11 ms·

NY Governor stalls right-to-repair bill; has until Dec 28 to avoid “pocket veto”

177 points by danuker 4y ago

eatonphil 4y ago
> The final version of the bill received rare bipartisan support, passing the state assembly 147–2 and the senate 59–4. The bill was delivered to the governor Friday, according to the New York Senate's bill tracker, though she has been considering it since late June. With such a majority surely they can override a veto? So the problem is more that it will need to happen in a new session from scratch (for some definition of scratch)?
- dataflow 4y ago
  My understanding is the reason it hasn't passed is that each entity has dragged its feet and then bounced it onto the other one for stalling (not just in NY). Passing bills in one chamber and having it sit there in the other - or in both chambers, but pocket vetoed - is a common tactic for these things. So it might look like it's close to passing but in reality who knows how far it is.
- LanceH 4y ago
  > With such a majority surely they can override a veto? Not necessarily. You have to look at votes a bit more cynically. There are generally no surprise votes in the house and senate. A 51-49 vote that passes may actually have a lot more people who would vote "yes" if they had to, but some can vote against to pay lip service to their constituents. They can go back to their district and say, "I tried to stop this bill" when they knew it would pass. Votes are regularly trade on this bases. Sometimes a party is ok with a bill not going through and "just enough" will defect from the party to kill it. Note how many votes in the senate are decided by a single senator -- even in years when the senate is not so closely divided by party. They know the numbers before it comes to the floors. With such overwhelming numbers, presumably it could pass a veto if they had the political will. Or they can just throw their hands up and say, "we tried, it's not our fault it didn't pass." Or some nuance in the bill will come out that makes in "unfeasible" to pass in the veto override. Then it goes back to committee never to be seen again, and definitely not in passable form. In short, don't view the vote on a bill as strictly a popularity vote on the bill's merits. Every actor involved has their own agenda, and to some, voting on the bill is just a way to build a favor or pay back a debt.
  - PM_me_your_math 4y ago
    "Every actor involved has their own agenda, and to some, voting on the bill is just a way to build a favor or pay back a debt." Which is one of the many reasons why we need term limits for each and every politician.
    - brewdad 4y ago
      Term limits don't matter when the politicians are in the pockets of billionaire donors. (Pick your preferred boogeyman Thiel or Soros). In fact, they can make things worse as now a Representative needs to ensure he or she has their lobbying job lined up for when they can longer run for re-election.
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      That just means a bunch of newbies dependent on deep-pocketed support for their first campaigns, and it'd be one of the few scenarios in which we punish job experience. For example: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/19/nyregion/george-santos-ny-republicans.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/19/nyregion/george-santos-ny...
    - llbeansandrice 4y ago
      I don’t understand why people think term limits will work. Now you just have a revolving door of people that are in the pockets of special interest groups. I’ve never seen a convincing argument for term limits and I don’t think they should exist. If you have a good representative they should be able to stay in that job for as long as the electorate wants. Your qualms are with other parts of the election process like first past the post and inability to recall reps when they’re no longer doing their job well.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  There is no veto. Ars had a writer who is an advocate for an issue write a news story about said issue, and completely screw up the key facts of the story. Instead of pulling the story, they made a “correction” that renders the whole thing moot. Ars should really be embarrassed by the shitshow.
photochemsyn 4y ago
This is yet another example of why direct referendums are a powerful mechanism for bypassing paid-off politicians who act on behalf of a few oligarchs to block popular policy changes.
- ISL 4y ago
  Direct referenda solve this particular problem, but create other conflicts: Referendum 1: the State shall not raise taxes in any way without a vote of the people. Referendum 2: the State shall fully fund the education of children living in the State
  - noworld 4y ago
    Referendum 2 sounds a little like a vote of the people to raise taxes.
    - sidlls 4y ago
      It isn't, though, and in fact often such referendums can't be funded through taxes because of referendums like the other one in the comment you responded to. So what happens is other programs suffer.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - asah 4y ago
        AFAICT, that's the point.
  - CuriouslyC 4y ago
    That's only a problem if you can't cut other services.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- TheRealPomax 4y ago
passwordoops 4y ago
- engineer_22 4y ago
  In New York one party rules state government so there is a long leash on bad behavior.
- godzillabrennus 4y ago
  The United States has always been a constitutional republic not a straight democracy.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- M95D 4y ago
  > My friends, you have ceased living in a democracy You're late. It was proven by science/statistics a long time ago: https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746
  - Karunamon 4y ago
    And like most statistics, they can be read to support almost any conclusion you want. A deeper dive on that study shows that it's not really that simple, or that distressing: https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-study https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-... Important quote: America is an imperfect democracy, in other words — but it's hardly an oligarchy. When the rich and middle class disagree, each wins about half the time.
    - hedora 4y ago
