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You’re confusing a constraint of the granted power (time-duration for an emergency action within the social contract) and the constraint of the situation (time-

by dfee 6y ago

You’re confusing a constraint of the granted power (time-duration for an emergency action within the social contract) and the constraint of the situation (time-duration of the virus). No one is arguing whether the virus is on our clock. The argument is whether we’ve granted our governments the right to indefinitely extend their emergency authorizations.

ashtonkem 6y ago
No, I am not confusing the two. I am in fact arguing that limiting the governments powers to fight the pandemic based on time is bad, because it ties our ability to fight the pandemic to a metric that is completely unrelated to successfully fighting the pandemic.
- showdeadtest 6y ago
  I think some would prefer standing up a more democratic process and putting time constraints on the undemocratic processes.
- HideousKojima 6y ago
  That's why you leave it up to duly elected legislatures to decide whether or not to extend the shutdowns created in response to the initial emergency. The legislature could create a reopening plan with specific metrics to follow to determine when that should happen. But the emergency powers that continue to be wielded by executives are an usurpation of democratic rule. The legislatures can and should have formulated a proper reopening plan by May at the latest, and they could have continued to modify it as more information became available.
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    That’s literally a different argument though. “After X days responsibility should transfer from the executive branch to the legislative” is completely different from “the governments ability to take X measures to stop a pandemic should be limited to Y days”. I am only responding to the latter. My fear about the former is the implicit assumption that the legislature won’t also close gyms, bars, and other businesses that a vocal minority want re opened immediately.
    - HideousKojima 6y ago
      >My fear about the former is the implicit assumption that the legislature won’t also close gyms, bars, and other businesses that a vocal minority want re opened immediately. That's the risk and price of democracy and freedom, the people (or their representatives) aren't supposed to do what's best, they're supposed to do what the public wants
      - ashtonkem 6y ago
        No. First of all, we’re a representative democracy. We do not elect people to implement our exact will, we elect people who we expect to use their best judgement to use the powers vested in them. If the expectation was that elected members do exactly what their constituents wanted, we would be a direct democracy instead. Second, I find the notion that “the price of freedom is the risk of just not bothering to solve a pandemic” to be a serious insult to democracy. I question the legitimacy of any democratic system that would just ... not bother to protect citizens. And finally, calls to return to normal represent a narrow minority of the population. In fact a majority of Americans are worried about the virus, a majority wants schools to remain closed, and a majority think we opened back up too soon. If we’re talking about “popular will”, then we would be talking about extending shut downs, not ending them.
        fuzxi 6y ago
        >And finally, calls to return to normal represent a narrow minority of the population. In fact a majority of Americans are worried about the virus, a majority wants schools to remain closed, and a majority think we opened back up too soon. If we’re talking about “popular will”, then we would be talking about extending shut downs, not ending them. Do you have a source for those numbers?
        ashtonkem 6y ago
