Category Archives: AMS Elections

Vigilance!

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Catty Unattributed Overheard of the Day:

OMG, I can’t believe Foxtrot broke news.

That said, it’s absolutely true—Foxtrot was the first to let their admiring public know that Pak Ho Leung, relatively unknown Presidential candidate, has been caught prematurely campaigning on Facebook.

What hurts most, of course, is not that they hunted him down first—it’s the bad erection joke they’ve made in their title.  DAMN, SON.  That’s unicorn-level good/bad.  And for that, we’re giving you our Man of the Hour award, Foxtrot Writers.  Well done, sirs—and madam.

<3 <3 <3

Umbrella, anyone?

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smaller than this one, though.

Elections shitstorm’s a-brewin’, kids.

Apparently the folks at the Ubyssey took it upon themselves to ask a few key politicos (*cough*El Bahmadian*cough*) a few key questions during last week’s All Candidates Meeting—standard reporting procedure, one might think.

Except certain elections officials are interpreting this as possible campaigning—strictly verboten until the 18th—and have, hence, forbidden publication of the question and its answer.

Gosh, I wonder if newspaper folk (who are already on edge after months of Blake-Frederick-enacted poor communications) would take offense at that kind of ultimatum?

The totally tragic part is that Newspaper News (Sam Jung) + Elections (Isabel Ferreras) are, like, super-close.  Way close.  Close in ways we can’t even tell you (but which aren’t what you’re thinking now, perv-o.)

"Hand check" close. (Gerald Deo photo)

I’m trying to think of a reality TV parallel to this, but all I’ve got is, like, Kim & that crazy girl on some old season of ANTM.  Thoughts?

Aaaand they’re off.

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Day one after the announcement of candidates, and rumor has it

(and by ‘rumor’ I mean verifiable evidence plus the natural supposition that of course elections officials are in Panic Epic Work Mode at the moment)

that Chief Elections Officer & CEO of Our Hearts Isabel Ferreras has spent her morning off and on the phone to her staff.  Certainly we’ve already seen three—three!—BoG candidates drop out.  Goodbye, Peter Stein, AJ Hajir Hajian, and Nader Beyzaei—we hardly knew ye.

We’ve got the complete list for you after the break, but first, let’s take a little walk down quelle scandale potentiale lane, y’all.

The buzz at beer last night and brunch this morning was triplefold—quadruple if you count the cheap Gallery pitchers—but it boils down to this:

  1. Blake Frederick.  It’s been too easy lately to forget that our BF came into office as something of a golden boy, hailed by supporters and detractors alike both for his passionate commitment and political credentials.

    Happier times.  (Photo: Gerald Deo)

    And despite—or perhaps because of—the shitshow that’s marked his end of term, Frederick hasn’t given up the political life.  He’s thrown his hat into, in fact, three races—not only the usual Senate/BoG pairing, but also the Ubyssey’s Board of Directors.  This last is interesting considering that Frederick & our beloved campus publication are not what you’d call the best of friends.  There have been scathing editorials all round and a rather sudden crackdown on AMS communications policy getting in the way of good relations.  With all that history, one wonders what the Ubyssey Board could look like at this time next year—assuming, of course, that Frederick doesn’t disqualify himself by winning another race.

  2. The positions of interest. Although it’s not unusual to see BoG, Senate, and VP External attract a few more competitors than other positions, this year’s International Student Rep hopefuls are almost frighteningly numerous.  You guys know this position is non-voting, right?  (And Star, you know you submitted all materials without a last name, right? you do know? and it’s a thing? oh. cool.)  It’s also heartening to see two relative unknowns rounding out the Presidential nominees, although it makes hunting for pictures a heckuva lot harder.  Don’t even ask me about typing the tags up for this post.  RIDICULOUS.

