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Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

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Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#401

Post by potato3732842 »

cthalupa wrote: post #307
rootusrootus wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I probably need to go read the arguments at the time the 17th amendment was adopted, because my inclination is that we should repeal the 17th amendment right along with repealing the PAA. Then the senate can truly represent the States, and we can have representatives who more closely reflect their constituency.

Also perfectly fine with a repeal of the 17th alongside the PAA. I think even with the 17th the Senate still quite closely represents the States so it's less of a priority, but the current status quo for Congress is just insane.

We could also split states.

It could very much be gerrymandered in a way to keep the red-blue balance of power neutral. But it will never happen because the state governments would never give up any power.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#402

Post by insane_dreamer »

tmnvix wrote: post #295
insane_dreamer wrote: post #213

It's absolutely insane how unrelated provisions can be inserted into a CR instead of being debated and passed on their own merits (or bundled with related laws). Regardless of what the measure is, or what party it's coming from, it's a significant flaw in the process.

One man's flaw is another man's feature.

"one man" -> American People; "another man" -> corrupt politicians

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#403

Post by mothballed »

harles wrote: post #380
mothballed wrote: post #46

Even the legal weed state senators were voting for this. It is mostly about shifting profits from mom and pop, low regulation hemp industry to wealthy corporations that own dispensaries that have gargantuan regulatory costs that gatekeep out most the competition. This ensures profits are captured by the wealthy rather than small family type setups. Wealthy former hemp companies will shift to the "legal" weed market,…

> It is mostly about shifting profits from mom and pop, low regulation hemp industry to wealthy corporations that own dispensaries that have gargantuan regulatory costs that gatekeep out most the competition. That’s a big assertion that needs evidence. I’m strongly in favor of legalization but not deregulation. It was a pretty big loophole that allowed what’s essentially weed to sidestep the regulation their competit…

We are speaking of federal law here.

There was absolutely no federal regulatory framework for marijuana. none. It's just plain illegal. Unless you can get one of a handful of research licenses, which is almost totally irrelevant.

Hemp had some, fairly weak regulation. And theoretically, testing requirements, although they were deferred and deferred to the point they were basically done only privately with the idea the DEA would eventually get involved.

Instead they're just dumped now into the marijuana bucket which has no federal regulation at all, or alternatively, at the state level the states could always define their regulatory framework to be agnostic to THC content of cannabis.

So this does the exact opposite of what you had hoped.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#404

Post by Terr_ »

cthalupa wrote: post #215
giantg2 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Of course the voters who have much more political power than is fair," Who determines what is fair? Why is it not fair for each state to have equal representation? "This point is always brought up as if it's inherently bad for rural concerns to get overruled by urban ones, but TOTALLY FINE if urban concerns get overruled by rural ones." The urban ones have more power in the house as that chamber is designed to repre…

The problem with this argument is the Permanent Apportionment Act. The House is more representative of the people than the Senate, but capping the size means that as it stands lower population states still receive an outsized amount of power per capita in the House vs. more populous states. As electoral votes are based on Congressional representatives across the two chambers, this also means they have outsized impact…

> The deck is stacked in favor of rural states in too many places for it to be balanced.

As a technical quibble, the mechanics have nothing to do with rural-vs-urban, but low-vs-high population chunks. I mention it mainly because there's a certain bloc that argues farmers deserve extra votes for dumb reasons.

One could theoretically carve up any major metropolitan area into a bunch of new states that would be the same population as Wyoming and 100% urban, and they'd still get Wyoming's disproportionate representation.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#405

Post by unethical_ban »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #389

Where'd all this abolish the senate nonsense come from recently? I get people have been complaining about 'flyover' states for a while now, but the Republicans also have the majority in the House at the moment. At least wait until the House doesn't represent the current majority party in the Senate (like it almost certainly will again eventually) to make that argument. I'm mildly worried that it's just an attempt to…

I don't know what you're talking about, since abolishing the Senate (or at least making it the lesser of the two bodies) is anything but nonsense.

edit: Since I cannot respond due to throttling, I agree with the below idea of statewide house races, but by doing Proportional representation and a ranked/approval voting system.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#406

Post by giantg2 »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #379
giantg2 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Of course the voters who have much more political power than is fair," Who determines what is fair? Why is it not fair for each state to have equal representation? "This point is always brought up as if it's inherently bad for rural concerns to get overruled by urban ones, but TOTALLY FINE if urban concerns get overruled by rural ones." The urban ones have more power in the house as that chamber is designed to repre…

If you conceive of democracy as a mechanism to allow individuals to have a role in choosing their leaders (and thus policy decisions), then any part of that mechanism that allows some individuals to have more of a role than others is inherently undemocratic, and thus (if you consider democracy to be good) unfair. If instead you consider our system of government to just be a bunch of hacks to come up with leaders and…

"If you conceive of democracy as a mechanism to allow individuals to have a role in choosing their leaders (and thus policy decisions), then any part of that mechanism that allows some individuals to have more of a role than others is inherently undemocratic, and thus (if you consider democracy to be good) unfair."

