"help bot" <nomorechess@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:1180161445.294656.145420@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> On May 25, 10:55 pm, Rob <robmt...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>> > These attacks on Sloan's personal life are lame, however, and if
>> > everyone
>> > wants to get personal, he wouldn't fare so poorly by comparison to
>> > many.
>> > This is not an endorsement of what he does, but more a recognitition
of
>> > its
>> > irrelevance.
>>
>> Character counts. It is a direct reflection of a persons soul. It is
>> from this soul that our directions of right and wrong are derived. We
>> color and mold our children by presenting them with role models in
>> ourselves. They reflect this back and thus our character shapes and
>> molds theirs.
>
> This is precisely why I never do silly things like
> going to some other newsgroup and make some
> dishonest claim about my rating or claim to a
> chess title. It's not merely a question of getting
> caught; it's like you said: "character counts".
I resemble that remark!
To add fuel to the flames, I just scored my first correspondance GM norm!
> Even if I believed for some reason that nobody
> would ever be the wiser, I myself would know that I
> had lied, and that is sufficient deterrent. For some
> people apparently, winning an argument is an
> op****tunity to make up lies or to distort facts to suit
> the whim of the hour, but a man of character does
> not easily bow to such whims, but instead, stands
> on principle, believing his moral character to be of
> greater im****t than "winning".
Fair points - but to be more concrete, if what is actually permitted
speech
under the constitution would proscribe you from getting on the school
board,
or passing a High School background test as an after-school chess teacher
-
then is this not a problem?
<...>
> However, the issue here was the USCF policy board
> and its members. Is Sam Sloan really any worse or
> any better than other members of the board?
I think Larry Parr has made very fair points about unfair attacks on Sloan
-
some of which are vicious, cowardly, and distorting. Even so, even if
Sloan
is no insider, and resents the clubby good-old-boy mutual back-scratching
culture which has not obviously done anyone elese any good, and even if he
resents people milking the organisation for a little bit of money or
inflence - is this quite enough to recommend him?
It seems to me that Sam Sloan is neither better nor worse, but differently
corrupt.
His own gyrations to avoid his own percieved faults are infamous evasions
to
the extent that he now plays the victim of it all, while continuing to
raise
17 problems a week which are always combined with blaming.
You don't need to be a grey-beard from Vienna to figure this out ;)
> Is it not
> the case that each new round of personal attacks we
> see here is the direct result of jealousy, envy, or a
> recent vote not going the way someone wished?
Switching to a white-haired guy from Long Island, Einstein said that you
can't resolve a problem at the level it was created, so merely being a
contra-personality is not to resolve the issue - which is indeed that of
personality politics, rather than anything more elevated, like issues to
do
with public standards and welfare for everyone in chess.
Sam Sloan is equally evasive about his own record as the good ol' boys.
> IMO, the primary critics -- if that is quite the word --
> of the board here are those who are willing to attack or
> sup****t particular members on a whim. If say, LP
> wants a vote to go against drug testing but it goes the
> other way, he will invariably attack all those who didn't
> do precisely what he wanted, regardless. And by the
> same token, he will lend his precarious "sup****t" to
> anyone who causes trouble for the gang of four, or
> whatever he decides -- again, on a whim -- to call the
> folks who caused things not to go his way.
The way any issue is determined by adults in society is by advocacy. And
as
in a court, it does not pretend to be a blance of all factors, impartially
considered. It is usually a redress to some excess, or an absent factor,
and
necessarily must contend with advocates for other courses of action.
Now, the difference is whether an advocate contends for the issue at hand,
or the personality of other advocates alone. To some degree personality
must
be taken in to account, since it -we all agree- can be a distorting
factor.
But the balance of fair comment must be on the basis of the issue.
> It's really quite comical, viewed from the outside;
> from a position of neutrality where the result hardly
> matters one way or another. I'm no longer a USCF
> member and I no longer read their magazine, so
> when I read here that they are squandering many
> thousands of dollars, I tend to -- calmly -- question
> the validity of the attack. Clearly, their revenues will
> be spent on something, so is it really "squander", or
> is it just being spent in a way that does not benefit
> the jealous complainer?
To be concrete once more - complaints are not necessarily jealous ones.
And
USCF exists to serve its mission, and that I suggest is the right basis
for
critical remarks - and there must be criticism, otherwise how is anyone to
say whether they serve it at all? Or to what degree and expense they go
about doing so, with other people's money? I think this has a direct
relation****p with USCF's income, from member****p and from sponsors.
> Many of the attacks on scholastic spending are
> of course, curmudgeonly old men. Or should I say
> cranky old men? Whatever. The point is, there's a
> lot of dough not coming their way. But unless they
> have a clearly better way to spend the money (or
> perhaps, to not spend it), it comes across as petty
> jealousy.
And yet if you try to raise the topic with USCF delegates eg, then they do
not refer to how well money is spent from the perspective of the recipient
of the service the money funds - they spend 5,000 words completely
ignoring
the putative benefit for chess players, and talking only of the benefit to
institutions, and their need to control management of affairs.
This is worth stressing, since I merely repeat what is as true in USA as
it
is in Russian Chess Federation, where chess burocrats have discussions
with
each other, mostly of their own fortunes, and without any semblance of
'representing' actual chess players at all.
What you get is a sort of chess-communism, and empowered commissars to
tell
people, and get 'em in line. Communism is not everyone's idea of how
things
are best run, and besides, it doesn't care what you think.
> I recall an incident back when they were making a
> movie about the Masters of Disaster, a team of
> elementary school children. Nearly all the strong
> local players were brought in to help out with the
> coaching, as funding was not an issue. When a
> player which I'll refer to as MDW showed up for
> the very first time, he had no clue what the other
> coaches were being paid -- dollars or donuts. So
> the head honcho asks him point-blank how much
> he wants, and he says, firmly: "more than what
> THEY'RE getting". The point was, he thought
> himself to be the strongest player there, so even if
> the rest were getting chump change, all that
> mattered was that his ego be stroked and that he
> make "something" for his time. LOL
Poor fella! Maybe someone should have told him the truth, that you get 5
bob
and a bag of donuts, just like everyone else. Then the person need not be
viewed as an egomaniac by asking for wages for work?
Phil Innes
> -- help bot
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