Official Civ4 S&T Off-Topic Thread

[Niccolo Edwards]

Due to writing too much too fast and burning myself out I was forced to leave. Then, due to personal problems and a lack of will to anything I wasn't able to come back. I'm going to ease myself back in. I'll casually write one story and interact with only a few stories. I won't kill myself like I did before.

In all seriousness welcome back, hope you have you will back and that all your problems were sorted out. Out of curiosity do you intend to rejoin The Struggles of the Noyyau.

 

[Moai_Spammer]

Due to writing too much too fast and burning myself out I was forced to leave. Then, due to personal problems and a lack of will to anything I wasn't able to come back. I'm going to ease myself back in. I'll casually write one story and interact with only a few stories. I won't kill myself like I did before.

I feel ya brother, the exact same pretty much happened to me. At least summer is here, so it'll be easy going for a bit. Probably gonna update my Massalia story tonight, as ive thought about exactly how to proceed.

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

So Stellaris is pretty fun.

Spoiler :

 

[Manuss]

So Stellaris is pretty fun.

Spoiler :

Yeah, that's pretty much what has been sucking away my time. The problem is, in Civ games you get the "just another turn..." feeling. Here, there aren't any turns, so you get the "just another hour..." feeling. That usually ends when you look out and realize it's night and two days have passed.

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

I made an IAAR, sign up here.

 

[CaterpillarKing]

In all seriousness welcome back, hope you have you will back and that all your problems were sorted out. Out of curiosity do you intend to rejoin The Struggles of the Noyyau.

Thanks. I might, we'll see how it goes.

 

[Moai_Spammer]

Thanks. I might, we'll see how it goes.

ck i gotta ask, did you make your profile picture, or did you somehow find it?

ive been meaning to ask this for like 2 years btw, i just procrastinate alot

 

[CaterpillarKing]

That's a secret that I will take to the grave

 

[Moai_Spammer]

That's a secret that I will take to the grave

._.

...

 

[Grifguz]

That's a secret that I will take to the grave

Your cocoon?

 

[Spirictum]

Also, from what I've been reading, Brazil's gone all Mad Max. Can you give me the perspective of someone who lives there? I've read some about Petrobras and Rouseff's impeachment, but you could give me a better perspective than anyone else.

I asked Greek if I could answer that question here instead of in his visitor message board because I thought maybe someone else could be interested in knowing this, but also and more importantly because it's easier to format the text and answer properly here instead of in the visitor message board.

If you're a CIVFANATIC and is still away from what is happening in Brazil, I would suggest 3 links FYI below in the spoilers tag:

Spoiler :

The Young Turks

Link to video.

Democracy Now

Link to video.

Vlog Brothers

Link to video.

Overall View
Let's start from the beginning. It's no secret that Brazil is historically corrupt and this has been worsening since the creation of our last constitution in 1988. What has happened with Petrobras may be larger then what has happened in the past, but the procedure is common knowledge in Brazil. To find someone which isn't corrupt is almost a miracle. The few exceptions are normally paranoid extremists both of left and right wing views and I believe some of those have been discovered in corruption schemes here and there, I just don't happen to know any example yet, and the best example of this character in brazilian politics today is one of the Federal Deputies elected from my State, Jair Bolsonaro, sometimes depicted as a hero, other times depicted as an UZI-user velociraptor-rider or Eric Cartman from South Park*. I see him not in the first portrait of course, he is completely insane. But he is not involved or presumed to be involved in any corruption scheme yet.

What is new is the polarization of the people towards this Impeachment Process. It's no new that our government has been economically inefficient since presidenttete Dilma (this is the best I could come in english to show that she insists on using a made up word that sounds like a female counterpart to President, so I used 'french-ing' to achieve this ) took power. It started well from the last day of the government of President Lula, but then it was so busy poorly trying to decrease the economic and social disparities in the country that our economy started to sink. I honestly don't know many specifics on this, but the growing inflation, growth of the unfavorable ratio between our currency and the other major currencies, the rampant corruption and the lack of popularity all helped to make the Congress an atagonist to the President. And as in good ol' Presidential Republics, if the government disapproves of the President, well

*SPOILER ALERT: inappropriate language ahead*

Spoiler :

Screw it! I got the votes

For those that dislike these harsh words (and pardon me about it, I don't know what's considered cursing in english, just some obvious ones), she doesn't need the Congress to rule, technically at least.

Here we have the Provisory Measure (Medida Provisória), a power invested in the President that allows him/her to create a law that takes effect immediately, but can be revogated after a month by the Congress if it feels like doing it. Nothing says the President can't make it again immediately after it is revogated by the Congress, so you guys can see where this goes to.

Of course this isn't done all the time, especially that stubborn attitude of defying the Congress, but just the use of these Provisory Measures have increased in number a lot after the Worker's Party(PT) took control in 2002 in President Lula's government (in fact it started on the government before it, but continues and increased after it took power). And I believe it's fair that the Legislative Body of the State gets mad at the Executive for legislating more then itself.



Culmination
But this time, gathering together all the factors I described before and some more I don't know/remember, the Congress found a breach in which it could force an Impeachment Process on Presidentette Dilma. It wasn't easy, and it wasn't the first attempt. But after everything that was needed to be setup was done so, the Federal Deputy Chief (the one responsible for presiding the Federal Chamber of Deputies, the lower chamber of the Congress) Eduardo Cunha from the Brazilian Democratic Movement's Party (PMDB) accepted to start the process in the government. This was completely Legal, although PT and Dilma were referring to the reason as not enough to qualify as an impeachment reason. It was about some delays in public spending to manipulate economical charts or something like this, I still didn't understand this well enough.

