We interrupt our usual Week in Review to deliver the following article of the utmost importance. Part of the purpose of this blog is to deliver the news in a readable medium, in a way so any candidate who peruses here can get a real bead on what happens in the U4Prez world. I write this so you don't have to dig through several comment threads and rely on other candidates who don't quite know either what's going on. It is such a bombshell, that the first word from the moderator on the subject is the word Boom.
*From u4prez on 09/15/2007 02:47 am
"BOOOM! Candidate Copulate exposes voter manipulation scheme. It turns out one of our top candidates was rerouting votes of a 1 and changing them to a 10. Brilliant strategy, but one step behind Copulate. Ouch!!! The candidate has been fined a whopping 5000 ratings points.
Thanks to Cop for figuring it out.
This is the tenth case of voter manipulation we've found this week. 7 of them resulted in account deletions (all related to trying to hack our site internally). Most were mild, but this one was pretty big."
That candidate was Kempite.
And yes, I plan to gloat. Fasten your seatbelts.
Now, I didn't say anything when I watched Kempite's score inflate and deflate rapidly over the summer. A couple of candidates asked me about it, and I would watch for a few days here and there, on Monday he would be in the 8th position in the Top Republicans, by Thursday he was #3. At that point, he was boasting over 4000 votes, so I knew, at that point, even in June, something was going on, but I couldn't prove it, so I just bided my time.
Pull out your calculators along with me, and let's do the math. Let's say a candidate has 5000 votes, with a rating of 8.000. In order to move your total to 8.100, just a single tenth of a point, you would need 264 10's, without a single 1 (A raw score of 42640, divided by 5264 votes, equals a rating of 8.1003). And yet, there have been rumors and reports about Kempite bouncing up and down everywhere between 7.9 and 8.5. Logistically speaking, it would be impossible, when you consider Kempite never did have the squeaky clean reputation he thinks you're stupid enough to think he had all along. Look around, just on this blog, which is still the hottest item in the U4Prez world, there are a handful of candidates who would give him a 1, if they voted for him at all. With the occasional break-out of anonymous 1's coming around every so often like a reoccurring rash, it boggles the mind how a candidate with 5000 votes can gain a tenth in their rating, seemingly at whim.
At U4Prez, by the time you get to about 1000 votes, you're pretty much locked into where you're going to be in terms of a rating.
As of this writing, Kempite has 9,465 votes (to give you an idea of how much that is, I quit with 4,269 votes, from March 17 to August 8, which, in 176 days as a candidate, averages out to be 24.25 votes a day, which I think is the norm for most all of the popular candidates, and I invite you to do the math for yourself, the more popular candidates who have been around can generate about 25-30 votes a day), which, from his starting date of February 20 to September 15, means he could generate almost 46 VOTES A DAY, every day, for all 207 days of his being here.
I urge you to make the same comparisons with MejicoJohn, Copulate, Mduminiak, kt2020, and any other candidate who has been here since at least March, and you will find a gross exaggeration in Kempite's ability to produce votes, as opposed to everyone else.
At the time, I dismissed it. Kempite was one of the truly elite players this summer, I figured he had a trick up his sleeve, he had access to votes somewhere on the web which, were the rest of us able to discover, our vote totals would go through the roof as well. I had no way of proving wrong-doing, so it was something I just kept under my hat.
Until now, when I read the news from Eric Gurr himself on U4Prez.
Do you all want to know how he did it?
Copulate deserves all the credit for discovering this. I am no IT expert, so I am sure I'm going to botch it in trying to tell you how Kempite manipulated his rating, his votes, his raw score, and ultimately U4Prez itself.
Kempite was using something called an "IP rerouter". I still don't quite understand how it works, but through this, he is able to take all the 1's he received and turn them into 10's. Arch, you were wondering just last night how his score goes up when you vote him a 1, well, THIS is what he uses. Anyone with a little knowledge in the IT department, feel free to expound on this. Where certain candidates are concerned, he has been able to take those 1's you give him and turn them into 10's.
Kempite was able to manipulate these scores my merely placing an IP rerouter into the wording of his stat counter.
Some of you, I know you have enough experience with what I'm talking about, I'm hoping you will put your two-cents-worth into this, so we can openly talk about it, and we can do a better job of exposing this form of cheating the moment we see it, and not let it go unchecked for God knows how long.
That's exactly what this is. Cheating. This isn't creativity, this isn't finding a new wrinkle in the old programming. This is the real deal, folks. For those of you who are true fans of democracy, what Kempite did was manipulate the system entirely for his own advantage. He went outside of the rules.
I will be amazed and impressed if anyone presses me too hard on this issue. I defy Iron Lady to defend Kempite now. Please, Hard Right, I would love to hear you spin this one to your advantage. I've already seen BigDaddy calling out Copulate for being a whistleblower, if he could rat out Kempite, surely he must be doing it himself. That's part of why this is making me laugh so loud, because not long ago, Copulate actually WAS being accused of manipulating his scores, Kempite being one of those accusing him the loudest.
I am also wondering, just how many members of the Hard Right are using this same tactic? I do remember, within the last month, Hawk and Mduminiak each winning runoffs in which, according to the moderators, they won because of a barrage of 1's. With the ringleader being caught red-handed, I don't think it's too far a reach to think other members of the Hard Right cabal also play this game. If that's the case, I am urging those with some IT sensibilities to take a good long hard look at those two, and pretty much anyone who is close with Kempite. And if those who previously defended him to the death suddenly come up tainted, they should suffer the same fate as their master.
