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Daemon Staff writes: "Daemon News has just announced FreeBSD Training Classes and a really cool new t-shirt. They finally have one on black! Chris Coleman announces everything in his Editorial in this month's Daemon News Ezine."
Chapter One: The First Post-War Parliamentary Elections in Lebanon:
,made the elections seem as if they occurred in more than one country, and not within the borders of one country, one state, and one people.
Bulwarks of the New Democracy, Farid El-Khazen
Part Three
Elections for Which State, and Deputies for Which Regime: Summary and Conclusions
The 1992 elections were unique in Lebanon's parliamentary history, whether the pre- or post-independence period. This uniqueness did not lie in the results, i.e. the make-up of the 1992 parliament, as much as it lay in the great political gap which resulted from disputes over the elections.
Prior to independence, the French mandate authorities held elections whose results were known beforehand, in order to maintain their grip on the country. In the independence period, there were two reasons for holding elections: the first was the laws which stipulated holding regular elections at specific times, and the second was serving the interests of the regime in whose hands authority lay, in order to anchor this regime, and affect the election of the next president, and his policies.
We must not conclude that the goals of Lebanon's parliamentary elections were limited to a tug-of-war between the government and the opposition. It is more correct to say that the elections, in addition to affecting the formation of the country's political elite, helped to direct the course of Lebanese politics, especially in the 1950s and 1960s. The elections also established that "the regime had the ability--even if limited--to modernize and develop its institutions, an ability that sprung from the regime itself, constituting a part of its fabric (66)." We see, however, that parliaments, despite their share in developing Lebanese political institutions, did not have an effective role in decision-making, and direct the general course of foreign and domestic politics. Their task was primarily legislative, in the sense that is known in democratic regimes (67).
It is obvious that since 1943, the election process has seen constant development in terms of representation, and the state's political performance both during and after elections. If we wish to be more specific, we see that the 1950s elections were relatively less chaotic and unfree than those of the 1940s. The 1960s elections, likewise, were better than those of the 1950s. This mode of improvement continued until the 1972 round, which recorded the best marks, in all aspects, whether in relative or absolute terms.
The givens that prevailed during elections of 1992 were no less important in influencing the structure and content of electoral laws since 1943. Disputes accompanied the promulgation of three electoral laws in 1950, 1952, and 1957. These disputes did not retreat until the law of 1960, on whose basis four successive parliaments were elected every four years with regularity, while the issue of electoral reform was not absent from political discussion and disputes. Political parties and groups, and politicians put forth many suggestions to reform the electoral system, to make it more representative, and balanced in sectarian terms (68). The political parties in particular (both leftist and rightist) strove to apply an electoral law on the basis of relative representation.
Contrary to the general course of the electoral process in the pre-war period, the 1992 elections did not only reverse this progress, but brought an administration (which might become institutionalized) that subjected the bases of democratic practice in Lebanon to gradual disintegration. The 1992 elections were held in a tense political atmosphere seen by the country only in times of severe political crisis. Perhaps the danger of the 1992 elections was that internal divisions did not result from differences over electoral policy, or competition between the government and the opposition, but rather from two contrary proposals: a proposal to hold elections which did not specify a time, and another which requested the postponement of elections until a favorable political and security situation in Lebanon obtained.
There were two objections to the electoral law: that it violated the law and the constitution, and it violated the spirit and letter of the National Covenant document, and consequently, the government's stated goal of protecting national unity. The most dangerous point is that the electoral law could render the National Covenant document ineffective, despite its newness. Indeed, it is even as if the document did not exist, and the issue not subject to discussion, when the issue at stake is connected to matters that the powers-that-be consider important.
Parliamentary elections were held in 1960, two years after the crisis of 1958; more importantly, they were held after the crisis began to near a solution. In contrary fashion, the 1992 elections were held at the peak of heated discussion of what problems had been left by the war. Perhaps the most important problem was that of displacement, which had removed 450,000 people, from all sects and regions, from their homes and lands.
Also, in contrast to the era of President Chehab (1958-1964), who strove to bridge the gap among Lebanese through a reform plan which aimed to build state institutions and guarantee social justice, the 1992 elections began with an initiative by a president who did not enjoy much trust, and a regime whose pillars were divided among themselves, and who, whether important actors or not, engaged in internecine fighting over the details of power and policy.
The government of Rashid al-Solh came to power after its predecessor was forced to resign due to the economic crisis (69). It was the first government in Lebanon to fall for non-political reasons, at least on the surface. Thus it was expected that al-al-Solh's government would tackle the country's economic decline, or at least decrease the intensity of the crisis. Instead of performing this duty, however, it set about supervising the elections, in the midst of the national currency's collapse, as it reached its lowest level ever against foreign currencies. This is to say nothing of the huge cost of the elections, which led to Lebanon's loss of financial resources the country was in dire need of, because the elections were held in the middle of the summer. This was unlike previous rounds, which were usually held in the spring, or fall, so as not to interfere with the summer tourism season, with its large benefit for the Lebanese economy.
If it had been possible for a neutral observer to regard Lebanon from afar, it would have appeared to him that what occurred in Lebanon during the four or five months prior to the elections were, in fact, a political game of the utmost frivolity practiced by the regime. While the minister of the interior one day expounds on the fact that preparing the corrected voter lists would take two years at the least, another day we see that the period of two years is compressed into a few months. While the cabinet decides that an identity card for the elections is an indispensable necessity, to guarantee the regulation of the electoral process, the idea is completely dropped with the approach of election day. This occurred after the cards were printed and the treasury assumed their cost (70).
The importance of these issues becomes secondary compared to the way in which the state dealt with the electoral law: the fluctuations among the expanded constituency, its antithesis, the small constituency, and a third type, lost between the two, were dizzying. The distribution of parliamentary seats among sects and regions was dominated by a process of public bidding. The timing of the elections, meanwhile, was of the utmost secrecy. For the citizen with an inclination toward observation, the preparation of the elections resembled a countdown toward implementing a military coup, more than the preparation for the most important event in a democratic process, namely, free parliamentary elections based on the law and the constitution, and respect for the national and sectarian conventions of Lebanese politics.
The 1992 elections were unique in another respect. It was the first time that elections took place in the shadow of the presence of foreign troops, whether they were present with official approval, as was the case with Syrian forces, or with the "approval" of unofficial parties. The last time elections were held with the presence of foreign troops on Lebanese soil was in 1943. Those elections, however, elected a parliament which abolished the French mandate, and subsequently eliminated the military presence three years later.
The Elections, The State, and Society
We can unequivocally say that every election process, whether on the national or local level, has its positives and negatives. Thus we can say that the 1992 elections had some positives that crystallized, in special fashion, on the local-regional level.
