Re: AIS:Judging (Political?)
- Subject: Re: AIS:Judging (Political?)
- From: a*@toad.net
- Date: Fri, 29 Mar 2002 19:44:55 -0500
> > From my perspective I can't say that I know or experience
> > "politics" or "insider control" regarding the AIS awards system
I suspect that there are close to 535 members of Congress who would make
similar statements about their own dealings.
Politics: political affairs or business; specifically: competition
between competing interest groups (TB, median, Siberian) or individuals
(hybridizers) for power (awards) and leadership in a government or other
group (AIS).
It may be because I have had too many years in elected office, but I'm
sensitive to the "politics" of any issue. As I see it, the AIS awards
system, by it's very existence, is political. A few examples:
At one judge's training session, the instructor ended the session by
passing out his own recent introductions. He pointed out that all of
them were on the ballot. At another session, the instructor ended the
session by passing out rhizomes of the class, but none of them were her
own and most were older introductions.
A photograph of a runner-up for an AIS Section Award was printed in a
prominent location in the Section publication. It was still eligible for
the Section Award. The next year, it won that award.
At a 3 hour judge's training session on TB's, the instructor spent over
two hours talking about the politics of judging, but he didn't use the
"p" word. The whole time he talked about how people try to influence
votes and it was to be discouraged. When he got around to the subject of
judging the class, he referred mostly to his own introductions.
In this forum, there have been candid discussions of potential award
winners. I recall discussions of a Siberian for the Dykes, a Japanese
for the Dykes (I'm not holding my breath on that one) - and most
recently "an end of the drought for Keppel".
If you even consider that there is the remote possibility that any Enron
official was involved in the politics of development of United States
energy policy in this administration AND you read the posts in this
forum, I don't see how you could deny the reality of such influence (or
attempts at it), whether it be positive or negative.
When I was in graduate school, I took a course on corporate
responsibility. The professor presented a model of typical media
response to accusations of impropriety. I no longer have those notes to
refer to, but the model left a lasting impression. It goes something
like this:
Step one: Deny that anything happened.
If that doesn't work:
Step two: Deny any connection with what happened.
If that doesn't work:
Step three: Blame someone else for what happened.
If that doesn't work, do what you should have been Step one:
Accept responsibility and try to turn it into a positive event.
End of rant.
R. Dennis Hager
on Delmarva
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