      The people that wrote that article don't address claims of the original study. They cite academic work that divides the country into four groups: the middle class, the rich, business interests and non-business interests. (This is not a covering set, which is already a red flag.) They show the rich and middle class agree on bill outcomes the vast majority of the time, with a 10% spread when they don't (e.g., 45% - 55%, from the article). As an example, they point out the rich are more supportive of public campaign financing than the middle class. This is a second red flag: It is unlikely that people that use their money to influence legislative outcomes are more supportive of banning the practice than the general population. The original study claimed that (1) lobbyists and oligarchs are basically writing legislation and deciding who gets elected, and (2) there is no correlation between popular opinion and actions of congress. You can't rebut that by claiming that the 90-99% usually agree with the 50-90%, and congress doesn't really seem to favor one of those groups' opinions over the other. It is as though I said that, once confounding factors are accounted for, there's no correlation between listening to rock music and catching cancer, and the rebuttal comes back as "Well, Eagles fans and Jay-Z fans both get lots of cancer, but half the outlier cancers are more common amongst Hotel California fans, so electric guitars must be carcinogens!" To rebut the original claim, the academic study would need to either reproduce the original study (showing statistical irreproducibility) or dive into causality. They could look into the actions / opinions of lobbyists and people like the Koch brothers, Soros and the ULine family. The could trace how many line items those groups are sneaking into bills, and whether the popularity of the line item matters at all to its success. (Hint: Most voters don't form an opinion on section 1.35.2.456.63356-b that was introduced at 2am the night before the 10,000 page military appropriations was passed by voice vote.) Anyway, the damage control piece was an interesting read. Thanks for the link.
bonyt 4y ago
Looks like the article has an important update: > (Update, 10:50 a.m., 12/20/2022: Given that the NY legislature is technically never out of session in modern times, inaction by the governor on the bill after 10 days would make a passed but not signed bill a law. The original post originally suggested an out-of-session process. Ars regrets the error regarding New York's otherwise completely straightforward legislative system.) > The governor has 10 days to act on the bill after Friday's delivery, or until midnight on Dec. 28. Failing to act with either a signature or a veto will make the bill become law. The bill was originally introduced in 2021, so it cannot be easily re-introduced during the next session and would have to be re-drafted and submitted.
- throw7 4y ago
  So she has until the 28th to veto it or it becomes law. I'm more interested in the details... from the scant info in the OP, it sounds like not much. Meaning, drivers in linux (and other foss os's) such as video, ethernet, wi-fi, etc. aren't gonna see any change. Be happy to hear otherwise though.
  - squarefoot 4y ago
    A beer says the veto will come on Dec 24th, when everyone is busy with Xmas related things for a couple days and attention is lowered.
- nabakin 4y ago
  Usually when publications make gross errors like this, they don't care or silently fix their articles. Ars noticed they were wrong and added a notice explaining how they were wrong. I've always considered Ars to be one of the better news sites out there but this increases my respect for them
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    The headline and subheadline should be updated, though. Plenty of folks won't even read the first paragraph, and they'll show up on all the social media share widgets when people share the link.
willcipriano 4y ago
> Given that the NY legislature is technically never out of session in modern times, inaction by the governor on the bill after 10 days would make a passed but not signed bill a law. The original post originally suggested an out-of-session process. Ars regrets the error regarding New York's otherwise completely straightforward legislative system Waiting is the same as signing it seems? So whats the plan here? Veto at the last second over the holidays and hope nobody notices?
- hedora 4y ago
  Messaging and managing perceptions is important for politicians (it's almost the entire job -- legislators should have aids that research and draft bills, and some of America's best presidents were known for delegating well, then practicing their golf swing for 4 years). By not signing, if this bill ends up being a shit-show, then during her next campaign, she can say she didn't support it, but didn't want to block popular opinion. If she does a last second veto, then her popularity will take a hit, but whoever forces the veto will continue to support her next election. I have no idea which of the two paths will be taken, or what back room negotiations are at play. On the veto path, she might be tightening the proverbial thumb screws in exchange for campaign donations, or she might be executing according to the schedule of some high-paid corporate PR firm. It's even possible she thinks right-to-repair will be a shit-show for the state, and will veto it for that reason. If she wants to continue to be governor, then it's crucial that we never know which of the above is true. See also: The dictator's handbook.
cokeandpepsi 4y ago
- seanw444 4y ago
  Preventing waste and unnecessary spending is a good thing. Repairing your own stuff, and keeping it as an heirloom to pass on to your children, was the norm. Making things literally as hard to fix as possible is only a very recent concept. And a universally harmful one, too.
  - rob74 4y ago
    But... consumption! growth! You have to throw away things and buy new ones (preferably twice as many things as you threw away), otherwise the economy will take a nosedive!
- godzillabrennus 4y ago
  Adam Smith would disagree.
- Spivak 4y ago
  Growth that is based on artificial consumption isn't real growth and isn't real economic output. It might make your stock numbers go up but it is bad in the long run if we delude ourselves into thinking that cannibalizing our own wealth in the form of trash is growth.
- flerchin 4y ago
  Funny!
- km3r 4y ago
  How is 'right to repair' in any way related to a bear market?
  - hedora 4y ago
    “This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much all of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.” ― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
mistrial9 4y ago
side-note: while investigating the E * Waste world news a while ago, an important California announcement was made, co-sponsored by Goodwill (established charity). SF Mayor Gavin "perfect hairgel" Newsom spoke. As a nerd and quite well read on the topic, I expected vapid or hand-waving sorts of statements at the media event. not so .. GNewsom spoke clearly and with detail, showed contextual understanding and also on important details. I was surprised. This E*Waste and consumer-rights topic is far from settled.
exabrial 4y ago
Context: Kathy Hochul, Democrat, Cuomo’s replacement after sexual misconduct allegations.
- Pigalowda 4y ago
  It's turdles all the way down

