Seerow

[quote name='Alonois' date='20 July 2010 - 09:38 PM' timestamp='1279676266' post='2381695'] Just to step into your argument, if MK couldn't defend itself it has no sovereignty. Through treaties, through direct force, through diplomacy, if MK couldn't assure its defense then it has no power and no sovereignty. [/quote] Here's somebody who gets it.

[quote name='Lennox' date='20 July 2010 - 09:34 PM' timestamp='1279676065' post='2381684'] So If I attacked MK it wouldn't be a violation of your sovereignty because its in my right to do so? [/quote] Correct. As far as I know, NSO has no treaties saying they will not attack MK. However, MK would be within its rights to destroy the NSO for such an overt act of agression. The trick here is figuring out the line between what you are allowed to do, and what you can actually do and get away with. [quote]So how is the wish to defend these nations a violation of your sovereignty? [/quote] Like Ryuzaki said, they claimed that nobody can raid them. In doing that they are attempting to limit the sovereignty of others. If they choose to actually follow up on their word and attack those raiding they are within their rights. They are also subject to the consequences of launching an aggressive attack over the pixels of a few unaligned nations.

[quote name='Wad of Lint' date='20 July 2010 - 09:28 PM' timestamp='1279675719' post='2381675'] And by your logic defending such individuals would be a violation of the sovereignty of someone wishing to attack them? [/quote] Why would it be? An alliance has the right to do whatever they please, unless they have a treaty that specifically says they will not do something. Unless the alliance defending the non-aligned alliance had a treaty saying they would not attack the alliance attacking the non-aligned alliance, there is no problem. In this situation, Red Dawn is within its rights to defend the red sphere. However, everyone else is within their rights to attack anyone on the red sphere, because they never made any treaty or statement saying they wouldn't. It is now on Red Dawn to follow through on what they said they would do, or admit that they made a claim bigger than they could handle.

[quote name='Wad of Lint' date='20 July 2010 - 09:16 PM' timestamp='1279674959' post='2381652'] What about an alliance without treaties? [/quote] An alliance without treaties has obviously by the logic I presented chosen to keep their full sovereignty, exchanging the safety of having a net of treaties forcing people to back you up in exchange for the freedom of not having any chance of being dragged into a war in which you do not want any part in. An alliance without treaties is free to do whatever they please. Other alliances are similarly free to do what they like in response to any actions the non-aligned-alliance takes.

[quote name='O-Dog' date='20 July 2010 - 07:37 PM' timestamp='1279669003' post='2381490'] So Red Dawn is a uniquely NPO project is it? And you decided to make your stand against it now, as opposed to when it was originally launched (without NPO signatures)? And why is striving to protect your colour sphere equal to becoming an untouchable force? Were FAN or GOLD attempting to become untouchable forces? [/quote] To be honest, I don't remember enough about FAN's protection of yellow to comment on it, however if I recall, that ended pretty badly for them. As to the matter at hand, until NPO joined, Red Dawn may have said they'd stop any tech raiding on the sphere, but they to my understanding never acted upon it in any reasonable way. People still raided red, just no big deal came of it. To my understanding this has been an escalation from NPO telling people to back off, and everyone else saying "no, we won't". Telling nations outside of your alliance what they can and cannot do is a direct violation of sovereignty. Treaties can be made to say that you will defend another party, as most treaties are. This is an alliance choosing to sacrifice their own right, the right to be neutral when a war starts against an ally you'd rather not take part in, in exchange for the other alliance you treaty also giving up a part of their sovereignty (being forced to defend you in the opposite situation). The Revenge Doctrine and the FAN equivalent also gave up sovereignty, they agreed to lend their might to attack any nation attacking an unaligned nation on their sphere. They could do this simply because there is nobody in their right minds who would challenge them, as the strongest alliance, there simply isn't any reason to challenge it rather than finding a different target. It is important to note, in none of the similar situations, has anyone ever given up the ability to raid the protected sphere. They chose not to because it is not profitable to defy the people doing the protecting. They knew if they tried, the alliance doing the protecting had the strength to back up their claims, and destroy any alliance that thought to defy them. Now however, NPO and the Red Dawn lack the ability to back up their claims. They want to lay claim to the sphere, to protect it. It is well within their rights to offer protection. However, they cannot expect anybody to care that they are offering protection, if they don't think it can be backed up. In this case, Red Dawn is being shown to be too weak to hold up to their promise of protection, and those they decided to protect are suffering for it. It will end up either as a lesson to the NPO that they should not make a claim they do not intend to back up, or will end with the Red Dawn following through on their word, and attacking every person tech raiding red, which would likely get ugly for Red Dawn. As I said in my earlier post, there are better ways that they could have gone about securing peace for their sphere, going to various raiding alliances and making treaties to agree not to attack each others' spheres, which likely would have resulted in much better results, as everyone affected would have agreed to it. It's the difference between asking for a favor, and telling somebody you're taking something from them. I'm not sure why this difference is so difficult to comprehend.