The 1992 elections brought an atmosphere of political normalcy to Lebanon. This was done in order to get the country accustomed to the post-war environment, even if the content and results of this normalcy differed among sects, and regions, and even if opinions about this process differed as well. Perhaps most importantly, the elections returned the direct political contact between the people and their representatives in parliament which had been interrupted by the war. For the first time in two decades, the electoral process took place in all parts of the country, during a specific period of time, even if it occurred in an unorganized fashion, with many defects in the process. This led to the revival of some aspects of political life, including local competition, which had prevailed prior to the war, especially in regions and within sects which had electoral competition among candidates. The elections also resulted in the shuffling of the local political deck in some regions, through the new opportunity for new political forces to emerge, reflecting some of the social and political variables resulting from the war.
Another positive element of the 1992 elections (whether for the boycotter or participant, or the winning or losing candidate) was that the principle of accountability was revived, through the return of communication between the voter and the candidate, both in theory and practice. The relatively long absence of elections, sectarian and regional divisions, and the tyranny of the language of artillery and barricades over the non-violent language of political dispute had placed the issue of elections, in the minds of the majority (average citizens, candidates, deputies), in the realm of impossibility.
The 1992 elections helped to return the accessibility of the electoral environment and put it in the realm of tangible possibility, even if the situation had many defects, and was accepted by some and rejected by others. Many deputies in the previous parliament and many za`ims and politicians had programmed their political calculations on the basis that parliamentary elections were a few years away, after deputies had been comfortable in their seats for twenty years, elected five presidents of the republic, and lived through the stages of the war with its complexities, and intertwined external and internal axes. The 1992 elections revitalized the principle of a limited period of tenure to parliament, if only in theory, with the next elections coming in four years. This is what had ceased to be customary in Lebanese political life since the middle of the 1970s.
The parliamentary elections produced another positive, namely, the revival of public political debate concerning the necessary conditions for holding elections according to criteria followed in democratic regimes. Following the war years, when political dialog at the popular level had been absent, a few parties expressed the need to improve the conditions for elections, even if this request was not answered, as the opposition hoped. Thus we can understand the feelings of frustration by some in the post-election period, although this phenomenon might establish future political behavior, that will possess, in abundance, the necessary conditions for an election process that will have a positive return for the state and its institutions, and for society.
The 1992 elections helped to energize the local dimension of electoral politics. This phenomenon, however, still lacks solidity, and a number of the foundations for future improvement, that will extend to the national level. In this framework, we would like to make some general conclusions about the 1992 elections, and their effect on Lebanese political life.
First of all, the 1992 elections led to a widening of the gulf between the state and the people on the one hand, and between the state and its policies, on the other. To the extent that society was distant from the elections desired by the state, the state in its turn was distant from the electoral process, which is one of its most central tasks. At no time had the government's electoral role been as marginal as it was in 1992.
Despite this fact, while previous governments had begun the electoral battle and launched campaigns through their support for pro-government lists, and consequently gave indirect help to forming electoral alliances and opposition lists, this did not occur at all in the 1992 elections. There were a few instances of this practice, such as the formation of the government lists, or more correctly, lists led by government figures--Rashid al-Solh's Beirut list, and Speaker al-Husayni's in Ba`albak-Hermel. In both cases the lists' leaders won their seats with difficulty, exceeded only by the difficulty of another candidate defeating the two lists.
Also absent from the 1992 elections was what is known as the "state's list," or "government list," as was the case in previous elections. In the 1992 round, there were lists headed by "pillars" of the government, or that included members close to the government, although there was no state list, customary in Lebanese politics.
This is of course not attributable to the neutrality of the state and its refusal to intervene in elections, through free competition in a legal framework, as is the case in countries with democratic regimes. Instead, it is attributable to the decline in the state's role in overseeing the country's general political course, and to the fall-back in its influence as a principal, effective party in political life, which represents a particular tendency, leadership, or ruling party, as is the case in more deep-rooted democratic regimes, in ideology and in practice. This is due to two main reasons: the limited ability of the state with regard to decision-making, and consequently the exercise of authority, and the state's inability to form a similar group with which it could work, or even ally itself, which would express state policies and electoral programs. Therefore, it was very difficult to form government lists with regional and sectarian alliances, as was the case in the pre-war period, in light of the absence of effective state authority and figures whose political orientation was similar, and who were in agreement with each other.
The truly decisive factor in the 1992 elections lay neither with the state, nor the people, as it had in previous elections. The decisive factor lay rather in local political forces within each electoral constituency. The political position and influence of these forces was reflected, in turn, within a "circle" of outside parties which influenced the electoral process. In the electoral constituencies that saw competition, though limited, especially among Shi`a candidates, election results reflected forms of transformation within the sect itself, which had crystallized regardless of the electoral process. This means that the electoral process did not actually cause change, but rather gave it the stamp of political legitimacy.
Second, the 1992 elections saw the absence of political opposition. This phenomenon began to appear after the middle of the 1970s, reaching its climax at the beginning of the 1990s. In pre-war Lebanon, the opposition was a principal part of the political process. However, during the war years, it became a political equivalent of boycott, and paralyzed institutions. In the wake of the Taif Agreement, opposition and pro-regime groups merged in a fashion previously unknown in parliamentary elections. No left or right, no extremist or moderate, no opposition or supporters. This was clear in the formation of "competing" candidate lists, with the assumption that one of them was pro-government and the other opposition. If we concede that the effective, active and real opposition did exist, then the difficulty that needed to be confronted was: toward what state institutions should the opposition direct its opposition, since these institutions were also in the same predicament, namely the inability to oppose, if opposition were possible.
In reality, the 1992 elections presented Lebanese political life in the post-Taif period the problematic of opposition. The opponent-loyalist was in the same situation as the opponent-boycotter, facing the same obstacles, as the opposition went decisively in the direction of boycott. It was as if there was no choice other than that of opposition in form, lacking content. In the event that the opposition takes a specific, different course than the prevailing, acceptable concept, the opponent then finds himself facing two choices: either opposition in form and rhetoric with limited political impact, which does not affect the core issue; or boycott, exiting the political process entirely. The middle position, represented by the effective and active opposition from within the political and democratic process, as is the case in democratic regimes, is either absent due to its effective marginalization, or removed because there is no place for this program under the agreed-upon conditions of the game, which the opponent-loyalist and opponent-boycotter know well.
Third, the elections worked to deepen internal sectarian division on the one hand, and deepen the division between sects and the state, on the other. Whereas in the past, factors leading to division were grouped around a state which was subject to the influence of a given group, with the state as the cornerstone of the regime, we see that this axis-cornerstone's role has diminished, while the same distances separate sectarian groups. The elections increased feelings of distance between the state and most groups in society. Any elections, however, do not help return sectarian balance as a substitute, in order to repair the current disequilibrium.
