Do the "states rights" folks have the right idea?

[DrToast]

I know the term "states rights" was code for the denying civil rights, but that's not what I'm talking about.

The federal government seems completely broken. Instead of our taxes going the federal government, what if most of it went to the state governments. Let them dole out education money and run health care. Quite frankly, I'm kind of surprised that more states haven't tried to pass health care reform on their own.

The federal government would still have a role--they could keep handling things like the military. I dunno, it seems like much of the stuff they handle could be done locally. Those that want to live ass-backwards lives can live in red states.

What would be the problems with this?

[Sugarcoated]

1. Russ Feingold has said he's preferring the state's rights type of health care reform

but I'm sure he'll vote yea on a good health care reform bill as long as it's not watered down.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

2. I don't about your state, but my state is too broke to

pass gas much less Health care.....

[NYC_SKP]

3. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to defend "states rights" that have nothing to do with civil

rights.

There are matters best resolved by the fed: defense, international relations, interstate highways, social security, patents and trademarks, etc.

There are other matters best decided by states for reasons of regional differences, reduced bureaucracy, freedom to innovate, etc.

I support a balance of these.

It may, in the end, turn out that states work out solutions that are better than a federal solution.

I cannot say if health care will be one of them or not.

[DrToast]

4. My question is, does the federal government do too much?

When I look at how much I pay in federal taxes and how much I pay in state taxes, I wonder if those amounts should be reversed.

[sandnsea]

5. All kinds of things are wrong with it

First of all, states did handle a lot of this before the Depression. When various states went bust, the people moved to other states and overloaded their social services. Second, states do not administer assistance fairly and often create systems that make it impossible for those most in need to get help, based on the location of offices, lack of information to apply, etc. Third, disease doesn't know borders. Fourth, children shouldn't suffer based on the location of birth. Fifth, we are already suffering enough from dumb-ass voters.

And a bunch more reasons related to unifying a country.

The thing that really kills me is when progressive states implement policies that prove themselves, and then the federal government has to step up with money for the other states that the progressive state doesn't need because they already implemented the policy.

[MarjorieG]

6. Regulation is national, and a national exhange for purchasing power a good idea. Also is Kucinich .

amendment for breaking barrier in states to allow single payer if the states want to innovate, as a companion.

[Union Yes]

7. State rights can trample your rights faster than any federal law.

[Union Yes]

8. Also, most of the laws/regs we live under are state laws.

So the big gubmint argumemt coming from the right is just hot air. State govt's can be as intrusive and as big as federal "big govt".

[quaker bill]

9. No, they do not

First, the notion that the federal government is "completely broken" is an easily discredited rightwing talking point. Social Security works, and Medicare works, unemployment insurance works. Various other programs work more or less effectively as republican control of at least some portion of the system has allowed over the last 30 years. Those portions of the federal government that republicans have intentionally disabled can be restored fairly promptly. Get the republican cronies out of management and things will improve. It is not all that tough, just put people in charge who have appropriate credentials and happen to believe in the mission.

States on the other hand present numerous problems. First among these is a sort of political Darwinism. In my experience, the best and brightest among the pols climb to the federal level, this is not a great personal commendation for their collective intellectual skill at the federal level, but more a statement of the variable lack of such skill on the more local level. So, in my experience working directly with elected officials, if you are looking for insight, creativity, and effectiveness, you are vastly more likely to find it in pols at the federal level. This does not mean that you will find it, as in general, pols are not a creative bunch, just that your odds are slightly better.

Second among these problems is the inherent and massive difference in resources available at the state level. Some states are quite poor and others quite wealthy. Restricting revenue and programs within these artificial borders will yeild a highly variable result. Places that are currently backwoods will stay just exactly where they are and such an arrangement will perpetuate this massive disparity and even enhance it over time.

The third problem is the inherent capacity of such an arrangement to drive a competition toward the bottom. Corporations are now on occasion far larger than our states. They will press for and obtain concessions on taxes and regulation from the isolated states, particularly the impoverished ones, in exchange for relocation of jobs, and as history has shown, only for short durations before they open the bidding war again. If you wish to enhance corporate power, few means other than a drive toward "states rights" could be more effective, which is why the insurance lobby presses for it now.

States rights is a colonial era construct that should have died at least 100 years ago.

[Lyric]

10. Because the states have wildly different economies.

The poorer states need help, plain and simple. If we agree that things like education and health care should be fundamental rights available to ALL people, then we must be able to provide those things to ALL people regardless of where they live, and as equally as reasonably possible...much like FEMA assistance or Social Security. Since New York is highly unlikely to donate millions to the poor children of New Mexico out of the goodness of its citizens' hearts, we need the federal government to collect the money and re-distribute it.

This is a basic tenet of progressive economics--otherwise, the wealthy children will grow up healthy and educated, and the lower-middle-class children will suffer tremendously, thus increasing crime, poverty, hunger, disease, malnutrition, and neglect in the have-not states. That hurts the entire nation, because no state is an island unto itself. We thrive together, or we fall alone.