Chapter 2052
It turns out that the US state of emergency is really useless.
When the disaster struck, everyone was confused. There was no way. The US had already played this thing badly. It was like crying wolf. If you cry too much, no one will believe it.
Intuitively, when we talk about the state of emergency, we will think that the United States is under attack.
But in actual operation, there is no such definition in the law. Yes, in fact, what is a "state of emergency" is not clearly defined in US law. Some people in the legal community believe that the declaration of a state of emergency is shocking because everything is just the president's active grab for the budget. For example, a certain golden retriever who has returned as a king, the Constitution gives the power of budget control to Congress, and Congress refuses to pay for a certain wall. The golden retriever declared the country to be in a state of emergency, which is obviously an attempt to usurp the power of Congress to allocate funds.
This kind of thing has happened many times in American history. After all, the emergency law was only established in 1979. As a result, in just a few years, it was promulgated dozens of times, an average of two or three times a year!
Everyone is used to it.
So this time, although the White House issued a very serious press conference on entering a state of emergency.
But in reality, from the state governments to the people below, everyone is still the same.
There is no way, the power struggle between the state government and the federal government has continued from the United States to the present. As the head of state of the United States, the President of the United States is a very influential figure in the world and can express political positions on behalf of the country. So it seems that as long as you become the president, you can call the shots. In fact, this is not the case. In the United States, the president does not even have the power to convene a meeting of governors, and sometimes he will even be "pointed at and scolded" by the governor. The United States is not a centralized country, it implements a federal system, each state is a political entity, and enjoys relatively independent sovereignty. There is only a cooperative relationship between the president and the governor, and there is no distinction between superiors and subordinates. States cannot overstep their authority to enforce the law, and their laws are even different. What is legal in one state may be illegal in another state.
States in federal countries and provinces in unitary countries are both first-level administrative units, so some people equate states with provinces in the United States, but in unitary countries, provinces are governed by the central government and obey the instructions of the central government, while states in the United States are separated and balanced with the federal government. States have relative sovereignty and have no subordinate relationship with the federal government. Therefore, in the national structure of the United States, the power and influence of the state are very large, which is inseparable from the colonial history and state rights tradition before the founding of the United States.
The United States was once a British North American colony. In the 17th century, the King of England approved the colonial charter company to go to the North American continent to develop colonial undertakings. After they arrived in North America, they established immigrant settlements there. Then, a large number of Puritans who fled religious persecution, royalists who escaped political struggles, and noble officials who were awarded land by the King of England, all poured into this virgin land one after another. It was these early immigrants who opened up the North American continent into 13 North American colonies. Britain did not continue to expand westward because the location west of the Appalachian Mountains was close to the territory of France. In order to avoid disputes with France, Britain prohibited colonists from crossing the mountains to open up territory. The 13 North American colonies are different from other British overseas colonies. They all have their own territories and borders, as well as their own relatively independent economic, cultural life and religious beliefs. Except for the indigenous Indians, the local residents basically migrated from the British mainland. Relatively speaking, the British royal family's control over them is relatively loose, because they are granted special permission by the King of England, and the relationship between them and the United Kingdom is more like a double contractual relationship. Although they have a high degree of autonomy, the colonial lords still have to report local affairs to the governor appointed by the King of England. In addition to being allowed autonomy by the King of England, the autonomy habits in North America are also inseparable from the British tradition of autonomy. The British Empire is composed of a number of kingdoms, and its main kingdom is England. Since the Norman conquest of England, England has been given the power of urban autonomy, and can build its own institutions, mint its own currency, and declare war and make peace with foreign countries. Therefore, the history of British autonomy is relatively long, and it has begun with urban autonomy in the Middle Ages.