Some of you out there hate my guts, and that's fine, if you don't have enemies, you don't have character. But what Kempite was caught doing validates pretty much everything I've been talking about in terms of vote count transparency, corruption, favoritism, and the "fix". THIS is what I've been talking about all along. THIS is why I quit, and why I won't return until after the general election. This is also why several other candidates have quit, because this Hard Right cabal has been allowed to use U4Prez as their little 'hood, beating down anyone who speaks up against them, without fear of reprocussion from the moderators. They see a website where freepers run rampant, where all elections are frauds, and where the creator, up until now, didn't seem to care. My gripes have all been confirmed.
Call me a whore or a slut or whatever you wish. Question my morals. Call me out when you think I'm wrong. But make no mistake about it, my integrity is still intact. I still have never betrayed a PM, whereas all PM's are fair game when placed in Kempite's corrupt hands. I have never had to manipulate my score unethically to get ahead. Again, question my tactics, but everything I did, I was upfront about, direct, never hid from anything I did, never made excuses.
So yes, Anthony Pellegrino, this whore has more integrity in her middle finger than you have in your whole body.
You of all people should know better than to put yourself on a pedestal, because it's a tough fall when you get knocked off. By trying this campaign of being a "serious candidate" with the serious answers, you put yourself up there. I didn't tell you to act like a pompous dickhead. That one is on you. There is no one here who will ever take you serious again, and if they do, sometime down the road, there's a few newbies who don't know, trust me, they will. If ever they write a history book on the U4Prez world, this article will be in there.
I wonder what Tony Nasso must be thinking right now, looking down on us from heaven. Do you think he would have approved of such cheating? Do you really think he wants your name associated with his anymore? Maybe you should roll his memorial page out again, just to make sure there's anything more in that well you can suck up and use. Maybe there's one last brownie point you can leech off of Tony4Prez, what do you have to lose at this point?
Pretty much everything I've ever said on the subject of Kempite has come to fruition. He is a backstabbing bully who can't be trusted with the slightest bit of confidentiality. He will use any bloody thing at his disposal to boost his own reputation, from dead candidates to apparently the U4Prez voting system itself. He cares for nothing but the feeding of his own ego.
Everything he has worked so hard for means absolutely nothing. What good is it to solve the problems in a democratic society, when democracy itself is something you seek to defile? What good is it to talk about American principles, when the most sacred principle itself, the belief in a fair and just voting system, is just the punchline to a joke in Kempite's mind? Why bother calling yourself a "serious candidate" when you are obviously the least serious candidate here?
I take very little pleasure in this. I never wanted to be right in the "fix", in the charges of favoritism I levied against Eric Gurr. But how tragically correct is it now, the thought that, while Eric and Kempite were getting it on on some dumb little talk show, while Kempite was shaking Eric's hand with his right hand, he was sticking him in the back with a knife in the other? Was Kempite actually looking Eric in the eye and saying all was well, while at the same time manipulating the already suspect voting system to his advantage? I cried bloody murder when I saw it happening, and I was shooed away like the psychobitch many would love to portray me to be. I feel completely validated, I think many might question the methods by which I sought to continue to apply pressure to U4Prez to open its eyes to the real problems it's facing. But in the recent turn of events, I don't think many will challenge me and call me wrong.
The only tough question left is, how deep does this go? I don't want to call for a witch-hunt, but I have already said every single election in the history of U4Prez is a sham. Let me make this perfectly clear, and this goes to friend as well as for. Not a single election in U4Prez history is valid. I do not recognize a single primary winner or party leader, including myself and my own set of victories. None of it counts. I'm sorry, but that primary win you covet, apparently Kempite thought so little of you that he sought to corrupt the entire system for his own masturbatory pleasures. It's now worthless. Oh, sure, with Kempite out of the way, you might actually win President, but so what? You won your primary through a corrupt system, a system easily manipulated and apparently bastardized for months on end. Why should anyone honor your win, after how Kempite trashed the place?
If anyone else is doing the same thing, anyone else in the Hard Right who thought they could get away with it, I'm telling you now, every day you continue to try to play this game of vote manipulation, you are bringing U4Prez that much closer to its own death. Come clean. Everyone with the slightest bit of IT experience is probably all over your profiles as we speak, watching your ratings chance on a minute-to-minute basis, voting you 1's and seeing if your rating also rises. You would be doing everyone a favor in admitting it to Eric and accepting whatever punishment is warranted.
Some get kicked out of here because they flame and curse their minds away. Personally, I feel this is far worse. I will never advocate the termination of a fellow candidate, but maybe, with Kempite remaining, he can be set up as the example, as the candidate most opposite what America stands for. The perfect traitor. Someone willing to destroy the site for his own ego. When new candidates come up to me in the future and ask me for a little advice, I will tell them of Kempite, I will point to his profile, I will direct them to all his accomplishments, and then I will tell them it all turned to shit, because Kempite took the essence of democracy itself, and wiped his ass with it.
Now, more than ever, U4Prez needs a Constitution, a framework through which this kind of thing becomes harder to pull off.
Kempite wins a recent video contest because he talks about being a "serious candidate". He has a lot of fucking nerve, to accept the prize with one hand, as he stabs U4Prez in the back with the other.
Kempite didn't betray me, I knew what he was a LONG time ago. Kempite betrayed U4Prez and a whole lot of people who went to bat for him. If they continue to defend him, if Iron Lady ever defends his name when someone brings his crimes up, then they go beyond blind loyalty, they transcend blind loyalty into complete stupidity.
For something positive, I thank Eric Gurr for sending a strong message, that such games will not be tolerated. I'm sorry I had to become a raving bitch out in the wilderness for this to come to pass, but considering how he has reprimanded ten people for hacking and manipulation, it is clear, if nothing else, he is tired of the idea of U4Prez being seen as a corrupt, neglected site, where favorites get away with what they want, and the creator will let it all go. Had this happened six weeks ago, maybe things would be completely different.
