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California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

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Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#221

Post by codys »

tathougies wrote: post #196
winter_blue wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Republicans might claim to support state's rights, but they certainly aren't principled consistent supporters of it. Just take a drug legalization. Many Republicans have been vehemently opposed to it. Take a look at the Supreme Court decision Gonzalez v. Raich , where Steve Scalia no less, wrote that the feds could interfere with your growing some plants inside your own home for your own personal use. Remember that t…

My claim on this issue was mainly due to the current administration's relatively pro-state stance in this regard (COVID). I am not insisting that the GOP is universally pro-state. You are right that they are not when it comes to marijuana legalization and some other things (and shame on them for it).

The current administration's position isn't relatively pro-state here though: Trump is on record insisting he can "reopen" the economy over the heads of state governments.

The position on "closing down" (that it was up to states) doesn't tell us anything about the administration's principle in regard to COVID because the administration is willing to change those "principles" very quickly, as evidenced by their current statements (among other actions taken by Republicans)

It's arguable that the position on closing down was based on the desire of the admin that the country remain "open", but was faced with legal/political difficulties in directly applying their desire to the country as a whole. What ever tactic is taken with respect to this Pact, we should be unsurprised if it ignores any "principles" and instead looks to effect the policy that Trump desires to put into place, or the effect on Trump's perception of his authority.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#223

Post by dahdum »

triceratops wrote: post #186
dahdum wrote: post #85

Stay at home is doing enormous economic damage, which indirectly will cause more deaths through decimated budgets of social and health programs. Especially in CA where high progressive taxation amplifies the impact of recessions. So there's a lot of pressure to reopen but no political cover to do so. I think the entire point of this pact is to provide that cover.

> which indirectly will cause more deaths through decimated budgets of social and health programs. Do you have any actual data for this?

Unless you're arguing the budgets won't be cut or frozen, the data is the success metrics of those programs.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#224

Post by _bxg1 »

yingw787 wrote: post #171
_bxg1 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> National Guard drills, deployments, and contingency planning That seems pretty far-fetched. Much more likely (and welcome) would be a sort of "legal coup", where the states that still have functioning governments band together in the task of reshaping the federal government through voting and legislative power. We're certainly approaching a breaking point in the dysfunction of the federal government and its inabili…

Maybe. I mean, I would acknowledge that given post-9/11 deployments of National Guard troops to active combat zones, all you would need to do to mess up any planning would be to deploy those troops separately and randomly far away. Then it wouldn't matter if the governor called up the National Guard in self-defense and if they wanted to obey despite being federalized, because they wouldn't be in-theater. You'd have t…

At the very most we might see Hong Kong-like civil unrest or something. But I see no path for any states to assemble a standing army under the nose of the federal government. Even if they tried to use the national guard; who's to say it would be more loyal to the state than to the fed?

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#225

Post by kelnos »

johncearls wrote: post #154
roywiggins wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He let who knows how many Americans back in from China without testing or quarantining them. Not much of a travel ban.

Quarantining is a fancy word for arrest, with zero cause. There were no "tests" at the time. And finally, thankfully, it is illegal to refuse an American citizen entry to the United States.

A quarantine wouldn't be refusing entry; entry is allowed, but then you must remain isolated for a certain period of time.

> Quarantining is a fancy word for arrest, with zero cause.

I just don't know what to do with statements like these. If you truly believe that there is never any grounds for a health-related quarantine, then I don't think you're going to be able to have a productive discussion on this with most people here; your fundamental beliefs are just too far outside the norm (and outside reality, but that's another issue).

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#226

Post by jeffdavis »

mullingitover wrote: post #14

This is great, and it's a big chunk of population, but I keep feeling like we could do better. For example, these three States could do a great job, but there's nothing stopping a bunch of the other States from bungling it (like, say, ignoring health experts and exempting certain groups from mass gathering restrictions). Then those States end up exporting infectious individuals into the States which are doing things…

It seems like you've essentially given up on the idea of freedom and separation of powers. Perhaps that would yield a better pandemic response (though that depends on the competency of the federal government), but I'm not sure it's worth the cost.

We're talking about forcibly keeping everyone in the country out of church. It's pretty disturbing to give that power to government, even temporarily. How long before it gets applied to other situations after the pandemic dies down?

What's to stop the president in 2030 from saying: "We're facing an epidemic of terrorism by [whoever] so we're keeping them from gathering in public."

Or: "There's an epidemic of [some crime] that uses the internet. We need to control it."

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#227

Post by tathougies »

codys wrote: post #221
tathougies wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My claim on this issue was mainly due to the current administration's relatively pro-state stance in this regard (COVID). I am not insisting that the GOP is universally pro-state. You are right that they are not when it comes to marijuana legalization and some other things (and shame on them for it).

The current administration's position isn't relatively pro-state here though: Trump is on record insisting he can "reopen" the economy over the heads of state governments. The position on "closing down" (that it was up to states) doesn't tell us anything about the administration's principle in regard to COVID because the administration is willing to change those "principles" very quickly, as evidenced by their curren…

That's true that we can't predict what they'll do in the future.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#228

Post by vondur »

btilly wrote: post #195
vondur wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what are the issues with the Federal Government response? I often hear people criticize it, without any concrete examples

Concrete examples. Early in office, Trump got rid of the department created by Obama to respond to pandemics. Early in this epidemic, we bungled getting testing out. Got it out in broken form. Had to get it out again. All the while we turned down an effective test advocated by the WHO. And when testing existed, had rules that tested so little that they missed the existence of community spread until it was well establ…

Wasn't the issues with the initial tests that there weren't accurate and their simply weren't enough to go around? As far as disbanding the Pandemic team, it's not really true, there was a shuffling of who was in charge of it. It was finally transferred to the Vice President. As far as I can tell, the FDA approved an emergency policy to Help Expedite the Availability of Diagnostics on Feb 19th. The US probably has more contact with China due to trade/travel than most other countries. I don't believe the numbers from China, they are sure to be way higher than they report. I don't think the Federal Government really has the ability to shut down a states beaches that aren't Federally managed.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#229

Post by alkonaut »

ambivalents wrote: post #91

Naive question: how is this better than each of these states doing its own thing (even if those things end up looking similar)? What does California gain by teaming up with WA and OR, for example?

Look at the Netherlands and Belgium screaming at each other and threatening to close borders because one felt the other had too little restrictions.

Let’s just say it’s very much bad for your neighborhood of states to have that kind of situation. Closing borders or having diplomatic disasters isn’t worth it. It’s better to reach a common decision.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#230

Post by Thorondor »

danhak wrote: post #48
RandomTisk wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He wanted to shut down travel from China in January, something he got reamed for politically by the media and the left. Damned if you do and all that.

I'm not able to find examples of that. Can you point to any mainstream media outlets "reaming" him over that decision?

Not the person you're replying to, but here are a few examples.

CNN: "Experts say travel restrictions the Trump administration put in place to stop the novel coronavirus from spreading could have unintended consequences that undermine that effort." (https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/07/health/coronavirus-travel-ban...)

The Atlantic: "Guiding Trump’s response is a hardheaded nationalism... Critics from WHO and elsewhere have said the bans are unnecessary and could generate a racist backlash against Chinese people." (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/02/trump-r...)

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