Her blog contains an amazing number of false statements even by the
standards of Susan. By the way, she quotes me directly without
attribution.

Among her many false and misleading statements is: "No board member
has spoken to me about this."

The board is not supposed to talk to Susan about this.

**In other words - or actually the same ones, it is not a false statement

That is the job
of the Executive Director and he has spoken to her about this. That is
how I know about it.


**'Spoken' and 'about'?

**I would think its useful to know if the USCF board have made a claim to
the word 'national' or 'world' and if they have put that into writing, and
if /that/ is what any USCF-related partnership makes as a condition of such
partnership?

I would think that any person of average intelligence would see that
Susan Polgar running her own private tournament and calling it the
"National Chess Championship" is a problem, in that it conflicts with
the REAL US Chess Championship won last week by Shabalov.

**Unfortunately USCF can't have it both ways - since Eric is always saying
USCF is a BRAND of chess, and it has 'properties' and so on - what is
different in USCF's behavior to any other 'brand'?

**Unless, of course, USCF states and can prove that its constitution grants
it a monopoly on chess - but I think that would get it into more formal
trouble than it already has with its own mission statement - A document
mostly winked at.

Also, Susan says that the "Evil Chess Politicians" refused to pay
bonuses to the 2004 Womans Olympiad team. The bonuses of $20,000 were
paid over a year ago. Actually, I do not think they were owed any
bonuses by the USCF. The Kasparov Chess Foundation was the sponsor of
her team, not the USCF. I have asked the USCF office for documentation
about this and received nothing. Apparently, it is in the landfill.

If there was such a contract, Susan should produce it. I do not
believe that the contract exists.


**Sam Sloan states that he can't find the contract, nor any record of it,
which doesn't even lodge itself in the accounts department who nevertheless
paid up on it after several years. His 'belief' extends to doubting its
existance, but not as far as to actually inquire of the organisation itself
why it was paid? Surely someone must have instructed payment?

Susan says on her blog that we are trying to "prevent" players from
participating in her "National Chess Championship". The USCF is doing
no such thing. Anybody foolish enough to think that her tournament is
a real national chess championship is free to play. However, the USCF
will not rate her event or advertise her tournament in Chess Life.


**I think this is fair enough. And it is also absolutely clear that USCF is
a brand-name organiser operating an illegal monopoly under the guise of
being a non-profit organisation to promote chess. It acts like a for-profit
organisation to suppress chess.

**As a non-organisation based reporter, our publisher intends to promote our
own TLA section, to make it FREE, and we already reach more US chess players
everyweek than USCF does. Our idea is basically to supprot chess by letting
people know what's going on where and when, which we think will keep the
active ones in the game. I know this is an entirely radical idea, but hey...

Phil Innes
------

Sam Sloan