BigDaddy yips ar everyone's ankles, claiming he GOT Olivia, GOT Copulate, with his usual NAH-na-NAH-NAH appeal. BigDaddy, you're not in Copulate's league. You are a homophobe trying to play GOTCHA games concerning your perceived homphobia in others, how tragic is that! We're trying to stop these harmful games, not perpetuate them. U4Prez will die if it descends to BigDaddy's level. What Kempite did hits to the core of U4Prez itself. Bagging on me because you question my motives for voting how I did in 2004, are you really going to sit there and call that a GOTCHA? If all you care about is the GOTCHA, then I declare Copulate the winner, BigDaddy, he took out the biggest name at U4Prez, but he didn't do it with gameplaying or nagging or namecalling, no; he used the truth. If this is truly a game to you, BigDaddy, Copulate's scored a touchdown, you lose, game over. For once, the good guys win.
It will be interesting to see who lands where in the Hard Right, and who will be the first to pat Kempite on the back.
As for me, Kempite, keep my name out of your fucking mouth! I told you guys over and over and OVER again, you have bigger things to worry about than how Olivia runs her campaign, how Olivia runs the Independent Party, how Olivia runs her mouth. You got caught, and if anyone else in your clique is doing it, they will be caught as well. You have no credibility left. All those who rely on you for their status will either distance themselves with you, or fall alongside with your down the crapper of mediocrity, and you will cease to ever be taken seriously ever again. Anytime you ever talk about that whore Olivia again, everyone will look at you, and say, didn't you whore yourself out to turn a few 1's into 10's?
The very first soundbite I ever put on my profile was, the difference between me and the rest in Washington is I'll tell you up front I'm a prostitute. I wonder which whore this place will appreciate more from this point on.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Never Mind the Big Boys, Let's Talk about You!
Last week, the moderators put up in the News Section their desire for you to put a short video together for YouTube. They're running their debate for the Republican candidates, and they mysterious powers-that-be thought it would be cool if someone at U4Prez got their video, asking the candidates a question, used at the debate, and hence shown all over the world on cable television.
I'm awaiting the moderators to announce Kempite's video won yet again, most likely because the moderators will only support a video made by the hand-picked president himself. Hedrick, Lucky, Mejico, anyone else wanting to take a crack at this, don't even waste your time, it's Kempite, or it's no one.
I thought it would be pertinent to turn the tables on this one. Instead of acting like adoring fans, why don't we have these kind of questions asked right here, for the U4Prez candidates to answer? You all are running for President, am I right? Then maybe YOU should get the opportunity to answer such questions.
In this spirit, I pose the following question to all candidates at U4Prez:
QUESTION: There has been some talk concerning a U4Prez Constitution to be written after the general election in November. If you are elected President, what do you think your role in writing such a Constitution should be, and, as a follow up, what is one thing you would definitely want to see put into this Constitution?
Maybe I should have addressed this to Kempite personally. As much as I believe he has been, and continues to be, the largest recipient of moderator favoritism, and there is a firm base of evidence to support this and the "fix", in not wanting to crush everyone's spirit and to actually have fun with the concept, I address the question to all of U4Prez. All are invited to answer this as a comment on this blog or in an email or message to me.
As for me, let me deliver my own answer.
Ever since I brought up the idea of a U4Prez Constitution, everyone I've talked to on the subject not only thinks it's a good idea, they can't wait to get started on it. I truly hope these people are brainstorming ideas, because if and when I do return after the general election, I want to jump in with both feet and really take this on. This is important, because it will be a document letting not only the Internet on the whole where we stand as a community and how we solve the problems we face, it will also tell the moderators what we expect from U4Prez as a website.
There are problems at U4Prez, some are trivial, like being unable to delete a frikkin photo without moderator approval, and some are major, like having a reliable system for counting votes that all candidates can understand. Some of the issues that face us, we can handle ourselves; issues of conduct, harassment, and anything of that nature, I believe we can police ourselves, and we should all take a more active role in such endeavors. But there are other items we simply have no or little control over.
A Constitution would change that. It would lay down a structure through which we as candidates can solve our own problems, can make the moderators more responsive to our needs, and can make U4Prez the sort of vibrant place it was once and could be again.
I am not running for President this year, but were I to win the Presidency in November, I would oversee the creation of a Constitution Convention, much like the conventions when the Articles of Confederation and the U.S. Constitution were written in the 1780's. It would involve all party leaders, past and present, all primary winners, and any other agreed-upon candidates at the party leaders' discretion. I would say, if we got at least the thirty most involved candidates at U4Prez to take part in this, we could create such a Constitution by January 2008, should we start a week after the general election of November 2007.
The role of the President would be to PRESIDE, not to write it herself. She would be the one to set the tone, to organize, to be at the center of the tempest, to calm candidates down, to organize committees and oversee debates. She would also be the one to frame the Constitution to her making, either making it resemble the US Constitution, or to come up with something entirely different. As the Convention wore on, the President would be organizing votes on given sections, piecing these sections together, and at long last, offering a draft the Convention can vote on as a whole.
As in real life, the President does not write law. Legislation begins in committees in the House and Senate. Such committees would do the actual hard work of penning this Constitution. The President can promote some of her agenda, assist the committees, but in the end, these committees would do the nuts-and-bolts work.
One issue I would definitely want addressed in such a Constitution would be vote reform, how votes are cast, how ratings are configured, and more importantly, how votes are counted in a fair, transparent way. Such a process should be made easy to understand, so there is no more wondering how one candidate can beat another under whatever cockamamie condition. It would demand the moderators make the voting process clear to all candidates as they sign up, the moderators no longer surprise us with whimsical changes to the process, they no longer act as if they can make it up as they go, and most importantly, such a process can be challenged.
Ratings are one thing, but however ratings are created, they need to not change at the drop of a hat, with no explanation.
