This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
They have the power to pretend they're totally following orders, but drag their feet until the next guy is elected.
These are all just words that bureaucrats said, not an objective fact. What evidence is there that it failed any such test, and that they'd totally allow it if it didn't?
Why did you skip the later part of my sentence, which gives an example of ruling by diktat, that does not involve executive orders?
That's not a "power" though. There isn't some law or legal ruling giving them this check on the president and is a risk in quite literally any organization. It's on the new admin to identify and replace people who aren't doing their duties.
SCOTUS has a majority opinion you can find from 30 seconds of googling on the topic. They start the opinion from the get-go acknowledging Trump's authority to do so but that the procedure was not compliant to law.
Letters, emails? What's the difference? If they are providing orders to the administration they are all vaguely the same thing as an executive order though with different levels of formality and purpose. Sending an email with guidance on how to enforce some presidential policy isn't verboten or just one weird trick to avoid process.
I don't think power lies in rulings and laws, power is the ability to make things happen or stop them from happening.
Those are still words written by bureaucrats, and it's not evidence that these bureaucrats would have come to a different decision if the administration happened to follow the procedure outlined int that particular ruling. Also, a 5-4 ruling is hardly what I'd call indicative of an obvious violation of an objective standard.
Then I have no idea what you argument is that Trump is not following process here, or ruling by diktat whereas other presidents have not.
Then what's your complaint exactly? There isn't a structural thing giving these people power as you've defined it.
How not? They explicitly say that they would have. One of the major issues of contention was that at the district Court level, they did actually put together a rationale and justification document for rescinding DACA however, it couldn't be used to defend the previous order which had to be argued against on its own compliance. At the time, the legal speculation was that Trump could have just given up on that particular court case and announcement and then immediately do it again using the revised version or as a similar new EO and it would have actually stuck. If you read the ruling, it seems a lot more reasonable than the 5-4 would seem.
Huh? Formal instruction from the president whether it's an EO or an email or whatever is subject to law surrounding the procedure. I'm arguing that's probably a good thing or it would otherwise be diktat.
My problem is the insistence on analyzing it from a structural perspective. I consider it mostly a red herring.
That doesn't mean they'd actually do it.
You're missing the point. Why was it 5-4, if the standard was so objective, and it's violation was so obvious?
You said that Trump sending e-mails being illegal is not initially crazy, and asked us to consider how bad things would be for cultural conservatives if Bush and Obama were allowed to rule by diktat. I'm saying I don't see a way for this e-mail to plausibly be diktat, while Bush's and Obama's EO's were not. In other words there's no hypothetical to consider - Bush and Obama presidencies actually happened.
Ah I see what you're getting at. Initially I was simply stating that I wouldn't be surprised if there were some probably dumb process requirements that would make that illegal as OP alluded to. I don't know what those processes necessarily are or would be but I do know that certain kinds of email guidance from the president requires physical copies, signatures, numbering and archiving much like an actual executive order. Not having that or the general process requirements in the APA would be more like Obama/Bush/Trump/Biden just post on Twitter/send a text/shoot an email and suddenly it has force of law - a diktat not subject to judicial or legislative restraint the way EOs are.
Because our institutions, the people that fill them, and the people that do the filling have all sorts of priorities that only sometimes seem to match good faith action and then only partially.
Yeah but we could have tested that easily enough but just redoing the announcement this time with Nielsen's rationale.
Can you expand on this? If it's not a structural thing then how are you supposed to ever fix it or work around it?
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link