Looking past this decision, the fact that SCOTUS is regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution, thereby making it irrelevant, means the US is going to need a representative legislative body to make 21st century laws so they don't actually end up back in the 18th century. No such body exists right now, and with democrats getting distracted by and arguing about universal health care and social issues while republicans systematically destroy American democracy, it might not for a while.
Democracy getting fucked means SCOTUS is the only entity the US can rely on to actually work for people. They have decided to not.
Looking past this decision, the fact that SCOTUS is regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution, thereby making it irrelevant, means the US is going to need a representative legislative body to make 21st century laws so they don't actually end up back in the 18th century. No such body exists right now, and with democrats getting distracted by and arguing about universal health care and social issues while republicans systematically destroy American democracy, it might not for a while.
Democracy getting fucked means SCOTUS is the only entity the US can rely on to actually work for people. They have decided to not.
What dude? Placing the blame on “arguing about health care and social issues” for Democrats’ complicity? Get real
Stock indices are 10x the value they were 40 years ago. Wages are the same. Go figure.
And what does that show.
That wealth was created, just not where it matters.
Stock indices are not wealth tho. There's no equivalence between how much stock indices have grown and how much actual value added has been created in the economy during a year.
Where are wages the same as 40 yrs ago
Everywhere except in developing countries. Adjusted for inflation, obviously. They might've grown a couple of percentage points in some places, declined in others, but yeah, basically no change.
Yeah, in real terms, wages have grown in the EU by a few %s.
Which means people have not actually lost buying power in the last two decades in the EU. They even gained a very modest increase in buying power.
But then the question is do people actually deserve to earn more, did their productivity also increase together with economic growth?
Looking at this table, it's a variable picture: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrows ... le?lang=en
They took the average for the EU-27 in 2020 as a baseline reference to compare with all the previous years down to 2006. And we can see that some of the economies that are less developed have increased their productivity as they catch up with the rest of the EU, while others from the more developed parts of the EU have seen declining productivity rates.
Stock indices are 10x the value they were 40 years ago. Wages are the same. Go figure.
And what does that show.
That wealth was created, just not where it matters.
Stock indices are not wealth tho. There's no equivalence between how much stock indices have grown and how much actual value added has been created in the economy during a year.
GDP then, whatever. Everyone knows, including you iirc, that the West got a shit ton richer in the past 40 years, and that the wealth did not find its way to the people who actually produced it.
Yeah, in real terms, wages have grown in the EU by a few %s.
Which is so little compared to the actual wealth that was created, I would still categorize it as "no change".
Looking past this decision, the fact that SCOTUS is regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution, thereby making it irrelevant, means the US is going to need a representative legislative body to make 21st century laws so they don't actually end up back in the 18th century. No such body exists right now, and with democrats getting distracted by and arguing about universal health care and social issues while republicans systematically destroy American democracy, it might not for a while.
Democracy getting fucked means SCOTUS is the only entity the US can rely on to actually work for people. They have decided to not.
Idk I've seen some rumours that Trump privately declared he thinks overturning Roe v Wade is bad and will impact Repubs in the midterms badly. Even though publicly he pretends to be rolling with those who cheer for the decision.
And US polls have shown a consistent majority pattern of opposition to overturning RvW in the vicinity of high 50s low 60 %s.
While only about 30-something support overturning it.
Among Republican voters, most of them don't support overturning RvW.
Even though Americans seem convinced that the Scotus majority is playing politics now, it's not clear that they've actually considered that such decisions could have a negative impact on Repubs in the elections.
It's possible that the Scotus simply did not care about political fallout, they really just did what they thought should have been done, focused on their own institutional bubble.
Democrats aren't complicit, they just need to get their shit together if they want to enact the democratic reform that's needed to actually fix stuff
Was there no opportunity for Obama to wield power in ‘09 and codify abortion rights with a Dem majority in the house and senate?
It won’t be liberal corporate bureaucracy that grants us these things.
It was already codified, in the constitution. At the time, spending your political capital on something that's already law would've seemed like a waste. The way this court just pooped on decades of precedent would have been one of those "what if?" scenarios justifiably deemed not worth worrying about in 2009.
Obviously post-Dobbs democrats are much more incentivized to codify abortion rights.
Looking past this decision, the fact that SCOTUS is regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution, thereby making it irrelevant, means the US is going to need a representative legislative body to make 21st century laws so they don't actually end up back in the 18th century. No such body exists right now, and with democrats getting distracted by and arguing about universal health care and social issues while republicans systematically destroy American democracy, it might not for a while.
Democracy getting fucked means SCOTUS is the only entity the US can rely on to actually work for people. They have decided to not.
Idk I've seen some rumours that Trump privately declared he thinks overturning Roe v Wade is bad and will impact Repubs in the midterms badly. Even though publicly he pretends to be rolling with those who cheer for the decision.
And US polls have shown a consistent majority pattern of opposition to overturning RvW in the vicinity of high 50s low 60 %s.
While only about 30-something support overturning it.
Among Republican voters, most of them don't support overturning RvW.
Even though Americans seem convinced that the Scotus majority is playing politics now, it's not clear that they've actually considered that such decisions could have a negative impact on Repubs in the elections.
It's possible that the Scotus simply did not care about political fallout, they really just did what they thought should have been done, focused on their own institutional bubble.