Not exactly. We are a democratic republic of states. You don't have to be an direct democracy to have benefits or be fair (under your argument, anything less than a direct democracy creates uneven power for an individual voter). To be fair to the states that joined the country, they each got equal voting rights in the senate. Again, the senate is supposed to represent states' interests and not the direct people's.

"For myself, the idea that "the state of Wyoming" deserves any sort of political representation above and beyond what the individual residents of Wyoming deserve is obviously non-sensical. But then I believe in democracy ..."

That's the first amendment right to organize - petiton for statehood, form cities, etc. You can set your own laws for your area. The federal level is not supposed to hold excessive power over any state of any size,bit nobody cares about the 10th amendment.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#407

Post by hattmall »

dashundchen wrote: post #305
hattmall wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a very idealistic idea. The reality is that some people / land area are simply far more important than others. It's not to say that the individual themselves is more meaningful as a matter of state, but there positioning, role in society etc simply carries more raw value than others. The US is huge and you have a major divide from the producers and the benefiters, the most critical components of the US…

I disagree with your premise that agricultural and extraction workers have some higher intrinsic value compared to urban dwellers, but even if you accept that premise, it is immediately undermined by California. California is an both a service economy and agricultural powerhouse, the number one producer of agricultural value in the US by far. Other states with heavily urbanized populations like like Texas, Illinois,…

>I disagree with your premise that agricultural and extraction workers have some higher intrinsic value compared to urban dwellers

Ok, which would you rather forgo for a month / a year / a lifetime? The output of a city, or the food and energy outputs of the rural areas.

I don't see how California is undermining anything. California has a lot of both rural and urban areas like many states, that doesn't change the premise and California is known for bending over backwards and taking a lot of detrimental actions to support their agricultural industry.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#408

Post by micromacrofoot »

goatlover wrote: post #377
micromacrofoot wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean like the current president that has been skipping over congress for a number of things, and the supreme court that has been doing little to stop him? Our institutions aren't failing they've already failed .

And that can change over the next couple of elections. What the current regime would like is for the electorate to think Congress is useless and not bother voting the majority out of power. There's already enough apathetic and disaffected voters who think voting doesn't matter.

Congress is directly responsible for causing this problem. Elections aren't going to change it because they redistrict to prevent it. They're a bunch of elites only interested in enriching themselves and holding office until they die. True regardless of party.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#409

Post by mring33621 »

giantg2 wrote: post #142
mjamesaustin wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course the voters who have much more political power than is fair, would be unhappy if we transitioned to a system where all voters have an equal amount of political power. This point is always brought up as if it's inherently bad for rural concerns to get overruled by urban ones, but TOTALLY FINE if urban concerns get overruled by rural ones. Our current system is a crazy double standard, and inherently unfair.

"Of course the voters who have much more political power than is fair," Who determines what is fair? Why is it not fair for each state to have equal representation? "This point is always brought up as if it's inherently bad for rural concerns to get overruled by urban ones, but TOTALLY FINE if urban concerns get overruled by rural ones." The urban ones have more power in the house as that chamber is designed to repre…

The problem is that the number of house members per state is capped, which results in more-populous states having less influence per-capita than less-populous states. So, in a way, more-populous states are disadvantaged in both the house and senate.

Re: Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill

#410

Post by unethical_ban »

rootusrootus wrote: post #374
tehjoker wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The senate was explicitly designed to provide a brake on the democratic aspirations of the lower classes by the founders. American government is a system of baffles designed to frustrate democratic will and preserve the property and political control of elites. The senate should be abolished along with the undemocratic supreme court (as currently constituted with lifetime appointments and the ability to overrule cong…

> ability to overrule congress at a whim That can be stopped easily enough. The Constitution makes it clear that Congress is the ultimate source of power; the SCOTUS power of judicial review was granted to itself by itself. Congress can (and has, a few times, though not often) make legislation not subject to judicial review.

The problem is that it is far, far more difficult for the legislature to "fix" a decision by SCOTUS than it is for SCOTUS to "fix" an unconstitutional law.

Supermajorities in both houses + 3/4 of the states is unlikely to ever happen again unless we face an existential threat or civil conflict.

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