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Started By
Message
Ron Paul: End the shutdown
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:31 pm
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:31 pm
LINK
The shutdown of the American economy by government decree should end. The lasting and far-reaching harms caused by this authoritarian precedent far outweigh those caused by the COVID-19 virus. The American people—individuals, families, businesses—must decide for themselves how and when to reopen society and return to their daily lives.
Neither the Trump administration nor Congress has the legal authority to shut down American life absent at least baseline due process. As Judge Andrew Napolitano recently wrote, business closures, restrictions on assembly and movement, and quarantines are not constitutionally permissible under some magic “emergency” doctrine. At a minimum, the federal government must show potential imminent harm by specific infected individuals at some form of hearing or trial.
These due process requirements are not suspended.
State and local officials may claim, or even possess, lawful police powers to shut down their communities. We offer no analysis of such powers or claims under the myriad of state constitutions and authorizing legislation. But they should resist exercising these powers. The governor of Virginia, in particular, deserves admonition for unilaterally imposing a lengthy period of virtual house arrest.
We do not know, and cannot yet know, how many Americans will become sick or die from the virus. We do know that predictions regarding infection and death rates are highly unreliable. Even actual deaths attributable to COVID-19 are not so easy to count, as Italy has discovered. Age, general health, and comorbidity are difficult variables to assess, and people may die “with” the virus but not “from” it. It is also very difficult to assess the lethality of the virus relative to previously known types of flu and colds.
To date, COVID-19 deaths in the US are far fewer than deaths in ordinary flu seasons or from past pandemics such as the H1N1 virus. This understanding is critically important to put the virus, and the government response to it, in perspective. Even during past pandemics, depressions, and world wars, Americans went to work.
In 1850, French economist Frédéric Bastiat helped the world understand the “seen and unseen costs” of state policies. It is simple to see how quarantines and lockdowns will slow the spread of COVID-19. It is critical, but not so simple, to see the costs and harms caused by the economic shutdown.
Only then can we rationally understand the tradeoffs involved.
How many Americans suffering from other illnesses cannot see a doctor now? How many Americans will lose their jobs, their life savings, their retirement prospects, and their incalculable feeling of self-worth? How many will succumb to depression, drug or alcohol abuse, and suicide? How many will lose their homes, divorce their spouses, or suffer abuse? How many will never recover in their careers? How many small businesses, including the vital ones of doctors, dentists, and veterinarians, will vanish from your community? How many young people will “fail to launch”?
Worse still, will grocery stores and gas stations remain open and stocked? Will crime spike? Will the American social fabric, already thin from politics, tear apart?
These questions are not rhetorical. All of these things happened, to a degree, following the Great Recession of 2008. They will happen again—very soon—if we fail to act immediately. Tomorrow, on April 1, millions of Americans will not pay rent or mortgages. Millions of small businesses will shutter, just as many large employers such as Macy’s, Kohl’s, airlines, and hotels already have. Millions of service workers are unemployed already, but many more jobs will be lost. The effects will cascade.
There is no conflict between humanitarian and economic concerns; in fact they are flipsides of the same coin. A poorer America will be a much less healthy America, one more vulnerable to future illness and disease. Technology, modern medicine, and market actors can address a virus; already we see entrepreneurs producing cheaper ventilators and doctors using cheap generic drugs with very promising results.
This local, bottom-up approach is the only effective way to confront the virus. The federal government, as we see now and have in the past, is comically incapable of competence in times of crisis.
On a fundamental level, freedom really is more important than security—or, in this case, an illusion of security. We all demonstrate this in our personal lives every day, from flying to driving to riding bicycles, to consuming unhealthy food and drink simply because we like it. Security has never been the sole or even primary goal for a country born in rebellion.
Government cannot decide what aspects of our lives are essential or nonessential. The American people cannot simply sit at home and wait for government checks written on funds that government does not have.
End the shutdown.
The shutdown of the American economy by government decree should end. The lasting and far-reaching harms caused by this authoritarian precedent far outweigh those caused by the COVID-19 virus. The American people—individuals, families, businesses—must decide for themselves how and when to reopen society and return to their daily lives.
