Who from the left carried rifles into a state house in protest of lockdowns and mask mandates? Who from the left is making death threats against public health officials? which politicians form the left are running websites to raise campaign donations calling for the firing of long serving public health leaders? Who from the left is going around screaming at underpaid waiters and baristas who politely try to enforce mask requirements in private businesses? Who from the allegedly left leaning Mainstream media is lying regularly about their own vaccine status to their viewers while peddling quack cures and denigrating vaccine developed by the last president? I could on and on.
You want us to have empathy for people who, nearly two years on, continue to voluntarily dismiss the actual science, to make - as you put it - the unethical choice to remain unvaccinated while demanding they be cured by an increasingly overburdened healthcare system? You want us to turn a blind eye to the enormous amount of needless death and suffering they have caused in the whimsical and naïve name of some alleged freedom? You want us not to judge?
That's rich. And sorry, no. We will judge, Just as the right judges us. Remember - to a vast many IRL Republicans and conservatives I'm at best and idiot and at worst a traitor for being an open and proud liberal. Marjorie Taylor Green - who is very popular in her very red Congressional district - wants people like me hunted and driven out of government (if not outright harmed) when Republicans take power. As long as that remains in play conservatives don't get to preach about the unfairness of being called out for their behavior.
Republicans weren’t gloating over the NYC outbreak. At least, no one I knew. We were worried for other people no matter their party affiliation.
You and I know very different Republicans. Because a great many were gloating about the outbreaks because they saw it as as yet another way to own the libs.
Now that liberals are getting the disease, they’re writing articles about how infection doesn’t make you a bad person. How utterly messed up must people have been, how smug and hate-filled, if that’s their reaction?
Those who remain unvaccinated, get COVID, and are now, again, clogging up the medical system begging for treatment are not bad people. They are making bad choices based on lies. Just as Republican politicians leading their states are making bad choices based on lies. That has been the case since the beginning.,
one of the big differences between liberals and leftists is that leftists aren’t going to become instantly loyal to a politician for doing one good thing when they’re still doing all sorts of bad things, or not doing any other good things.
in Red states where politicians have jumped on the antivax train, we may reasonably expect to see higher rates of infection, transmission, hospitalization, and ultimately death…
Top 4 states for covid hospitalizations - Louisiana, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi. Note that while Louisiana has a democratic governor, he's being regularly opposed by a Republican legislature.
Agreed in part, dissent in part. Democrats do need to do a better job of bragging about their successes and reminding voters that they do actually get stuff done for ordinary Americans. Unfortunately if you don't change some minds some times, electoral politics won't allow you to enact policy.
To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.
Further, Article 2, section 3 is pretty clear that the President shall faithfully execute the laws of the land.
SO you contend - as sadly does SCOTUS - that Congress telling the secretary of labor to issue regulations isn't a delegation of decisional authority? Or do you contend - as they also do, that even when done clearly, Congress Can't delegate authority?
I mean as feds, when we receive federal law training, we are told over and over that when Congress says our agency SHALL do something, its not optional.
1) Over 844,000 Americans are now dead of CVOID. Many of them - probably the majority of them - working age adults.
2) 208.6 Million Americans have been vaccinated
3) Daily cases per 100,000 are now more then double the prior peak in early 2021.
4) Unvaccinated people are around 14 times as likely to get Covid as vaccinated people.
5) Unvaccinated people are being hospitalized at a rate of 67.9 per 100,000; vaccinated people are being hospitalized at a rate of 3.9 per 100,000.
6) Deaths rates per 100,000 in rural areas are 0.71; in urban areas they are 0.54.
This is very much now a pandemic of the unvaccinated and rural America. Its probably only coincidence however that rural America is overwhelmingly Red.
That's an interesting take on originalism - We, SCOTUS, have decided that Congress CAN'T do the thing the Constitution tells it to do, which is direct the Executive by passing laws. I guess its one way to further degrade the regulatory state that conservatives find so onerous.
The Legislative Branch didn't, so far as I know, prohibit it either.
To assure safe and healthful working conditions for working men and women; by authorizing enforcement of the standards developed under the Act; by assisting and encouraging the States in their efforts to assure safe and healthful working conditions; by providing for research, information, education, and training in the field of occupational safety and health; and for other purposes.
That's the opening of the OSHA Act of 1970, what we call the organic act. Seems to me, simply based on that, that OSHA has purview, in that rampant COVID outbreaks impact the health of the workers in a workplace.
SEC.
2.
