Standing firm on my principles for a positive USCF
This was a letter I posted at the USCF forum which has become the paradise for destructive chess politicians who contributed to the downfall of the USCF.
Dear Hal,
Thank you for your post although I completely disagree with quite a few things you said. However, you are entitled to your opinion and I respect your right. In addition, thank you for your help many years ago. I have made my decision a while back not to discuss or debate in this environment (USCF Forum). It is not healthy or productive.
I decided to run in this election to help the USCF and changing the environment and culture of the game are two of the things I will try to achieve.
I want to energize the members in a positive way. As I said before, unless the forum's rules here are strictly enforced and people can properly respect each other, I will take my issues and discuss with the USCF members in person at countless events that I attend each year or in a more civilized and productive environment. In addition, my forums attract about 3-6 million unique chess players each month.
I will make my campaign the way I see fit. I am not going to follow the same path that does not work and clearly needed to be changed. It is like in chess. Why would anyone play the same losing lines over and over again? Surely you would not want me to do that?
I would like to wake up each morning and be proud for what I stand for.I also want my children and family to be proud of me and because of this, I will always try my best to do the right things. Joining this dirty and destructive political game is not the right thing for me and I am not going to do that.
Whether I will be elected or not, I will continue to give US Chess 150% of myself. I hope you will join me to a more positive, respectful, professional and productive road.
Happy New Year Hal!
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
posted by Chess Daily News @ 1/15/2007 10:11:00 AM
1 Comments:
At Monday, January 15, 2007 12:31:00 PM,
Anonymous said…
Let’s put all of this in perspective here.
In our culture and internationally, too, we’ve become WAY too partisan. People attack people blindly just because they oppose them; people defend folks they support blindly, too. (George Bush.) And then we all say, “Both sides are equally guilty,” as a way of being fair and even-handed.
But what if both sides are not equally guilty? Should we say that they are, anyway – just because that’s the fashionable thing to say?
So we turn to the case of Polgar and US Chess. - Her attackers and her defenders. - And the ugly scene. – Are the two sides equally guilty?
Quite definitively not. Because we are Susan’s supporters, we are fair. We don’t just defend someone out of blind partisanship; just like we don’t attack people out of blind partisanship, either.
This is the significance of the activities over the last several weeks. I’ve written at great length, both on Susan’s blogs and on the USCF Forums and I’ve been writing with a purpose.
All the words that have been written against Susan on the internet now constitute a rather large book. I’ve pretty much gone through the whole thing. I’ve sorted out the attacks on Susan into four broad categories: (a) those that are obviously false; (2) those that are too petty to worry about; (3) questioned and answered; and (4) what’s left over.
Attacks on sexual morality grounds can be dismissed out of hand. Attacks on financial misconduct grounds can be dismissed on the basis of audit reports. (I expended a lot of time and word count on this area in order to nail it down.)
So what’s left over?
I listed just three items in the comments to previous post. When an observer looks them over, any impartial, fair person must conclude that they don’t amount to very much. And I strongly suspect that if Susan and/or Paul were to decide to answer them, they would be whittled down even more if not disposed of entirely.
To cap the whole process, I threw those three items into a special thread on the USCF forums last night for anybody to address. I invited them to add to the list. Almost all of Susan’s detractors were out in force last night. They posted onto that very thread. 25 different comments. But not to attack Susan. (Maybe they saw my name as the originator and maybe that had something to do with it.) Hal Bogner, the addressee of Susan’s letter of this post, later called my attempt “gracious” and “fair”.
So, apart from Susan, herself, where does that leave the rest of us? Are we blind partisans? Blind partisans would not make the effort that I did. Are we equally guilty? A blind partisan would not go so far to accommodate the other side’s point of view as I did.
Last night we reached a climax. We had dealt with the sex stuff. We had dealt with the financial stuff. We had dealt with the petty stuff. And then we threw what was left open for the other side to substantiate and convince. And they choked.
Now it is time to say enough is enough. And not just because Susan says so. We have earned the right to say to the world, “enough to all of this” because we INDEPENDENTLY made an effort to get real with this stuff.
More attacks may be made in the future and probably will. But we should dismiss such late hits. Anything that’s real should not be sprung upon the public as a matter of timing and calculation. If Susan’s detractors had anything important to say, they should have said it already.
Enough. We’re Susan’s supporters. And no, we’re not equally guilty. We’re better. We’ve earned the right to say that. Enough.
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