The absence of traditional electoral alliances among sects and regions and of electoral blocs contributed to the emergence of regionalism and sectarianism. This subsequently helped to establish effective parliamentary blocs which contributed to "energizing" democracy in the ranks of the opposition, and loyalists. Many Lebanese were not content with the holding of elections, especially Christians whose spiritual and political leaders opposed the election law and rejected the elections' timing. At the same time, Muslims were not overly satisfied with the holding of elections, even if the Islamist opposition remained relatively subdued, and covert.
Fourth, there is an observation connected to the electoral process, not to mention its goals, and the political and electoral regime that oversaw these elections. It is connected to the political task of parliamentary elections. Parliamentary elections in democratic regimes have many functions, the most important of which are the representative function, the task of changing the political elite, and that of support or opposition the government. The principal task, however, is centered around finding a mechanism to effect an organized transfer of power. This is in principle. In practical terms, elections fulfilled these tasks in pre-war Lebanon, even if they did not always lead to the hoped-for results. In today's post-war Lebanon, parliamentary elections have an additional function, and perhaps it is more important: the task of ending the political "war," following the end of the military war.
In reality, the elections would have borne positive fruit, if they had crowned the true National Covenant, with the goal of giving this agreement the necessary popular legitimacy, after the actual covenant had reached a stage of maturity, at least in practice, regardless of other intentions involved. However, this was not achieved by the 1992 elections; rather, they directed a blow at the political course and morale of the National Covenant. There was no resulting end of the war, strengthening of national unity or the Covenant. No other functions were fulfilled, the most prominent of which involved the function of electoral representation. The boycott and the low voting percentage in most constituencies stripped the elections of some of its representative functions, and hindered democratic practice, which is built on real competition between opposition and loyalist political forces.
A question remains; it applies to the goal of holding elections when they were held, as it applies, in the same context, to the appointment of deputies in June 1991, or one year before the elections, and the timing of these appointments. The question concerns the benefit from appointing deputies, which aimed at correcting the imbalance in sectarian representation, and filling the gap left by the passing of a number of deputies, when it occurred after the ratification of a new constitution, and not before. Wouldn't the promulgation of a new constitution be more beneficial in both political and popular terms, at least in theory, even if it occurred after correcting the imbalance in representation through the undemocratic method of appointing? What is, then, the benefit of appointing (which works against the true democratic principle), if elections follow a few months later?
Fifth, the elections mobilized people, and energized local politics, especially in some regions and electoral constituencies, such as the Biqa`, the south, and the north, though in different, if not conflicting, directions. While the elections had a positive result on the local level, as we have indicated above, mobilizing citizens and revitalizing the spirit of competition and the principle of accountability, even if in limited fashion, they had a negative result on the national level. The election atmosphere, which differed from one region to another
The south was "amputated," with the lost security belt dividing it from the belt of Lebanese state authority, on the one hand, and divided by the belt of occupation, on the other. In the north, in the opposite part of the country, there were "belts," and special ties, and likewise special electoral conditions (in terms of laws and preparation). The Biqa`, with its geographic and political position, had various local and regional ties, sensitive points, and pockets. In Beirut, the elections came off the best, after a number of local political figures, who were available, came together. In the Mountain, there was ample room for both the boycotter and non-boycotter, the displaced and not displaced, and for whoever wanted to not be in a given position. Thus emerged new and old political forces, according to the hoped-for and required tuning. Every region, in fact, every electoral constituency, had its electoral task in both its external and internal dimensions, according to the requirements determined by the powers-that-be.
Sixth, the elections of 1992 presented another issue, that of equal representation for sects and regions, and for all parts of society, and consequently, the issue of parliament's popular legitimacy. This issue is of the utmost importance, not only because of the principle of sound popular representation as known in democratic regimes, but also because the elections' representational task had political content with particular relevance for heterogeneous societies, like Lebanon's. This holds during normal circumstances, and not only periods of sharp political crisis. In exceptional circumstances, such as the first parliamentary elections of the post-war period, elections match the political importance of announcing and implementing a new constitution. This is because elections give the post-Taif constitutional and political decisions the feature of popular legitimacy that the process of creating the Taif Agreement fundamentally lacked, in its various stages, among Lebanese and non-Lebanese parties.
This is not to mention the fact that the 1992 elections had another political-representational function, which was a core function in precisely this period; they were Lebanon's first post-war elections. They had to constitute the real, popular crossing point out of the civil war, at least in its internal dimensions, to civil peace, at least with regard to internal division, since it is impossible to end the external dimensions of the war. The elections would perhaps be the ideal tool with which to cross from the atmosphere of war to that of consensus whose bases of legitimacy and power would extend from true agreement among Lebanese, and not means of imposition by force. This, of course, is what was not achieved by the 1992 elections, neither in theory (through the election law) nor in practice (in the preparations for and results of the elections).
Thus, we arrive at the reality of fragmented representation produced by the 1992 round, which was an unprecedented result of Lebanese parliamentary elections. A large number of deputies entered the 1992 parliament by means of "negative elections," if the expression is permitted, namely, uncompetitive elections due to the absence of true competition, or to the filling of the vacuum caused by the boycott in some constituencies. This situation applies to Christian sects more than it does to others, especially the Shi`a, and to a lesser degree, the Sunnis. This does not mean, however, that the effective members of the new parliament do not enjoy popular support in their areas, or that they would be unable to enter parliament under other electoral conditions. They are, after all, influential candidates within their sects. What occurred in 1992, however, was the victory of strong and weak candidates through negative election. For example, Walid Junblat, Omar Karami, Sulayman Franjiyyeh, Salim al-Hoss and Nabih Birri, the prominent za`ims within their sects, are equal to others who entered parliament in one way or another, or through electoral-political coincidence. Some of the aspects of the problem of proper representation emerge in this critical period of Lebanese political life.
This problem results in another, which might be more complex and difficult than the fundamental problem. This is the problem of the Christian boycott and the lack of enthusiasm and "boycott," unannounced among Muslims, although its extent, and its symbols differed at the level of the leadership, and the people (71). Boycott as political practice in previous parliamentary elections occurred during the French mandate. At that time, it was a Muslim boycott, especially by Sunnis, in the coastal areas which were joined to the mountain under the framework of the state of Greater Lebanon. The goals of the pre-independence Muslim boycott were wider and more comprehensive than the issue of elections, because they expressed the position that rejected the new entity in principle. Muslim opposition was not limited to the electoral law, administrative problems and legal contraventions, and the electoral process' accompanying defects, but rather fundamental positions of principle, tied to the conditions of creating the Lebanese state (in 1920) and the neighboring countries after the fall of the Ottoman sultanate (72).