Vote count reform, though, would be my prime issue as President. If we can't trust elections, then what's the point in playing democracy? If no one understands the process, it can only turn to chaos, which is the status quo. If the moderators can change the system in the middle of a run-off, then you can hardly blame me for bringing up favoritism and the fix. Unless there is a designated place where the vote count system is posted, easily accessible to all and easily understood by all, it is subject to corruption and manipulation.
As you can see, such a Constitution would force the moderators to be much more open and honest in how they determine run-off leaders, instead of merely announcing winners at their convenience, producing numbers no one really understands. Such openness would promote trust in the process. A well-written Constitution would state not only how the candidates demand such votecounts to be done, but also what will happen when the moderators blow it, and how the candidates can challenge the results. With transparency, however, I would like to think almost all elections would be considered legitimate, but in cases where a vote is suspect, the Constitution would have guidelines as to what should happen in such an event, and what we demand the moderators do to rectify the situation.
In short, WE have the power to make law for U4Prez and to enforce it.
I'm not saying we should have three branches of government, a bicameral legislature, yada yada. But I am saying, we should have a system in place whereby we can solve crises ourselves, where we work with the moderators, and the President will have a role in upholding and defending this Constitution. How the President does this will go a long way to whether or not she will be re-elected next year, because such a President would have the chance to put some of their principles to practice. Hence, the President is not just someone who won a contest. The President actually will have responsibilties according to the Constitution we all write together.
But this is all speculation, my own daydreaming from my own question.
I encourage all candidates to challenge one another and ask of themselves these kind of questions, not just go around and around ober Washington politics, but the politics within the U4Prez world. How would you solve the problems U4Prez itself faces, were you to actually be elected President in this little world of ours? I offer up the question I posed for you to consider, and I hope to get some sort of feedback on what I ponied up.
And if you've thought up some questions to ask U4Prez candidates, this is the place to bring them up. Never mind the big boys and their canned responses, you know what they'll say, there's no real surprises there. But you've been at U4Prez for a while, you know it for what it is. If you were in a position to improve it, what would you do? What kind of questions would you pose to those candidates who have won a primary and are in a position to win it all? How would YOU answer these sort of questions?
Feel free to comment plentifully on this one.
I'm awaiting the moderators to announce Kempite's video won yet again, most likely because the moderators will only support a video made by the hand-picked president himself. Hedrick, Lucky, Mejico, anyone else wanting to take a crack at this, don't even waste your time, it's Kempite, or it's no one.
I thought it would be pertinent to turn the tables on this one. Instead of acting like adoring fans, why don't we have these kind of questions asked right here, for the U4Prez candidates to answer? You all are running for President, am I right? Then maybe YOU should get the opportunity to answer such questions.
In this spirit, I pose the following question to all candidates at U4Prez:
QUESTION: There has been some talk concerning a U4Prez Constitution to be written after the general election in November. If you are elected President, what do you think your role in writing such a Constitution should be, and, as a follow up, what is one thing you would definitely want to see put into this Constitution?
Maybe I should have addressed this to Kempite personally. As much as I believe he has been, and continues to be, the largest recipient of moderator favoritism, and there is a firm base of evidence to support this and the "fix", in not wanting to crush everyone's spirit and to actually have fun with the concept, I address the question to all of U4Prez. All are invited to answer this as a comment on this blog or in an email or message to me.
As for me, let me deliver my own answer.
Ever since I brought up the idea of a U4Prez Constitution, everyone I've talked to on the subject not only thinks it's a good idea, they can't wait to get started on it. I truly hope these people are brainstorming ideas, because if and when I do return after the general election, I want to jump in with both feet and really take this on. This is important, because it will be a document letting not only the Internet on the whole where we stand as a community and how we solve the problems we face, it will also tell the moderators what we expect from U4Prez as a website.
There are problems at U4Prez, some are trivial, like being unable to delete a frikkin photo without moderator approval, and some are major, like having a reliable system for counting votes that all candidates can understand. Some of the issues that face us, we can handle ourselves; issues of conduct, harassment, and anything of that nature, I believe we can police ourselves, and we should all take a more active role in such endeavors. But there are other items we simply have no or little control over.
A Constitution would change that. It would lay down a structure through which we as candidates can solve our own problems, can make the moderators more responsive to our needs, and can make U4Prez the sort of vibrant place it was once and could be again.
I am not running for President this year, but were I to win the Presidency in November, I would oversee the creation of a Constitution Convention, much like the conventions when the Articles of Confederation and the U.S. Constitution were written in the 1780's. It would involve all party leaders, past and present, all primary winners, and any other agreed-upon candidates at the party leaders' discretion. I would say, if we got at least the thirty most involved candidates at U4Prez to take part in this, we could create such a Constitution by January 2008, should we start a week after the general election of November 2007.
The role of the President would be to PRESIDE, not to write it herself. She would be the one to set the tone, to organize, to be at the center of the tempest, to calm candidates down, to organize committees and oversee debates. She would also be the one to frame the Constitution to her making, either making it resemble the US Constitution, or to come up with something entirely different. As the Convention wore on, the President would be organizing votes on given sections, piecing these sections together, and at long last, offering a draft the Convention can vote on as a whole.
As in real life, the President does not write law. Legislation begins in committees in the House and Senate. Such committees would do the actual hard work of penning this Constitution. The President can promote some of her agenda, assist the committees, but in the end, these committees would do the nuts-and-bolts work.
One issue I would definitely want addressed in such a Constitution would be vote reform, how votes are cast, how ratings are configured, and more importantly, how votes are counted in a fair, transparent way. Such a process should be made easy to understand, so there is no more wondering how one candidate can beat another under whatever cockamamie condition. It would demand the moderators make the voting process clear to all candidates as they sign up, the moderators no longer surprise us with whimsical changes to the process, they no longer act as if they can make it up as they go, and most importantly, such a process can be challenged.