        https://news.gallup.com/poll/308222/coronavirus-pandemic.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/308222/coronavirus-pandemic.asp... Its interesting because Gallup has shown remarkable consistency in people self isolating. The percentage of the population visiting restaurants, bars, and their friends homes remains down in the mid 20s. Only 34% of Americans have returned to the office, only 5-6% of Americans are going to their place of worship. 5% of Americans have returned to a gym. People are by and large self enforcing the lock down. According to Gallup the percentage of Americans who would return to normal “right now” is 28%. The vast majority of Americans want at least to see case numbers fall first, with sizable groups expecting no new cases in their state (28%) or a vaccine (23%) before returning to normal. 67% of Americans say they will enforce social distancing “for as long as necessary” before their mental health begins to suffer, up 13% since April. The groups shouting about ending the lock down and returning to normal are about 28-30% of the population, according to Gallup.
  - organsnyder 6y ago
    Executives are also elected, and most states (all?) have provisions for extraordinary measures in extraordinary situations. Legislatures are able to override them given sufficient super-majorities. Courts prevent executives from overstepping their authority.
    - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
      >have provisions for extraordinary measures in extraordinary situations. And the legal justification by which those measures apply to a situation that is going on half a year is dubious at best. The legality of those measures themselves is also generally dubious from a constitutional law perspective. Most of them have never been meaningfully challenged because they've mostly been used for short term emergencies at this point. The legislatures need to nut up and to their damn jobs. They've had nearly 6mo at this point.
      - organsnyder 6y ago
        And do what exactly after they "nut up"? Lockdowns and closures to contain the spread of the Covid-19 remain overwhelmingly popular in most areas, and are saving lives.
        throwaway0a5e 6y ago
        Pass bills that says "yo, the governor is actually allowed to do <the current things they're doing> in response to a pandemic" with the usual legal stuff that is used to restrict it to the present situation. I know that doesn't solve the constitutional law aspect but frankly it won't matter for reasons of how the courts work.
    - caseysoftware 6y ago
      > "extraordinary measures in extraordinary situations" That's a key phrase and begs some questions: - Do the "extraordinary measures" have to be proven effective? - Do the "extraordinary measures" have to be proven effective than doing nothing? - Has anyone announced what metrics we're even tracking to determine "effective"? - How long does something have to persist until it's no longer an "extraordinary situation"? - Are the "extraordinary measures" persistent or limited by time, risk, etc? Asking for the War on Poverty, Drugs, Terror, etc, etc.
- michaelt 6y ago
  By speaking in terms of "time-duration for an emergency action within the social contract" compared to "time-duration of the virus" dfee means: You need powers that bypass democratically elected representatives in week 1 of an emergency - but when you get to week 10, there's been plenty of time to get a urgent bill passed by the legislature, so shouldn't the emergency powers have been replaced by an explicit bill? And if such a bill can't be passed - i.e. the person holding emergency powers is using them to do things our elected representatives aren't willing to sign off on - surely that proves how important it is that the powers be limited. (Of course, if you believe our elected representatives would risk killing people to make the other side look bad, or would stuff unrelated pork into the must-pass bill, you might not follow this line of reasoning)