At that time, England had a very obvious decentralization feature. The power of the royal power and the feudal aristocracy was in a state of balance. Local affairs were managed by the aristocracy, and kingdom affairs and diplomatic affairs were managed by the royal family. Although the local areas enjoyed sovereignty, they were still monitored by the royal power. This was the key to their formation of local autonomy. The colonists who immigrated to North America were from England. They brought England's tradition of local autonomy, political culture, and customs to the New World, so North America's self-government habits were actually "copied" from Britain. Although most of the North American colonies are descendants of England, under the influence of time and distance, their relationship with their motherland has gradually become alienated. After a long period of development, the colonies have also formed their own national consciousness and have a unified market, so they began to have more demands on politics and economy. Britain originally let it go, but after discovering that the North American economy had become prosperous, the British royal family began to strengthen control, increase their taxes, and exploit them. In the end, North America could not bear it any longer and chose to start a war of independence.
In 1775, the War of Independence broke out. In order to unite against Britain, the North American colonies planned to establish a permanent alliance with a common government to coordinate political and military affairs, and the "Confederation" was born. The Confederation is actually a union of states, composed of two or more sovereign states, which is equivalent to an alliance relationship, similar to the current European Union. After the publication of the Declaration of Independence, North America not only established the United States of America, but also turned the colonies into 13 free and independent states of the United States. The states have the power to declare war, form alliances, and conduct business. They can make their own laws, build their own armed forces, and trade on their own. Therefore, the states of the United States were born in the early days of the establishment of the Confederation.
At that time, the Confederation did not have the concept of a unified country, but was more like a war alliance composed of 13 independent countries. Therefore, after the end of the War of Independence, without the common enemy of Britain, the disadvantages of the American Confederation system began to gradually emerge. Because the sovereignty of the Confederation lies in the states, the states can only see their own interests, have no desire for unified cooperation, and the alliance relationship is very loose. In addition, the Confederation government is subject to the states and has no sovereign authority, so the situation faced by the United States after independence is very serious. In the international environment, there are strong enemies, surrounded by Spain and British colonies. In terms of internal issues, each state has its own way, and the tariff laws between states are different, resulting in many restrictions on interstate trade and discord between states. In order to solve these problems, some elites reformed the confederation system and created the "U.S. Constitution". The federal system is established in the U.S. Constitution. The federal system integrates "nationalism" and "state rights" to avoid national autocracy or local decentralization. However, as a new country, the United States is still unstable in its internal affairs, and the country has different views on federal power and state power. Under the competition of the two factions of viewpoints, new problems are born.
Anti-federal state rights advocates believe that the power allocated to the federation in the Constitution is too great. In addition to the Senate's legislative, executive and judicial powers, the federal Congress also has two absolute powers of standing army and taxation. Even the president has military power in one person, so they are worried that state sovereignty will eventually be swallowed up by federal sovereignty and the United States will develop into a centralized country. Anti-state rights nationalists believe that the popular sovereignty created in the Constitution does not explicitly stipulate whether it is the popular sovereignty of the federal government or the popular sovereignty of the state, and the federal government is no longer a union, but a unified country. If localism is not weakened, the phenomenon of decentralization will reappear, so the focus of sovereignty should be placed on the federal government. Under the struggle for sovereignty between the federal government and the state, the dual federal system was born. It is called a layered cake by American scholars, that is, a power division line is drawn between the federal government and the state, and they do not interfere with each other. In fact, this system is the product of concessions made by both parties to maintain superficial peace. It has not brought about any substantial changes, because the federal government has not stopped expanding its functional powers, and the state is still emphasizing that the federal government should serve the state, so the contradictions between them are getting deeper and deeper, and finally the American Civil War broke out. After the establishment of sovereignty, the federal government began to expand its power, especially during the administration of President Roosevelt in the 20th century, their power was more significantly enhanced. In 1929, due to the basic contradictions of capitalist society, the New York stock market crashed. The capitalist world took this incident as a fuse and fell into a major economic crisis.
It was from this time that the United States moved from a "dual federal system" to a "cooperative federal system". The power comparison between the state and the federal government also became unbalanced due to the weakening of state power and the centralized development of the federal government.
