| > National businesses in many cases (though not all) want uniform regulations to ease doing business. So they lobby for federal preemption of state regulations. Very few of the regulations in that nature are the ones people are complaining about. The objectionable things largely fall into the categories of things that cost a lot in blood and treasure, put poor and middle class people in prison or erect regulatory barriers to competition and entrepreneurship. > The last time state vs. federal power came to the point of an outright test of strength, the federal government won. The federal government always wins. They have more soldiers than anyone else. Winning and being right are not the same thing and being right sometimes is not an excuse to claim unchecked power. > People move around a lot, which makes it increasingly impractical to deal with things like social security or Medicare at the state level, when you might be born in one state, work in three others, and retire in a fifth. Problem solved by internet. There is no reason that four states can't deposit the retirement income you're due into your bank account in a fifth. And people retiring in a place far from where than they've lived is something to be discouraged from a social welfare standpoint in any event. |
Ah, so federal preemption is okay when it's good for businesses' profits (e.g. overriding state environmental and product-safety laws), but bad when it's bad or businesses' profits (e.g. imposing environmental or product-safety laws)? Sounds like policy-biased "federalism", not principled federalism.