Congressional Findings and Purpose
(a) The Congress finds that personal injuries and illnesses arising out of work situations impose a substantial burden upon, and are a hindrance to, interstate commerce in terms of lost production, wage loss, medical expenses, and disability compensation payments.
Again, COVID outbreak arise in workplaces - hospitals around the US are currently experiencing this, as are school districts. In the early days, we had numerous reports of outbreaks in meatpacking and poultry plants.
(b)
The Congress declares it to be its purpose and policy, through the exercise of its powers to regulate commerce among the several States and with foreign nations and to provide for the general welfare, to assure so far as possible every working man and woman in the Nation safe and healthful working conditions and to preserve our human resources --
(3)
by authorizing the Secretary of Labor to set mandatory occupational safety and health standards applicable to businesses affecting interstate commerce, and by creating an Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission for carrying out adjudicatory functions under the Act;
And there Congress tells the Labor Secretary to create these regulations. In unusually plain language.
Carrying it further, Congress directed the new agency to:
(6)
by exploring ways to discover latent diseases, establishing causal connections between diseases and work in environmental conditions, and conducting other research relating to health problems, in recognition of the fact that occupational health standards present problems often different from those involved in occupational safety;
(7)
by providing medical criteria which will assure insofar as practicable that no employee will suffer diminished health, functional capacity, or life expectancy as a result of his work experience;
And then Congress told the Secretary to use the new agency to look at health in the workplace, separate from occupational issues.
Down in Section 6 we see:
SEC.
6.
Occupational Safety and Health Standards
(a)
29 USC 655
Without regard to chapter 5 of title 5, United States Code, or to the other subsections of this section, the Secretary shall, as soon as practicable during the period beginning with the effective date of this Act and ending two years after such date, by rule promulgate as an occupational safety or health standard any national consensus standard, and any established Federal standard, unless he determines that the promulgation of such a standard would not result in improved safety or health for specifically designated employees. In the event of conflict among any such standards, the Secretary shall promulgate the standard which assures the greatest protection of the safety or health of the affected employees.
Which means the Secretary of Labor HAS TO ISSUE regulations comporting with this standard. Equally important the Secretary is required by law to do so in the way that protects the most people.
Bottom line - Congress was quite clear in 1970 what they wanted OSHA to do in instances like this. SCOTUS clearly disagrees with that. But the appointed officials certainly look like they are on solid ground.
In these calls, business leaders employ fancy financial lingo to tell large shareholders how they are engaging in “pricing improvements” and “successful pricing strategies.” They tell you they are experiencing customer “elasticities” to price increases at historically low levels. When you decode what they’re saying, it’s nothing less than a euphoric articulation that they’re able to pass off price increases to consumers, who, in the words of legendary investor Warren Buffett, are “just accepting it.” The stocks have in turn moved higher and higher. (And interestingly, when a corporation like Target announces it hasn’t raised prices despite strong earnings, investors are punishing it by pushing the stock downward.)
And I'm saying the "constraint" of supply is a red herring. The American Petroleum Institute - whose business it is to know these things and lobby for that industry against government actions - is quoted above as saying the decision to not extend the existing pipeline from nebraska to the Gulf is not impacting supply. And as also noted above there are already existing pipelines and rail transport with excess capacity in them to absorb an amount of oil close to what might have flowed through the Keystone extension. This means that the extension is in the nice to have but not necessary to have category for oil futures. Or to use your language - the rate of growth of supply of crude oil for refining in the US isn't constrained in some future time by the lack of pipeline extension.
Also note that the articles and fact check show that the issue isn't crude oil flowing - is how much is getting refined. There were no publicly announced plans to build new refineries on the Gulf for any additional Keystone related supply in the future. Which tells me refineries have plenty of unused capacity they are sitting on. Which also tells me they could crank out more gasoline now if they chose to, which would lower prices.
Which leads back to the non-trivial observation that they aren't yet choosing to.
The "reasonable and prudent person" might think that an agency named Occupational Safety and Health Administration did, in fact, have the mandate to make such decisions.
I'm amused by all the reporting and commentary on this - because these aren't decisions on the merits, just whether the mandates can or can't stay in place as litigation proceeds.
Supply of cure oil to US Refineries - whether Canadian in source or otherwise isn't presently constrained, nor will it be because an extension to Keystone didn't get approved. There's enough pipeline and rail transport capacity to meet demand at pre-COVID levels, and there was excess transportation capacity prior to COVID.