The 1992 Christian boycott, especially by parties that had supported Taif and accepted the new political reality, while looking for ways to avoid the boycott, was unconnected to issues concerning the Lebanese entity, as was the case in the 1920s and 1930s. Rather, it revolved around issues with limited goals. For groups that had supported Taif and later joined the boycott reluctantly, it was possible to find ways out, unlike the case with the boycott during the mandate period, when the solution was tied to extremely complicated regional and international factors. This solution enters the realm of possibility, through means that were available. This is what gave the 1992 boycott and its results its interesting special features, at the political and representational levels.
It is true that the timing of an electoral round had not been an issue in the pre-war period, because the procedures were well-known. The elections' timing was not a given that could not be overcome or treated in one way or another, especially since no implementation of Taif, or National Covenant government performance, or general political situation was so ideal that the country would be unable to bear the postponement of the elections, however brief, following a twenty-year period of representational imbalance in parliament, and the correction of this imbalance through appointments. Perhaps the authors of this decision had other goals and intentions, which aimed at bringing about a coup, both on the level of representation of the political elite, and the new parliament's political performance (73).
Seventh, there is another matter connected to representation. The widening of the gap between the 1992 parliament and popular representation corresponds to the large increase in the elite-mass gap (74) within sects, particularly within the Christian sects. For the first time in parliamentary elections, we see the representational gap between the Christian political elite and its base (or mass) with the size we saw in the 1992 elections.
Previous elections assisted the emergence of leaders representing a particular popular tendency, pro- or anti-government, or supporting other political programs. This applied to all sects. Today, leaders represent their regions, and some of them enjoy popular support, but do not represent tendencies or orientations that distinguish them from other pro- or anti-government groups. This reality applies equally to all sects, parties, and political leaders, though it may differ in detail. There is general "service" representation, if the expression is permitted, which is a product of any electoral process, whether local or national. This type of representation, however, lacks the political concept of representation, or is incomplete, unequal to the service dimension of representation. This new reality, with regard to the elite-mass tie, distinguished the 1992 elections and their results from previous rounds.
Eighth, the growth in parliament's role and the speaker's increased powers, and consequently, his influence in the machinery of power in the post-Taif period according to the new constitution, gives the elections and the new parliament an unprecedented amount of importance, not to mention the fact that it was the first parliament after an imposed break of twenty years. These realities make inevitable consensual behavior by the authorities that respects the considerations of Lebanese politics, with its sectarian balance, in deciding to hold elections, or for the results of these elections. This is especially because Lebanon is in a critical transitional period which is building the foundations that build and support civil peace. Here, we can point to some conclusions regarding the elections' consequences for the sectarian-political map, and to the real impetus behind holding elections, despite wide opposition by both leaders and the public.
In avoiding contrasting explanations of the presence or absence of pre-planned electoral results for the 1992 elections, through the Christian group's hard-line reactions that put it outside the political process, we can say that the expression "the two wings of Lebanon," indicating the time of peace prior to the mid-1970s, was put to rest by the 1992 elections. It was obvious that the morale and political position of the Christian community, particularly Maronite, was targeted, as if it was meant to send a clear message to those concerned. The content of this message was that the government's decisions and relevant issues were not those that had prevailed in the past, in the pre-Taif period. The two communities of yesterday are now prisoners of today's "train," whose course will either be on or off the rails. It does not matter, as long as the train's movement persists.
This new situation in political practice, seen in Lebanon only during the civil war, was utterly unconcerned with the core of Lebanese political considerations, with their customary forms of consensus and sectarian balance. This is because one of Lebanon's two communities lost its step, paralyzing the country and throwing it into crisis. The communities today are broken, although events move in one way or another. Perhaps this unaccustomed-to situation in Lebanese politics will not only fail to help national consensus, but also lead to a permanent hobbling of these two communities.
A final observation involves the elections as a political event. It is true that they shook society, but in the end they do not carry political significance, either for the average citizen, or for parliament's representational function. It is also true that the elections carried the largest amount of political and sectarian content which was not merely electoral in nature. It is more correct to say, however, that the elections results carried the least amount of political meaning. This is because they reflected a political orientation dominated by one color, even if in different shades.
The 1992 elections constituted a historic turning-point in Lebanese political life. In essence they were crisis-elections, although the essence of this lay in the final results, as is usually the case in democratic regimes, and not in the political content of the election process and election day, as in the 1992 elections. The explanation for this situation lies in the political rhetoric of recent years, which did not proceed from internal transforming givens, and did not reflect society's priorities or its political regime. As long as external patronage, especially regional, influenced the course of Lebanese politics, this influence was limited to specific sects or institutions, and consequently, reactions to this influence were limited to these groups' positions. Today the scope of influence is wide-ranging, and does not except any sect, region, or political group.
From all of these givens we arrive at the question: Why, then, were elections held, and why were they held specifically in the summer of 1992? Who benefited, and why? It appears to us that the most correct explanation is what Guy Hermet labels "the non-competitive functions of elections (75)." Although the concept of false elections prepared by the state in non-democratic regimes does not apply to Lebanon, the unified and non-competitive characteristic of these elections, helped to ["tasrib"] the electoral regime supported by the state (preparation, candidacies and results) into Lebanon, which has a democratic political regime. In this context, the elections took place as if they were in a non-democratic regime, even if their real stage was a democratic country, based on its political regime.
If the function of free competitive elections is to guarantee the peaceful transfer of power and gain legitimacy for regime actors, Hermet says, then the function of non-competitive elections, which are prepared beforehand, does not differ in terms of their goals and functions. The difference, however, is "that the government that calls for elections in a non-democratic regime, while not being forced into holding them if it does not want to, certainly aims to achieve specific goals and results. This is because the organizing and holding of elections in a certain way, at a certain time cannot lack a cost, and have no benefit (77). In this case, "regime actors must have important and serious motives for holding elections, through which they aim, whether or not this is rightfully so, to gain certain benefits (78)." The hoped-for benefits of elections for regime actors lie in the relationship between the ruler and the ruled (political participation, legitimacy, communication) and aim to "affect the internal balance of centers of power through modifying the distribution of authority among various groups (79)."
It is true that some of the functions of non-competitive elections apply to Lebanon's 1992 elections, even if to differing degrees, although they remain a part of the process of social-electoral communication among groups and individuals that does not end on election day. In reality, adds Hermet, "it is hoped that people become used to the fact that they have no choice, and that they must accept what the state imposes, or even that the people will forget what they marginally possessed in the way of choice, and learn how to behave moderately in elections, so that the state is not even required to follow and prepare the results (80)."