Neither the Trump administration nor Congress has the legal authority to shut down American life absent at least baseline due process. As Judge Andrew Napolitano recently wrote, business closures, restrictions on assembly and movement, and quarantines are not constitutionally permissible under some magic “emergency” doctrine. At a minimum, the federal government must show potential imminent harm by specific infected individuals at some form of hearing or trial.
These due process requirements are not suspended.
State and local officials may claim, or even possess, lawful police powers to shut down their communities. We offer no analysis of such powers or claims under the myriad of state constitutions and authorizing legislation. But they should resist exercising these powers. The governor of Virginia, in particular, deserves admonition for unilaterally imposing a lengthy period of virtual house arrest.
We do not know, and cannot yet know, how many Americans will become sick or die from the virus. We do know that predictions regarding infection and death rates are highly unreliable. Even actual deaths attributable to COVID-19 are not so easy to count, as Italy has discovered. Age, general health, and comorbidity are difficult variables to assess, and people may die “with” the virus but not “from” it. It is also very difficult to assess the lethality of the virus relative to previously known types of flu and colds.
To date, COVID-19 deaths in the US are far fewer than deaths in ordinary flu seasons or from past pandemics such as the H1N1 virus. This understanding is critically important to put the virus, and the government response to it, in perspective. Even during past pandemics, depressions, and world wars, Americans went to work.
In 1850, French economist Frédéric Bastiat helped the world understand the “seen and unseen costs” of state policies. It is simple to see how quarantines and lockdowns will slow the spread of COVID-19. It is critical, but not so simple, to see the costs and harms caused by the economic shutdown.
Only then can we rationally understand the tradeoffs involved.
How many Americans suffering from other illnesses cannot see a doctor now? How many Americans will lose their jobs, their life savings, their retirement prospects, and their incalculable feeling of self-worth? How many will succumb to depression, drug or alcohol abuse, and suicide? How many will lose their homes, divorce their spouses, or suffer abuse? How many will never recover in their careers? How many small businesses, including the vital ones of doctors, dentists, and veterinarians, will vanish from your community? How many young people will “fail to launch”?
Worse still, will grocery stores and gas stations remain open and stocked? Will crime spike? Will the American social fabric, already thin from politics, tear apart?
These questions are not rhetorical. All of these things happened, to a degree, following the Great Recession of 2008. They will happen again—very soon—if we fail to act immediately. Tomorrow, on April 1, millions of Americans will not pay rent or mortgages. Millions of small businesses will shutter, just as many large employers such as Macy’s, Kohl’s, airlines, and hotels already have. Millions of service workers are unemployed already, but many more jobs will be lost. The effects will cascade.
There is no conflict between humanitarian and economic concerns; in fact they are flipsides of the same coin. A poorer America will be a much less healthy America, one more vulnerable to future illness and disease. Technology, modern medicine, and market actors can address a virus; already we see entrepreneurs producing cheaper ventilators and doctors using cheap generic drugs with very promising results.
This local, bottom-up approach is the only effective way to confront the virus. The federal government, as we see now and have in the past, is comically incapable of competence in times of crisis.
On a fundamental level, freedom really is more important than security—or, in this case, an illusion of security. We all demonstrate this in our personal lives every day, from flying to driving to riding bicycles, to consuming unhealthy food and drink simply because we like it. Security has never been the sole or even primary goal for a country born in rebellion.
Government cannot decide what aspects of our lives are essential or nonessential. The American people cannot simply sit at home and wait for government checks written on funds that government does not have.
End the shutdown.
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:35 pm to FlexDawg
(no message)
This post was edited on 2/2/21 at 12:00 pm
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:36 pm to FlexDawg
Ron Paul has become a kook since leaving office
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:37 pm to FlexDawg
quote:
Neither the Trump administration nor Congress has the legal authority to shut down American life
I'll wait for Ron to point out what aspects of American life Trump has officially shut down. The shutdowns are coming from State and Local officials.
This post was edited on 4/1/20 at 10:38 pm
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:37 pm to FlexDawg
Trump can order it tomorrow and every liberal on this site will be 100% ALL FOR State’s rights.
