04-21-2020, 09:08 AM
(04-21-2020, 07:31 AM)6andcounting Wrote: On Constitutional grounds, Trump has the power under Title 42 of U.S. Code to halt all immigration. The 2018 upholding of his 2018 ban also gives him precedent. I suspect there will be no shortage of experts that will be paraded out to justify and support his decision. And I'm sure his slide show of CDC numbers and models shows how we need a total immigrant ban to keep us safe is already ready to roll for today.
I seriously doubt that. It is not Trump's style to have his hunches backed up by expertise. He'd rather claim he knows more than the experts anyway.
Not saying your overall point isn't fair. It is. But Trump won't roll out too many experts and numbers and models. FOX might try for him though.
(04-21-2020, 07:31 AM)6andcounting Wrote: The average person can't sift through the bias and issues in these highly specified fields that we don't study ourselves.
That's certainly true. Experts won't help you out on many topics, including all those that have an ideological question involved. But the concept of social distancing is not one of those instances. This is easy to explain, easy to get and I'd at least hope the average human is intelligent enough to grasp the concept once it's laid out. And whoever doesn't, like those protesters, is just an ignorant fool. (Or is fine with an uncontrollable spread, just let millions die; or claims that the right to assemble is more important than said millions of lifes... whatever).
That doesn't mean every single question around the virus can also be answered by experts. There are some. Like the fact that you can be asymptomatic, but still have and hence spread the virus. That is not said from a pro-Trump or anti-Trump viewpoint, it is a medical fact, one of those that should shape one's stance. Is an immigration ban needed, that one will be loaded ideologically and sure enough, that's one of the things where experts won't give you the one and only correct answer. As was the case with counterterroruism measures, the prominent instance where civil liberties were on the line to a major extent. I do not dismiss that point in any way. Stay vigilant, but not to the point where you defy important, expert-backed concepts (expert-backed around the world that is, hence including foreign experts that don't care about Trump) to fight an epidemic.
The tendency to give a political affiliation to every person and to claim all he says and does is solely shaped by said affiliation and not by facts and figures and reason is a right-wing media trick though. In reality, there are many more or less independent people around, that keep their politics private and get that it's not the only important thing in the world. And scientists/experts actually do not lie that much in favor of a politician and kill their reputation. Which is what would happen if an expert were to say utter falsehoods just to please or contradict Trump.
![[Image: 4CV0TeR.png]](https://i.imgur.com/4CV0TeR.png)