Ratings are one thing, but however ratings are created, they need to not change at the drop of a hat, with no explanation.
Vote count reform, though, would be my prime issue as President. If we can't trust elections, then what's the point in playing democracy? If no one understands the process, it can only turn to chaos, which is the status quo. If the moderators can change the system in the middle of a run-off, then you can hardly blame me for bringing up favoritism and the fix. Unless there is a designated place where the vote count system is posted, easily accessible to all and easily understood by all, it is subject to corruption and manipulation.
As you can see, such a Constitution would force the moderators to be much more open and honest in how they determine run-off leaders, instead of merely announcing winners at their convenience, producing numbers no one really understands. Such openness would promote trust in the process. A well-written Constitution would state not only how the candidates demand such votecounts to be done, but also what will happen when the moderators blow it, and how the candidates can challenge the results. With transparency, however, I would like to think almost all elections would be considered legitimate, but in cases where a vote is suspect, the Constitution would have guidelines as to what should happen in such an event, and what we demand the moderators do to rectify the situation.
In short, WE have the power to make law for U4Prez and to enforce it.
I'm not saying we should have three branches of government, a bicameral legislature, yada yada. But I am saying, we should have a system in place whereby we can solve crises ourselves, where we work with the moderators, and the President will have a role in upholding and defending this Constitution. How the President does this will go a long way to whether or not she will be re-elected next year, because such a President would have the chance to put some of their principles to practice. Hence, the President is not just someone who won a contest. The President actually will have responsibilties according to the Constitution we all write together.
But this is all speculation, my own daydreaming from my own question.
I encourage all candidates to challenge one another and ask of themselves these kind of questions, not just go around and around ober Washington politics, but the politics within the U4Prez world. How would you solve the problems U4Prez itself faces, were you to actually be elected President in this little world of ours? I offer up the question I posed for you to consider, and I hope to get some sort of feedback on what I ponied up.
And if you've thought up some questions to ask U4Prez candidates, this is the place to bring them up. Never mind the big boys and their canned responses, you know what they'll say, there's no real surprises there. But you've been at U4Prez for a while, you know it for what it is. If you were in a position to improve it, what would you do? What kind of questions would you pose to those candidates who have won a primary and are in a position to win it all? How would YOU answer these sort of questions?
Feel free to comment plentifully on this one.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Six Secrets to a World-Class Flame-Out
One of my better friends got a hold of me last night just a hair too late, alerting me that The Wiz was losing control. I rushed to U4Prez as soon as I could, and there he was, really ranting about things I'll tell you about later. I wanted to chime in, give him a quick PM to tell him I was here, he needed to calm down before he got himself in real trouble.
I was just too late. When I got there, even though his crown was at the top of the comment listings, his account had been suspended. TheWiz flamed out.
I've talked to him since then, and I thought how his blaze of glory went. And in this moment of reflection, my mind came to rest on my own flame-out last month, my own resignation that was too awesome to deliver quietly. In this thought, I think I can pat myself on the back, because I flamed one of the all-time greatest flame-outs you will ever see on a message board.
TheWiz will read this, and I know GESmith reads this on occasion, and if they had to do it over again, I'm sure they would make sure they didn't just get shoved to the door as if by a half-dozen bouncers at some nightclub. Had they had it to do over again, I guarantee you they would have made sure they got EVERYTHING out that they wanted to say. That's sort of the problem with spontaneous combustion, it's... well, spontaneous. There's no time to rehearse. It happens.
I think that's why my meltdown was so frenzied and dramatic, because I had actually quit the night before. I came back, knowing it was a bad idea to do so, and it didn't take much, just the usual sarcasm from the Hard Right hooligans, to set me off. I had a night to think about what would happen if I returned, hence, to a small degree, I guess my flame-out was planned.
And I think I'm in a position to offer advice for those of you who are frustrated with U4Prez, don't know why you bother showing up anymore, and are looking to quit with a little bit of panache. Why just walk away and no one notice for a few weeks, when you can rip shit and tear ass and let EVERYONE know you're pissed off and can only be happy again if everyone else is even more pissed than you!
Here are six tips, six thoughts to consider as you feel yourself sliding into the fire, and you are dancing the forbidden dance of the flame-out.
FIRST, PICK A TARGET. There's no point in going after someone who doesn't come around but once a week, he's not going to know what you're spazzing about. If you're going to go down, go down swinging at the biggest baddest motherfucker you can find. In my case, Mduminiak was around, even as a monkeyboy he was the highest ranking member of the Hard Right around, I might as well let him have to deal with me. I think this made my flame-out better because my wrath was focused, concentrated on a single individual, and that individual had an outstanding reputation for being a gold-ribbon asshole. I didn't go after the others who were there. If the bomb was strapped to my chest, I was going to give the biggest target at the moment a big kiss as it went off.
SECOND, IGNORE THE SARCASM AT THE PERIPHERY. While I was going after Mike, you had the usual Hard Right thugs chiming in with insults and sarcasm. I think they knew I was leaving and melting down, why not give Olivia one more good kick to the solarplexus as she's getting thrown to the curb? I remember Musicman asking who pissed in my Cheerios that morning. Iron Lady and I think BigDaddy started in with the usual dysentary that runs from their vocal chords, but I don't remember what they said, I really don't. That's because I was focused on my target, and I was letting loose my inner demons for all to have to deal with. Now, had I removed my sights from Mduminiak and went after Musicman, the flame-out would have become discombobulated, out of sync, all over the place. The single stream of ranting would have become two, then three and four and more rivulets, none with the impact that original burst of angst would have if continued uninterrupted. Because I kept going forward with my attack, it was far more effective than had I went after everyone at once.
