What the Supreme Court's Nix on the Chevron doctrine means for food regulation
foodpolitics.com
foodpolitics.com
It's long been an open secret that our politicians are for sale to the highest bidder but it's very difficult for me to understand how the mask can be this far off and people don't know, realize, or seem to care all that much.
For example, net neutrality was a thing, and then it wasn’t, and now it might be again, all in the span of about a decade and all because different presidents and FCC chairs had different opinions about the extent (and intent) of the powers of the FCC.
Or consider marijuana, still a schedule I drug per the DEA, yet by presidential decree, the DEA isn’t supposed to be spending effort enforcing that. Until I guess a new “tough on drugs” president comes into office. Or maybe until it’s politically expedient to enforce that law against some distributor. Maybe some grower in California or Colorado where it’s legal at the state level has done something to draw the ire of the president. Gosh wouldn’t you know it, the DEA decided it has some time to start enforcing those laws after all.
Consider what it means for someone who wants, say, limited but substantial restrictions on abortions. Their choices are a low-restrictions party or a party that attempts to ban it entirely every chance they get. Where’s their representation on that issue? Doesn’t exist.
Further consider that if they decide one of those is closer to their position than the other, and they take that issue very seriously, they’re now stuck supporting the entire rest of that party’s agenda no matter how much they hate it, if they want to vote close to their own views on the issue.
Repeat for all other issues.
The system basically guarantees most voters don’t agree that much with the party they end up supporting. WTF.
And the only way to fix it is an uphill—scratch that, up mountain—battle against the two parties, since they benefit greatly from the current system.
[edit] it’s a weak point, to clarify, because it enables all kinds of bundling of terrible, unpopular, and even dangerous-to-democracy policies with other issues. It elevates those unpopular positions by holding other issues hostage, basically.
Nothing has ever stopped this except for the ability to vote these people out. In fact, voting for people that hold the same political values as you do and expecting them to advance those political values is literally the point of representative democracy.
There is a lot of fearmongering related to the Supreme Court's decisions recently, but a lot of it seems to take an issue with our political system generally rather than the specifics of the decisions. (And the entire discussion is hampered by everyone's inability to actually read and understand what the Supreme Court decisions actually say, leading to people just repeating their favorite news agency's talking points like you have here with the "supreme court ruled this isnt a bribe" insert.)
With extensive rollbacks to the voting rights act, and the inherent power of money in political campaigns, it's very difficult to swallow the "just vote" argument as well. It clearly isn't working. Also, you cannot vote out appointed judges, including the ones sitting on the SC that are making decisions that impact hundreds of millions of people and sit for life.
I'd be interested in your basis for the statement that it's "accelerating." I'd go further and bet that your basis is more of a vibe rooted in recency bias.
Edit: And to your point about voting out judges - well, some would say that's a good thing, but more importantly most judges at the state level are usually voted in or have term limits along with recall procedures (so it's not even clear how your original hypothetical of a governor appointing sympathetic judges would work in practice since governors don't appoint judges usually, but whatever). We are talking about state judges, right?
I guess one of my points here is what I said before about fearmongering. You're out here posting about these hypothetical situations that you're afraid of trying to drive Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt when you apparently don't even know how the judicial system works (federal judges vs. state judges, elections vs. appointments, federal law vs. state law, etc.).
https://ballotpedia.org/Gubernatorial_appointment_of_judges
Hope this is informative.
> You're out here posting about these hypothetical situations that you're afraid of trying to drive Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt when you apparently don't even know how the judicial system works (federal judges vs. state judges, elections vs. appointments, federal law vs. state law, etc.).
Besides the fact that this word salad makes zero sense, it seems you are not the one that understands how the judicial system works. There has been a party-wide effort of packing the courts for years now (aware this happens on both sides) - Bannon wrote and spoke extensively on this topic.
Information is free!
So we're only concerned about this for a few blue states' courts (and even in those cases there might be an electoral backstop permitting removal). Got it. I guess the correct answer here is for those states to change their laws to be more democratic by subjecting their judiciaries to elections and by passing state laws that criminalize bribery by state and local officials?
I'm glad we both agree that the legitimate political strategy of corruption and sympathetic political appointments has been going on for years, and been used by both parties. But you still haven't shown that it's accelerated in the past decade.
