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COVID-19

scoolbubba

Brett327 gargles ballsacks
pilot
Contributor
Don’t feed the trolls, jack. 500k and counting in the dirt and no return to normal in sight, but dude thinks you guys down under that are living normal lives got it all wrong.


All places like Taiwan, NZ, and Aussieland prove is how important strong immigration and border control policies are. What's the point of locking down if you're going to let 10,000 person convoys cross our border unimpeded?

I'll concede we could have done differently if border control enters the chat. Til then, this is much ado about nothing.

and really, trolls?

"how dare people have different thoughts on life-changing circumstances created by the government for a virus that doesn't affect them!' Grow up.
 

Jim123

DD-214 in hand and I'm gonna party like it's 1998
pilot
Don’t feed the trolls, jack. 500k and counting in the dirt and no return to normal in sight, but dude thinks you guys down under that are living normal lives got it all wrong.
I don't think they got it all wrong, I think they got it partly wrong. I think we got it partly wrong too. A big part of our problem is we have a society that glorifies unhealthy lifestyles, we place value on pushing through illness (things like coming to work or even being out and about). It's complicated and I'm not suggesting we'd solve all our problems by transforming into a socialist utopia (we'd create more problems).

We, that's everybody from rich to poor, are going to be paying the bills for all the economic damage for a long time. One way or the other from our bank accounts to taxes or from having crap paying highly productive for the compensation jobs. Like I said, it's complicated. My opinion is the Aussies shutdown more than optimal. My opinion is also that us Americans, of all political stripes, collectively shot ourselves in the foot seven ways from Sunday. None of us got it right, none of the 50 states out of all the different courses we've taken, but in the outlandish "I can't believe I'm saying this," to me it looks more and more like... Florida got closer to getting it right than most of the others.
 

Treetop Flyer

Well-Known Member
pilot
Don’t feed the trolls, jack. 500k and counting in the dirt and no return to normal in sight, but dude thinks you guys down under that are living normal lives got it all wrong.
I guess “no return to normal” depends on where you live. Like I said, a lot of states have been pretty “normal” for quite a while.
 

HAL Pilot

Well-Known Member
None
Contributor
Hang on a minute, there are more covid restrictions affecting people in the US, than we have down here. We have been over freedom before, Australia 5th compared to the US 15.

I don't think the U.S. got it right either. I bet in a few years after the dust settles there will be courts and scholars talking about the constitutional rights trampled on by local and state authorities.
 

Hair Warrior

Well-Known Member
Contributor
I don't think the U.S. got it right either. I bet in a few years after the dust settles there will be courts and scholars talking about the constitutional rights trampled on by local and state authorities.
I hope this happens but I don’t have faith that it will. It’s been a year: where are the lawsuits and judges?
 

BigRed389

Registered User
None
All places like Taiwan, NZ, and Aussieland prove is how important strong immigration and border control policies are. What's the point of locking down if you're going to let 10,000 person convoys cross our border unimpeded?

I'll concede we could have done differently if border control enters the chat. Til then, this is much ado about nothing.

and really, trolls?

"how dare people have different thoughts on life-changing circumstances created by the government for a virus that doesn't affect them!' Grow up.

Well it kinda helps that you can’t get to Australia from another country unless you literally fly in or take a fairly large ship in.
So, as I was living in AUS last year until December, and having been back in CONUS for 3 months, it's mystifying to hear it said that the US response wasn't actually worse than Australia's.

I'll absolutely concede, to follow up on the first sentence, that Australia had the deck stacked in its favor.
And I would also 100% agree that border control absolutely should have been part of the discussion from the start.

That said, those controls would not actually have been as bad as it sounds.

I obviously flew international to come back, flights to the US are not at all packed...because even with our very lax entry quarantine requirements, demand outside the US to visit is not even remotely what it was before the pandemic.
And for our land borders, you can't enter Canada without a mandatory quarantine either...so that's already strangling travel north.
So...while the woke idiots might have bitched about not letting convoys enter from Mexico, if we'd actually demonstrated we had COVID mitigated to very low spread, and that therefore letting migrant convoys in without a quarantine would be a problem, nobody would have care what they had to say.

Australia is large enough that their mainland states are basically the geographic size of many nations.
As they quickly got it under control (by around June/July), things were pretty much back to normal in each state by then, and travel between states was opening up on a case by case basis (eg if a city was having an outbreak, travelers from that city or state were turned away). None of that seems illogical or all that hard...other than the extra challenge we would have of getting 50 different states and all their local governments to try to talk and coordinate amongst each other.
 