THIRD, USE EVERYTHING WITHIN REACH TO FUEL YOUR TANTRUM. It wasn't enough that I was screaming and morphing into the lunatic psychobitch some had already painted me into being. I had to do more. I went to my own profile and erased all of it. I went to the Indyleader profile and posted my resignation there for all to see. I started ripping down the Antipartisan Pledge. Everything I had a hand in, everything that had taken five months to build, I was ripping down in a few minutes. And while that was happening, I was still bellowing at my target, maintaining my focus on him. See, you can walk and chew gum at the same time, provided you keep your target eyed up. So long as every step is a forward step, your hands can go complete apeshit and rip down anything on the walls. By doing this, by ripping down your own work, you're ripping your heart out of the place, and this jagged, gaping hole will be left for everyone to patch.
FOURTH, YOU HAVE EVERYONE'S ATTENTION, SAY IT! And Lord knows I did. I called the fix, and I called Eric Gurr out on the charge of favoritism, for all to hear. And while I was being poo-poo'ed by some, I knew there was a jolt of truth in it, and it rang out through many who had confided in me over the months, the belief that this whole thing was bought and sold, that the president had already been picked, and that U4Prez was going down the crapper because Gurr wanted to play with the elite instead of reconcile the bloody voting system! Unfortunately, unless you are one of about five candidates on U4Prez, Eric Gurr really doesn't give a shit about what you think. A flame-out, however, gets his attention real quick, and if the cursing is fluid and rancid, and the ranting gets faster and faster, he will come RUNNING to your needs. And that's a real pity, that Eric really doesn't care about what the vast majority of candidates have to say, and that you have to impale yourself against the wall to get his attention. Had he shown that kind of attention in previous incarnations, perhaps the need to set yourself on fire wouldn't be so harried and consuming. Of course, the reality is he presses a button, and poof, you're gone, your profile is suspended, and hopefully that's the end of it.
FIFTH, IF YOU KNOW YOU'RE GOING DOWN, TAKE SOMEONE WITH YOU IF YOU CAN. Suspending the OliviaLLC profile wasn't enough to get me to go away. I quickly jumped onto the Indyleader profile and continued the rant. That worked for a minute or two, until Eric suspended that one as well. But it gave me a moment to see a few new faces, and it struck me, these poor saps were just starting as candidates, maybe I should save them the heartache and tell them the fix was in, and they'd go find something better to do. I was able to get my RUN FOR YOUR LIVES blast in on three of them before I was cut from that one as well. I tried it again on the Antipartisan Pledge profile, but Eric was catching on and cut me off quickly. I was strongly thinking about using the Women's Society profile, and I may have tried, but by that time I think Eric just cut my IP address altogether. I watched as I continued to fume, watched how smug some acted, how others asked what my problem was, how the argument seemed to continue without me for a few moments. It was strange. But I knew I was about to be cut, and I had enough presence of mind to warn a few newbies, as I was being drug out kicking and screaming, to not even bother, Kempite's the winner, sorry to blow the surprise for everyone, now you can do something more productive with your lives than build a tidy little campaign while the Hard Right hooligans laugh you down.
SIXTH, END THE TIRADE ON YOUR TERMS, NOT THEIRS. I think everyone has left at least one bad job in their lives, thinking to themselves, I know enough to bury this place, all I would have to do is spill my guts, and this place would be down the tubes. I think most of us, if not all, have thought that one time or another, but we never actually do it. Well, I told myself that's exactly what I will do, spill my guts, let it all hang out, tell all the little stories I'd been tucking away all these months, all the sordid details not known in the U4Prez mainstream. All of it true, all of it was on the record, it's just a matter of recording it in a way that others could make sense of it. When I wrote my first article, I truly thought this blog would last a week tops, that I would have no readers, that life would go on. I truly didn't expect Eric Gurr being demoted because of what a disgruntled former candidate had to say, and yet he was, which brought instant credibility to the points I was making as I was flaming. I also didn't expect my meltdown to become perhaps THE seminal event in U4Prez history, because I knew I had enemies before I flamed, but I had no idea how deeply obsessed they were over me. They didn't have Eric Gurr with his finger on the trigger any longer, waiting to shoot me down again should I get uppity and out of line. They no longer had the creator in their hip pockets. I had no idea every video Kempite would make thereafter would have Olivia as a tag. I had no idea Mduminiak would make MORE anti-Olivia videos. I certainly had no idea those two would make me the centerpiece of their talk shows and their history-making 67-minute couchfest. The blog I thought would last a week as the final burst of a nasty flame-out has become a five-week tour-de-force. There is definitely something to be said about leaving on your own terms.
I got Kempite and Mduminiak sending their lackeys over to my blog to write YOU'RE A WHORE and STUPID SLUT where they can. I got Kempite himself calling me a crackwhore on video, probably the stupidest thing a candidate trying to promote himself as one with answers instead of games could do. Now they have their minions coming to me, just like Osama bin Laden sends his stooges to Al-Jazeera with his latest video, begging me to debate them on their shows. Why would I do that? Since my departure, I've said what I wanted to say, without fear of a drop in ratings or suspension for vulgarity, and they've twisted themselves every which-a-way trying to deal with it all. They've put on the most savage attack campaign in U4Prez history, and for all their efforts, there's a petition being circulated for my re-instatement, with I believe more signatures than the U4Decency Petition, a petition co-authored by Kempite, a petition he long ago used as bathroom tissue. Why in the world would I suddenly give them the time of day? Sounds to me like I'm having my way with them.
I am in this position because I had a world-class flame-out last month, and U4prez is still feeling the effects of it.
I am tempted to jump onto one of these talk shows, or even start one of my own. Can you imagine, Kiss & Tell on the radio?