Next thing you're going to tell me is that gerrymandering has only been a problem since the Democratic-Republicans started doing it!
I can come up with plenty of other hypotheticals for you to nitpick, but I find this discussion pointless and you obnoxious and clearly arguing in bad faith, so I won't.
In Chicago.
Now it's everywhere.
Chevron won Chevron v. Natural Resource Defense Council. The case focused on what was meant by a 'source' of pollution as used in the Clean Air Act of 1963. The EPA was on the side of Chevron, and NRDC sued in the hopes that the court would interpret the law as they, rather than the EPA, interpreted it. The court deferred to the EPA.
So while you think you might want deference to the agency, sometimes it's nice to have a judge.
But then, in another opinion they knew they were delivering this session when they finalized that, they removed the statute of limitations on challenging federal regulations, so actually it does mean they’re all (well, any that inconveniences a corporation) going to be reviewed without Chevron deference. They basically lied, all back-to-back so it was obvious.
The removal of the statue of limitations means that any new company that's formed can challenge any regulations that they are subject to, no matter when the regulation was formed.
Combined with Chevron's reversal and the increased power of the judiciary, well, I think it's going to paradoxically destroy the court system. Imagine the delays when thousands of companies sue to challenge millions of regulations.
The Supreme Court (ultimately) now decides not whether a President is guilty of, say, murder committed while in office, but whether they may even be tried for it.
Though, yeah, it’s gonna gum up the works in a big way. I wonder if they’ll see a budget increase and large increase in the number of (lower) court judges (so, new appointments) if the elections go a certain way in November.
I'm a libertarian and an environmentalist. Pollution is harming other people just as clearly and directly as assault, rape or murder and so regulations against that harm still fit naturally and comfortably within even fairly extreme or hardline libertarian frameworks.
A law that says "You can't spray mace in someone's face" and a law that says "You can't spray <whatever other harmful chemical> in <the air that will eventually hit people's faces>" are ideologically the same.
Perhaps you meant it's a fascist, statist or autocratic dream? The people with power (economic, political, social) get to benefit while the people without power get harmed.
Also a case that is bogged down in the courts is in some ways worse because it is yet another source of uncertainty.
And in many states they are appointed by republicans. Companies already venue shop to cases to get the judge they want. Why won't this continue to happen?
> a case that is bogged down in the courts is in some ways worse because it is yet another source of uncertainty.
It's not for the companies because while its bogged down, its business-as-usual. The longer they can delay, the better for them.
> while its bogged down, its business-as-usual.
Uncertainty is bad for business.
Only some kinds, while other kinds are great for business. For example, the tabacco industry very deliberately created uncertainty about the links between smoking and lung cancer for years and years because it meant in the meantime they could continue business as usual.
Too bad courts can't do things like admit expert witnesses.
"Casts a chill on developing new regulations development."
Good! Things are ridiculously out of control. Just look at the fiasco going on around raw milk right now - and that's just the tip of the over-regulatory spear.
"For those of us wanting diets to be healthier and more sustainable, it’s a disaster waiting to happen"
Why? How does a lack of regulation prevent you from making your own informed, intelligent choices?
What a piece of crap fear mongering article.
Can you refer me to the over-regulation of raw milk? (I hope that the FDA has at least some authority to regulate raw milk [1].)
> "For those of us wanting diets to be healthier and more sustainable, it’s a disaster waiting to happen"
> Why? How does a lack of regulation prevent you from making your own informed, intelligent choices?
There's more to diet than choosing which foods you eat. Regulations also control acceptable levels of pathogens in food, presence of chemical toxins in food and water, and accuracy of advertising and labeling [2].
[1] https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/dangers-r...
Is this accurate? Or would the experts - currently sitting in regulatory bodies, or lobbying somewhere - transition to the courts, similar to how they are used in criminal cases?
Are the “batshit-but-here-for-life” edge case judges really going to be making decisions based on their personal non expert views? Sounds like negligence.
All this hand wringing does is expose the statist who think everyone should defer to the "experts" and not think for themselves.
’The question is,’ said everyone else, ‘whether you can make originalism mean so many different things.’