Woot! Woot! And the decriers (mostly or exclusively loyal to the Democratic party) are doing this even though (1) Trump’s shutting down travel from China, and soon thereafter from the entirety of Europe, was done against the howls of opposition from these same decriers, who (2) spent January trying to dethrone Trump via impeachment instead of raising an alarm about the pandemic brewing in China.
I’ve watched the body politic in the USA for around 60 years (i.e. since I was 10 years old; my family was always talking about religion and politics, heatedly so too). My conclusion, now that I’m entering my dotage, is that American voters are profoundly (and, possibly, irremediably) double-minded, so that the primary aim of political parties is to deploy whatever carrots and sticks are effective in moving the herd in the direction they prefer. I am, therefore, pessimistic about any return to “normalcy” in the wake of this pandemic. It has enough power, in the hands of our political handlers, to work permanent and irreversible changes at all levels of our national life. The political powers that be will not waste such a grand disaster to arrange matters so as to enhance and protect their powers.
You must have missed his statement: “Nobody seriously disputes the right of local government to keep the contagious off the streets for a week or two to prevent the spread of diseases or of the federal government to put a block or two off limits during wartime military movements.”
Again, did you miss the statement above?
Then John writes:
The individual payments are not need-based, and thus particularly pernicious in their debasement of our national civic character, nakedly appeasing and pacifying individuals directly. Yes, of course it’s mind-numbing to read through the larger amounts given to PBS, Kennedy Center, National Endowment for the Arts, and so on; but the corruption of the electorate is so destructive. And this is not even to mention theft-by-inflation by which we rob future generations yet unborn.
Our Governor Holcomb’s order explicitly places “religious institutions” in the category of “Essential Businesses and Operations” stating “religious gatherings” are permitted “provided they adhere to the CDC’s guidelines on social gatherings.”
BTW, just tweeted: "Our Governor Holcomb’s order explicitly places ‘religious institutions’ in the category of ‘Essential Businesses and Operations’ stating ‘religious gatherings’ are permitted ‘provided they adhere to the CDC’s guidelines on social gatherings.’”
We have already held a funeral service observing social distancing and we are contemplating a drive-in Easter Sunday service, although it may not be held due to fear that people driving by would misunderstand.
My understanding is that those who make under $75,000 annually will receive the checks in full, with the amount tapering off until reaching zero once one makes $99,000 annually. Certainly some will receive money that do not have a need for it, but would it be so easy to create a means-testing system other than a simple metric like annual income, that can be rapidly implemented to get funding to families who need it desperately? I don’t think so. And again, the total for this direct payment is $250 billion out of the $6 Trillion that has been dolled out thus far.
In a federal reserve system, where money can be printed off on a whim (yes, at the expense of future generations) it is not surprising to see our bloated federal government resorting to its favorite activity. The question is how that money will be allocated, and I’d personally rather see as much money be widely distributed to the masses as possible, as opposed to giving it to the elites, who as we saw in the 2008 crisis, cannot be trusted to do anything but cast off their toxic assets and create their “golden parachutes.”
I’m afraid the country that we all long for, one of fiscal responsibility, stewardship of what we have been blessed with for future generations, has long ago dissolved into a multi-cultural pagan mish-mash. To pine for the good old days before the 1965 Immigration Act when we had a homogeneous population with a culture centered around self-responsibility and sustainability seems delusional. The genie is already out of the bottle. We are no longer that nation.
No. I didn’t miss that statement. What I saw was the following statement:
What is being done now is virtually a complete ban on most travel. It is clearly contrary to Supreme Court opinions that hold unconstitutional the confinement of people to their home state without due process, a sort of return to the old English writ ne exeat regno.
The implication is that the federal government is doing it, which it is not. And it is false anyway. I can still get in my car and drive to Tennessee. Ohio isn’t preventing me. The closest you get is FL requiring people arriving from New Orleans to self-quarantine for two weeks. Likewise, I might not be able to find a flight to Ethiopia right now, but the US isn’t gong to prevent me from going, though Ethiopia might prevent me from arriving. As far as I can tell, the comparison to the old English law that prevents you from leaving the country is specious.
Then the next paragraph:
At least in peacetime the federal government is constitutionally forbidden to deprive citizens of any reasonable use of their property without fair compensation. That is exactly what the government is doing when it closes restaurants and stores.