[quote name='O-Dog' date='20 July 2010 - 07:25 PM' timestamp='1279668299' post='2381467'] You're having a laugh aren't you?!? The people showing King of the Hill tendencies these days ain't the NPO. [/quote] When an alliance decides to tell all other alliances "You can't do this" I would call that trying to act like they're the king of the hill. It's one of the things the NPO did to prove their superiority early in CN, and those raiding red are doing the right thing by preventing them from being able to recreate the persona of an untouchable force.

[quote name='D34th' date='20 July 2010 - 07:03 PM' timestamp='1279666963' post='2381428'] For everyone who are saying "The reason of safari isn't t piss off NPO" : it's already pretty clear by posts of your own people that is not true. I have just one question to do: If you start to hurt and harm innocent people just because you can and to piss off a third part, what make you better than NPO in the old days? Note: Because we don't install viceroys and this kind of BS isn't an acceptable answer. That's what I said in my post? [/quote] I want to point out there's a difference between doing something to piss off the NPO and doing something to show NPO we're not going to put up with their King of the Hill attitude. You may not see the distinction, but it does exist.

[quote name='King Wally' date='20 July 2010 - 06:38 PM' timestamp='1279665474' post='2381387'] man you people on here crying about the red raid safari are really glass half empty type people arent you? If you were smart you would draft a nice recruitment message and send it to all the red nones being raided reminding them that they would be safe from raiding if they simply took 5 minutes to sign up to your alliance NPO etc. Hell you would come across as the hero's on white stallions riding in to save them from the evil outland raiders (like me!) and you would bump up your membership considerably.... ...and the problem is again? [/quote] The problem is the evil tech raiders killing innocent pixels to prove a point! But seriously, the old Revenge Doctrine never got challenged because when the NPO instituted it, they were on top of the world. There was no force who would try to challenge them over something as small as tech raiding a relatively small sphere. There were simply easier targets around. That's one of the perks of being on top, you can do things and nobody will question it. In the year since then, the NPO has lost the power and influence that allowed them to get away with such acts. They need to realize that them saying something unilaterally does not make it so. Had they gone to tech raiding alliances individually and tried to forge a treaty with each one, to ignore the red sphere in raids, it may have been met with a better response. And had they gone this route, the NPO (and the rest of red dawn) would have been able to enjoy the stability granted by their sphere being protected from raids by a voluntary treaty. The method they chose to take however, was to pretend like they are still on top of the world, and assume nobody would question their will, and simply told everyone else they would not raid red or face consequences. No asking, no negotiation, no discussion. They just decided they could declare that other alliances could not do something, and that the other alliances would listen. Obviously, some people don't like that attitude when it's not coming from a group that can destroy them without any effort, and will challenge this attempted infringement upon their own sovereignty. If the unaligned red players don't like that, they are welcome to join an alliance for protection, or change color spheres.

What a long strange trip it's been.

Took you guys long enough. Now to sit back and see what happens next [quote name='Letum' date='20 May 2010 - 11:22 AM' timestamp='1274368916' post='2305171'] Alas, even that strategy did not save us from the peace-mode penetrating missiles that the secret Karma labs developed to strike at our NS. [/quote] Just remember, we aren't afraid to use them again :x

[quote name='Johnny Apocalypse' date='14 May 2010 - 08:37 AM' timestamp='1273840622' post='2297730'] Let this be a warning to Nordreich and all other alliances who've had their flag uploaded because someone won TE for them. Sanction will reward you with nothing. Have a terrific day. [/quote] I would argue the better lesson is that those of you who are near sanction status, don't waste money and time on CN:TE trying to get a flag, as once you gain your sanction you lose your reward.

[quote name='flak attack' date='10 May 2010 - 11:34 PM' timestamp='1273548830' post='2294408'] As a note, this is incorrect. If you get your flag in through TE and then get a sanction, you apparently don't get to upload another flag. MK: First alliance in history not to get a flag for getting sanctioned. Yet another award for us. [/quote] We just keep raking in these rewards.

[quote name='Cager' date='02 May 2010 - 10:00 PM' timestamp='1272852030' post='2284506'] I would like to petition the removal of Sir Donald R Daemon from the position of Retired Imperial Officer. Given he never really acted his part AS an Imperial Officer I do not see how he could have possibly retired. Aside from that discrepancy it was a decent read. [/quote] SDRD paid a lot of good money to Pacifica to get his position. Cortath taking away the meaningless status of "retired imperial officer" and removing him from even an advisory position would be borderline criminal. I'm just glad to see a number of those people removed from having any sort of actual power. Definitely a step in the right direction.

[quote name='TheNeverender' date='05 April 2010 - 12:14 AM' timestamp='1270440880' post='2248497'] What. No, really...what. If TIDTT felt that it was fair to pay reps, then something tells me they don't need you wailing to the heavens about injustice of it all or whatever. [/quote] Don't deny it, take pride in it. You are the leader of the new hegemoney, take pride in your work and extortion! But seriously, when an alliance is attacked it's really hard to call anything they demand as restitution to be extortion.

So reading the post closer, I see Gramlins refused to budge on their ridiculous stance. It will be interesting to see where that policy gets them alone in the coming days.