What kind of electoral behavior should we expect, and what are the benefits that we look forward to from the 1992 elections? Time, and the behavior of regime actors, will hold the answer. One issue, however, for Lebanon, remains certain. If regimes that hold elections whose results are prepared beforehand reap the benefits of this work themselves, then the state in Lebanon might not become the only beneficiary of the political or other return.
It remains, then, that the elections mobilized the people, even if in different directions, and gave an impetus to an electoral atmosphere, revitalizing the method of holding subsequent elections every four years. Will the next elections be held on time, and overturn the criteria of the first post-war elections? The answer lies in the state's political performance, and the way in which the next elections are prepared, to correct the course of the National Covenant and deepen the bases of civil peace, the goals desired before and after parliamentary elections.
I think the FreeBSD classes are a great idea. I'm waiting for the classes to form on the East Coast (D.C. anyone?). It would be nice to have a seperate advanced system administration couse that covers more than we'll probably see in the 4 day sysadmin course they are offering. Including information about TrustedBSD would be pretty cool as well.
Yet another crppling bombshell hit the beleaguered *BSD community when last month IDC confrmed that *BSD accounts for less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of the latest Netcraft survey which plainly states that *BSD has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. *BSD is collapsing in complete disarray, as further exemplified by failing dead last in th recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.
You don't need to be a Kreskin to predict *BSD's future. The hand writing is on the wall: *BSD faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for *BSD because *BSD is dying. Things are looking very bad for *BSD. As many of us are already aware, *BSD continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood. FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers.
Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.
OpenBSD leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenBSD. How many users of NetBSD are there? Let's see. The number of OpenBSD versus NetBSD posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetBSD users. BSD/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetBSD posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of BSD/OS. A recent article put FreeBSD at about 80 percent of the *BSD market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeBSD users. This is consistent with the number of FreeBSD Usenet posts.
Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeBSD went out of business and was taken over by BSDI who sell another troubled OS. Now BSDI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.
All major surveys show that *BSD has steadily declined in market share. *BSD is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If *BSD is to survive at all it will be mong OS hobbyist dabblers. *BSD continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.
*BSD is dying
Training, we don't need no stinking training.
Badges, we don't need no stinking badges.
...to see this sort of thing in Europe, too.
proof of Osama's guilt..
...would be nice as well! AND "Here Here" on the TrustedBSD inclusion!
trolled from a 28.8 modem! yeah bitches! OWNED!!
Laying here in the shadows of my room, I squint up at my love. My Ms. Portman.
I am sore and tired after fucking her for eight solid hours. My chapped and aching
dick is soaking in grits to relieve the pain. She gets on her knees and starts lapping
the grits up out of the bowl. She places her beautiful hands on my penis and starts to
lick the grits off my achy piece.
Massaging my nutsack she....
WAIT, I DO IT WRONG!!!!
Yanking my dick out of her mouth I throw her to the ground and shove it in to her
gaping freshly fisted ass.
"OH BIG ASS SPORK!! Fuck my ass, fuck my ass good. DEEPER, my stallion, deeper!!
Make a Beowulf cluster of sperm on my back!!"
"Imagine a Beowulf cluster of this baby!"
I DO IT WRONG!!!!
Due to excessive bad posting from this IP or Subnet, comment posting has temporarily been disabled. If it's you, consider this a chance to sit in the timeout corner. If it's someone else, this is a chance to hunt them down. If you think this is unfair, please email jamie@mccarthy.vg.
HAHAHAHAA fuckers! I am not ssooo wrong I can't recover! All your trolls are belong to... forget it...
Q: What do you call a 30week-old premee?
A: An Appetizer!
Q: What do you call a dead baby with no arms and no legs laying in a ditch?
A: Phil
Q: What is special about a dead baby over all other forms of life
A: You can achieve deep throat from whichever way you enter
Q: How are babies and the elderly alike?
A: Both are fun to throw out of moving cars.
Q: What's red and dances
A: A baby on a barbecue
Q: Whats worse than finding 7 dead babies in 1 trash can?
A: Finding 1 dead baby in 7 trash cans.
Q: What's the difference between a Dead Baby and a tree?
A: One is legal to hit with an AX.
Q: What bounces up and down at 100mph?
A: A baby tied to the back of a truck.
Q: What's brown and gurgles?
A: A baby in a casserole.
Q: Whats the best thing about a siamese twin baby?
A: Threesomes.
Q: What do you get when you have sex with a pregnant woman?
A: A baby with a black eye!
Q: What's blue and flies around the room at high speeds?
A: A baby with a punctured lung.
Q: What's red and goes round and round?
A: A baby in a garbage disposal.
Q: What's the difference between a gay man and a freezer?
A: You can't hide dead babies in a gay man.
Q: What's more fun than strapping a baby to a washingline and then spinning it around at 200km/h?
A: Stopping it with a shovel.
Q: What do you call a dead baby with no arms and no legs hanging on your wall?
A: Art
Q: What do you call a dead baby with no arms and no legs laying on your porch?
A: Matt
Q: What do you call a dead baby with no arms and no legs laying on a beach?
A: Sandy
Q: What do you call a dead baby with no arms and no legs in a swimming pool?
A: Bob
Q: What do you call a dead baby with no arms and no legs in the middle of the ocean?
A: Fucked
Q: Whats worse than smoking pot with a baby?
A: Making a bong out of it.
Q: What's the difference between a dead baby and a felt tip marker?
A: you don't get second looks when you're writing with a felt tip marker!
Q: Why did the dead baby cross the road?
A: It was chained to a bumper.
Q: What do you have when you have 4 dead babies, take away two, and add 5 more?
A: An orgy!
Q: What's the difference between a dead baby and a table?
A: You can't fuck a table.
Q: How do you make a dead baby float?
A: Take your foot off of it's head.
Q: If a tree falls on a baby in the forest, and no one is around to hear it, is it still hilarious?
Q: What is red and creeps up your leg?
A: A homesick abortion.
Q: What's red and lies in all four corners of the room?
A: A baby that's been playing with a chainsaw.
Q: What do vegetarian dingos eat?
A: Cabbage patch kids.
Q : Whats white and bobs up and down in a baby's crib ?
A : A Pedophiles ass.
Q: What's the difference between a watermelon and a dead baby?
A: A watermelon floats.
Q: Whats the safest way to play with a baby ?
A: With a condom.
Q: What gets louder as it gets smaller?
A: A baby in a trash compacter.
Q: What do you call a baby on a stick?
A: A Kebabie.
Q: What's the difference between a lamp and a dead baby?
A: It's really easy to turn on a lamp.
Q: Whats does a blind, deaf, quadriplegic baby can get for Christmas ?
A: Cancer.
Q: Why are test tube babies the most beautiful ones?