    YOU SEE HOW I SUFFER FOR YOU

  3. The Elections Committee’s (presumed) accountability screed. One of the new features this year will be a PENALTY BOX on the Elections official website.  Isabel Ferreras is a formidable woman, as seen here:

    cower, puny candidates!! leg-biting will be penalized!

    and we have no doubt that she won’t hesitate to use this box, which purpose is to daily—publicly!—keep the voting public very aware of any and all “warnings, violations, infractions and penalties.” It’s a move we here at Fuzzy Kitten Unicorn Scandal are looking forward to a little too much, frankly.

BUT WHO ELSE is out there? here are the people we’ll be stalking bothering in the name of Fair Game Media Coverage for the next month:

Continue reading →

ACM: Beers before Recaps

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All Candidates Meeting! what exciting times.  Isabel (Ferreras, Chief Elections Officer) ran things with incredible speed and efficiency, so even heavily venerated hacks are having trouble compiling complete lists.  Will Davis, Swarthy VFM Dude, tells us there’ll be an official list out soon, so, uh… this particular tipsy reporter will wait for that.

(What? It’s Friday. I HAVE NEEDS.)

In the meantime, have some fun quotes from our delicious delicious elections comm:

Ricardo (CRO): I don’t want you guys to have my phone number.  Most of you guys are creeps.

Isabel: Jell-O wrestling, I don’t know a lot about, but maybe Ricardo can fill you in.  …  It’s not obligatory.

Oh, yes.  There will be Jell-O.  And, in the near future, an explanation for this:

Oh, hey, that looks like a fun time.

Naylor Smash MORE! & other potential funtimes

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UBC Insiders, with their commitment to Issues That Matter, beat us to the punch, but in case you like your news with unicorns, here are the six questions (a.k.a possible future referenda) being circulated for votes:

  1. Remove Blake from office
  2. Remove Tim from office
  3. A $5 “engagement levy”—also known as a fee to be paid by non-voters
  4. The (exciting!!!) return of slates
  5. Indexing AMS fees to the CPI (Consumer Price Index) so they rise with inflation
  6. Amending bylaws so that future execs can be removed from office legally PLUS bonus voting seats for VST, Regent and St. Mark’s

The democratic process round these parts being what it is, we’d like to remind you potential newly-interested voters that you can sign one single petition for some, all, or none of these questions.  In other words, it’s hell of easy to exercise your god- and AMS-fees-given voting rights. And heck, even if you’re not sure how you feel, signing only contributes toward making these referenda—meaning the student body as a whole will have to vote on them again.

The thoughtful Kyle Warwick was taking a clipboard door-to-door today in the SUB, and there’s a permanent station over in MASS if you’re near Buchanan tomorrow and feel like gettin’ political. And sexy. Because politics, if you were unaware, is FUN and SEXXXY

And finally, to fulfill our daily quota, here’s a unicorn within a unicorn:

Naylor Potentially Smash

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Fuck the other referenda.  Glorious Impeachment cannot be stopped!

Yesterday, the (really, really) ridiculously good looking Taylor Matt Naylor was passing around a petition for impeachment. How is this possible, you ask? You mean we might not be stuck with have Mr. Blake Frederick and his sidekick Timkachu representing us due to a legal blip? Yes, my friends. This is a possibility.

How smash? In order to remove Blim, a referendum would occur in which YOU, the student body, would decide whether we should have an interim President/VP External until the new one steps in. For this referendum to happen, 1000 signatures are needed.  Considering our regular voter turnout, collecting that many signatures in two days could potentially be called some form of “mandate,” possibly “from the people.”

If we can’t remove them democratically, we’ll have to remove them democratically.
-Hillson Tse, opinionated badass, Facebook group “Impeach the AMS President and VP External“

Confused yet?

