Closing USAID

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is just crazy. Why is congress even bothering with appropriations when Trump can just decide later on what gets paid for.

USAID is under the executive branch. President hs right to review spending and control departments and agencies. That's just the way it is. Some Article 3 judge isn't going to get in the way of a Unitary Executive. Get used to that fact.

Unitary Executive basically means that congress and the courts are useless. Why would you support this idea? Checks and balances prevent abuses of power regardless of the political leanings of a president. Do you really want someone like AOC to become president with Unitary Executive branch power? If you don't then the current president should not have this power either. This crackpot legal theory is incredibly dangerous and no one should have absolute control over the government.

Unitary executive means the opposite. It means that the branches are coequal because they are vested with their respective powers.

But in the world we live in today where legislative and judicial powers exists within the executive branch, well, yeah, why can’t POTUS exercise those legislative and judicial powers via the Department of Government Efficiency?

I get it. I really do. In an ideal world Congress makes the laws, the executive executes the laws and the judicial branch does the judging. But starting with FDR we have chosen to allow the executive branch to wield quasi legislative and judicial powers.

That’s all DOGE is doing. This is a continuation of New Deal era inventions in our government.

Not sure if serious?

Dead serious. If we can have legislative and judicial powers residing in the executive branch (via the regulatory agencies, for example) then DOGE can also exercise legislative and judicial powers.

Yeah, there are some very serious conservatives that I follow online who also authoritatively state nonsense like this. They ignore legislative history in favor of their own ideas and call themselves rational rather than partisan.

Once upon a time, conservative did not mean "making stuff up". That time is no more.

Do you have links to an attempt at a well-reasoned defense of this?

I keep coming back to THE LAW. So much of this is statutorily or administratively illegal, and ultimately the executive is going to have to ignore court orders to destroy the government.

How do you defend that?

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Supreme Court opinion came down - Trump lost. The government needs to pay its already incurred bills.

What is supporting the theory that the government does not need to pay for work that has ALREADY BEEN DONE?

[Anonymous]

I have some thoughts about this, but I need to read through it and see what the Supreme Court said and did not say, before writing them down. I will say, though, that this is both a small and a large issue, and from both perspectives, it is a win for the rule of law.

[Anonymous]

ahahahah:

"The District Court has made plain its frustration with the Government, and respondents raise serious concerns about nonpayment for
completed work. But the relief ordered is, quite simply, too extreme a response. A federal court has many tools to address a party’s supposed nonfeasance."

The relief, that the government pay for work that has been done, as ordered by congress, is "too extreme." LOL.

5-4 is not good on this one, y'all. we're in trouble.

[Anonymous]

Rather amazing that there are 4 supreme court justices who do not believe federal contracts should be enforceable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Rather amazing that there are 4 supreme court justices who do not believe federal contracts should be enforceable.

Replying to myself, these same four Justices held Biden could not use a statute passed by Congress for student debt relief because the statute authorized it but needed to extra double authorize it.

But for Trump, he can simply ignore statutes and appropriations entirely, Congress is irrelevant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Rather amazing that there are 4 supreme court justices who do not believe federal contracts should be enforceable.

Clearly. But at least there is a head nod by the larger court towards continued rule of law. Some people around here were declaring it DOA with no conversation. And, as a Catholic with lots of family ties to Notre Dame, I'm grateful to see that Amy Coney Barrett is committed to Rule of Law.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rather amazing that there are 4 supreme court justices who do not believe federal contracts should be enforceable.

Replying to myself, these same four Justices held Biden could not use a statute passed by Congress for student debt relief because the statute authorized it but needed to extra double authorize it.

But for Trump, he can simply ignore statutes and appropriations entirely, Congress is irrelevant.

It's disappointing, to be sure. Absurd even.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rather amazing that there are 4 supreme court justices who do not believe federal contracts should be enforceable.

Replying to myself, these same four Justices held Biden could not use a statute passed by Congress for student debt relief because the statute authorized it but needed to extra double authorize it.

But for Trump, he can simply ignore statutes and appropriations entirely, Congress is irrelevant.

Many SCOTUS opinions are just reverse-engineering to whatever policy outcome the majority wants. I remember going to law school naively thinking that the justices were paragons of reasoned thinking, but that the more I learned, the more it was clearly just "We hate this administration and its policies" or "We like this administration and its policies" determining an outcome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Supreme Court opinion came down - Trump lost. The government needs to pay its already incurred bills.

What is supporting the theory that the government does not need to pay for work that has ALREADY BEEN DONE?

Trump stiffs his workers/vendors, and so can the US Government. Then each individual contactor/vendor would be forced to sue the US Government, some of which are small NGOS overseas who could never afford to do that. I'm glad that the Court opinion came down the way it did, but I'm horrified it was so close. Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Thomas are deadbeats who lack any sense of professional ethics.

[Anonymous]

Short SCOTUS lady is a mom of six! seven? She adopted two kids from Haiti!

[Anonymous]

Alito/Thomas/Gorsuch/Kavanaugh Are the deadbeat justices. We know that Thomas and Kavanaugh live beyond their means and accept handouts from wealthy donors. I just didn’t really see them enshrining it into law.

[Anonymous]

48-year-old appellate court judge has said she is a “faithful Catholic.” Catholics are secret radicals who are pro poor. Lots at USAID

Usaid was also full of Mormons. They are also a radical sect that is pro poor.

[Anonymous]

Jesus was crazy. He literally spread his religion around the globe and said rich men could not get into heaven. Rich men were like passing a camel through the “eye of a needle.”

We don’t have either of those items in the US. But the idea is that it’s really hard to get into heaven and enjoy eternal love if you are rich!

That is why we shut it all down. Pro poor in that agency. America is not pro poor at all any more. Peace corps is the worst . I don’t know why they didn’t bring those kids home yet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rather amazing that there are 4 supreme court justices who do not believe federal contracts should be enforceable.

Replying to myself, these same four Justices held Biden could not use a statute passed by Congress for student debt relief because the statute authorized it but needed to extra double authorize it.

But for Trump, he can simply ignore statutes and appropriations entirely, Congress is irrelevant.

Many SCOTUS opinions are just reverse-engineering to whatever policy outcome the majority wants. I remember going to law school naively thinking that the justices were paragons of reasoned thinking, but that the more I learned, the more it was clearly just "We hate this administration and its policies" or "We like this administration and its policies" determining an outcome.

Yes, but Roberts likes to pontificate about upholding the legitimacy of the Supreme Court as an institution. So he doesn't want to look entirely like a political hack in this case, but it doesn't bode well that the vote was so close.