Trust me on this, though, candidates, there are 2500 candidates out there. The U4Prez world does not revolve around these two putzes. I've had invitations to do other shows, and I am strongly considering calling up the Johnny/John show when it gets off the ground, or perhaps take Rosty up on his invitation for the "DynamicDuo" to make an appearance. Who knows? I can tell you this, such an event will be on my own dime, not to give the Gruesome Twosome the sort of audience they've never enjoyed, but to have fun with a friend or two.
I have these options because I had the flame-out to end all flame-outs.
I'm not sure what the future will hold for Wiz. I hope we haven't seen the last of him. I hope he can rest assured, thought, that his moment of spontaneous combustion could certainly have been worse, and while I hope there won't ever be a repeat performance, in case it does so come to pass, I've offered him six points of advice for a bigger and badder flame-out.
And if you're sitting there, frustrated with U4Prez, and you have the gasoline in one hand and the lighter in the other, I encourage you to take my six points to heart. There's no point in lighting yourself on fire unless you intend on maximizing it, sucking every morsel of marrow out of that bone, making the most of your final moments in this world. Why be a fire when you can be a shooting star, streaking and screaming across the sky for all to deal with? I think you've got your work cut out for you if you insist on trying to top my effort, because, frankly speaking, when it comes to losing one's mind for all to watch, I've set the bar pretty high. Don't settle for mediocrity. Burn bright!
I was just too late. When I got there, even though his crown was at the top of the comment listings, his account had been suspended. TheWiz flamed out.
I've talked to him since then, and I thought how his blaze of glory went. And in this moment of reflection, my mind came to rest on my own flame-out last month, my own resignation that was too awesome to deliver quietly. In this thought, I think I can pat myself on the back, because I flamed one of the all-time greatest flame-outs you will ever see on a message board.
TheWiz will read this, and I know GESmith reads this on occasion, and if they had to do it over again, I'm sure they would make sure they didn't just get shoved to the door as if by a half-dozen bouncers at some nightclub. Had they had it to do over again, I guarantee you they would have made sure they got EVERYTHING out that they wanted to say. That's sort of the problem with spontaneous combustion, it's... well, spontaneous. There's no time to rehearse. It happens.
I think that's why my meltdown was so frenzied and dramatic, because I had actually quit the night before. I came back, knowing it was a bad idea to do so, and it didn't take much, just the usual sarcasm from the Hard Right hooligans, to set me off. I had a night to think about what would happen if I returned, hence, to a small degree, I guess my flame-out was planned.
And I think I'm in a position to offer advice for those of you who are frustrated with U4Prez, don't know why you bother showing up anymore, and are looking to quit with a little bit of panache. Why just walk away and no one notice for a few weeks, when you can rip shit and tear ass and let EVERYONE know you're pissed off and can only be happy again if everyone else is even more pissed than you!
Here are six tips, six thoughts to consider as you feel yourself sliding into the fire, and you are dancing the forbidden dance of the flame-out.
FIRST, PICK A TARGET. There's no point in going after someone who doesn't come around but once a week, he's not going to know what you're spazzing about. If you're going to go down, go down swinging at the biggest baddest motherfucker you can find. In my case, Mduminiak was around, even as a monkeyboy he was the highest ranking member of the Hard Right around, I might as well let him have to deal with me. I think this made my flame-out better because my wrath was focused, concentrated on a single individual, and that individual had an outstanding reputation for being a gold-ribbon asshole. I didn't go after the others who were there. If the bomb was strapped to my chest, I was going to give the biggest target at the moment a big kiss as it went off.
SECOND, IGNORE THE SARCASM AT THE PERIPHERY. While I was going after Mike, you had the usual Hard Right thugs chiming in with insults and sarcasm. I think they knew I was leaving and melting down, why not give Olivia one more good kick to the solarplexus as she's getting thrown to the curb? I remember Musicman asking who pissed in my Cheerios that morning. Iron Lady and I think BigDaddy started in with the usual dysentary that runs from their vocal chords, but I don't remember what they said, I really don't. That's because I was focused on my target, and I was letting loose my inner demons for all to have to deal with. Now, had I removed my sights from Mduminiak and went after Musicman, the flame-out would have become discombobulated, out of sync, all over the place. The single stream of ranting would have become two, then three and four and more rivulets, none with the impact that original burst of angst would have if continued uninterrupted. Because I kept going forward with my attack, it was far more effective than had I went after everyone at once.
THIRD, USE EVERYTHING WITHIN REACH TO FUEL YOUR TANTRUM. It wasn't enough that I was screaming and morphing into the lunatic psychobitch some had already painted me into being. I had to do more. I went to my own profile and erased all of it. I went to the Indyleader profile and posted my resignation there for all to see. I started ripping down the Antipartisan Pledge. Everything I had a hand in, everything that had taken five months to build, I was ripping down in a few minutes. And while that was happening, I was still bellowing at my target, maintaining my focus on him. See, you can walk and chew gum at the same time, provided you keep your target eyed up. So long as every step is a forward step, your hands can go complete apeshit and rip down anything on the walls. By doing this, by ripping down your own work, you're ripping your heart out of the place, and this jagged, gaping hole will be left for everyone to patch.
FOURTH, YOU HAVE EVERYONE'S ATTENTION, SAY IT! And Lord knows I did. I called the fix, and I called Eric Gurr out on the charge of favoritism, for all to hear. And while I was being poo-poo'ed by some, I knew there was a jolt of truth in it, and it rang out through many who had confided in me over the months, the belief that this whole thing was bought and sold, that the president had already been picked, and that U4Prez was going down the crapper because Gurr wanted to play with the elite instead of reconcile the bloody voting system! Unfortunately, unless you are one of about five candidates on U4Prez, Eric Gurr really doesn't give a shit about what you think. A flame-out, however, gets his attention real quick, and if the cursing is fluid and rancid, and the ranting gets faster and faster, he will come RUNNING to your needs. And that's a real pity, that Eric really doesn't care about what the vast majority of candidates have to say, and that you have to impale yourself against the wall to get his attention. Had he shown that kind of attention in previous incarnations, perhaps the need to set yourself on fire wouldn't be so harried and consuming. Of course, the reality is he presses a button, and poof, you're gone, your profile is suspended, and hopefully that's the end of it.