Now he explicitly claims the federal government is depriving people of the use of their property. It isn’t, to my knowledge. Can anybody point out where this is happening?
In other words, though there may not be as much subsidiarity as we want to see, he seems to have stepped away from reality to make his point. Each state is free to do what they want. Even Washington D.C. is refusing to use the model that the White House uses as they prepare for the “surge” they think is coming. Yet he pretends that not only the federal government but international authority is being invoked. That’s crazy talk.
As to the cash payouts (and yes, the centralization they cause), and the 10 person rule, I’m in complete agreement. Grocery stores are not limited to 10 people. I’ve argued elsewhere that church services are not like grocery stores, and they aren’t. But they ought to be doing the same thing, which limits the number of people gathering on the basis of the space available and following procedures to keep people safe. The procedures would simply need to be different for services. I think there is a good case to be made for challenging this rule (at the state level) as being unconstitutional, but I’m not a lawyer.
You and Joel didn’t mention his attribution of the initial quarantines to local governments and his explicit approval of them.
As for travel bans, you blur the distinction between what is strictly legal and what is the present state of affairs, practically. As he said, “most travel.” Planes are flying empty not simply because people don’t want to fly, but because of the national/federal cloud that has descended from doomsday DC every minute on TV. Most people would think they’d be incarcerated if they tried to show up at an airport and fly.
Yeah. Pastors’ taxes are very weird. You’re treated as both an employee and self-employed. You basically get to deduct your housing twice. It’s not worth trying to explain further. lol.
That’s because he acknowledges that such would be legal but then goes on in the next sentence to contrast that with what he claims is actually happening: “What is being done now…” At least that’s how I read it, and I can’t figure out what else to make of it. He is explicitly saying that what is happening now is unconstitutional (at least regarding travel). If that is the case, then the government does not have the authority to do what they are doing. I don’t see how else to read it. I don’t mind (as I did above) making an argument that some bit here or there might not be strictly constitutional and need to be worked through. Another example: I’ve been concerned about the enforcement I saw against a pastor and church (linked elsewhere on this site) because it actually appeared from pictures that they may have been taking appropriate steps regarding distancing.
But I don’t think it’s right to claim that the current travel restrictions are wholesale unconstitutional, which again, seems to me is certainly what he argues by mischaracterizing what is being done.
Agreed. But it’s not the federal government bringing the fire and pain on people who would dare to think about traveling. It’s the media. Besides, most travel is not flying, which is the only thing the federal government is involved in at all.
Edit: I should probably add that I think much of what the federal government does is actually unconstitutional… Interstate commerce and all that.
One of my favorite security experts has this to say about the tradeoffs:
I think the effects of COVID-19 will be more drastic than the effects of the terrorist attacks of 9/11: not only with respect to surveillance, but across many aspects of our society. And while many things that would never be acceptable during normal time are reasonable things to do right now, we need to makes sure we can ratchet them back once the current pandemic is over.
The reason people aren’t traveling is that there is not much reason to do so. Business and professional meetings are cancelled. Why go on vacation if you will be confined to your hotel room the whole time? Why visit grandma and take a chance at infecting her with a deadly disease?
Somewhere recently, someone I was reading (who knows anymore?) commented that it might not be such a bad thing if we were to return to bows and curtsies when greeting one another.
I wonder - truy wonder! I’m not kidding! - what would be the result over time in a community if that were practiced routinely.
The soulish dynamic by which belief, or its absence, works itself out into behavior - that dynamic has a “reverse switch,” wherein behavior that is consistently practiced works itself into one’s beliefs. It’s a law of psychology known for many, many centuries in the Church and it goes by the name lex orandi, lex credendi.
Most of the time this law surfaces in discussions of the interplay between worship and belief. But the psychological dynamics are not confined to that sphere of life (i.e. worship and belief). The dynamic works in other areas of life as well.
My guess is that the egalitarian spirit has so thoroughly infected modern society in the West that no community would be able to consistently renovate the practice of bowing/curtsying in greeting.
Men, I suspect, could pull it off with significant effort.
Yes. One of our Founders said something like once the voter finds he can vote benefits to himself out of the public treasury, the Republic will be ruined.
Interstate commerce and all that.