Capt. Spurlin arrived in IRC later that evening to the cheer of the majority of the 20 people present. When asked what he was planning to do now that he had been elected he replied "I'm going to Disney Land!" Mr. Spurlin imediately held a press confrence, against his better judgement but considering that all five major media organizations were present he had little choice. Spurlin steadfastly refused to make any official statements regarding his future cabinet, although his VP-to-be Colin Wyers was willing to divulge the information listed in the top story above under threat of serving on a ship with Izzy Harris. Spurlin did state that his name of "Bob" was in fact related to the failed product from Microsoft, and that he has been receiving royalties from Bill Gates for the last five years.
 

  Mike, 24, is studying biochemistry at Cal State Fullerton University, "in a vain effort to get [his] Masters of Science degree." He is also working as a Teaching Assistant, working on a research program, and toying with computer programming such as the WeBB. He plans to go into Biotech drug/protien modeling or biotech law, depending on where the money is. He is currently in a steady 3 year relationship with one "Marni," who has probably heard enough horror stories from Mike to avoid STF like the plague.
 

Mark Longanbach, 55, of Xanthan IV, was named the winner of STF's Winter '99 election in a landslide of 100-50-50. Election Coordinator and AFComm-6 Seamus "O'Seamus" Hughes was quoted as saying, "BAH!" His lawyers later stated that Hughes was under extreme duress from counting votes and meant to congratulate Longanbach. Just what Hughes was counting is being investigated.

Reaction from the losers was mixed. Said Greg "Mega" Hertzsch, "[blank] [blank] Communists everywhere! [blank], [blank]!" Alan "Nyet" Felts was even less inviting, saying, "I hope Greg Hertzsch rots in . . . what? Mark Longanbach? Oh, boy, is my face red."

Bob "That dog has a puffy tail!" Spurlin was the least nice of all of the losers. "I'll get you, my little pretty!" he was quoted as saying to noted reporter G. Gordon MIDI. He later added, "and your little Gunty, too!" Colin "All of my friends are shrubbery" Wyers, Spurlin's running mate, made a cryptic comment: "This won't hinder my takeover plans in the least." Scholars and motorists from around Sector 3035-A are deciphering exactly what he meant be "least."

In any event, Longanbach has achieved the mutligalatic dream of becoming the President of STF, and with Bill Gunty at his side, he will no doubt do great things for us in the next eight months. This win comes at a time when Longanbach was far, far behind his competitors; many didn't think he would win. Like Truman, though, he has risen through the muck to become STF President Mark Longanbach.

STFers recently elected Bob Spurlin to the office of STF Commander-in-Cheese. Unfortunately, however, Mr. Spurlin was not the best candidate for the job. Neither, for that matter, was Greg Hertzsch or Mark Longanbach. All three share a fundamental character flaw: They have lives.

Let us examine the role of the President. The President has two primary functions. On the one hand he is there to oversee and regulate the day-to-day operation of STF, usually by relying on his cabinet to make a suggestion which he then approves, because 90% of the time the FComm will know more about the Fleet or the Department Director about his Department than the Prez will. His other major function is to swiftly and fairly deal with crises as they arise. In this case the Prez needs to be quickly available, because as the IRC Crisis demonstrated things can get out of control fast.

In the first case, we need a Prez who will listen to hopefully-intelligent Cabinet members and take the advice of the people he entrusted with the job. In the second, we need a Prez who can always be available to make decisions without regards to personal preferences.

Easily half of the STFers today could find cabinet members they trust to do their jobs with little intervention and then rubber stamp them. While the Prez does need to oversee the cabinet, day-to-day operations are done by the cabinet, not by the President. A crisis-covering Prez, on the other hand, must be present personally. If he isn't, things get out of hand fast. But none of the candidates in the last election can do that. They all have other things pressing on their time.