by dfee 6y ago

ashtonkem 6y ago

No, I am not confusing the two. I am in fact arguing that limiting the governments powers to fight the pandemic based on time is bad, because it ties our ability to fight the pandemic to a metric that is completely unrelated to successfully fighting the pandemic.

showdeadtest 6y ago
I think some would prefer standing up a more democratic process and putting time constraints on the undemocratic processes.
HideousKojima 6y ago
That's why you leave it up to duly elected legislatures to decide whether or not to extend the shutdowns created in response to the initial emergency. The legislature could create a reopening plan with specific metrics to follow to determine when that should happen. But the emergency powers that continue to be wielded by executives are an usurpation of democratic rule. The legislatures can and should have formulated a proper reopening plan by May at the latest, and they could have continued to modify it as more information became available.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  That’s literally a different argument though. “After X days responsibility should transfer from the executive branch to the legislative” is completely different from “the governments ability to take X measures to stop a pandemic should be limited to Y days”. I am only responding to the latter. My fear about the former is the implicit assumption that the legislature won’t also close gyms, bars, and other businesses that a vocal minority want re opened immediately.
  - HideousKojima 6y ago
    >My fear about the former is the implicit assumption that the legislature won’t also close gyms, bars, and other businesses that a vocal minority want re opened immediately. That's the risk and price of democracy and freedom, the people (or their representatives) aren't supposed to do what's best, they're supposed to do what the public wants
    - ashtonkem 6y ago
      No. First of all, we’re a representative democracy. We do not elect people to implement our exact will, we elect people who we expect to use their best judgement to use the powers vested in them. If the expectation was that elected members do exactly what their constituents wanted, we would be a direct democracy instead. Second, I find the notion that “the price of freedom is the risk of just not bothering to solve a pandemic” to be a serious insult to democracy. I question the legitimacy of any democratic system that would just ... not bother to protect citizens. And finally, calls to return to normal represent a narrow minority of the population. In fact a majority of Americans are worried about the virus, a majority wants schools to remain closed, and a majority think we opened back up too soon. If we’re talking about “popular will”, then we would be talking about extending shut downs, not ending them.
      - fuzxi 6y ago
        >And finally, calls to return to normal represent a narrow minority of the population. In fact a majority of Americans are worried about the virus, a majority wants schools to remain closed, and a majority think we opened back up too soon. If we’re talking about “popular will”, then we would be talking about extending shut downs, not ending them. Do you have a source for those numbers?
        ashtonkem 6y ago
        https://news.gallup.com/poll/308222/coronavirus-pandemic.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/308222/coronavirus-pandemic.asp... Its interesting because Gallup has shown remarkable consistency in people self isolating. The percentage of the population visiting restaurants, bars, and their friends homes remains down in the mid 20s. Only 34% of Americans have returned to the office, only 5-6% of Americans are going to their place of worship. 5% of Americans have returned to a gym. People are by and large self enforcing the lock down. According to Gallup the percentage of Americans who would return to normal “right now” is 28%. The vast majority of Americans want at least to see case numbers fall first, with sizable groups expecting no new cases in their state (28%) or a vaccine (23%) before returning to normal. 67% of Americans say they will enforce social distancing “for as long as necessary” before their mental health begins to suffer, up 13% since April. The groups shouting about ending the lock down and returning to normal are about 28-30% of the population, according to Gallup.
- organsnyder 6y ago
  Executives are also elected, and most states (all?) have provisions for extraordinary measures in extraordinary situations. Legislatures are able to override them given sufficient super-majorities. Courts prevent executives from overstepping their authority.
  - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
    >have provisions for extraordinary measures in extraordinary situations. And the legal justification by which those measures apply to a situation that is going on half a year is dubious at best. The legality of those measures themselves is also generally dubious from a constitutional law perspective. Most of them have never been meaningfully challenged because they've mostly been used for short term emergencies at this point. The legislatures need to nut up and to their damn jobs. They've had nearly 6mo at this point.
    - organsnyder 6y ago
      And do what exactly after they "nut up"? Lockdowns and closures to contain the spread of the Covid-19 remain overwhelmingly popular in most areas, and are saving lives.
      - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
        Pass bills that says "yo, the governor is actually allowed to do <the current things they're doing> in response to a pandemic" with the usual legal stuff that is used to restrict it to the present situation. I know that doesn't solve the constitutional law aspect but frankly it won't matter for reasons of how the courts work.
  - caseysoftware 6y ago
    > "extraordinary measures in extraordinary situations" That's a key phrase and begs some questions: - Do the "extraordinary measures" have to be proven effective? - Do the "extraordinary measures" have to be proven effective than doing nothing? - Has anyone announced what metrics we're even tracking to determine "effective"? - How long does something have to persist until it's no longer an "extraordinary situation"? - Are the "extraordinary measures" persistent or limited by time, risk, etc? Asking for the War on Poverty, Drugs, Terror, etc, etc.
michaelt 6y ago
By speaking in terms of "time-duration for an emergency action within the social contract" compared to "time-duration of the virus" dfee means: You need powers that bypass democratically elected representatives in week 1 of an emergency - but when you get to week 10, there's been plenty of time to get a urgent bill passed by the legislature, so shouldn't the emergency powers have been replaced by an explicit bill? And if such a bill can't be passed - i.e. the person holding emergency powers is using them to do things our elected representatives aren't willing to sign off on - surely that proves how important it is that the powers be limited. (Of course, if you believe our elected representatives would risk killing people to make the other side look bad, or would stuff unrelated pork into the must-pass bill, you might not follow this line of reasoning)