Refining output - which varies due to demand all the time - is the constraint at present, and Keystone has zero impact on that. Refineries routinely run at 60 or 70% capacity even in peak seasons so they have reserve capacity if something goes down.
you will note in my politifact link above that people in the industry don't see a current lack of supply as a problem. Because the original Keystone pipeline already made it to Nebraska, so the oil is making it to the US. The part Biden scuttled was an expansion to the Gulf, which bypassed existing pipeline and railroad transportation.
Even the Canadians weren't worried:
"I really don't think that this works out to be a major, significant change to American oil supply right now," said Warren Mabee, director of Queen's University's Institute for Energy and Environmental Policy.
"The flow of oil out of Canada ... is now a much smaller part of any big U.S. energy strategy. They've got the capacity in the States to be able to make up for that. They're not really counting on the additional capacity, the growth that Keystone XL would bring."
And here's the pricing going back to 1994
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=pet&s=emm_epm0_pte_nus_dpg&f=a
Notice prices rising dramatically at the end of the Great Recession, and then fighting to get back down during the Obama years as we tried to create Mainstreet recovery. Gas prices currently are NOT outside historic trends. GO find another hobby horse to beat.
On “Supreme Court Mandates Rulings: Read Them For Yourself”
Who from the left carried rifles into a state house in protest of lockdowns and mask mandates? Who from the left is making death threats against public health officials? which politicians form the left are running websites to raise campaign donations calling for the firing of long serving public health leaders? Who from the left is going around screaming at underpaid waiters and baristas who politely try to enforce mask requirements in private businesses? Who from the allegedly left leaning Mainstream media is lying regularly about their own vaccine status to their viewers while peddling quack cures and denigrating vaccine developed by the last president? I could on and on.
You want us to have empathy for people who, nearly two years on, continue to voluntarily dismiss the actual science, to make - as you put it - the unethical choice to remain unvaccinated while demanding they be cured by an increasingly overburdened healthcare system? You want us to turn a blind eye to the enormous amount of needless death and suffering they have caused in the whimsical and naïve name of some alleged freedom? You want us not to judge?
That's rich. And sorry, no. We will judge, Just as the right judges us. Remember - to a vast many IRL Republicans and conservatives I'm at best and idiot and at worst a traitor for being an open and proud liberal. Marjorie Taylor Green - who is very popular in her very red Congressional district - wants people like me hunted and driven out of government (if not outright harmed) when Republicans take power. As long as that remains in play conservatives don't get to preach about the unfairness of being called out for their behavior.
"
You and I know very different Republicans. Because a great many were gloating about the outbreaks because they saw it as as yet another way to own the libs.
Those who remain unvaccinated, get COVID, and are now, again, clogging up the medical system begging for treatment are not bad people. They are making bad choices based on lies. Just as Republican politicians leading their states are making bad choices based on lies. That has been the case since the beginning.,
"
Even then, hospitalizations and case rate were important.
On “The Paradox of Democratic Governance”
Bingo.
On “Supreme Court Mandates Rulings: Read Them For Yourself”
Top 4 states for covid hospitalizations - Louisiana, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi. Note that while Louisiana has a democratic governor, he's being regularly opposed by a Republican legislature.
On “The Paradox of Democratic Governance”
Agreed in part, dissent in part. Democrats do need to do a better job of bragging about their successes and reminding voters that they do actually get stuff done for ordinary Americans. Unfortunately if you don't change some minds some times, electoral politics won't allow you to enact policy.
On “Supreme Court Mandates Rulings: Read Them For Yourself”
Article 1, Section 8:
Further, Article 2, section 3 is pretty clear that the President shall faithfully execute the laws of the land.
You know, the SHALLS that Congress writes.
"
Agreed.
"
SO you contend - as sadly does SCOTUS - that Congress telling the secretary of labor to issue regulations isn't a delegation of decisional authority? Or do you contend - as they also do, that even when done clearly, Congress Can't delegate authority?
I mean as feds, when we receive federal law training, we are told over and over that when Congress says our agency SHALL do something, its not optional.
"
See Flu Pandemic, 1918 for the last time we had this intense level of public health impact from a pandemic.
"
To reiterate:
1) Over 844,000 Americans are now dead of CVOID. Many of them - probably the majority of them - working age adults.
2) 208.6 Million Americans have been vaccinated
3) Daily cases per 100,000 are now more then double the prior peak in early 2021.
4) Unvaccinated people are around 14 times as likely to get Covid as vaccinated people.
5) Unvaccinated people are being hospitalized at a rate of 67.9 per 100,000; vaccinated people are being hospitalized at a rate of 3.9 per 100,000.
6) Deaths rates per 100,000 in rural areas are 0.71; in urban areas they are 0.54.