Posted on 4/1/20 at 10:39 pm to rds dc
quote:
I'll wait for Ron to point what aspects of American life Trump has officially shut down. The shutdowns are coming from State and Local officials.
I agree. He seems to indicate that most state and local officials may have the right depending on their individual constitutions....but that they shouldn’t give stay at home orders.
I wish he would have made it more obvious that Trump has only given guidelines. Nevertheless I don’t like the orders from any form of government.
This post was edited on 4/1/20 at 10:42 pm
Posted on 4/1/20 at 11:26 pm to rds dc
Dont think this is something that has to be processed through a MAGA or OMB filter. That response to me speaks more to what we’re allowing as citizens without even a second thought as to the legality of it all and also reinforces the fact that bottom up, free market driven responses will always be more effective than any top down action the government can conjure up.
Read the words dummies, there’s some good stuff in there.
Read the words dummies, there’s some good stuff in there.
This post was edited on 4/1/20 at 11:32 pm
Posted on 4/1/20 at 11:33 pm to FlexDawg
quote:
The shutdown of the American economy by government decree should end.
The economy hasn’t been shut down.
Posted on 4/2/20 at 1:18 am to Apache
My current employment status says otherwise.
Posted on 4/2/20 at 3:07 am to FlexDawg
Well, it seems to me that it's the states and local governments shutting things down.
Posted on 4/2/20 at 4:21 am to Lakeboy7
No surprise you are the sort of idiotic sheep that goes along with this lunacy
You will be cheering when this stupidity is done with "climate change" as the excuse in a few years
You will be cheering when this stupidity is done with "climate change" as the excuse in a few years
Posted on 4/2/20 at 5:56 am to FlexDawg
Why does beyond one of these arguments make this out to be an American thing? As if the entire world isn’t on lockdown right now? China just went into their second lockdown. This thing is serious and it seems the only way you guys would believe it if millions of millions of ppl die—-which is the exact thing we are trying to avoid. I’m so glad nothing like this happens under Obama or any other Dem cause good lord If you guys are framing out with Repubs in office I can’t even imagine how bad you would be if it were a Dem.
Posted on 4/2/20 at 6:13 am to HailHailtoMichigan!
quote:
Ron Paul has become a kook since leaving office
Yeah, being vigilant about the government taking your individual freedom and liberty is really kooky.
Posted on 4/2/20 at 6:16 am to Lakeboy7
quote:
Why arent you in the street pay8triot?
Why aren’t you out of your mom’s basement yet!
Posted on 4/2/20 at 7:00 am to HailHailtoMichigan!
quote:
Ron Paul has become a kook since leaving office
Stfu, Mr. “Louisiana has a climate identical to Cuba.”
Posted on 4/2/20 at 7:38 am to FlexDawg
What has fedgov shutdown?
In this article, Ron Paul says the federal government does not have authority to shut anything down. He goes on to say local state governments may have that authority and this article isn’t commentary on those.
Aren’t the vast majority of lockdowns being done at the state level?
In this article, Ron Paul says the federal government does not have authority to shut anything down. He goes on to say local state governments may have that authority and this article isn’t commentary on those.
Aren’t the vast majority of lockdowns being done at the state level?
Posted on 4/2/20 at 7:49 am to Tiguar
Yeah. That’s the obvious criticism. The states are obviously taking some cues from Trump’s recommendations. But a lot of them are just making shite up as they go.
None of knows anything. But the dangerous ones are the ones who think they know.
None of knows anything. But the dangerous ones are the ones who think they know.
Posted on 4/2/20 at 7:51 am to the808bass
I don’t necessarily disagree with his premise but his entire article is basically irrelevant if fedgov hasn’t actually decreed anything
Posted on 4/2/20 at 8:02 am to FlexDawg
What about common sense in the face of a common threat?
Posted on 4/2/20 at 8:24 am to JawjaTigah
“Common sense” is always based on assumptions that can be warranted or unwarranted. To this point, I’ve seen no effective, in-depth analysis of those assumptions and their relative merits.
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