volkris @volkris@qoto.org
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
I think the key there is the word "budget".
A budget is a plan. Sometimes plans don't work out. Often in the US government plans don't work out.
Just because they budget for something doesn't mean it will work out, and when you review the treasury reports it never ever does.
The Treasury never actually spends what is budgeted.
So no, when Congress budgets more spending than revenue, it's not only true that Treasury must raise money to cover that deficit, constitutionally the Treasury cannot raise money to cover that deficit without additional legal action.
It's not that the executive branch can't simply decide to spend less; constitutionally it has no choice but to spend less.
@StOnSoftware @LFpete @rbreich
That is not at all what is going on here in US politics.
The government bondholders are going to be paid, one way or another, since the president has the money to pay them.
The president is threatening not to pay them, but that is not his option. Joe Biden cannot legally refuse to pay bondholders when he has the money in the treasury to pay them, but he is bluffing about that very thing.
This is all ridiculous rhetoric, and Biden needs to be called out, and he needs to knock it off.
So if you read the ruling they cite FDA officials showing that the FDA did not follow their own procedures that are legally mandated.
If the drug has proven itself over decades, great! The administration should simply move forward to approve the drug under the legally mandated procedures. That would solve this whole mess.
Really, I have no idea why the administration is not doing that. It makes me think it is political, that the administration would rather fight this out in court rather than just have the FDA sign the paperwork It is legally required to sign.
Of course the Treasury can pick and choose what it spends money on, because that is how the separations of power of the US government is designed.
If Congress authorizes the Treasury to spend money that it does not have, then it is implicitly all about letting the executive branch pick which things it wants to spend money on.
If I tell you that you can spend $10,000 but you only have $1,000 to spend then mathematically there is no choice but for you to pick and choose what to spend money on.
That is what we are facing now.
You have that exactly wrong! This whole case is about people questioning the FDA procedures for two decades!
The issue of timing is a core part of this entire dispute!
@StOnSoftware @LFpete @rbreich
Representatives decide how much the executive branch may borrow, and that amount is the debt ceiling.
To say the debt ceiling does not exist is just flat out ignoring how the federal government works.
SCOTUS overturns ban on abortion drug
Not quite.
The Court stayed an order that would have had the the drug available through regulations up through 2016, putting that order on hold while the rest of the case goes through the courts.
It didn't overturn a ban (that was already done), and nationwide access was also not in question at this stage.
Bitter? No. More like disappointed.
He calls out the court for playing games and accepting false premises instead of simply applying the law and pursuing a consistent legal environment.
Just get it directly from the Court. No need to go through NYTimes.
I think this is one of those cases where people who were surprised might reconsider their ideas about the Court, that left them missing the prediction.
I thought it was a pretty predictable outcome, despite what a lot of speakers were saying.
No, the court case has not reached the merits stage, so this doesn't settle the original lawsuit.
What specifically do you disagree with from Alito's dissent?
That kind of dovetails with my point.
If those speakers aren't even constrained to honesty, and they can say whatever they want, then their emphasis of the importance of child exploitation is even more likely reflective of their beliefs.
I mean, they absolutely get so much wrong. However, they're expressing strong opposition to child exploitation even if that exploitation only exists in their fever dreams.
Just to highlight another case of how we live in completely different worlds when we don't stop to figure out matters of basic fact, compare this week's breathless reporting on mifepristone against the Supreme Court's release:
"As narrowed by the Court of Appeals, the stay that would apply if we failed to broaden it would not remove mifepristone from the market. It would simply restore the circumstances that existed (and that the Government defended) from 2000 to 2016 under three Presidential administrations."
Press outlet after outlet said the opposite. So, would have been nice if we could all get on the same page about this kind of thing.
Right, but US law calls for specific procedures through which such data is to be considered, and it's up to the FDA to consider that data.
Maybe we should change the laws. I'd say the Executive Branch should have acted on that data already so we wouldn't be in this mess at all.
But judges aren't in a position to ignore laws and the FDA's own records due to the results of independent investigations.
This case is about whether legal procedures were followed. That's what judges are looking to rule on.
Yep, but we're not at the merits phase of this court proceeding.
And again, the administration could fix all of this since the mess was caused by executive branch processes.
So, instead we're going to wind through the court proceedings, taking time and accepting the uncertainty.
The US Treasury, which writes checks and spends money on behalf of the United States, is an Executive Branch department.
It is not a part of the Legislative branch, which wouldn't make sense anyway.
It's true that "No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law" but power of the purse only extends to giving the president the permission to spend.
If you want more evidence of how this works, note that the Treasury NEVER spends exactly what lawmakers legislate. And that's because Congress does not, and cannot, spend.
You're missing the different functions of the separate branches of government.
No, just as there are rules about taking turns to speak, there are also guidelines on decorum when speaking.
Whether you or I might approve or not, legislative bodies tend to have rules about speakers attacking each other and things like that.
This legislator was found to have broken those rules of decorum, that everyone agreed to.
That's exactly the issue: this case is about the FDA's own questions about whether the drug passed its tests.
To put it another way, the judge isn't judging the drug. Rather, the judge is looking at FDA's own records saying the drug didn't pass tests, but they approved it anyway.
That's simplifying it a little bit, but I'm just trying to emphasize that this case is all about the FDA's own judgement of the drug, based on the FDA's own records.
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
volkris's choices:
