No Future for the GOP?

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
At this point, I think that if someone invented a pill that both prevented and cured all forms of cancer with 100% efficacy, had no side effects, and could be produced for like a dollar apiece, and one of the major drug companies offered to manufacture and distribute it to everyone in America for a nominal fee, and the Dems were like "OK, let's spend a trivial amount of money to save hundreds of thousands of lives and literally hundreds of billions of dollars each year", the Reps would block it out of the sheer joy of being cunts for the sake of being cunts.
They'd probably pay some shitty quack doctor to invent some "research" showing that it turns your kids both gay and autistic.
 

Leo

Well-known member
At this point, I think that if someone invented a pill that both prevented and cured all forms of cancer with 100% efficacy, had no side effects, and could be produced for like a dollar apiece, and one of the major drug companies offered to manufacture and distribute it to everyone in America for a nominal fee, and the Dems were like "OK, let's spend a trivial amount of money to save hundreds of thousands of lives and literally hundreds of billions of dollars each year", the Reps would block it out of the sheer joy of being cunts for the sake of being cunts.

I get your point but that isn't the issue here.
 

version

Well-known member
As much as I dislike this Supreme Court decisions on carbon emissions, I think they are right in their finding that the Executive Branch (aka, the president) shouldn't have absolute authority to issue executive orders on major issues. Congress makes the laws, and congress should be the ones who legislate by drafting and voting on new laws (that don't violate the Constitution). Executive power is great when you agree with the policies of the president, horrible when you don't.

The court isn't saying we shouldn't have strong carbon emissions standards and environmental laws, they are saying Congress should be the body that makes those laws, not a president by executive order. If we don't like the law, use the process to change the law. And if your side doesn't have enough votes to change the law in Congress, then we should get out there and elect representatives who share our views.

Of course, gerrymandering makes that difficult, but the point is clear.

Yeah, I agree, although it's complicated by the fact the GOP's wrecked the process to the point of gridlock and climate change isn't waiting around for the American establishment to get its act together.
 

Clinamenic

Binary & Tweed
I still suspect the real tide shifts (no pun intended) have to emerge organically within the private sector, perhaps specifically within the American tech sectors, for any enduring systematic change to be made. I get intimations of this from the various institutional gestures toward the green transition, even among the big asset managers like what Mark Blyth said, but I still think there needs to be more of a corporate warrior class emerge within the environmentalist milieu.

In character there is such an emergent green capitalist vanguard within web3, but personally I'm not yet sold on the concept of Regenerative Finance.

At any rate, relying on public institutions to drive this change I suspect is misguided, which isn't to say they are unessential.
 

Clinamenic

Binary & Tweed
I also think one of the critical challenges here is A) devising business models that doesn't tacitly assume some course of indefinite growth, but rather aim for an equilibrium within a given market context, and B) supporting the adoption of such business models.

The former point can perhaps be compared to certain lifeforms or colonies of lifeforms which equilibrate into a balance with their environment, rather than growing indefinitely until the environmental balance itself is disrupted.

Such a change would be profound because it would ostensibly run against what is arguably the central thrust of human welfare progress, economic growth driven by technological and related innovation.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
As much as I dislike this Supreme Court decisions on carbon emissions, I think they are right in their finding that the Executive Branch (aka, the president) shouldn't have absolute authority to issue executive orders on major issues. Congress makes the laws, and congress should be the ones who legislate by drafting and voting on new laws (that don't violate the Constitution). Executive power is great when you agree with the policies of the president, horrible when you don't.

The court isn't saying we shouldn't have strong carbon emissions standards and environmental laws, they are saying Congress should be the body that makes those laws, not a president by executive order. If we don't like the law, use the process to change the law. And if your side doesn't have enough votes to change the law in Congress, then we should get out there and elect representatives who share our views.

Of course, gerrymandering makes that difficult, but the point is clear.
But this is the case with a lot of what they do or have done isn't it? For example when they got rid of Roe v Wade they didn't actually ban abortion as I understand it, they simply handed the choice back to the states But they know full well that some GOP strongholds such as Texas want to band it and it doesn't take genius to work out what kind of stuff is going to happen.
 

Leo

Well-known member
yes, correct. but technically, the court didn't make the "for or against" decision themselves. they said Roe didn't stand up as federal law under the constitution, and the decision should instead be made on a state level.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
My understanding is that EOs are just calls to action for agencies within the executive branch to take certain actions within their powers allotted by congress. Did the Biden administration make some EO that went against this, re: carbon emissions?
Can someone (by which I mean @Leo or @padraig (u.s.) let's face it) explain Executive Orders to me? In my head the government can create a law by writing a law that they want and then getting both houses to vote for "Yes let's make that a law" - that vaguely (on the right lines, albeit no doubt crudely simplified?

And I thought that an EO was a way for the president to just make his own law and put it into place by bypassing Congress, more specifically, bypassing the need to for a vote on it.
I seem to remember that there was a period when Obama did a few of them - more than normal I guess - and the right lost their shit. And the, following the usual pattern, when Trump got in power he started firing them out like confetti and the right went "Woooh go for it Trumpy, why didn't you do that Obama you twat, it's a perfectly way for the president to act".

I sort of get that there may be times when the Pres might need to do something like that - if things are gridlocked perhaps - but I would have thought that there need to be some kind of criteria that need to be met before it can be done, and maybe a limit on how many you can do per term or per week or per hour or something. Otherwise what's stop pres running the country that way by default... or is it just another of those toothless convention type things?

As an aside, thank you very much to those answering questions on basketball and the US system. I do appreciate you guys taking the time to do that. For me it's so much more interesting to hear it from you guys than to try and look it and wade through dry explanations. Of course it has the advantage that I can ask very specific questions and you can enlarge on the bits that i need and so on. Very helpful, also interesting and enjoyable - I want you to know that I am not taking it for granted. And also, I do hope it's not too annoying.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Jury is out for Bannon trial. He ignored a subpoena and is facing jail time for contempt of court. He said nothing in his own defence and called no witnesses, his defence just went straight to a closing statement so things don't look good for him. Still he might get a haircut and a shower etc so it's not all bad.
 

Leo

Well-known member
I don't care that jail time would make him a martyr in the eye of some people. I just want him to go to jail
 

version

Well-known member
The thing is even if he goes to jail then the first chance the GOP get they'll just pardon him and let him out.
 

Leo

Well-known member
Doesn't matter. LOCK. HIM. UP.

Also, the president is the only person who could pardon him. If a Republican wins the next prez election, they don't take office until late January 2025, and I doubt Bannon will be their first concern.
 

Leo

Well-known member
It's the principle of it. Anyone who ignores a court order should pay a price, no one is above the law.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Doesn't matter. LOCK. HIM. UP.

Also, the president is the only person who could pardon him. If a Republican wins the next prez election, they don't take office until late January 2025, and I doubt Bannon will be their first concern.
You say "a Republican" - there's not really anyone else in the running, is there?
 
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