  1. Elections for the new term of President are happening very soon. That’s what we’re here for. The nomination deadline is January 8, and there will be an All Candidates Meeting after in which we will find out who is running.
  2. This new term would officially begin after the Olympics extended reading week in February. However, there is a transition period which happens earlier for the incoming Executive to learn the ropes and how to be victorious/not an epic fail in the next year.
  3. Currently we have a President and a VP External who council tried to “impeach” but due to swanky legal terms within the Society Act, just had to censure.  This was a giant headache that made no one happy except, possibly, people who want us all just to get along.
  4. If this request for referendum gets 1000 signatures, it goes to Council tomorrow night.
  5. In a flurry of legal speak, Council will vote on two issues: a) to approve funding for Yes & No committees on the issue, and b) whether they wish to sponsor the Yes or No side.  Exciting stuff, considering the general Council attitude towards Blim before the break.  Have they cooled down, or will these lovely hands be forced to construct some form of monstrous Council-headed Rage Hulk?  (this is not necessarily a bad thing)
  6. You get to vote YES or NO for keeping Blim.
  7. If the referendum fails, Blim stay on through the Olympics and transition period
  8. If the referendum passes, an interim President/VP External will be appointed until the new term of the new Executive.
  9. There will still be an election Jan 25-29 in which we will have a new Executive, including yet (potentially) another new President and VP External.

Hopefully that makes a bit more sense.

You can sign the request for a referendum in the AUS offices (BUCH D140) all day today. They need 1000 signatures by WEDS for the impeachment to go forward! The organizers also need volunteers to help sort the signatures for the upcoming Council meeting. If you have any questions or would like to volunteer, feel free to contact Matt Naylor (naylorm@interchange.ubc.ca)

Rehashing Old News

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To combat the brain drain that occurs over winter break, here’s a quick recap of what’s affecting elections this term: namely, the United Nations Tuition Debacle.

The United Nations visited the Knoll

I’m sorry,  let me repeat that: the UN DEBACLE!!!!

Quick summary: is tuition a human rights issue worthy of the UN?  Blake & Tim and their legal counsel think so, and they’re willing to secretly spend $$$ on it.  Oh, it was all just a media stunt? The campus is safe from  Too late—we’re still on Failblog.  (The Ubyssey has a whole UN category if you’re a total keener.)

—so anyway, the wake of the biggest thing to happen to AMS politics since Slategate ’09 saw student leadership divided into two factions: Blake & Tim supporters, who believe Council are a bunch of groupthinking overreactors and that involving students in the tuition discussion is worth breaking a few rules, VERSUS Blake & Tim detractors (i.e. most of Council), who are generally displeased with the maverick turn Blim have taken.  Also, they’re not too happy about said broken rules, especially the ones where they demand to be consulted about large expenses. Not to mention Blim had a secret rendezvous with an expensive lawyer and didn’t invite Council along.

In an emergency meeting in which Blim did not appear (those NDP conventions throw serious parties), AMS Council unanimously passed a motion to retract the complaint to the UN against the BC and Canadian governments in regard to Article 13(c) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Basically, they showed them who’s boss.

I’m suddenly confused at this methodology that everything has to go through committee.
-President Blake

Thus, when we last left our esteemed student leaders, everybody was all het up.  In lieu of legal advice which said that removal from office was not an option*, Team Blim had been censured (note existence of previous attempts to do so) and, in addition:

  • asked to keep exhaustive records of their activities (aka hourly reports)—Blake, that bastion of transparency, puts his on Twitter.
  • effectively stripped of their decision-making abilities

And, of course, Geoff Costeloe, outspoken Blim detractor & vanity URL holder, had become one of the most polarizing men on campus (see also: Matt Naylor), judging by pure undiluted blogosphere commentary.

So what’s to be expected from this round of elections?  Without knowing who’ll run, we can predict platforms in the following non-exclusive categories:

  1. People who claim to represent some form of “new politics,” or “fresh thinking,” be that more or less radical
  2. People who are 100% committed to lowering tuition (but…)
  3. People who aren’t here to discuss Blake & Tim, goddamnit
  4. People who are not, in fact people. See: Kommander Keg

Either way, it’s going to be an exciting month plus, folks.

* Unless, of course, there was a referendum.