David Cronenberg's character

[137th Gebirg]

Which is really not a very accurate depiction of things; especially on DS9, we saw Starfleet officers in the field making decisions that really should have been made by the democratically-elected civilian government, not a captain on the front lines. Star Trek really ought to feature the Federation President and Council more than it does.

Yep. Specifically, you had the changeling Admiral Leyton who quite easily engaged in a thorough planet wide military takeover while the feckless President Jaresh Inyo was wringing his hands in his comfy office in Paris, watching the rest of the world burn from Red Squad attacks.

Kind of shows how scary-weak Federation leadership was, relying more on the perceived strength of the historical concept of the Federation as an abstract, rather than the ruling class making any kind of substantive decisions.

Starfleet, and to some degree Section 31, were the ones really running the show.

 

[Sci]

Yep. Specifically, you had the changeling Admiral Leyton who quite easily engaged in a thorough planet wide military takeover while the feckless President Jaresh Inyo was wringing his hands in his comfy office in Paris, watching the rest of the world burn from Red Squad attacks.

Kind of shows how scary-weak Federation leadership was, relying more on the perceived strength of the historical concept of the Federation as an abstract, rather than the ruling class making any kind of substantive decisions.

Well, that's not what I was thinking of, and I don't agree with that assessment of "Homefront"/"Paradise Lost." "H/PL" depicted the normal relationship between Starfleet and the Federation government more realistically in my view -- remember, in "Homefront," Leyton wants to drastically increase security on Earth and on Federation government and Starfleet installations, and President Jaresh-Inyo initially refuses to authorize this because he thinks the Changeling threat isn't as big as Leyton thinks it is. President Jaresh-Inyo wasn't "wringing his hands" when the power went out -- he was doing everything he could do to get power restored, and he agreed to declare a State of Emergency based upon the information he had at the point. He was being a responsible leader, quite frankly.

What I was thinking of was more things like, Sisko in "The Way of the Warrior" deciding to leak the news of the Klingon invasion of the Cardassian Union to the Cardassian government via Garak. Deliberately endangering the troops of your ally by leaking their military deployment to a recently-hostile nation is the sort of fundamental foreign policy decision that should only ever be made by the democratically-elected head of government after consultation with the Cabinet and key military leaders -- it's not the sort of decision someone who isn't even a flag officer should get to make. In fairness, this has more to do with the dramatic conceits of television -- producers wanting major decisions to be made by the primary characters of the show rather than by one-off guest starring characters -- than it does with any sort of intentional or meaningful commentary on Federation politics.

Starfleet, and to some degree Section 31, were the ones really running the show.

There is no evidence whatsoever that Section 31 were the ones "really running the show." Section 31 rarely acts, and canonically every time it has acted, its actions have blown up in their faces: they failed to recruit Bashir; their placing their agent Koval as Chair of the Tal Shiar on the Romulan Continuing Committee utterly failed to prevent Shinzon's takeover four years later; their use of the Changeling virus actually made the Female Shapeshifter more resolution in her desire to give the UFP a pyrrhic victory (Odo had to talk her out of that by offering himself to the Great Link) rather than more likely to surrender; their decision to let the Klingons abduct Phlox nearly caused a war with the Klingons and definitely caused the spread of the Augment Virus that created great animosity from the Klingons for the better part of the next century and a half; and their decision to create the A.I. known as Control nearly led to the extermination of all life in the galaxy. There is literally nothing Section 31 has ever done canonically that did not blow up in their faces. They are the most incompetent Super-Secret Conspiracy in popular fiction.

 

[fireproof78]

What I was thinking of was more things like, Sisko in "The Way of the Warrior" deciding to leak the news of the Klingon invasion of the Cardassian Union to the Cardassian government via Garak. Deliberately endangering the troops of your ally by leaking their military deployment to a recently-hostile nation is the sort of fundamental foreign policy decision that should only ever be made by the democratically-elected head of government after consultation with the Cabinet and key military leaders -- it's not the sort of decision someone who isn't even a flag officer should get to make. In fairness, this has more to do with the dramatic conceits of television -- producers wanting major decisions to be made by the primary characters of the show rather than by one-off guest starring characters -- than it does with any sort of intentional or meaningful commentary on Federation politics.