Treetop Flyer

Well-Known Member
pilot
None of that seems illogical or all that hard...other than the extra challenge we would have of getting 50 different states and all their local governments to try to talk and coordinate amongst each other.

And we’re done here.

Government doesn’t have the right to dictate which business is essential, where citizens can travel in their own country, or how many people can gather in a private residence. Period. There were certainly mistakes made, but mostly by vastly overstepping and trampling peoples rights.
 

BigRed389

Registered User
None
And we’re done here.

Government doesn’t have the right to dictate which business is essential, where citizens can travel in their own country, or how many people can gather in a private residence. Period. There were certainly mistakes made, but mostly by vastly overstepping and trampling peoples rights.

Yeah, I don’t agree that it’s so simple. Government absolutely does have, to an extent, the right to do some of that, if warranted. Nothing strictly unconstitutional about it, and even if it was, government is just an expression of the will of its people.

It does, however, have a responsibility and obligation to do so in a way that is most efficient and will do the least harm to its citizens.

It’s an absurd hypothetical extreme, but if there were a real life World War Z style zombie apocalypse in (pick a city) I’m 100% OK with government telling those people in that city that they’re not fucking leaving until the outbreak is under control.
 

HAL Pilot

Well-Known Member
None
Contributor
Nothing strictly unconstitutional about it,
Except for that pesky interstate commerce clause and the fact lockdowns and quarantines interfere with interstate commerce. Only the US Congress can restrict interstate commerce and they aren’t imposing the restrictions.

The COVID lockdowns and quarters remind me of interning the Japanese-Americans during WW2. The government thought it was a great idea and did it. After the war when politics finally allowed the courts to review it, it was found unconstitutional and an abuse of government power.
 

BigRed389

Registered User
None
Except for that pesky interstate commerce clause and the fact lockdowns and quarantines interfere with interstate commerce. Only the US Congress can restrict interstate commerce and they aren’t imposing the restrictions.

The COVID lockdowns and quarters remind me of interning the Japanese-Americans during WW2. The government thought it was a great idea and did it. After the war when politics finally allowed the courts to review it, it was found unconstitutional and an abuse of government power.

Constitutionality as defined by who and when?
The internment of Japanese is a great example - it was also found to be constitutional by the courts during WW2? Which one is correct?

If the only objection on constitutional grounds is which government branch is allowed to do it, then you’ve de facto declared that part of government has the right to do that. The slowest, most inefficient branch sure, but still gives them the authority to do so. Which, in the event of a crisis is likely to lead to some form of War Powers or “Pandemic Powers Act” to give the Executive Branch some authority to oversee it in real time. Or not, if it doesn’t have enough popular support.

If your argument is that none of this was necessary or proper for COVID....well, I’m actually with you. But only because COVID as a disease wasn’t really that bad.
If your argument is instead that it’s an absolute and can never apply, no matter what, regardless of the magnitude of the crisis...then no I don’t agree with that.
 

HAL Pilot

Well-Known Member
None
Contributor
The Japanese internments were not considered by the courts until after the war and after the fact. Many of the U.S. governments actions during WW2 were just accepted during the war but were found to be unconstitutional after was when finally reviewed by the courts.

The constitution says the U.S. Congress controls interstate commerce and the states cannot interfere with it. By imposing restrictions such as quarantines and limits, the states are interfering with interstate commerce. To date, the few cases filed against these types of actions have been squashed by state courts and lower level federal courts without higher court reviews. They have mostly only been filed at local levels without big corporations or organizations participating mostly because they are afraid of the cancel culture backlash by government panicked consumers resulting in boycotts of their products. When life is back to normal for a few years and things have calmed down, I believe there will be lawsuits seeking injunctions against these ever happening again and even seeking damages for lost business. It will eventually end up at the Supreme Court and I am positive it will all be ruled unconstitutional.

My argument is that things like quarantines, lockdowns and restrictions on businesses (especially those operating interstate) were unconstitutional and therefore illegal. But that will be conveniently ignored by the federal, state and local governments until long after they are done. They should never have happened or been allowed.

None of this was legal, proper or should have been allowed to happen no matter the magnitude of the crisis unless the U.S. Congress passed a law putting the restrictions and quarantines in place. (Just to be clear, I'm talking blank quarantines, not quadrating sick people on an individual basis).

I'm also a believer in less government control and regulation of our lives. It is an individuals choice and responsibility to the level of risk they are willing to accept, and the consequences of their actions should only lay on themselves.
 
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