STF needs a President who can be online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Such a person, sadly, does not exist. STF's explosive growth has ended the era when a normal human being could be President. There are two options. One, we can find a computer-savvy, 67 year old retired man with no wife and no kids to be President. He would have more time to spend online than anyone else, but he would still not be perfect.

Option two should be obvious. The WeBB itself is the President. Only a computer can be online 24/7. We need the bot back. Mike Bourdaa's second son, St-fleet Bot, is the future of the leadership of STF. Only the bot can be present the moment the next crisis arises, and believe you me it will arise. Only the bot can be emotionless when deciding who is in the right, if anyone. Only the bot can honestly say that personal friendship did not play a part in its decision.

So I state here and now that in the October elections later this year, I am supporting St-fleet / Bourdaa for Bot and Vice-Bot of STF.

AOTW fugitive from responsible journalism Seamus Hughes apparently got a bit too itchy without a pulpit from which to repeat forwarded jokes and lampoon recent OOC events at point-blank range. Thus was born, or more precisely, thus was reincarnated, the Plumber's Union Network (or PUN for short), net-posted to the star-fleet.com members directory on 5 February. Mr. Hughes borrowed [read: stole] the PUN name from FComm-1 Dennis Hannigan, the handiest handyman on Prodigy, yet decided (for reasons known only to him, although we suspect incompetence) to change the middle word from "union" to "united." Showcasing a color scheme borrowed from the New York Mets, PUN #1 actually attempts to report real news, but often falls back on the old AOTW "Headlines" section trick of making a not-really-that-funny joke about an OOC event. Also included are the very funny "If Dr. Seuss Wrote for Star Trek" and some other non-STF jokes, altough all of these appear to have been copied from websites or email forwards. Perhaps the only redeeming facet of Hughes' PUN #1 is its interview with Fmr. Adm. Jim Midyette, one of the club's founding fathers and our longest-serving President. This is the same interview that appeared in the short-lived AOTW #7.

Hot on the heels of PUN came The Tangled WeBB We Weave (TW3 Issue #1 was published on 10 February 1999), a new journal by ex-AOTW writer Jim Armstrong. The first edition hurt its readers' eyes, with fluorescent green text on a wavy blue background. When one could make out the words, though, it seemed to be alternately factual and comedic, with the whole thing delivered in Mr. Armstrong's terse news style. Issue #2, uploaded to Tripod.com on 26 February, offered a much more sedate color scheme and short, Aye-esque interviews with the Presidential candidates. It also treated the promotion of Adm. Mike Ballway [although expressing fear at that event is not the way to get on the good side of SNN --Ed.] and gave a retrospective on the Mike Bourdaa Presidency. On the most part, the news in TW3 is short but to the point, and some of the jokes are even funny. In fact, we might be willing to give the ol' SNN Stamp-O-Approval to this budding newsletter if not for the fact that it boasts of being the only Canadian-run newspaper in STF. Ha-ha, just kidding, all you Torontonians and Albertians and whatever other Maple Leaf partisans are running around out there . . . I really respect you guys, honestly . . . eh?

We returned to the green pastures of the good ol' U.S. of A. -- Jim Kirk's Iowa, to be precise -- on 16 February for the second issue of IveSTFiya. Editor Colin Wyers appears to have staged a mass-extermination of his cabinet, so to speak, as Owen Townes and Bob Spurlin have mysteriously disappeared from the staff list. IveSTFiya was strangely short this time around, possibly because there's been little to report lately, other than the election. It offers mostly news yet strangely little comedy for a newsletter which even its editor admits is "a joke," but still has an anti-Swede bias stronger than our shared anti-Canadian one [wait, how'd that get in there? We don't hate Canada, honest, we don't! --Ed.].

Tune in next episode where you may find out: Will Seamus Hughes switch to a color scheme with a decent pitching staff and a chance at the NL East? Will Jim Armstrong go the way of Aye and start to lose direction after Issue #2? Will Colin Wyers quit his own staff, with no apparent effect in the quality of IveSTFiya? Will Riker? Will we answer any of these questions?