A: Because they're hand made.
Q: What's the difference between a dead baby and a trampoline?
A: When you jump on a trampoline, you take your boots off.
Q: What is the definition of revenge?
A: A baby with a dingo in its mouth.
Q: What's the difference between a baby and a bagel?
A: You can put a bagel in the toaster. You have to put the baby in the oven.
Q: What's the difference between a bucket of gravel and a bucket of baby guts?
A: You can't gargle gravel.
Q: Why did the toddler fall off his bike?
A1: A fridge fell on him .
A2: He was quadraplegic.
Q: Why do you unload a truck full of babies with a pitchfork?
A: So you can tell which ones are still alive.
Q: How do you know when you hit a live one?
A: The pitchfork shakes
Q: What's this? (hold arms out and shake them)
A: A live one.
Q: Why do you stick a baby in the blender feet first?
A: So you can see the expression on its face!
Q: What's blue and thrashes about on the floor?
A: A baby playing in a plastic bag.
Q: What is bright blue, pink, and sizzles?
A: A baby trying to breast feed from an electrical outlet.
Q: What's sicker than driving over a baby?
A: Skidding.
Q: How do you spoil a baby?
A: Leave it out in the sun.
Q: How do you stop a baby falling down a manhole?
A: Stick a javelin through it's head.
Q: How do you make a gay men pregnant?
A: stick a dead baby up his ass!
Q: Why did the toddler drop it's lollypop?
A: It was hit by a truck...
Q: What goes plop, plop, fizz, fizz?
A: Twins in an acid bath.
Q: What's red, screams and goes around in circles?
A: A baby with its foot nailed to the floor.
Q: What's the difference between a Cadillac and a pile of dead babies?
A: I don't have a Cadillac in my garage.
Q: How many babies does it take to paint a house?
A: Depends how hard you throw them
Q: Whats more fun than feeling up a dead baby
A: Feeling up a dead baby with three nipples
Q: What is the differance between a dead baby and a VHS tape?
A: The VHS tape don't stink when you leave it out in the sun
Q: How do you prepare a dead baby for Valentine's Day?
A: You shove a box of chocolates down his throat and a boquet of roses up his ass.
Q: Why did the Baby fall out of the Tree?
A: Because he was DEAD!
Q: What's grosser than gross?
A: A garbage can full of dead babies.
Q: What's grosser than that?
A: The one at the bottom is still alive.
Q: What's grosser than that?
A: He has to eat his way to freedom.
Q: What's grosser than that?
A: He goes back for more.
Q: How do you get a baby to run faster?
A: Chase it with the lawn mower.
Q. What's the difference between a dead baby and an onion.
A. You don't cry when you chop up a dead baby.
Q: What has 4 legs and one arm?
A: A Doberman in a children's playground!
Q:What does a baby and a Pinto have in common?
A:They're fun to ride until they die.
Q: What happens when you burn baby's face off?
A: It makes weird noises and crawls into walls.
Q: what's funnier than a dead baby?
A: a dead baby sitting next to a kid with down syndrome.
Q: What do you get whan you dislocate a dead baby's jaw?
A: Deep Throat.
Q: What's blue and bloated and floating in your beer?
A: A dead baby with fetal alcohol syndrome!
Q: Whats white and red and hangs from a telephone wire?
A: A baby shot through a snowblower.
Q: How do you know when a baby is a dead baby?
A: The dog plays with it more.
Q: What does a bum call a dead baby in a dumpster?
A: A Freeloader.
Q: What do you get when you put a dead baby in a blender?
A: Hold on. I'll tell you in a second.
Q: What is better than a dead baby?
A: The revoked child-support.
Q: Whats the difference between a baby and a grandmother?
A: Grandmothers dont die when you fuck them in the ass
Q: What's the difference between a dead baby and a peanut butter cup?
A: The dead baby won't stick to the roof of your mouth.
Q: Why didn't they crucify baby jesus?
A: I dont know why they didn't either.
Q: What's the difference between a truck full of bowling balls and a truck full of dead babies?
A: You can't unload a truck full of bowling balls with a pitchfork.
Q: What's the worst thing about fucking a dead baby?
A: Wiping the blood stains off of your clown suit!
Q: What's the best sound in the world?
A: Hearing dead baby's hips crack under pressure!
Q: what wiggles spits and is covered in shit?
A: inside out baby!
Q: What's blue and orange and lies at the bottom of a swimming pool?
A: A baby with burst armbands.
Q: How do you make a dead baby float?
A: Two scoops of ice cream, one scoop of dead baby.
Q: Whats worse than a having sex with a dead baby?
A: Having sex with a dead baby filled with razor blades.
Q: What's 18 inches long and makes women scream all night ?
A: Crib death.
Q: Why is there always hot water at childbirth?
A: In case of a stillbirth, soup.
Q: How do you stop a baby from choking?
A: Take your dick out of its mouth.
Q: What's red, bubbly, and scratches at the window before exploding?
A: A baby in a microwave.
Q: When is the best time to bury that baby you killed?
A: When it starts talking to you again.
Q: How many babies does it take to make a bottle of baby oil?
A: It depends on how hard you squeeze them.
Q: What's more fun than stapling babies to a wall?
A: Ripping them off again.
Q: What do you call a dead baby with its skin peeled off?
A: Sexy.
Q: What's funnier than a dead baby?
A: A dead baby in a clown costume!
Q: What's blue and flies around the room at high speeds?
A: A baby with a punctured lung.
Q: What do you call a dead baby pinned to your wall?
A: Art!
Q: How do you get 100 babies into a bucket?
A: With a blender!
Q: How do you get them out again?
A: With Doritos!!
Q: What is pink and red and sits in a corner?
A: A baby chewing on razor blades.
Q: What is green and sits in a corner?
A: The same baby, six weeks later.
Q: What is red and pink and can't turn round in a corridor?
A: A baby with a javelin through its throat.
Q: What is more disgusting than a pile of 100 dead babies?
A: One live one in the middle is eating its way out.
Q: What's blue and sits in the corner?
A: A baby in a baggie.
Q: What's present do you get for a dead baby?
A: A dead puppy.
Q: What's purple, covered in pus and squeals?
A: A peeled baby in a bag of salt.
Q: What sits in the kitchen and keeps getting smaller and smaller?
A: A baby combing it's hair with a potato peeler!
Q: What's pink and red and silver and crawls into walls?
A: A baby with forks in its eyes.
Q: Why did the baby cross the road?
A: It was stapled to the chicken.
Q: What do you get when you cut a baby with a straight razor?
A: An erection.
Q: Why did the baby fall off the swing?
A: Because it had no arms or legs.
Q: What's got four wheels, smokes and squeals?
A: A bus load of babies on fire.