177 points by danuker 4y ago

> The final version of the bill received rare bipartisan support, passing the state assembly 147–2 and the senate 59–4. The bill was delivered to the governor Friday, according to the New York Senate's bill tracker, though she has been considering it since late June. With such a majority surely they can override a veto? So the problem is more that it will need to happen in a new session from scratch (for some definition of scratch)?

dataflow 4y ago
My understanding is the reason it hasn't passed is that each entity has dragged its feet and then bounced it onto the other one for stalling (not just in NY). Passing bills in one chamber and having it sit there in the other - or in both chambers, but pocket vetoed - is a common tactic for these things. So it might look like it's close to passing but in reality who knows how far it is.
LanceH 4y ago
> With such a majority surely they can override a veto? Not necessarily. You have to look at votes a bit more cynically. There are generally no surprise votes in the house and senate. A 51-49 vote that passes may actually have a lot more people who would vote "yes" if they had to, but some can vote against to pay lip service to their constituents. They can go back to their district and say, "I tried to stop this bill" when they knew it would pass. Votes are regularly trade on this bases. Sometimes a party is ok with a bill not going through and "just enough" will defect from the party to kill it. Note how many votes in the senate are decided by a single senator -- even in years when the senate is not so closely divided by party. They know the numbers before it comes to the floors. With such overwhelming numbers, presumably it could pass a veto if they had the political will. Or they can just throw their hands up and say, "we tried, it's not our fault it didn't pass." Or some nuance in the bill will come out that makes in "unfeasible" to pass in the veto override. Then it goes back to committee never to be seen again, and definitely not in passable form. In short, don't view the vote on a bill as strictly a popularity vote on the bill's merits. Every actor involved has their own agenda, and to some, voting on the bill is just a way to build a favor or pay back a debt.
- PM_me_your_math 4y ago
  "Every actor involved has their own agenda, and to some, voting on the bill is just a way to build a favor or pay back a debt." Which is one of the many reasons why we need term limits for each and every politician.
  - brewdad 4y ago
    Term limits don't matter when the politicians are in the pockets of billionaire donors. (Pick your preferred boogeyman Thiel or Soros). In fact, they can make things worse as now a Representative needs to ensure he or she has their lobbying job lined up for when they can longer run for re-election.
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    That just means a bunch of newbies dependent on deep-pocketed support for their first campaigns, and it'd be one of the few scenarios in which we punish job experience. For example: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/19/nyregion/george-santos-ny-republicans.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/19/nyregion/george-santos-ny...
  - llbeansandrice 4y ago
    I don’t understand why people think term limits will work. Now you just have a revolving door of people that are in the pockets of special interest groups. I’ve never seen a convincing argument for term limits and I don’t think they should exist. If you have a good representative they should be able to stay in that job for as long as the electorate wants. Your qualms are with other parts of the election process like first past the post and inability to recall reps when they’re no longer doing their job well.
Spooky23 4y ago
There is no veto. Ars had a writer who is an advocate for an issue write a news story about said issue, and completely screw up the key facts of the story. Instead of pulling the story, they made a “correction” that renders the whole thing moot. Ars should really be embarrassed by the shitshow.