This is very much now a pandemic of the unvaccinated and rural America. Its probably only coincidence however that rural America is overwhelmingly Red.
"
Except as I note below, Congress DID.
"
That's an interesting take on originalism - We, SCOTUS, have decided that Congress CAN'T do the thing the Constitution tells it to do, which is direct the Executive by passing laws. I guess its one way to further degrade the regulatory state that conservatives find so onerous.
"
I am very well aware.
"
The Legislative Branch didn't, so far as I know, prohibit it either.
That's the opening of the OSHA Act of 1970, what we call the organic act. Seems to me, simply based on that, that OSHA has purview, in that rampant COVID outbreaks impact the health of the workers in a workplace.
Again, COVID outbreak arise in workplaces - hospitals around the US are currently experiencing this, as are school districts. In the early days, we had numerous reports of outbreaks in meatpacking and poultry plants.
And there Congress tells the Labor Secretary to create these regulations. In unusually plain language.
Carrying it further, Congress directed the new agency to:
And then Congress told the Secretary to use the new agency to look at health in the workplace, separate from occupational issues.
Down in Section 6 we see:
Which means the Secretary of Labor HAS TO ISSUE regulations comporting with this standard. Equally important the Secretary is required by law to do so in the way that protects the most people.
Bottom line - Congress was quite clear in 1970 what they wanted OSHA to do in instances like this. SCOTUS clearly disagrees with that. But the appointed officials certainly look like they are on solid ground.
On “2021 Saw Highest Levels of Inflation In 40 Years”
"
And I'm saying the "constraint" of supply is a red herring. The American Petroleum Institute - whose business it is to know these things and lobby for that industry against government actions - is quoted above as saying the decision to not extend the existing pipeline from nebraska to the Gulf is not impacting supply. And as also noted above there are already existing pipelines and rail transport with excess capacity in them to absorb an amount of oil close to what might have flowed through the Keystone extension. This means that the extension is in the nice to have but not necessary to have category for oil futures. Or to use your language - the rate of growth of supply of crude oil for refining in the US isn't constrained in some future time by the lack of pipeline extension.
Also note that the articles and fact check show that the issue isn't crude oil flowing - is how much is getting refined. There were no publicly announced plans to build new refineries on the Gulf for any additional Keystone related supply in the future. Which tells me refineries have plenty of unused capacity they are sitting on. Which also tells me they could crank out more gasoline now if they chose to, which would lower prices.
Which leads back to the non-trivial observation that they aren't yet choosing to.
On “Supreme Court Mandates Rulings: Read Them For Yourself”
The "reasonable and prudent person" might think that an agency named Occupational Safety and Health Administration did, in fact, have the mandate to make such decisions.
"
I'm amused by all the reporting and commentary on this - because these aren't decisions on the merits, just whether the mandates can or can't stay in place as litigation proceeds.
On “2021 Saw Highest Levels of Inflation In 40 Years”
Supply of cure oil to US Refineries - whether Canadian in source or otherwise isn't presently constrained, nor will it be because an extension to Keystone didn't get approved. There's enough pipeline and rail transport capacity to meet demand at pre-COVID levels, and there was excess transportation capacity prior to COVID.
Refining output - which varies due to demand all the time - is the constraint at present, and Keystone has zero impact on that. Refineries routinely run at 60 or 70% capacity even in peak seasons so they have reserve capacity if something goes down.
"
you will note in my politifact link above that people in the industry don't see a current lack of supply as a problem. Because the original Keystone pipeline already made it to Nebraska, so the oil is making it to the US. The part Biden scuttled was an expansion to the Gulf, which bypassed existing pipeline and railroad transportation.
Even the Canadians weren't worried:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/keystone-xl-u-s-oil-supplies-pipeline-alberta-biden-1.5882313
"
Here's the ten year gas price chart -
https://charts.gasbuddy.com/ch.gaschart?Country=USA&Crude=f&Period=120&Areas=USA%20Average%2C%2C&Unit=US%20%24%2FG
And here's the pricing going back to 1994
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=pet&s=emm_epm0_pte_nus_dpg&f=a
Notice prices rising dramatically at the end of the Great Recession, and then fighting to get back down during the Obama years as we tried to create Mainstreet recovery. Gas prices currently are NOT outside historic trends. GO find another hobby horse to beat.
"
True. I still believe, however, that when Jaybird goes obscure he needs to be called out for it.
"
Well I find that when people misapprehend its best to make a more detailed explanation.
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That surprises you? It shouldn't.