Q: What's harder to do than nailing a baby to a tree?
A: Nailing it to a dead puppy.
Q: What's grosser than ten dead babies nailed to a tree?
A: One dead baby nailed to ten trees.
Q: What's pink and chunky?
A: A baby with leporacy.
Q: Why do babies have a soft spot in their heads?
A: So you can pick them up five at a time.
Q: How many dead babies does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: As many as it takes to climb on top of them in order to reach the socket.
Q: What's pink and spits?
A: A baby in a frying pan.
Q: What's worse than finding a dead baby on your pillow in the morning?
A: Realizing you were drunk and made love to it the night before.
Q: What's more fun than a barrel of dead babies?
A: Sticking pins in their eyes.
Q: How do you make a baby cry twice?
A: Wipe your bloody cock on his teddy bear
The
This is version 0.6 of a troll HOWTO, sort of a companion piece to jsm's excellent troll FAQ. As a draft, comments and criticism are always welcome, if not appreciated
Section 1 - Trolling techniques
There are techniques used by successful trolls to elicit the maximum amount of responses from unthinking
Timing
Because you're posting as an AC, your troll will generally be ignored in favour of posters using their accounts, and so getting in early is essential. A good guideline is to get into the first 20 posts, so that people reading the article will see the troll before it is swamped out. One way of increasing the speed with which you get your troll into play is to prepare them beforehand, and then quickly customise them for the current article. This is easier than it sounds since
Note that this is why Jon Katz stories are pretty worthless as trolling material - by the time you've found the article and prepared a troll there's already 50+ posts on it, most of them flaming Jon Katz anyway
Exposure
Once you've got your troll in, you need people to actually read it. You also want replies -
Accounts
An alternative to the time-honoured tradition of AC trolling is that of creating a "troll" account. This gives you the advantage of posting at 1 rather than 0, and slashbots are more likely to take you seriously, especially if you at least sound reasonable. If you do this, try to avoid posting stuff where it is obvious you're a troll under the account - post it anoymously instead - some slightly more canny readers actually check your user info before they reply. Not many though
The ultimate goal of the troll account is to secure the +1 bonus, which is currently received once you hit 26 points of Karma. To get there, employ the techniques of karma whoring that we see every day on
Layout
To get people reading it a troll needs to be easily readable. Make sure you break it down into easily digestible paragraphs, use HTML tags where appropriate (but always make sure you close them properly) and use whitespace appropriately.
Size
Generally a troll shouldn't be too short, otherwise it'll get lost in the crowd. A workable minimum is a couple of medium paragraphs. Conversely, it shouldn't be too long, or no-one will bother to read it. Keep it to a happy medium.
Spelling
Whilst spelling is important if you want the troll to be taken "seriously", key spelling mistakes can draw out the spelling zealots, especially if you mis-spell the name of a venerated
Subject
The subject line needs to draw attention to your post without making it obvious that it is a troll. A simple statement of the main point of your argument can work here.
Style
Once you realise that most moderators don't bother to read past the first paragraph or two, you can use this fact to craft trolls that can be moderated up as "Insightful" (note that I mean this in the
Linking
As we all know, a post with links is considered "informative" by the
Feeding
The ideal troll requires no feeding - it runs on its own, generating flamewars between clueless
Know your audience
Always keep in mind the kind of things advocated on
Arrogance
Be arrogant. You, as a troll, know that you're right. No other explanation could exist. The wronger the "fact", the more assertively you should state it. Make it clear that you are better than everyone else - you know the truth and they are just too stupid to realise it. Use plenty of sarcasm, and use "quotes" to show it to people too dumb to realise.
Offensiveness
Being offensive in your initial troll can be counter-productive - it causes moderators to mark you down as flamebait in general. But if you're feeding, then you can get away with calling
Indifference
Great for articles with a political or social bent, this kind of troll expresses complete indifference to the topic at hand, wondering who on Earth cares about it. An alternative method is to say that the topic only concerns a certain group of people - criminals, idiots, hackers (always use this instead of crackers) or whatever group you want to offend.
Sympathy
Appear to take the same stance as the people you're trying to troll - claim you're as much a fan of Linux as the next man, but... This way you can make all kinds of claims in the sure knowledge that you actually know what you're talking about. A great phrase to use here is "In my experience". Remember to act like all the things you're pointing out are unfortunate but true.
The common touch
Always accuse
The 31337 touch
The opposite of the above. Claim that technology or whatever is only for the elite of society and that any attempt to open it up for everyone is wrong, an attack on intellectualism and possibly even dangerous. If people were meant to understand these things then they would, and it's their fault if they're too stupid to learn.
Contradiction
Never be afraid to contradict yourself, even in the space of a single sentence. The phrases "I am a top programmer who codes in VB" or "I am a supporter of open source who uses NT at work and 95 at home" will be sure to get a response from some weenie smugly pointing out the contradiction. Confuse the issue more by engaging in contradiction when you are feeding - this will confuse
Clues
If you're feeling brave, give the reader clues that this is an obvious troll. The classic example here is dmg's stock phrase "I am often accused of trolling (whatever that is)", but also feel free to use phrases like "I have not read the article, and I don't know much about XYZ but I feel I must comment". If anyone responds to a troll with these kinds of clues in it, feel free to bask in the glow of knee-jerk
Denial
If you're unlucky someone will accuse you of being a troll (surely not!) and try and ruin it for you. If you don't want it all to end there, then be sure to counter it by accusing them of being small-minded and petty, saying that it's easier for them to say it's a troll than to accept that people have different opinions. Be sure to say this in the subject line, especially if their subject was the infamous "YHBT. YHL. HAND."
Claiming credit
Given that
As for when to post it, that's a matter of opinion really. You can either post it straight away or leave it will after people start biting. Remember that the troll forum is also frequented by non-trolls, and sometimes you may get a self-declared "troll-buster" try and expose you. But remember,
There is no real current forum at the moment thanks to various spammers hitting the sids, but try trolltalk, the original troll sid started by 80md and osm way back in the day. Generally all postings are done there as an AC, with your name at the end of the post. Include a link to the troll somewhere in the text, which ideally will be directly to the post and its replies - click on the #XX link in the thread to get there.