Archer did the same thing to the Vulcans-Earth's only ally at the time. Star Trek has not handled this well in the past.

 

[NCC-73515]

The first time I saw the Federation’s civilian government, he got fly-tackled by Kirk to save him from an assassination attempt.

I love that moment:
MIIISSTAAA PREESIIDEEEEENNNTT!!!!!!!! ...Kirk, Enterprise.

 

[Sci]

Archer did the same thing to the Vulcans-Earth's only ally at the time. Star Trek has not handled this well in the past.

ENT at least had the excuse of there not being the tech necessary for live communications with Earth at the time. There was no such excuse on DS9 -- it was pure dramatic conceit for the sake of keeping narrative momentum with the main cast.

 

[Tim Thomason]

The beauty of fan theories about vague characters is we can actually make it happen. If we all wish real hard (and also popularize the President Kovich Theory through more public means), CBS will hear us and Kovich will be giving his State of the Federation address to close out Season 4.

 

[Yistaan]

If Kovich is Fed president, isn't it a bit disturbing that he has a lifelong fascination with an evil regime from centuries ago in a parallel universe that everyone remembers as an evil version of our universe? I can't imagine his opponent keeping silent on that come re-election campaigns.

 

[Nerys Myk]

If Kovich is Fed president, isn't it a bit disturbing that he has a lifelong fascination with an evil regime from centuries ago in a parallel universe that everyone remembers as an evil version of our universe? I can't imagine his opponent keeping silent on that come re-election campaigns.

Why? A lot of people are history buffs. Some are experts on Nazi Germany. It doesn't make them bad people.

 

[Yistaan]

Why? A lot of people are history buffs.

Fair enough, and you basically stated what Kovich would say in response to such an accusation. It just feels odd.

 

[Sci]

If Kovich is Fed president, isn't it a bit disturbing that he has a lifelong fascination with an evil regime from centuries ago in a parallel universe that everyone remembers as an evil version of our universe? I can't imagine his opponent keeping silent on that come re-election campaigns.

Having an interest in evil is not the same thing as supporting it. And I imagine it became extremely common for Federates from the Prime Timeline to be fascinated with the idea that they have identical counterparts in a next-door dimension who live under an evil counterpart to the UFP after Kirk reported the existence of the Mirror Universe in 2267.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Fair enough, and you basically stated what Kovich would say in response to such an accusation. It just feels odd.

As long as he doesn't go all John Gill everything should be fine.
At least he's not admiring Phillipa.

KIRK: Name, Khan, as we know him today. (Spock changes the picture) Name, Khan Noonien Singh.
SPOCK: From 1992 through 1996, absolute ruler of more than a quarter of your world. From Asia through the Middle East.
MCCOY: The last of the tyrants to be overthrown.
SCOTT: I must confess, gentlemen. I've always held a sneaking admiration for this one.
KIRK: He was the best of the tyrants and the most dangerous. They were supermen, in a sense. Stronger, braver, certainly more ambitious, more daring.
SPOCK: Gentlemen, this romanticism about a ruthless dictator is
KIRK: Mister Spock, we humans have a streak of barbarism in us. Appalling, but there, nevertheless.
SCOTT: There were no massacres under his rule.
SPOCK: And as little freedom.
MCCOY: No wars until he was attacked.
SPOCK: Gentlemen.
KIRK: Mister Spock, you misunderstand us. We can be against him and admire him all at the same time.
SPOCK: Illogical.
KIRK: Totally. This is the Captain. Put a twenty four hour security on Mister Khan's quarters, effective immediately.

 

[Blue Squadron]

TrekMovie have had a thing about Kovich being President for a while now — but that was based on the erroneous assessment that he was wearing some sort of special all-gold version of the new combadge.

Only, he’s not.

Kovich is actually quite clearly wearing the one-pip version of the flag officer badge with the gold lower section — making him a Commodore. The fact that he’s in civvies would suggest a security and/or intelligence role, which would also fit with what we have seen of the character so far, and would explain his links to Vance. Section 31...? Possibly but I’m kinda hoping they leave that one well alone (although I suspect they’ll choose to go there sooner or later).