Took you long enough. For once your 100% was 100%. But you rode it pretty damn close.

I could understand that, but if that's the case why would it be on the university to require professor's to do the research, if all it is doing is providing a supplemental income stream for the professors? I could see some professors demanding it, and getting that time available for research as a benefit, since they will directly benefit from it (being able to get work done that they want and get more money for it), but there is no logical reason for a Unviersity to require it if they don't get a cut of the money back. I can think of two possible explanations: 1) It started out how I initially said (as a perk etc) that came to be expected and thus standardized, and as all such things in a bureaucracy we end up shafted for it. 2) The university is being paid under the table for the research time, so it wouldn't show up on the budgets, but the policy makers are receiving a cut. 1 is probably the more likely of the two.

And so I am proven wrong. I was operating on the assumption that universities ran like businesses and thus would make business like decisions. tbh now I believe that the University system is uncapitalistic and deserves to fail. Too bad the government would just bail them out.

Profs teaching more means less research, much of a college's money comes not from tuition, but from royalties from the professor's research. I'm almost certain those mandates are due to economics, not a whimsical figure pulled out of nowhere, and reducing research time to make professors teach more would result in higher tuition costs to maintain the school's budget. Either that or we would lose a great deal of progress in many sciences due to research being cut altogether and universities existing soley to teach, rather than to be a place to both teach and learn for student and professor alike.

I hear you and feel your pain. But trust me sticking in there and getting a job you actually want is better than the alternative. I took the alternative two years ago and am now trying my damndest to get back into school. All of the doubling up classes suck... but the reason they don't just accept high school equivalencies is because those aren't standardized. From what you said your grade school years were much higher quality than mine were up until 10th grade (in 11th grade I dual enrolled at a community college and just knocked out my first two years of college rather than wasting time with upper end high school classes). I know many people with the same high school credits you had, and maybe even the same grades, with probably half the experience you described. iirc they do have tests to let you skip entry level courses and take more advanced courses to start with... but they don't fulfill credit hour obligations which seems to be your primary issue. You already are aware of overlapping courses (your history of art to fulfill art, etc), so there's nothing really more I can suggest to help you, just recommending again that you hang in there. It does suck that you have to have this knowledge that is useless to you, and it's probably a large part of the reason we have a shortage in teachers. If they made a vocational program for teachers where instead of qualifying as a well rounded teacher you could specialize in one field and get out in 2 years, it would probably solve a lot of problems... but what can you do.

[quote name='Gopherbashi' date='04 April 2010 - 06:14 PM' timestamp='1270419239' post='2247917'] You guys had better submit that as your pip if you ever get sanctioned. [/quote] The trick is to find a way to work in smug, penises, and our innate awesomeness, without breaking forum rules and having to make a different one.

[quote name='Antoine Roquentin' date='03 April 2010 - 11:40 PM' timestamp='1270352393' post='2247188'] That doesn't help at all. [/quote] tbh if you want a sanction that bad, come back to MK. You don't belong running Genmay2.0.

[quote name='Unsure' date='03 April 2010 - 11:09 PM' timestamp='1270350567' post='2247152'] -MK, literally constantly from when I joined until about a week ago [/quote] Except for the 6 months or so we've been trying to get the Vanguard merger to go through?

[quote name='Choader' date='02 April 2010 - 09:35 PM' timestamp='1270258527' post='2246047'] No, but it's a good try. I don't need to argue anything because apparently our definitions "at war" and "not at war" are not the same, so there's little use in comparing them. If you consider a skirmish between three alliances that was never intended to escalate being "at war" for FoB then I have little use in discussing it with you. [/quote] You're confusing me with SW. I was the one who said from the start FoB was at war and the initial temporary leave was understandable. What is not understandable is the continued absence, and then the denial that staying from your alliance for so long, including through a period where FoB WAS at war is not abandoning your alliance. Had you returned at the conclusion of WWE, or even once TOP et al declared war on CnG I would have no problem with your action. However you didn't, you stayed in PC while FoB suffered for it, and then come back in this very thread to insult the people who picked up the slack in your place while denying that your actions had any negative impact on FoB. [quote]No one has yet denied Stormsend and Tammerlane were encouraged by their superiors to join FoB and "reorganize" it. There's no rebuttal? [/quote] To be honest I thought the accusation was too wild to warrant a response. Stormsend and Tamerlane leaving was a surprise when it happened, and many of us were disappointed. But of course I can't speak for any government level plans, I havent held position in MK in a very long time. I can say I feel I know Archon well enough to judge him organizing such an op to be highly unlikely.

[quote name='Choader' date='02 April 2010 - 09:29 PM' timestamp='1270258130' post='2246033'] What's funny is all of you claiming FoB was wronged are from MK, that speaks volumes right there doesn't it. [/quote] I can only imagine your thought process here. "I can't think of any arguments against what they're saying. What do I do?! I wait I know, I'll point out the people I'm arguing with are from MK, they're clearly ganging up on me to make an unreasonable viewpoint seem right, everyone knows they have rediculous propaganda. Clearly once I point this out everyone will realize I was right all along because MK is the root of all evil" Am I close?