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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

#311

Post by triceratops »

blaser-waffle wrote: post #308
triceratops wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Remember that the "states rights" movement started as a response to federal action to end segregation. It's way older and more sinister than that. States' rights was first used to justify the continuation and expansion of the institution of slavery. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_the_American_Civil_...

States Rights go back to even before that, to the original Articles of Confederation and Constitution. Until the US Constitution was ratified the behavior of the union was closer to the EU than the current US government, and the bigger, more powerful states (NY, VA) didn't like giving up their sovereignty. States Rights was dug up before the Civil War as a continuation of that argument, this time in the context of sl…

> States Rights go back to even before that, to the original Articles of Confederation and Constitution.

Ah right, I'd forgotten about that. IIRC "What can the federal government do?" was a key question that divided Jeffersonians and Federalists.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#312

Post by lisper »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #280
lisper wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me be more precise: if you're a Republican politician or a civil servant you are not allowed to say anything negative about Trump and hope to keep your job. If you are a Democratic politician you are not allowed to say anything negative about Trump without risking the loss of federal money and resources that you would otherwise receive. Anyone else is, of course, free to say whatever they want. (For the time bein…

I don't know for sure, but I wonder if the Republican governor of a state like Massachusetts feels that way. He might get more votes if he spoke against Trump than if he didn't.

He would lose to a Trump-supported Republican primary challenger.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#313

Post by roywiggins »

ummwhat wrote: post #290
johncearls wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

>Quarantining is a fancy word for arrest, with zero cause. There is probable cause. You probably have the virus. Spreading it around is negligent manslaughter. This court sentences you to two weeks in a hotel.

That's not quite right. Quarantine is a kind of civil detention. You have habeus corpus rights but you aren't accused of a crime and the probable cause standard doesn't apply. There's a standard- it's not zilch- but it's not the same as criminal detention.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#314

Post by AnimalMuppet »

lisper wrote: post #312
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know for sure, but I wonder if the Republican governor of a state like Massachusetts feels that way. He might get more votes if he spoke against Trump than if he didn't.

He would lose to a Trump-supported Republican primary challenger.

He might. Not this year, though - the 2020 Massachusetts primary is history. And four years from now, will Trump care enough to support a primary challenger? Will Republicans care what gubernatorial candidate Trump supports?

I mean, I guess if your ambition is to hold office for decades, then you might be concerned. But the downside seems minimal to me. (But then, I'm neither in politics nor in Massachusetts, so what do I know?)

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#315

Post by xapata »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #137
xapata wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nonplussed It seems nonplussed has two, almost contradictory definitions: 1. (of a person) surprised and confused so much that they are unsure how to react. 2. (of a person) not disconcerted; unperturbed. The latter is an "informal" definition. This seems to be the process by which the word awful switched from meaning awe-inspiring to the opposite.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nonplussed unsure about what to say, think, or do : perplexed chiefly US : not bothered, surprised, or impressed by something I'm an American. "Not impressed" is the closest thing I am seeing to what I was trying to convey. Unmoved might be a good substitute word in this case.

I'm an American, too. It's funny that those Merriam-Webster definitions are so mild. I've always "known" nonplussed to indicate a fairly extreme state, like gobsmacked.

I quoted definitions from Google's search snippet.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#316

Post by mrb »

vondur wrote: post #120
mrb wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, this Western States Pact is a result of lack of leadership at the White House and federal level. They feel the US government is not doing enough, so they took the matter into their own hands.

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

Just one example:

The US federal government waited until mid-March to order N95 respirators: https://apnews.com/090600c299a8cf07f5b44d92534856bc

Other governments acted much more quickly, for example Australia started doing so on February 7: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanres/article/PIIS2213-2...

The US government, in particular Trump, is responsible for this delayed response.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#317

Post by kelnos »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #285
kelnos wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm generally worried about this sort of thing as well, and wish people were looking into this. However, we have pretty good estimates on how many people will die if we don't shelter and isolate, and I think that trumps what would inevitably be some very vague guesses as to how many people might die as side effects of sheltering and isolation. And regardless, many of those potential deaths could be preventable with t…

> we have pretty good estimates on how many people will die if we don't shelter and isolate This is a fantastic point/rebuttal and has helped shift my perspective somewhat. We can do things about tomorrow's suicides, heart attacks and diabetes later, though not too too much later.

Right, I think it's a "one thing at a time" sort of situation. Like: we have a clear problem with a potential solution that will mitigate the problem immediately. That solution may create other problems, but we do have some time (though, as you suggest, not a lot) to try to fix that up after dealing with the first problem.

Re: California, Oregon and Washington announce western states pact

#318

Post by kelnos »

xref wrote: post #294
kelnos wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Add "not allowed to pump your own gas" to the list of "things that are completely unnecessary and stupid that have been removed because of COVID-19 and never need to come back".

It’s a job creation/protection play, like grocery stores where the union won’t allow self-checkout. No idea if the law is achieving its goals or if it just exists because of historical inertia now, but that’s why it exists.

Oh, I know why it exists (I grew up in New Jersey, which has [had?] similar laws); I'm just reiterating that it exists for stupid reasons.
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