photochemsyn 4y ago

This is yet another example of why direct referendums are a powerful mechanism for bypassing paid-off politicians who act on behalf of a few oligarchs to block popular policy changes.

ISL 4y ago
Direct referenda solve this particular problem, but create other conflicts: Referendum 1: the State shall not raise taxes in any way without a vote of the people. Referendum 2: the State shall fully fund the education of children living in the State
- noworld 4y ago
  Referendum 2 sounds a little like a vote of the people to raise taxes.
  - sidlls 4y ago
    It isn't, though, and in fact often such referendums can't be funded through taxes because of referendums like the other one in the comment you responded to. So what happens is other programs suffer.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - asah 4y ago
      AFAICT, that's the point.
- CuriouslyC 4y ago
  That's only a problem if you can't cut other services.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
TheRealPomax 4y ago

passwordoops 4y ago

engineer_22 4y ago
In New York one party rules state government so there is a long leash on bad behavior.
godzillabrennus 4y ago
The United States has always been a constitutional republic not a straight democracy.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
M95D 4y ago
> My friends, you have ceased living in a democracy You're late. It was proven by science/statistics a long time ago: https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746
- Karunamon 4y ago
  And like most statistics, they can be read to support almost any conclusion you want. A deeper dive on that study shows that it's not really that simple, or that distressing: https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-study https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-... Important quote: America is an imperfect democracy, in other words — but it's hardly an oligarchy. When the rich and middle class disagree, each wins about half the time.
  - hedora 4y ago
    The people that wrote that article don't address claims of the original study. They cite academic work that divides the country into four groups: the middle class, the rich, business interests and non-business interests. (This is not a covering set, which is already a red flag.) They show the rich and middle class agree on bill outcomes the vast majority of the time, with a 10% spread when they don't (e.g., 45% - 55%, from the article). As an example, they point out the rich are more supportive of public campaign financing than the middle class. This is a second red flag: It is unlikely that people that use their money to influence legislative outcomes are more supportive of banning the practice than the general population. The original study claimed that (1) lobbyists and oligarchs are basically writing legislation and deciding who gets elected, and (2) there is no correlation between popular opinion and actions of congress. You can't rebut that by claiming that the 90-99% usually agree with the 50-90%, and congress doesn't really seem to favor one of those groups' opinions over the other. It is as though I said that, once confounding factors are accounted for, there's no correlation between listening to rock music and catching cancer, and the rebuttal comes back as "Well, Eagles fans and Jay-Z fans both get lots of cancer, but half the outlier cancers are more common amongst Hotel California fans, so electric guitars must be carcinogens!" To rebut the original claim, the academic study would need to either reproduce the original study (showing statistical irreproducibility) or dive into causality. They could look into the actions / opinions of lobbyists and people like the Koch brothers, Soros and the ULine family. The could trace how many line items those groups are sneaking into bills, and whether the popularity of the line item matters at all to its success. (Hint: Most voters don't form an opinion on section 1.35.2.456.63356-b that was introduced at 2am the night before the 10,000 page military appropriations was passed by voice vote.) Anyway, the damage control piece was an interesting read. Thanks for the link.

