It's been over 8 years now since Jack Axaopoulos rigged the HGAA election. That organization soon failed under Jack's oppression, and it's been dead ever since.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Hawks has continued to grow, and Joe Faust recently came up with the brilliant idea of objective and non-member-based ratings (USHGRS). Jack Axaopoulos sees any national hang gliding web site as competition, so he not only banned Joe, but also programmed his forum to change the posts of anyone who mentions USHGRS (or the U.S. Hawks).
Jack then threatened to ban anyone who mentions either of these sites claiming that any such mention was "shilling" for the banned members.
So Frank Colver made a reasonable request to know who's been banned on hanggliding.org. The U.S. Hawks posts such a list, and I've just noticed that kitestrings.org does as well.
Here's
Frank's reasonable request:
Frank Colver wrote:Requesting the names of banned persons
I was accused of "shilling" for a banned person. I would like to prevent that happening again in the future. I have no idea how many "persona non grata" folks there were on this forum, who might cause me to
accidentally "shill" again, if I mention a name that I did not know was banned.
I'm requesting that the moderator provide a place to click on, which would provide a list of those who have been banned since the inception of this forum. This would be very helpful in preventing accidental "shilling" by any current forum participants.
Currently there are only two banned names that can be clicked on and identified on this forum but I know there are more. I won't mention those and risk "shilling" again.
Thanking the moderator in advance for providing us access to the list of the banned.
Trying to do the right thing,
Frank Colver
Jack Axaopoulos immediately locked the topic and threatened to ban Frank:
Jack Axaopoulos wrote:Not going to play these silly bobK games. People know what you guys are up to and they report it to me. Members here are not idiots. You knew for a fact the person in question was banned. Either be a part of this community and leave bob and his little crew of extremists out of it, or just stay on the other forum. Not giving them ammo to badger and harass more people here. Have no patience for the insanity spilling over from bobs site. Dont do it again. Final warning.
Its sad to see you so easily fooled by Bob and crew. He plays a good game. Fooled me once too. But there is a reason he's banned from everywhere. The guy even asked me to blatantly RIG an election. But I guess you believe all his bulls*** EXCUSES even though I have 100% evidence.
Last time I will ask you. Leave all things Bob off this site. We're all sick of his crap.
The relavent part of Jack's post (with regard to this topic) is this quote:
Jack Axaopoulos wrote:The guy even asked me to blatantly RIG an election. But I guess you believe all his bulls*** EXCUSES even though I have 100% evidence.
If anyone were interested in getting to the bottom of this, they might start by asking Jack Axaopoulos to present his "100% evidence". They might even ask Jack if the following text (from the first post in this topic) is an accurate copy of the PM sent on July 28th, 2010 which Jack claims was "voter fraud". It's addressed to Jack himself and to one of the opposition candidates.
Please Redistribute Votes
Sent: Wed Jul 28, 2010 7:33 am
From: bobk
To: sg bobk SkyPilot S C Wise ThinAirDesignsJack (cc Transition Team Members - Note that PM would not send to all!!),
I just noticed that you've included me in the list of candidates. Yet my own candidate post (which you removed from the forum) stated:
"Finally, I'd like to comment that I fully endorse Scott Wise as Transition Team Chairman in addition to myself. In fact, if Scott does accept his nomination, then I will withdraw my own candidacy in support of Scott."
Scott did accept his nomination shortly after my post, and I am therefore not a candidate.
So I ask that all of the votes for me be redistributed to Scott since that was my posted recommendation prior to the start of voting.
Thanks.
Bob Kuczewski
Here's the full quote of my original posting:
bobk wrote:Members of the Transition Team and Members of the HGAA,
I'd like to start by thanking Hgaaflyer for his nomination of myself and all other members of the Transition Team. I hope we will end up being deserving of your endorsement.
On June 04, 2010 I posted a "Call for Leaders and Founders" on hanggliding.org, and that started the ball rolling toward the HGAA. It's been an interesting 54 days. Those 54 days have been full of great excitement and some terrible disappointments. Yet here we are, undaunted, and still trying to go forward. I thank everyone who's come this far, and I hope we can all keep going together.
Having said that, I feel that the HGAA is at a crossroads. We are no longer just one man's dream. We're now the melded dreams of many men and women who want to see a better organization to support our love of flight. I hope we will do just that. But we have some fundamental decisions to make, and I think these decisions will determine what kind of an organization we'll grow up to be.
As you may know, I was on USHPA's Board of Directors, and I attended 5 of the 6 USHPA Board meetings over the last 3 years. I've seen how their board operates, and I've seen what works and what doesn't work. From that perspective, I've come to believe that the greatest problem with USHPA has been a lack of insight by the general membership into what the Board does and how it does it. All of their other problems flow from that one single failing. So when I began contemplating a new national organization, I immediately thought about what we could do better. The list (as you might imagine) was pretty long, but at the top of it was accountability to our members. That means that the members should always know how we vote and how we conduct ourselves as representatives of the HGAA and particularly in all HGAA meetings and discussions. I think that is probably my primary goal for the new organization - transparency.
Well, for an organization with no money, that turned out to be easier than I might have expected. We live in the information age, and we've got forums and other on-line tools that allow us to hold "virtual board meetings" that are 100% visible to every member of the HGAA. What could be better? There's only one small hitch. The people who run the HGAA have to agree that what we say in these "virtual board meetings" will not (as in "NEVER EVER") be touched or modified in any way. That's a commitment that I am willing to make. In fact, it's so important to me that I'm willing to make it a term of my continuation on the HGAA Transition Team, and a fundamental plank of my platform as Transition Team Chairman.
Finally, I'd like to comment that I fully endorse Scott Wise as Transition Team Chairman in addition to myself. In fact, if Scott does accept his nomination, then I will withdraw my own candidacy in support of Scott. I do this because I think that Scott has demonstrated the proper mix of authority and tolerance. This is a hang gliding association and it's made up of people who have a great deal of independence and self confidence. I believe our members would prefer a leader who respects that independence, and treats us with the respect that Scott has shown during his tenure as Transition Team Chair. Let's get back to where we were when we started and get behind Scott again to lead us forward.
Thanks,
Bob Kuczewski
Now if I had been trying to commit "voter fraud" why in the world was I sending my request to all of the members possible ...
including the opposing candidates?Is that the "100% evidence" Jack is claiming he has? It's been sitting here in plain view (posted by me) since October 1st, 2010. Maybe Jack could confirm that for everyone?