What happened after this was a successful Impeachment campaign that polarized the country, but with seemingly more strength on the side of those in favor of the impeachment then those against it. In Congress this unbalance was even more drastic.

Currently Presidenttete Dilma is writing her defense to the Comission established by the Senate. After that it'll decide if it'll open the process in the Senate by a simple majority of votes within the comission, and after this the Senate itself will decide if Dilma is indeed impeached or not, needing 2/3rds of the Senate's votes to accomplish that.



Conditions for this Mess
What happened before that is even more important and it explains why her Vice-President, which is currently governing in her absence, is Michel Temer from PMDB the same party of that Deputy Chief Eduardo Cunha which opened the impeachment process against her, that by now is currently held under corruption involvement investigation and had to step down as Chief Deputy, just after the Session in the Chamber of Deputies, which he held, that passed the Impeachment Process to the hands of the Senate.

How can a party have at the same time someone so close to Presidentette Dilma like Michel Temer and someone so against her like Eduardo Cunha. That is the strongest reason why PT is falling. In order to ensure and later to keep its victory on the polls since 2002, PT has allied itself with PMDB, the biggest, most corrupt and the essential centerrupt-wing politically inclined party in Brazil.

This amorphous party can live completely split into two opposing factions with ease. It's actually the mother party from which most major parties came from, including PT. It is a remnant from the times of the Military Dictatorship, which lasted from 1964 to 1985 (and which is eagerly defended by that Crazy deputy Jair Bolsonaro that I mentioned in the beginning), the only party allowed in that regime besides the regime's own party, ARENA.

So having as an ally the most powerful, most corrupt and politically amorphous party is dangerous, but of course this wasn't the only Ally PT had. It had allied with several medium and minor parties, which were either its children/brothers in the left-wing spectrum or smaller and weaker versions of PMDB.

Corrupt Politicians love to enrich themselves more then anything else, so increasing inflation and weakening the economy wasn't a smart move by the government. The social plans and projects OTOH were what held together the left-wing parties under PT's wings.

Suddenly the PMDB-like parties that were aligned with the government started splitting or abandoning the government, with the most prominent and fomenting case being PMDB. This allied to the historical antagonism against PT by the Brazilian Social-Democratic Party (PSDB) which is considered the right-wing party here, led to a major reproval of the government by most of the Congress.

Without money to pet the corrupt, and backstabbed by her Vice-President's party, Presidentette Dilma has little or no chance of avoiding the impeachment by now. Her only light of hope is that her Vice Michel Temer does a terrible job as President or he suffers some sort of major issue (like being part of a corruption scandal or suffering from an impeachment process too). For that she gave the Federal Police all the needed money for the year in advance, before the Vice took over, so it could keep working to uncover the corrupts in the recent scandals.

Although I believe Dilma's government capabilities to be extremely limited, at least her government did this favor to us, by equipping the Federal Police to do its job. I hope Michel Temer gets impeached as well, but sadly any candidate left to run for President that has any chance of winning is even worse then what we have now, with the only possible exception being a candidate from PSDB, because that party has governed from 1994 to 2002, and although it had many problems it did a decent job in the economic aspect. My fear lies on religious fanatics, mafia-like bosses, politically amorphous corrupt politicians or INSANE fanatics like that Jair Bolsonaro that seems to be becoming a threat. He was the most voted Deputy from my State, that's really alarming. Thankfully he is currently in a small party that isn't backed by anyone that matters.


Any doubts remaining about the subject will be joyfully adressed by me if you wish. That's what has been happening here, and oh! The Olympics are in 2 months! And it is here! In my city! I shall warn you that it isn't a good idea to come here by now, we have no idea what can happen in the near future .


*I put a google translated to english page in the link, and there you can answer a simple guess test about said phrases from either Cartman or Bolsonaro, but the test isn't translated, so I would suggest getting the questions and putting on google translate to understand. They are all small simple phrases.

 

[adhiraj.bose]

@Spirictum : So basically, Dilma's impeachment is not final yet ?

Also, I revived Tryst with an update .

 

[Spirictum]

@Spirictum : So basically, Dilma's impeachment is not final yet ?

Also, I revived Tryst with an update .

No, if she has the power to buy enough Senators to her cause she can actually avoid the Impeachment process. She still has 2 chances to do that

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

Nice post Spirictum! Thanks for the perspective of someone who's living through all of this.

As for swearing, we're on the internet, so you're pretty much free to do whatever (within CFC's rules, of course.) 'Screw' generally isn't considered a swear word, even though it has a lot of the same uses as the f-word, which most people would consider a swear word. What is and isn't considered swearing really depends on your parents, e.g. I was always taught that 'crap' was okay but 'moron' wasn't. Swearing is a really interesting topic in language in general.

 

[Noyyau]

I agree, that was quite interesting.
Thanks Spirictum!
Hopefully the olympics won't make even more of a mess of things...

 

[Tycho]

Nice to see that this place is still alive.

 

[CaterpillarKing]

Hopefully the olympics won't make even more of a mess of things...

 

[GreekAnalyzer]

Nice to see that this place is still alive.

We're still kicking. Drop by again sometime if you want!

 

[Tycho]

We're still kicking. Drop by again sometime if you want!

For sure, fresh off the plane from Wales, and ready to restart my story and maybe a new one as well if I have the time.

 

[Spirictum]

Things are already getting worse, I'm just not so much into searching for news because of the finals that are upon me, but by what I've heard already political manifestations have been happening some days by week in several major cities