A PM can veto, if your give him the power to do so.

well sure...but then the PM could not be part of the legislature...and if a PM is not part of the legislature they really arent a PM at all....

Yeah, we can come up with a hybridization of the offices, we just have to clearly define which power we want the Head Exec to have.

Appoints cabinet, veto powers, purely exec (no membership in assembly)

Those are my general thoughts. Basically a President.

Can address and debate there, but no voting.

River wrote:Can address and debate there, but no voting.

Yeah, they should be able to assert influence and attempt to sway the Assembly, but that's mainly ceremonial. I guess what I should have said was that Head Exec = no vote.

We're good

Why don't we just use a Semi-Presidential System like France and Russia?

Just a thought...

are you familiar with the caveots of the Russian and French Presidency?

i am not, so i am just asking for clarification.

Umm well, I don't know what a Caveot is so idk...

But, I know the structure and formation and their individual powers pretty well. If that's what you mean? French Four, I know a lot.

caveot i just use colloquilly to mean the differences of things, what makes something unique/tick, or to make someone aware of something about the object/idea/thing...

and because i just like to say it....mainly just because i like to say it.

So you mean like election process and separation of powers?

Yes, I know that whole spiel as well (:

you seem to be covering it up pretty well

basically what i am asking is, what do you mean when we should base our system on that? anything specific?

What I mean is, the President can handle foreign affairs while the Premier and his/her Cabinet head the country and the Legislative Branch. And if we want we can let the President have the power to veto (:

President Sarkozy is not very popular right now in France :'(

The President is elected via referendum and so is the legislative body, but then the legis elects the Premier from within who then appoints his cabinet, the legis has the right and duty to hold a vote of no confidence for the Premier and the (Supreme) Court system can do the same for either the Premier or Pres.

The idea of impeachment of the Pres. is the same as it is in the US.

Anglenburgh wrote:What I mean is, the President can handle foreign affairs while the Premier and his/her Cabinet head the country and the Legislative Branch. And if we want we can let the President have the power to veto (:

President Sarkozy is not very popular right now in France :'(

The President is elected via referendum and so is the legislative body, but then the legis elects the Premier from within who then appoints his cabinet, the legis has the right and duty to hold a vote of no confidence for the Premier and the (Supreme) Court system can do the same for either the Premier or Pres.

The idea of impeachment of the Pres. is the same as it is in the US.

I'm just gonna say that I don't think that we can legitimately function with a system like that. At least for the moment, I don't think we have the necessary participation to operate within that system.

an interesting idea, personally i think any foregin affairs though should be under the guise of the same person domestically leading the nation.

to have a strong foregin diplomacy you have to be rooted in yuor domestic culture and atmosphere, they go hand in hand in my opinin, so when you seperate them you create a need for communication, and that create the possibility of mis-communication, for there can not be miscommunication if there is no need to communicate in the first place.

I understand both of those arguments.

Personally I do mind either way, I think our government is coming together rather nicely and pretty darn quickly!

Did we ever come to a consensus of wether we wanted it so:

A. Anyone can nominate themselves and announce their running mate and appear on the ballot

or

B. A person has to be 'nominated' by two of his/her peers before he can either accept, or reject candidacy. As such, if s/he accepts and declares a running mate, s/he will appear on the ballot.

I saw that Cool Eggs appeared to prefer option A, by his earlier post.

personally i like option B, but A is fine if that is the growing consensus.

so what do you guys prefer?

I prefer option B, that way the chances of having minor "elect mes" would be much less. If that makes sense?

I suppose I would be willing to accept "Option B", as it were; however, I would much rather allow self-nomination. There exists the potential for certain nations to be "lesser known entities" who have incredible governing ability, as well as provocative ideas.

If the region were to become "over-politicized", with the growth of political parties and factions within those parties, the aforementioned "lesser known" nations will have a hard time running for office in certain political climates.

I understand this is purely hypothetical and highly speculative on many levels, but I would like to make sure that a nation's "right" to run for office is protected by our Constitution.

Rgds.,