I’m well aware of the in-universe time gap from Picard to S3 of Discovery but in the minds of the writers, Picard is a relatively recent event and in that show there was a working relationship between the five-pip Fleet Admiral / Commander in Chief and the one-pip Commodore as head of Starfleet Security (even if she did later turn out to be a deep plant Tal Shiar spy...).

If you’re looking for a more much simpler explanation for the relationship between Vance and Kovich, and the rank that Kovich is wearing, then I suspect that, out-of-universe, this is it.

So, my money is therefore on Commodore Kovich as director of Starfleet Intelligence / Security.

 

[Sci]

TrekMovie have had a thing about Kovich being President for a while now — but that was based on the erroneous assessment that he was wearing some sort of special all-gold version of the new combadge.

Only, he’s not.

Kovich is actually quite clearly wearing the one-pip version of the flag officer badge with the gold lower section — making him a Commodore. The fact that he’s in civvies would suggest a security and/or intelligence role, which would also fit with what we have seen of the character so far, and would explain his links to Vance. Section 31...? Possibly but I’m kinda hoping they leave that one well alone (although I suspect they’ll choose to go there sooner or later).

I’m well aware of the in-universe time gap from Picard to S3 of Discovery but in the minds of the writers, Picard is a relatively recent event and in that show there was a working relationship between the five-pip Fleet Admiral / Commander in Chief and the one-pip Commodore as head of Starfleet Security (even if she did later turn out to be a deep plant Tal Shiar spy...).

If you’re looking for a more much simpler explanation for the relationship between Vance and Kovich, and the rank that Kovich is wearing, then I suspect that, out-of-universe, this is it.

So, my money is therefore on Commodore Kovich as director of Starfleet Intelligence / Security.

It's certainly possible! But honestly I think a simpler explanation is that even civilian government officials wear those combadges when aboard Federation Headquarters for safety reasons, and that the combadge probably doesn't indicate anything about their role per se.

But certainly, there's as much evidence that Kovich is Chief of Starfleet Intelligence or Security, or Director of the Federation Security Agency, or what-have-you, as there is evidence that he's President. Which is to say we're all shooting the breeze here.

 

[Timo]

...For all we know, those are one and the same thing, in this new and security-conscious Federafleetion. And the single pip is no obstacle, either: Colonel Gaddafi still had Generals in his army.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Blue Squadron]

I get Sci’s argument about folks being given a badge for security or communications reasons but the single-pip flag officer badge is a mighty specific badge to give out instead of a generic badge or something like the “visitor” badge given to J-L in Picard.

Equally, I’m not sure that referencing the leader of a military coup is a particularly helpful analogy...!

 

[dupersuper]

Yep. Specifically, you had the changeling Admiral Leyton who quite easily engaged in a thorough planet wide military takeover

Though a changeling did briefly impersonate Admiral Leyton in those episodes, the actual admiral was the one responsible for the attempted coup.

 

[Awesome Possum]

Why? A lot of people are history buffs. Some are experts on Nazi Germany. It doesn't make them bad people.

Tons of people are obsessed with true crime and serial killers, evil can be fascinating.

 

[Timo]

Equally, I’m not sure that referencing the leader of a military coup is a particularly helpful analogy...!

An analogy? It's a straightforward description!

First Vance tells the UFP government to move in with him. And then he tells foreign diplomats that there's no meeting the government, and that he's the stand-in President now...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Yistaan]

Kovich is Palpatine and Vance is Vader. The latter leads the military and the former zaps people with lightning.

 

[Blue Squadron]

An analogy? It's a straightforward description!

First Vance tells the UFP government to move in with him. And then he tells foreign diplomats that there's no meeting the government, and that he's the stand-in President now...

Timo Saloniemi

Timo, normally I'm right with you on most of what you say but you've lost me here...

First you were talking about Kovich still possibly being the President despite his rather specific combadge, now you're suggesting that it's Vance who's usurping the civilian government instead.

Huh?