site banner
zataomm  4mo ago (text post)   5323 thread views

Colorado Supreme Court Thread

Link to the decision

I don't know to what extent there are established precedents for when a topic is worthy of a mega-thread, but this decision seems like a big deal to me with a lot to discuss, so I'm putting this thread here as a place for discussion. If nobody agrees then I guess they just won't comment.

11
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

This whole subject reminds me that I’ve long thought it would be a good change for the president to be appointed by state legislatures on a weighted majority-of-majorities basis, with a weighting system based on census data. So much of the issues with American politics are because congress has zero accountability to the states’ governments themselves, only to individual voters to some extent.

In general, direct elections to the federal level could be done away with as much as possible. It’s inefficient and confusing for people not only to elect 3+ levels of representative but then to do so in multiple forms (eg bicameral states, and congress itself for both senators and reps).

Recentering more politics around the states makes state politics more important and means that any president with a more radical plan is likely to be supported by a large ground-up movement in state houses across the country, instead of Trump being a one man band whose movement largely begins and ends with him.

My understanding is that basically the reason we don't do that anymore is that as the federal positions mattered more, the state legislature elections turned into proxy elections for the federal positions and the state issues were getting ignored. If you're going to have an indirect system for selecting the federal positions, you would probably want to either (1) keep it separate from state elections or (2) decide to go even harder on giving power to the federal government (so it doesn't matter as much if the state legislatures aren't governing).

How about (3) - go back on giving all power to the federal government? If most issues are state or local issues, because the federal constitution's short allowlist is respected, you pretty much have to pay attention to non-federal candidates.

That ship sadly sailed

It’s not just that past precedence and the current Overton window has caused it to sail, but in the modern world I do not even believe it’s possible.

Technology has made the world a smaller place. Having this big federal government that can manage all these global forces has become necessary.

What some scientist mixes up in a lab will come to hurt you on the other side of the globe. Along with all the wealth Americans got useful from global trade.

I’m trying to think of what America could be if it didn’t have a big federal government managing all these policies and my best guess is like Argentina which was largely locked out of global trade due to their currency being awful. Also poorer because modern industry scale abilities is much higher than a few million person state which they haven’t hit that scale. Poor in nominal terms but everyone does say it feels wealthier on the ground.

On the flip side, the federal system enabled some states (eg Florida, Georgia) to show that the covid restrictions were nonsense. That is, despite the world getting smaller local control still allowed for so called different laboratories enabling a better outcome compared to a bet it all on black approach.

All we need is a slightly sane judiciary branch to revisit Wickard v. Filburn. From there most federal laws would be rightly determined to be unconstitutional.

I think if we just took the takings clause seriously that would be better than overturning Wickard. And honestly, the judiciary is starting to take takings more seriously b

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats