They are in order on purpose

[greengrass]

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Sometimes they rub up against each other. There is a reason "Life" is first. You don't get to experience the other two without it. Economic damage can be repaired.

Just my 2 cents for those calling for everyone to get infected so we can get through the economic issues quickly.
That and I'd rather not lose my son.

[Aitrus]

I respectfully disagree, greengrass. (forgive me if I get a little formal in my response on this one - there's quite a bit to unpack and reference, legally-speaking)

While it is indeed best practice to stay at home and prevent the spread of the disease, it should be done voluntarily and not through governmental coercion or under the threat of force (fines and/or arrest). Government - at any level - has no authority to mandate that the general populace be restricted in their travels or associations. Only those who are a direct threat to public health - meaning, those who have tested positive - can be forcibly quarantined. The case of Typhoid Mary, for example. However, for the general populace who show no signs of sickness, none of our rights can be legally abridged by government without due process.

I think this view is Constitutionally supported. Fisch, a Professor of Law at University of Missouri-Columbia, wrote:

"Neither the term 'emergency' nor any cognate of comparable generality appears in the text of the United States Constitution...The Constitution was intended to function in emergencies as well as in normal times, and therefore an emergency affords no excuse for deviating from its terms." (1990, p. 2 & 5)

Fisch also noted that the Founders listed specific emergency power exceptions granted to the government in the Constitution - all related to times of war and rebellion (plus one allowing the President to convene one or both houses of Congress on extraordinary occasions). "While the allocations of power are general, the exceptions are specific to particular limitations on government action, inviting the conclusion that the Framers intended no other exceptions to be recognized...they all have to do with force and violence: war, rebellion, insurrection, the use of the militia to enforce the laws." (1990, p. 4)

Further, under the Incorporation Doctrine,the Supreme Court has ruled that the entirety of the First Amendment applies to the States as well as to the Federal level of government. Thus, if the Federal level of government can't mandate "stay at home" orders or require businesses to close, then neither can State governments.

There is a growing discussion about the Constitutionality of the authority (some would argue "the duty") of State governors to issue the various orders to "shelter in place" or "stay at home" or threats to fine and / or arrest individuals or business owners who violate the orders. However, we probably won't find out if they were legally enacted. We likely won't know for sure until after everything ends and somebody pushes a case through the system to the Supreme Court. Fisch concluded that:

"Tension arises, of course, when the Court undertakes its own evaluation of the emergency; but on the whole it has done so in the calm after the storm has passed." (1990, p. 33)

Source: Fisch, W. (1990). Emergency in the constitutional law of the United States. The American Journal of Comparative Law, 38, 389-420. Retrieved from https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/cg ... xt=facpubs

[userque]

I still haven't researched this, and may or may not; but I did come across this, fwiw. AFK.

Coronavirus Quarantines and Your Legal Rights
https://www.snopes.com/news/2020/03/18/ ... al-rights/

[greengrass]

So my argument was that you have to be alive to enjoy the others. I don't see how that's debatable. I didn't bring up law anywhere.

[tspwizard1]

Trump is gearing up to kill 8-10 million Americans. That is what would happen when the hospitals get overrun and the 3% mortality rate of infected people getting treatment, goes to 10-15% when infected people cannot get any treatment.

405,000 Americans died in WW2
58,220 Americans died in Vietnam
2,977 Americans died in 9/11
6-11 Million people died in the Holocaust

Do those numbers put it in perspective? He is willing to sacrifice millions of American lives to try and get the economy to bounce back to get reelected. That is a sick man. And does he actually believe the economy would bounce back with thousands of deaths a day from the virus? Delusional. I for one will not be lead to slaughter by this madman dictator Trump. Can you imagine the lawsuits? If employers make their employees come back to work vs. termination so they go back, aren't given any protective gear because there isn't any, and then die?

Pass the relief bill. Shut the country down. Build as many hospitals and ventilators as you can produce. Flatten the curve. That is what a real leader would do.

[tspwizard1]

So my argument was that you have to be alive to enjoy the others. I don't see how that's debatable. I didn't bring up law anywhere.

It is a FACT you have to be alive to enjoy your life. Dying so the stock market might go up a few points is about as stupid as one could be.

We are already on pace to lose more people to this virus than any other country. Trump seems to want to make sure we win that race by a lot.. PATHETIC.

[stilljammi]

Some people would rather be dead than to give up their liberty. And this is where the issue is. Our friends in the East can cooperate and do what's right not necessarily for the self, but for the community. In the West we are individualistic and we love our freedums. Everyone should obey these lockdowns, but I'm the exception. China and S. Korea can eradicate a pandemic and I guess we'll see what we're going to do.

[Aitrus]

So my argument was that you have to be alive to enjoy the others. I don't see how that's debatable. I didn't bring up law anywhere.

I don't disagree that one has to be alive in order to enjoy freedom. However, the virus is not going to kill millions of Americans as some would have us believe. By year's end we'll have seen more deaths from things we normally see every day - cancer, car crashes, hospital infections, the regular flu, etc. - than from COVID-19.

[mjedlin66]

So my argument was that you have to be alive to enjoy the others. I don't see how that's debatable. I didn't bring up law anywhere.

I don't disagree that one has to be alive in order to enjoy freedom. However, the virus is not going to kill millions of Americans as some would have us believe. By year's end we'll have seen more deaths from things we normally see every day - cancer, car crashes, hospital infections, the regular flu, etc. - than from COVID-19.

Source: Aitrus, Infectious Disease expert.

If this virus doesn't kill millions of Americans, that will be evidence that our measures to slow it down worked.

[Aitrus]

Trump is gearing up to kill 8-10 million Americans. That is what would happen when the hospitals get overrun and the 3% mortality rate of infected people getting treatment, goes to 10-15% when infected people cannot get any treatment.

405,000 Americans died in WW2
58,220 Americans died in Vietnam
2,977 Americans died in 9/11
6-11 Million people died in the Holocaust

Do those numbers put it in perspective? He is willing to sacrifice millions of American lives to try and get the economy to bounce back to get reelected. That is a sick man. And does he actually believe the economy would bounce back with thousands of deaths a day from the virus? Delusional. I for one will not be lead to slaughter by this madman dictator Trump. Can you imagine the lawsuits? If employers make their employees come back to work vs. termination so they go back, aren't given any protective gear because there isn't any, and then die?

Pass the relief bill. Shut the country down. Build as many hospitals and ventilators as you can produce. Flatten the curve. That is what a real leader would do.

We are not going to see millions of deaths in America from COVID-19, and Trump has no more desire to cause deaths in order to get re-elected than Obama is a Muslim. That's just plain conspiracy theory territory, fear mongering, and contributing to the problem.

"Real leaders" who would follow your model embraced policies that were responsible for over 100 million deaths last century, and in every case it all began with policies designed "in order to best provide for the good of the people". That's the perspective I don't believe you're seeing.

[Aitrus]

Source: Aitrus, Infectious Disease expert.

If this virus doesn't kill millions of Americans, that will be evidence that our measures to slow it down worked.

Not necessarily. I don't believe it's possible to say "x number of deaths were prevented because of the measures we took." That's like saying "I didn't go for a walk today, otherwise I would have been hit by a car." That's false logic because we do not know how many total infections / deaths would have occurred without the measures.

Although, it does raise an interesting conundrum: if - as you say - we can somehow derive numbers of deaths / infections saved (probably couched in terms of "estimated" or "expected"), who gets the credit for it? Will it be Trump for early on restricting China from traveling to the US and reshaping a medical system that wasn't designed to handle such an event? How about former administrations for managing what Johns Hopkins researchers last year reported as the country that is best prepared for a pandemic? (Source: https://www.ghsindex.org/) Will it be the "real leaders" that are following tspwizard's ideas? Or will it be the regular folks like you and I who are trying to do the right thing by social distancing, washing our hands, and staying at home voluntarily if possible without the force of government coercion?

Nobody knows - that's the point. Everybody (including me) is making claims - some more outlandish than others. But just like death, nobody really knows. We have theories and ideas about those unknowns, and we should certainly try to stop the spread of disease. But that has to be balanced with what we do know: that our freedoms and beliefs are to be cherished, and cannot be traded for temporary security or platitudes. If any "emergency" can be used as justification for stripping away our rights, then are they really "freedoms"?

I'm not an infectious disease expert by any means, but I have not read any reports stating that we'll have millions of deaths in the US from COVID-19. I have seen a wide variety of models, all of which base their figures on varying things. The only way I could possibly see us having millions of deaths is if we did absolutely nothing, but that's not what we're doing. We've already begun flattening the curve.

[greengrass]

Source: Aitrus, Infectious Disease expert.

If this virus doesn't kill millions of Americans, that will be evidence that our measures to slow it down worked.

Not necessarily. I don't believe it's possible to say "x number of deaths were prevented because of the measures we took." That's like saying "I didn't go for a walk today, otherwise I would have been hit by a car." That's false logic because we do not know how many total infections / deaths would have occurred without the measures.

Although, it does raise an interesting conundrum: if - as you say - we can somehow derive numbers of deaths / infections saved (probably couched in terms of "estimated" or "expected"), who gets the credit for it? Will it be Trump for early on restricting China from traveling to the US and reshaping a medical system that wasn't designed to handle such an event? How about former administrations for managing what Johns Hopkins researchers last year reported as the country that is best prepared for a pandemic? (Source: https://www.ghsindex.org/) Will it be the "real leaders" that are following tspwizard's ideas? Or will it be the regular folks like you and I who are trying to do the right thing by social distancing, washing our hands, and staying at home voluntarily if possible without the force of government coercion?

Nobody knows - that's the point. Everybody (including me) is making claims - some more outlandish than others. But just like death, nobody really knows. We have theories and ideas about those unknowns, and we should certainly try to stop the spread of disease. But that has to be balanced with what we do know: that our freedoms and beliefs are to be cherished, and cannot be traded for temporary security or platitudes. If any "emergency" can be used as justification for stripping away our rights, then are they really "freedoms"?

I'm not an infectious disease expert by any means, but I have not read any reports stating that we'll have millions of deaths in the US from COVID-19. I have seen a wide variety of models, all of which base their figures on varying things. The only way I could possibly see us having millions of deaths is if we did absolutely nothing, but that's not what we're doing. We've already begun flattening the curve.

What curve is flattering? I've checked John Hopkins and the WHO and there is no flattening anywhere to be found. Where are you getting your data?

[mjedlin66]

I'm not an infectious disease expert by any means, but I have not read any reports stating that we'll have millions of deaths in the US from COVID-19. I have seen a wide variety of models, all of which base their figures on varying things. The only way I could possibly see us having millions of deaths is if we did absolutely nothing, but that's not what we're doing. We've already begun flattening the curve.

Wide variety indeed. Italy reporting a 9% fatality rate so far, Germany reporting a 0.3% fatality rate. Both countries have relatively old and unhealthy populations. Some of it is recording methodology, but the biggest factor is more obvious: Italian hospitals are overwhelmed, and German hospitals are not (at least not yet).

So while you cling to your libertarian ideals through this crisis, and continually say the government should not force anything at all, just know what you're really vouching for.

The ideal that enough people will be responsible to flatten the curve is laughable. Americans are largely irresponsible. We're seeing that right now. How many people have enough cash to go a month without pay?

Before Washington State's shutdown, what I saw was that the grocery stores and Lowes were just absolutely packed with people. Forget the 6' social distancing- totally out the window. I was wearing a respirator, but nobody else was. People would stand right behind me in line. Pin pads weren't being sanitized periodically, at least not that I noticed.

Our culture is largely irresponsible. We emphasize individualism to a fault here, to the point that people aren't used to thinking about others. Especially among those who have little to worry about. Look at the problem Florida had with college-age spring breakers.

Merely asking the people to stay home would not have accomplished much, I'm afraid.

[userque]

I don't think the debate is focused enough; let's first establish a foundation, to see where everyone's head is at:

Aitrus:

1. Do you believe that COVID-19 has the potential to overwhelm healthcare systems (ventilators, ambulances, first-responders)? As already happened in Italy?

2. Do you believe that if the healthcare system is overwhelmed, that folks that would have otherwise survived, will die. (Due to not having ventilators; not obtaining an ambulance in time; etc.)

3. Do you believe that slowing the rate of infection via social distancing will lessen/slow the above-mentioned impact to the healthcare system?

After, specific and on-point answers to the simple, succinct, point-blank, questions above, we will know how (and/or whether) to proceed with the discussion.

[Aitrus]

What curve is flattering? I've checked John Hopkins and the WHO and there is no flattening anywhere to be found. Where are you getting your data?

Sorry, I guess my message didn't come through the way I intended.

What I meant to say that the prediction models were based on as if nothing were done - but that's not what has happened. Thus, those models are already out of sync with reality. Actions were being taken already - people voluntarily social distancing / washing hands, etc; businesses voluntarily restricting customers, implementing telework, or switching over to medically-focused production of goods; etc. These were all done voluntarily, no need for government to mandate further restrictions. On top of that, Trump closed down the northern and southern borders to most traffic, and stopped travel from China and Europe. All of these things were already going to flatten the curve without the need for further mandates implemented by authoritarian-minded leaders.