I do think it's going to be bad for republicans in the mid terms, hence the "that's the good news."
The main point of my post though is that this is not the story. The story is SCOTUS regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution and the political landscape not being ready to counteract that by making a bunch of 21st century laws. It's going to take more than republicans narrowly losing an election or two.
Stock indices are not wealth tho. There's no equivalence between how much stock indices have grown and how much actual value added has been created in the economy during a year.
Stock indices, however, show very well that large parts of the economy that formerly were not represented by stocks are now. It makes the structural change visible that is the result of digitalization and platform economies like Amazon. There is a lot of wealth that was generated over the last years, but it ended up in someone else's pockets compared to earlier times, thereby increasing fragility of the middle class.
Whatever is written above: this is no financial advice.
Looking past this decision, the fact that SCOTUS is regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution, thereby making it irrelevant, means the US is going to need a representative legislative body to make 21st century laws so they don't actually end up back in the 18th century. No such body exists right now, and with democrats getting distracted by and arguing about universal health care and social issues while republicans systematically destroy American democracy, it might not for a while.
Democracy getting fucked means SCOTUS is the only entity the US can rely on to actually work for people. They have decided to not.
Idk I've seen some rumours that Trump privately declared he thinks overturning Roe v Wade is bad and will impact Repubs in the midterms badly. Even though publicly he pretends to be rolling with those who cheer for the decision.
And US polls have shown a consistent majority pattern of opposition to overturning RvW in the vicinity of high 50s low 60 %s.
While only about 30-something support overturning it.
Among Republican voters, most of them don't support overturning RvW.
Even though Americans seem convinced that the Scotus majority is playing politics now, it's not clear that they've actually considered that such decisions could have a negative impact on Repubs in the elections.
It's possible that the Scotus simply did not care about political fallout, they really just did what they thought should have been done, focused on their own institutional bubble.
I do think it's going to be bad for republicans in the mid terms, hence the "that's the good news."
The main point of my post though is that this is not the story. The story is SCOTUS regressing to an 18th century interpretation of the constitution and the political landscape not being ready to counteract that by making a bunch of 21st century laws. It's going to take more than republicans narrowly losing an election or two.
I don't think the issue here is that they're not ready to do something. They just know very well that they can't legislate a right that does not explicitly exist in the constitution. They know well that any such law passed on a federal level will be challenged in court by the states and they can't lose because it will eventually get to the same Scotus that already decided this.
The Biden administration is looking for a save-facing response but they know they can't really do much except doing something nuclear about the Scotus itself, which Biden declared he won't, because he realises if you do that, all hell can break loose and there's no turning back from that.
They just know very well that they can't legislate a right that does not explicitly exist in the constitution. They know well that any such law passed on a federal level will be challenged in court by the states and they can't lose because it will eventually get to the same Scotus that already decided this.
Politically it would be a smart thing for democrats to do regardless. If it gets struck down by SCOTUS that will rile up the base even more.
And it would be a different kind of decision; I don't think it would be quite as easy for SCOTUS to strike down such a federal law, although they obviously could.
They just know very well that they can't legislate a right that does not explicitly exist in the constitution. They know well that any such law passed on a federal level will be challenged in court by the states and they can't lose because it will eventually get to the same Scotus that already decided this.
Politically it would be a smart thing for democrats to do regardless. If it gets struck down by SCOTUS that will rile up the base even more.
And it would be a different kind of decision; I don't think it would be quite as easy for SCOTUS to strike down such a federal law, although they obviously could.
It could go like it did for the marijuana state laws thing. The states passed laws that legalised marijuana consumption, which was banned by federal law. And the federal government didn't enforce.
So in this case, states that already triggered anti-abortion laws might keep them and just refuse to repeal them.
Then the federal government will have to do something to enforce. Then this could go to court, then to the Scotus, etc.
I think states could block any federal attempt to reintroduce legality of abortion, by using all sorts of methods.
They could claim this is a case of nullification and refuse to enforce federal law that they deem unconstitutional.
Democrats aren't complicit, they just need to get their shit together if they want to enact the democratic reform that's needed to actually fix stuff
Was there no opportunity for Obama to wield power in ‘09 and codify abortion rights with a Dem majority in the house and senate?
It won’t be liberal corporate bureaucracy that grants us these things.
It was already codified, in the constitution. At the time, spending your political capital on something that's already law would've seemed like a waste. The way this court just pooped on decades of precedent would have been one of those "what if?" scenarios justifiably deemed not worth worrying about in 2009.
Obviously post-Dobbs democrats are much more incentivized to codify abortion rights.
If it was “already codified” why was it one of his campaign promises to codify it
It is exactly with in mind the possibility that the SC could overturn their decision that he would’ve made such a promise in the first place…
Here-in lies the problem with this liberal polity, always kowtowing to the right when it comes possible the moment for action, withering, prostrate like a slug
This might not even bring (or lose) votes if it becomes clear it's basically out of politicians' hands
Reforming the SC is in politicians' hands. If it just starts striking down federal laws without proper justification, that might and probably should happen, or at the very least democrats will probably start campaigning on it.
He makes a good point. If a law with 49 years of precedent should never be overturned, what do we make of Plessy, which was 58-years-old when it was overruled by Brown? Does Obama think Brown was a bad ruling?