Ending the troll
Sometimes you just get bored with a troll, or people start posting genuinely thoughtful stuff in reply (it does happen). When this happens it might be time to own up to the troll with a helpful "YHBT. YHL. HAND." post. Sometimes people will carry on a discussion of the issue, and if you're really lucky (and it was a great troll) they will completely fail to believe you and carry on arguing. If that happens, pat yourself on the back for writing a great troll
The cheap $3 crack
Finally, when all else fails and your troll gets moderated down to (-1, Troll) within ten seconds of you posting it, the only honourable thing to do is to accuse the moderators of smoking the cheap $3 crack (again) and give up
Section 2 - Types of troll
The Maniac
Probably the most popular kind of troll, the Maniac holds an opinion on something, and won't budge from that opinion no matter what evidence to the contrary is presented. If challenged, the Maniac will simply get more and more agitated and abusive, deriding his opponents as "idiots", "wrong-thinking", "dangerous" and "subversive". Generally the Maniac takes a position that opposes the prevalent
Maniacs can be crafted for practically every article
Here are some fruitful avenues to explore:
The Right-Wing Maniac
Always popular, the right-wing maniac (RWM) is a God-fearing, gun-toting, flag-waving American, and proud of it. They don't care about the rest of the world, unless it's to "prove" that America is better than everything else, and they cannot stand liberal whining over civil rights. They hate the moral decay of America and want it to revert into a nation of heterosexual, Christian whites like it was meant to be. Woe betide anyone that dares to suggest otherwise.
Religion
There are two ways to approach this kind of maniac. The harder to pull off is the militant atheist, but this is quite common amongst
Ideology
Pick a philosophy, any philosophy. This troll is a troll with a cause - they have found some kind of ideological truth, and are out to expose every other philosophy as a sham. Whether it be libertarianism, objectivism, communism or capitalism, this troll will point out the obvious "flaws" in any other philosophies, whilst spouting dogma about their own. And the best thing is - you don't even need to know that much about what you're spouting - making doctrinaire mistakes will get both sides of the argument flaming you, adding to the fun.
Software
This is an old favourite and crops up in many forms, covering the gamut from OS maniacs (Linux zealots, MS-apologists or embittered BSD fanatics), language maniacs (Pascal vs. C, C vs. C++, C++ vs. Java, Perl vs. Python, VB vs. everything), application maniacs(GIMP vs. Photoshop, Netscape vs. IE, vi vs. emacs) and also includes people who complain about how technology should only be for the 31337 hackers.
Guns
Americans love their guns, and will always fight passionately for their Constitutionally guarenteed rights to bear arms and shoot people. Even the slightest hint of criticism of this will bring down the wrath of a thousand and one enraged gun-owners on you, so it's always a great point to work into a troll
The Expert
The Expert is someone who is "savvy" in their particular field, and is perfectly willing to give their opinion on any topic even vauguely related to their field. The Expert is most likely to be from a field which
Some possible angles to exploit:
Industry knowledge
The expert knows the computing industry from the inside - as a long-term pro, they can dispense knowledge knowing that they can "speak for the industry". Their smug self-satisfaction is bound to annoy, as is any suggestion that things aren't the way that
Helpful hints
With their tech-savvy (or law-savvy or whatever) experience, the expert is obviously the best person to point out what's wrong with things or to give out useful "factual" information. In fact this probably works best with lawyer trolls - for all that
Offtopic Trolls
Not really a "troll" in the strict Jargon File sense of the word, but they certainly should be included here
Offtopic trolls, like any other, come in almost as many colours as an iMac, but generally not as cute. But then again, a good offtopic "troll" can affect more people than a repulsive little gumdrop on your desk, because you need to have someone SEE your desk before they can react. Simple? Moreso than even my overblown prose could indicate. Some basic examples:
The serial troll
Write a story. Keep expanding it. It doesn't matter what article you post it under, so long as it's high up. If you want people to recognize you, pick a couple themes or symbols, and carry them on throughout the story. Other alternatives include back linking or including the entire story, but adding more each time. Be funny if you want. Or if you don't feel like being funny, just be really weird. Someone will react.
The random troll
This has nothing to do with anything. Be it a stream of consciousness rant, or a description of the corner of your desk. Another favorite is a monologue, read as if spoken from any one given entity to another. The more outlandish, the better (a pair of socks talking to a mousepad, for example). If you really wanted to be artsy, work in an actual metaphor or legitimate meaning behind it, but it's not necessary.
The vaguely related troll
Start out with a comment about the article. Have a definite opinion of it. Then, after a little while, disintegrate into randomness. All roads eventually can eventually lead to cheese (yum), Natalie Portman, cannibalism, toasters, squirrels, futons, you name it. All it takes is a little bit of creativity. Oh, and feel free to use other trolls' motifs. Open source and all that
General tips:
If it's funny for a fleeting moment, then it's worth posting.
Puns. Puns are only less vile than mimes, but it's hard to mime on
Obscure cultural references and injokes are always good. SOMEONE will get them eventually.
Several drafts of a serial or random post are common, but true elegance is being able to come up with something on the spot that still makes the top 40 posts (on a post-heavy article)
Section 3 - Useful trolling links
The following links contain background information useful for trolls needing quick quotes and "expert" opinions to include.
General purpose links
ddi.digital.net/~gandalf/trollfaq.html - How to deal with USENET trolls - learn your enemy
www.don-lindsay-archive.org/skeptic/arguments.h
www.altairiv.demon.co.uk/troll/trollfaq.html - USENET troll HOWTO
www.baiting.org - Baiting.org
www.fieldingtravel.com/df/index.htm - Fielding's DangerFinder - A guide to what and where's dangerous
Religious links
www.godhatesamerica.com/ - God Hates America
www.chalcedon.edu/creed.html - The Creed of Christian Reconstruction
www.demonbuster.com - How to cast out your demons and do spiritual warfare
riceinfo.rice.edu/armadillo/Sciacademy/riggins/
www.icr.org/ - Institute for Creation Research
www.xenu.net - Operation Clambake - The fight against Scientology on the net
www.hom.net/~angels/ - Citizens for the Ten Commandments
www.bju.edu/rcnbc.html - The difference between Catholics and Christians
www.geocities.com/prazske00/biblequotes.html - Bible quotes by category
Political/economy links
www.aynrand.org - The Ayn Rand Institute
www.reason.com - Libertarian site
www.freerepublic.com - Right-wing stuff
www.jbs.org - Excellent site for all kinds of right-wingery
www.dack.com/web/bullshit.html - Web economy bullshit generator
Crackpot science links
www.fixedearth.com - The Earth Is Not Moving
www.jir.com/index.htm - The Journal of Irreproducible Results
I dO k-RaD sH1T oN mY 8088! i |-|a> DEBUG!
I use it to change my video game scores...
I wIlL |-|a>0Rz j0o!!
Proof of the gay-linux conspiracy!
Is any teaching courses in Europe? I wonder how much it would cost to get a training seminar set up for in Helsinki, Finland.
I think it'd be of a lot of use for people there, primarily because Linux seems to be the core system used, and there's a lack of familiarity with BSD (IMHO).
Ignore the fact that I'm planning on moving back.
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it. - G.B. Shaw