In the early 1970s, in order to solve the economic problems left over from the New Deal, the ruling US President Nixon specifically introduced the "New Federalism", returning the state power stipulated in the Constitution to the state, that is, the state's resident safety, education, health and public service management, etc., re-positioning the federal government and the state to curb the development of centralization. This reform was pushed to a climax during Reagan's administration.
Reagan believed that the United States was a federal country formed by sovereign states. The original intention of establishing a federal system was to adhere to the principle of autonomy and avoid the situation of excessive centralization of the big government. However, the economic crisis expanded the power of the federal government, deprived the power originally belonging to the state, caused the loss of state power, and gradually deviated from the essence of the federal system. Therefore, in order to completely eliminate the drawbacks left by the cooperative federal system, Reagan once again reformed the federal system. Reagan's new federalism, on the surface, is to restore state autonomy and achieve a balance with federal power, but in reality it is to reduce the economic burden of the federal government. Whether it is the subsequent Clinton government reconstruction or Bush's neoconservatism, they are all a continuation of the new federalism.
So the current state power in the United States is more like a service tool, with relatively independent space and the power of local autonomy, but it can no longer compete with the federal government like the traditional state power in the past. It is still subject to the federal government. Although it is subject to the federal government, compared with other countries that implement the federal system, the state power in the United States is already large enough.
Sometimes, some federal resolutions, when it comes to the state government, the response is very slow.
For example, this federal state of emergency, the states feel that it has nothing to do with them... They are too lazy to promote it. The U.S. federal government is not the kind of big government that can handle everything. They can't mobilize resources at the level of state governments, so the obviously serious state of emergency did not cause any waves among the people.
The key is that the federal government itself is also confused... They only know that the crisis is coming, but they don't know where it comes from... Otherwise, how to say, Riddler, get out.
Why can't these people be more specific?
And the starting point of the disaster is the city of sin - Chicago!
...
Chicago
The three justice women are on their daily patrol.
Recently, Kelly is very frustrated.
Because she found that... no matter how hard they try, they can't change this city.
Chicago, one of the most famous crime cities in the world.
The third largest city in the United States, the Chicago Bulls where Jordan is, the birthplace of International Labor Day, the hometown of skyscrapers!
These are the labels of Chicago.
Unfortunately, the impression given by this place now... is only gangs and gunfights.
"This is a war zone now, Chicago is crazy." A Chicago pastor described the frequent vicious shootings in this way. According to Forbes data, from 2001 to 2016, 4,504 Americans died in Iraq and 2,384 Americans died in Afghanistan. Shockingly, a total of 7,916 people "died" in Chicago, far more than the total number of the two wars.
Data from the Chicago Police Department show that areas with high incidence of shootings in Chicago are often inhabited by low-income and ethnic minority people, and their gathering is "attributed" to a period of history. As an important trade and transportation center in the Great Lakes region, Chicago has accepted two groups of immigrants. The first group was Italians, who flocked to Chicago during the early economic development period of the United States. The Chicago government began to build public housing for them in 1938 to solve housing problems. The second group was blacks from the southern United States. In the 1950s, white Americans implemented extremely strict racial laws in the South. Under oppression, blacks had to go to Chicago to find opportunities.
The original old-style public housing could not accommodate a large number of black immigrants, and white people did not want to share the community with blacks, so the government built a batch of new public housing for blacks in the south of Chicago. The area and facilities of public housing were far inferior to those of whites. Many communities have accommodated more people than the original design.
For a long time, such independent communities have formed "local separatism".
Chicago's economy is booming, with an unemployment rate of only 3.8%. One-third of urban workers earn at least $100,000 a year. It can be said that this is a milestone achievement and is leading in the United States. However, the rich are too rich and the poor are too poor. Chicago's wealth is unevenly distributed in such completely isolated communities. According to Chicago census data, 34% of local African Americans live below the poverty line, and the median income of residents in African communities is $20,000 less than the median income of residents in other parts of the city. The impoverished and weak residents cannot find a way to make a living. Young people in the community gradually turn to violence and engage in criminal activities at will. These communities naturally become "gang bases."