FIFTH, IF YOU KNOW YOU'RE GOING DOWN, TAKE SOMEONE WITH YOU IF YOU CAN. Suspending the OliviaLLC profile wasn't enough to get me to go away. I quickly jumped onto the Indyleader profile and continued the rant. That worked for a minute or two, until Eric suspended that one as well. But it gave me a moment to see a few new faces, and it struck me, these poor saps were just starting as candidates, maybe I should save them the heartache and tell them the fix was in, and they'd go find something better to do. I was able to get my RUN FOR YOUR LIVES blast in on three of them before I was cut from that one as well. I tried it again on the Antipartisan Pledge profile, but Eric was catching on and cut me off quickly. I was strongly thinking about using the Women's Society profile, and I may have tried, but by that time I think Eric just cut my IP address altogether. I watched as I continued to fume, watched how smug some acted, how others asked what my problem was, how the argument seemed to continue without me for a few moments. It was strange. But I knew I was about to be cut, and I had enough presence of mind to warn a few newbies, as I was being drug out kicking and screaming, to not even bother, Kempite's the winner, sorry to blow the surprise for everyone, now you can do something more productive with your lives than build a tidy little campaign while the Hard Right hooligans laugh you down.
SIXTH, END THE TIRADE ON YOUR TERMS, NOT THEIRS. I think everyone has left at least one bad job in their lives, thinking to themselves, I know enough to bury this place, all I would have to do is spill my guts, and this place would be down the tubes. I think most of us, if not all, have thought that one time or another, but we never actually do it. Well, I told myself that's exactly what I will do, spill my guts, let it all hang out, tell all the little stories I'd been tucking away all these months, all the sordid details not known in the U4Prez mainstream. All of it true, all of it was on the record, it's just a matter of recording it in a way that others could make sense of it. When I wrote my first article, I truly thought this blog would last a week tops, that I would have no readers, that life would go on. I truly didn't expect Eric Gurr being demoted because of what a disgruntled former candidate had to say, and yet he was, which brought instant credibility to the points I was making as I was flaming. I also didn't expect my meltdown to become perhaps THE seminal event in U4Prez history, because I knew I had enemies before I flamed, but I had no idea how deeply obsessed they were over me. They didn't have Eric Gurr with his finger on the trigger any longer, waiting to shoot me down again should I get uppity and out of line. They no longer had the creator in their hip pockets. I had no idea every video Kempite would make thereafter would have Olivia as a tag. I had no idea Mduminiak would make MORE anti-Olivia videos. I certainly had no idea those two would make me the centerpiece of their talk shows and their history-making 67-minute couchfest. The blog I thought would last a week as the final burst of a nasty flame-out has become a five-week tour-de-force. There is definitely something to be said about leaving on your own terms.
I got Kempite and Mduminiak sending their lackeys over to my blog to write YOU'RE A WHORE and STUPID SLUT where they can. I got Kempite himself calling me a crackwhore on video, probably the stupidest thing a candidate trying to promote himself as one with answers instead of games could do. Now they have their minions coming to me, just like Osama bin Laden sends his stooges to Al-Jazeera with his latest video, begging me to debate them on their shows. Why would I do that? Since my departure, I've said what I wanted to say, without fear of a drop in ratings or suspension for vulgarity, and they've twisted themselves every which-a-way trying to deal with it all. They've put on the most savage attack campaign in U4Prez history, and for all their efforts, there's a petition being circulated for my re-instatement, with I believe more signatures than the U4Decency Petition, a petition co-authored by Kempite, a petition he long ago used as bathroom tissue. Why in the world would I suddenly give them the time of day? Sounds to me like I'm having my way with them.
I am in this position because I had a world-class flame-out last month, and U4prez is still feeling the effects of it.
I am tempted to jump onto one of these talk shows, or even start one of my own. Can you imagine, Kiss & Tell on the radio?
Trust me on this, though, candidates, there are 2500 candidates out there. The U4Prez world does not revolve around these two putzes. I've had invitations to do other shows, and I am strongly considering calling up the Johnny/John show when it gets off the ground, or perhaps take Rosty up on his invitation for the "DynamicDuo" to make an appearance. Who knows? I can tell you this, such an event will be on my own dime, not to give the Gruesome Twosome the sort of audience they've never enjoyed, but to have fun with a friend or two.
I have these options because I had the flame-out to end all flame-outs.
I'm not sure what the future will hold for Wiz. I hope we haven't seen the last of him. I hope he can rest assured, thought, that his moment of spontaneous combustion could certainly have been worse, and while I hope there won't ever be a repeat performance, in case it does so come to pass, I've offered him six points of advice for a bigger and badder flame-out.
And if you're sitting there, frustrated with U4Prez, and you have the gasoline in one hand and the lighter in the other, I encourage you to take my six points to heart. There's no point in lighting yourself on fire unless you intend on maximizing it, sucking every morsel of marrow out of that bone, making the most of your final moments in this world. Why be a fire when you can be a shooting star, streaking and screaming across the sky for all to deal with? I think you've got your work cut out for you if you insist on trying to top my effort, because, frankly speaking, when it comes to losing one's mind for all to watch, I've set the bar pretty high. Don't settle for mediocrity. Burn bright!
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Olivia of Arc
My thanks to TheWiz
