On Mon, Jan 05, 2009 at 02:07:08PM +0100, Raphael Hertzog wrote: > Can we stop this absurd discussion/reasoning? I don't believe it is absurd. But reading some of the private replies I've already got to my other mail, it seems my motivation for this discussion has not been obvious. To me, this discussion is not (and has not been for several weeks) about who was right and who was wrong about the recent events. In the main, I have been trying to understand the position of the people whose understanding of the Constitution obviously differs from mine in a significant way, and to find the extent of our disagreement. That requires, among other things, poking around in the other person's arguments and try to see whether the flaws I perceive in them are actual flaws in the argument or in my understanding of the argument. (I do also sometimes strongly express that I disagree on some point, mainly as a response to an assertion which, if left uncontested, might be seen as a consensus position.) The big goal, for me at least, and hopefully for the other participants, is an eventual agreement on what the constitution says, or alternatively, a broadly accepted amendment of the constitution that clarifies unclear matters and settles the major disputes. Now is not the time to start the formal process for amending the consitution, but we may as well explore the issues while we concentrate on other matters. It may be that -vote is not the correct list for this discussion. If so, we may as well move it to another list. Moving it to private mail, as some people have suggested to me, would be counterproductive, as private discussion leaves no public record and it is also not open for non-participants to become participants. > There's a context behind all this and discussing things while ignoring the > context is useless. I do not ignore the context, but at the same time, I see no point in addressing it in every mail, where the context is not the point of the message. > Your lawerish-like interpretation of everything that happens in Debian (I assume that was a typo for "lawyerish".) For the record, I am offended by this description (not so much the reference to lawyering, though I'm sure you intended it as an insult, but that you seem to think I interpret the bug reports I receive in a lawyer-like fashion). > BTW, the context is 4.1.5 in our constitution: "Issue, supersede and > withdraw nontechnical policy documents and statements." > > So by default, we issue "policy documents" and "statements" (or position > statements). The special case is the modification of the foundation > document, and to meet that case, you have to be explicit about it. I see nothing in the Constitution that says that point 5 in section 4.1 is the default if another point is not explicitly invoked. But perhaps pointing this out would be more of my "lawerish-like [sic] interpretation of everything that happens in Debian". To explain my point further: To determine which point is being invoked requires assessing the matter as a whole. It is simplest when the GR proposal actually says which point it intends to invoke, but even then the proposal may have it wrong. It is quite possible that the proposal's declaration of its purpose is inconsistent with what it actually does - in that case, it would be ridiculous to insist that the declared purpose trumps the facts of the matter. When the proposal does not say which power of the developers by way of general resolution is being invoked, the matter may be a bit more difficult. In any case, one must *think* about it, and determine what the actual effects of the proposal are (and not what it says its effects are - remember the "editorial changes"). Now, it is quite possible for reasonable people to come to different conclusions of fact and interpret the Constitution differently. In the case of such a situation, we need some oracle, one that everyone respects, that pronounces the Official Truth and the Official Interpretation. The current Constitution says that this Oracle is the Secretary, but since it is obvious the position of Secretary is no longer generally trusted with that power, we come back to the issue at hand - and to the initial paragraphs of this email. -- Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho, Jyväskylä, Finland http://antti-juhani.kaijanaho.fi/newblog/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/antti-juhani/
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