The Agrinautica

   In sarcastic reference to the several ongoing controversies I'd started last week (notably Ms Johnson and the MUN thing, and specifically the anonymous comments), I declared The War on Wrong ("we'll need some of your civil liberties for this"). The war has escalated significantly since then.

   CFC / SPAC found in my favour, the $740 team dinner was changed to an unsubsidized dinner at Chevy's, and Secretary-General Myung was obliged to resign.
   The War on Wrong had been far more successful than I had anticipated. But they say our rightious repression will only beget more obstinance. It came to my attention today that following the CFC debacle, a move to have me expelled from the club by vote of the Secretariat (the officers) narrowly failed (the Secretariat may by unanimous vote expel a member from the club).

   Today Secretariat member Gena Rinaldi, who lives with most of the rest of the Secretariat, was using a computer they all use (it has an MUN printer on it) and discovered an AIM dialogue box had been left open.
   It included an amazingly extensive conversation between (former) Secretary-General Catherine Myung and Secretariat member Shemek Pawlik (famous for stealing $10,000 from Unitrans, incidently) about how every single member of UCD could be compelled to vote against Rinaldi in the upcoming MUN election, to such detail that they even decided to get Secretariat member Kevin Gong to be the one to nominate Rinaldi for the Secretary-General position, because "everyone knows that Kevin is a parrot," and they calculated that a nomination from him would do the most damage to Rinaldi's chances. Otherwise, they have or plan to talk to every single member of the club on an individual basis and convince them that Rinaldi is a fundamentally flawed human.
   More alarming however, is their discussion about potentially defrauding the election. Myung mentions she has to appear unbiased so she can count the ballots, and congradulates Shemek in gaining the other ballot counting position without Rinaldi objecting (incidently Rinaldi thought he was her friend).

   Incidently, after hearing about these ruthless campaign tactics I noted "so thats why Kevin got elected over me to Secretariat last year" ("kevin is universally unliked"), to which Rinaldi responded, "Akila counted the ballots then, what do you THINK happened?" (Akila has fewer scruples than either Myung or Shemek). She also noted that much as I have suspected, despite her resignation, Myung still runs everything.


   Under-Secretary-General Rinaldi will be resigning today. She was planning the major Model UN conference we host in Spring, but now someone else needs to pick up on that. In all likelihood, without her dissenting vote, the Secretariat will expel me.

   To counteract this, I will introduce an amendment to the bylaws today that eliminates the ability of the Secretariat to expel members without consulting the body (it can still be done via 2/3rds of Secretariat and a majority of the membership). This amendment will hopefully be voted on next week during the Secretariat election. In all likelihood it will be too late to prevent my expulsion.

   The Model United Nations club at UC Davis (MUN) recently received $750 from Club Finance Council (CFC) to partially subsidize the upcoming UC Berkeley MUN Conference (UCBMUNC '05). In order to qualify for this money, MUN officers had to convince SPAC that they needed the money.

   During this conference, the MUN officers have planned a "team dinner" whereupon the 37 participants from Davis will eat at a $40 per person restaurant, and it will be subsidized by MUN club money down to $20 a plate (a $740 total subsidation).
   Club officers emphasize that this money is not the CFC money. I stated that the argument that there is no relationship between the two sources of money is the kind of financial knavery I'd expect to only hear only during an ASUCD Senate meeting.

[Poll #438856]

   When it was discussed at the meeting I grilled the officers but they were recalcitrant on the subject. Shortly thereafter we were served up the topic of "sovreignty" to practice debating. After numerous people loudly grumbled that it was a boring topic, I suggested that maybe we practice debating by using the "Team Dinner" as a topic. Secretary General Myung pointedly ignored the suggestion. I found it quite distinctly shady.

   In addition to it being in all likelihood grave misuse of CFC funds (in that we obviously didn't need the CFC money), I object to this because the dinner is STILL way out of my price range.
   I have an appointment with the Club Finance Council Program Director tomorrow morning at 9am, at which point I shall probably file a formal complaint and the SPAC people will contact the MUN officers to establish a hearing.