Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 1001 posts

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#191

Post by radford-neal »

civilized wrote: post #41

This is a silly decision. I don't respect the reasoning at all. If Republicans want to abolish the EPA, all they have to do is pass a law. They could do it with a simple majority in each House if they abolish the filibuster (which itself requires only a simple majority). There is no meaningful loss of democratic control here. Congress can do whatever it wants, with or without the EPA. This is just the highest court i…

For a law to be passed in the US, it must be approved by the House, the Senate, and the President. For a law to be repealed in the US, the repeal must also be approved by the House, the Senate, and the President. So there will often be situations where it matters what the current law is - whenever these three components of the system do not agree, so that the current law will not be changed. In such a situation, it is not supposed to be the case that the President (in control of the executive branch) can unilaterally decide that the current law is whatever they want it to be.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#192

Post by matthewdgreen »

xpe wrote: post #40
xthrowawayxx wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a good thing that laws can't pass without sufficient consensus. If you can bypass consensus for the greater good then so can the other side.

This statement is an obvious assumption of democracy. Am I missing something more?

The key word here is "sufficient consensus." Your judgement of sufficiency is a personal opinion.

I could, for example, define "sufficient consensus" as requiring that all laws require a 90% supermajority in the Senate. Or I could reduce this to 50% of the Senate. Alternatively I could reform Congress so that lawmaking requires voting totals representing 50% of the population.

Each of these is one possible version of "sufficient consensus", and still none of them actually matches the version we actually have. What is clear is that the sclerotic nature of today's Congress is problematic, and it's doing a great deal to undermine faith in our democratic system.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#193

Post by yieldcrv »

seoaeu wrote: post #161
yieldcrv wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's too complicated for most people. Although it does pain me to see people using their energy so ineffectively. Protester: "6 unelected officials can't decide what I can do!" Supreme Court: "That's literally what we just said!" If Congress punts issues around indefinitely for its own political wheeling and dealing, it still cannot outsource a decision on those issues to other branches of the federal government. W…

> Protester: "6 unelected officials can't decide what I can do!" > Supreme Court: "That's literally what we just said!" Bullshit. The court was perfectly happy telling millions of people they had no right to an abortion. They’re just a bunch of partisan hacks

that is a very popular perspective, which reinforces exactly what I said about it being too complicated for people.

Congress outsourced the decision to the judicial branch, the judicial branch said its for the elected representatives, aka Congress, to decide. Barring any supremacy from Congress, state laws and the consensus mechanisms of those states are the only laws available.

Congress outsourced emissions decision to the executive branch, the judicial branch said its for the elected representatives, aka Congress, to decide. Barring any supremacy from Congress, state laws and the consensus mechanisms of those states are the only laws available.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#194

Post by xpe »

scifibestfi wrote: post #83
qalmakka wrote: post #14

The fact that people can't see that the conservatives are basically advocating worldwide for short term economic growth in exchange for basically our future is appalling to me. I am afraid we will see an immense amount of instability, increased poverty, mass migrations and authoritarian regimes rising up due to the fact that we couldn't manage to convince people that those parties do not care about them. In a previou…

This sounds like GPT-3 trained on partisan talking points. If it's not, isn't it weird that you didn't notice that Democrats keep promising to codify Roe but never do? They had 40 years!! If they solved the problem, they wouldn't have that to campaign on and raise money with. Keep people enraged to get their vote. You're spot on about that, but it's how both parties operate. Never solve the problem so it'll be there…

One part of what you say is largely true: fear motivates in the short term more than many other techniques.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#195

Post by arjas-mva »

ohboii20202 wrote: post #80

It's time to de-sanctify the Supreme Court. I really don't like having this unelected councils of wizards who get wield god-like "authority"-- it feels a bit gross in a democracy. I 'get it' w/ respect BrownvBoard, Miranda, etc, but at least in my lifetime the court hasn't done much to expand or protect my rights. Greatest hits from them are weird election cases (Florida 2000) making it easier for really shadowy/fuck…

> gross in a democracy.

It is happening at the state level too. In Wisconsin, the gerrymandered (google it for background on Wisconsin) legislature has chosen to not conduct hearings on governor appointees, with the result that holdovers from prior administrations can remain in office indefinitely.

""(T)he expiration of Prehn's term on the DNR Board does not create a vacancy. Prehn lawfully retains his position on the DNR Board as a holdover," wrote Chief Justice Annette Ziegler for the majority. "Therefore, the Governor cannot make a provisional appointment to replace Prehn." [1]

[1] https://www.wpr.org/wisconsin-supreme-court-rules-former-hea...

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#196

Post by Miner49er »

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #177
Miner49er wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is impossible to keep partisanship out of the court, so it is a lot like a second version of Congress.

We managed for hundreds of years.

Not everyone thinks so: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/04/03/the-suprem...

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#197

Post by brodouevencode »

itslennysfault wrote: post #7

These guys are on a roll. Yesterday was giving states legal rights over indigenous nations. Today this. I was already planning to expat soon, but this all makes me want to try to hurry that timeline. Sorry to those of you that are stuck in this hellscape.

No post body was provided.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#198

Post by camgunz »

brodouevencode wrote: post #75
jrochkind1 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you see a blow to the chevron deference doctrine as a good thing? I'd say that the doctrine properly tries to keep the supreme court, the least democratically responsible branch of US federal government, from being the most powerful of the three branches of government.

> being the most powerful of the three branches of government. By pushing the responsibility to lifelong bureaucrats? I honestly don't see a difference there.

The "lifelong bureaucrats" are typically (but not always, see the CDC) policy and subject matter experts.

Chevron deference's main purpose is to free Congress from writing exhaustive laws. If the executive branch does something Congress doesn't like, they can change the law and make it more specific. Of course Congress does almost nothing, so when you say it has to take legislative action to regulate something, what you're effectively doing is deregulating it.

This decision follows more from the Court where they pick and choose what they doom in this way based on their personal politics, contrary to precedent and reliance interests.

We shouldn't think too hard about what this Court does; it's a nakedly ideological power grab that's the endgame of a generation long effort by Conservatives to control the US through the court as they slide further and further into permanent minority status. Future generations will look back on this era as one of infamy.

Post reply on HN