bonyt 4y ago

Looks like the article has an important update: > (Update, 10:50 a.m., 12/20/2022: Given that the NY legislature is technically never out of session in modern times, inaction by the governor on the bill after 10 days would make a passed but not signed bill a law. The original post originally suggested an out-of-session process. Ars regrets the error regarding New York's otherwise completely straightforward legislative system.) > The governor has 10 days to act on the bill after Friday's delivery, or until midnight on Dec. 28. Failing to act with either a signature or a veto will make the bill become law. The bill was originally introduced in 2021, so it cannot be easily re-introduced during the next session and would have to be re-drafted and submitted.

throw7 4y ago
So she has until the 28th to veto it or it becomes law. I'm more interested in the details... from the scant info in the OP, it sounds like not much. Meaning, drivers in linux (and other foss os's) such as video, ethernet, wi-fi, etc. aren't gonna see any change. Be happy to hear otherwise though.
- squarefoot 4y ago
  A beer says the veto will come on Dec 24th, when everyone is busy with Xmas related things for a couple days and attention is lowered.
nabakin 4y ago
Usually when publications make gross errors like this, they don't care or silently fix their articles. Ars noticed they were wrong and added a notice explaining how they were wrong. I've always considered Ars to be one of the better news sites out there but this increases my respect for them
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  The headline and subheadline should be updated, though. Plenty of folks won't even read the first paragraph, and they'll show up on all the social media share widgets when people share the link.

willcipriano 4y ago

> Given that the NY legislature is technically never out of session in modern times, inaction by the governor on the bill after 10 days would make a passed but not signed bill a law. The original post originally suggested an out-of-session process. Ars regrets the error regarding New York's otherwise completely straightforward legislative system Waiting is the same as signing it seems? So whats the plan here? Veto at the last second over the holidays and hope nobody notices?

hedora 4y ago
Messaging and managing perceptions is important for politicians (it's almost the entire job -- legislators should have aids that research and draft bills, and some of America's best presidents were known for delegating well, then practicing their golf swing for 4 years). By not signing, if this bill ends up being a shit-show, then during her next campaign, she can say she didn't support it, but didn't want to block popular opinion. If she does a last second veto, then her popularity will take a hit, but whoever forces the veto will continue to support her next election. I have no idea which of the two paths will be taken, or what back room negotiations are at play. On the veto path, she might be tightening the proverbial thumb screws in exchange for campaign donations, or she might be executing according to the schedule of some high-paid corporate PR firm. It's even possible she thinks right-to-repair will be a shit-show for the state, and will veto it for that reason. If she wants to continue to be governor, then it's crucial that we never know which of the above is true. See also: The dictator's handbook.

cokeandpepsi 4y ago

seanw444 4y ago
Preventing waste and unnecessary spending is a good thing. Repairing your own stuff, and keeping it as an heirloom to pass on to your children, was the norm. Making things literally as hard to fix as possible is only a very recent concept. And a universally harmful one, too.
- rob74 4y ago
  But... consumption! growth! You have to throw away things and buy new ones (preferably twice as many things as you threw away), otherwise the economy will take a nosedive!
godzillabrennus 4y ago
Adam Smith would disagree.
Spivak 4y ago
Growth that is based on artificial consumption isn't real growth and isn't real economic output. It might make your stock numbers go up but it is bad in the long run if we delude ourselves into thinking that cannibalizing our own wealth in the form of trash is growth.
flerchin 4y ago
Funny!
km3r 4y ago
How is 'right to repair' in any way related to a bear market?
- hedora 4y ago
  “This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much all of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.” ― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

mistrial9 4y ago

side-note: while investigating the E * Waste world news a while ago, an important California announcement was made, co-sponsored by Goodwill (established charity). SF Mayor Gavin "perfect hairgel" Newsom spoke. As a nerd and quite well read on the topic, I expected vapid or hand-waving sorts of statements at the media event. not so .. GNewsom spoke clearly and with detail, showed contextual understanding and also on important details. I was surprised. This E*Waste and consumer-rights topic is far from settled.

exabrial 4y ago

Context: Kathy Hochul, Democrat, Cuomo’s replacement after sexual misconduct allegations.

Pigalowda 4y ago
It's turdles all the way down