I am starting to lean toward koko's position on openness.

I do agree that the current system leaves much to be desired from a communication standpoint, as all the general members get is voting records and someone needs to pro-actively solicit comments from TalkBoard members if they are interested in the “whys” behind a particular decision. Obviously, the process is slowly evolving toward more transparency, but I can see a need for further openness.

This also impacts the elections. Outside of looking at voting records and the occasional comments made in the public TalkBoard forum (which usually relate to controversial decisions), we really have no information on the thought processes of TalkBoard incumbents. Of course, they do provide such insight during the debate process, but it would be useful to be able to look at the TalkBoard discussions from a third-party point of view.

“Throw it open to everyone” is the simple and inelegant solution, which doesn't address the (presumably very infrequent) need for private deliberations. Having TalkBoard members restate and retype their discussions in public for each vote, is, to be blunt, a waste of their time and idiotic (not that they shouldn't do it). There is a happy medium somewhere, but this candidate needs to spend more time pondering it.