Issue 1: Marsy’s Law. Provides rights to crime victims. Sounds great, victims of crimes should have rights, too. But, it comes with some possible consequences. We already have laws that protect a victim of crime, is this necessary?
Issue 2: “Sander’s Law.” (No, not its name, but it doesn’t seem to have a catchy name, and when researching the issue, the thing that kept coming up was his endorsement.) This makes it so that state agencies don’t pay more for drugs than the VA. Sounds good, in theory, but what are the catches here? The odd thing about it is the second clause, about the state paying the legal fees of the people pushing it.
I’m tempted to go with a 1:No, 2:Yes vote, but I haven’t been able to keep up as well with the issues, and so was looking for any more input.
Mods: This is about an issue at the ballot box, sort of like an election, but with no candidates. I think this belongs here, but if elsewhere is more appropriate, I have no objection to a transfer.
I have decided to vote the opposite way: yes on 1 and no on 2. Number 1 isn’t strictly necessary, but what it requires may help some people and I don’t see what harm it might cause.
My county’s auditor and my family doctor have convinced me that no is the way to go on issue 2. They have convinced me that the law will result in further distortions of the drug market as drug companies scramble to recoup the losses from sales to state agencies by raising prices to private insurers in the state. I don’t think the status quo is the best of all possible worlds, but this law does not look like a good solution.
I would like to add that issue 2 is the most confusing ballot issue I have looked at in my voting life. The issue itself is not that complicated, but figuring out which way to vote, especially with the barrage of pro and con ads that we have seen, has been nearly impossible.
I agree that there needs to be a better notification process to victims when criminals are up for parole/release, but I disagree with the increased power victims would be granted under the amendment to contest and testify at criminal proceedings, compared to the powers victims have at present.
Setting artificial price ceilings tends to carry unforeseen and unintended consequences, and I’m not at all comfortable with the number of unknowns in this case. When I’m this unsure, I usually vote to maintain the status quo. And in any case, when practical, I tend to favor increased collective bargaining rights as solutions to pricing issues rather than government-mandated price ceilings/floors.
Definitely NO on issue #1. Will open up a can of worms/unintended consequences.
Issue #2 is, as Crotalus says, the most confusing issue I’ve seen in 30 years. I will keep investigating the issues and reading quite a few editorials. May not know which way to go until voting day.
Not judging the advisability of Issue 2 over all, but the 2nd clause seems to be a preemptive response to an opposite party AG refusing to defend a ballot initiative he/she doesn’t like and settling the “are you an injured party with standing” question at the get-go. I actually like the concept and would like to see it attached to all future ballot questions in Florida.
I haven’t done my research on 1 yet but from what I’ve read I’m going with NO on 2.
At first I was for 2 - something I read showed that the pharma companies were against it and the AIDS coalition was for it. So it was a cursory no-brainer. But the more I read and the more groups I saw that were against it made me decide on NO.
I’m No on 1 probably Yes on 2, although I agree with Zipper, that it’s a squirrelly issue.
How does one identify a “Crime Victim” according to issue 1? I’m sure there’s a definition in there, but especially during the trial process, I suspect it presupposes that there is a guilty perpetrator. Isn’t that contrary to the notion of “Innocent until proven Guilty”?
The reason I will probably vote Yes on 2 is that the drug companies are throwing so much money at it that it will surely put a dent in their wallet and that has to be a good thin in my estimation. It also means it has no chance of passing because drug companies have convinced people that lawyers will make money if it passes. That’s anathema.
Issue 1: Would be a yes, I’m hard-pressed to see a significant downside here.
Issue 2: The second clause is a real downer, why would we pay some out of state clown’s legal fees? Is this clause there because he anticipates challenges?
Re issue #1: apart from creating more work for D.A.'s offices, I’m having a hard time finding anything really wrong with it, so it’d be a yes vote.
I’ve gone back and forth on issue #2. For awhile it seemed like a good idea to at least send a message to drug companies about lowering prices (and I suspect that’s why a number of people will vote for it, even though the reality of discovering and paying only those V.A. prices is a lot murkier than suggested). A real problem is the likelihood that large groups of people will be hit with higher drug costs (and it’ll be tied up in court for years, with taxpayers footing the legal bills), which is why those groups have come out against issue #2.
One op-ed by Max Cleland urges us to vote for issue #2, not addressing any concerns raised about consequences of its passage, but more or less just saying Big Pharma Is Evil and we should vote for it on that basis. Sorry, but that’s not good enough. I’m leaning towards voting no. A comprehensive plan at the federal level for knocking down exorbitant drug prices, fine.
Issue 2 (drug price restrictions) gets crushed by a nearly 4:1 margin, following a narrower defeat in California. Apparently the pro-issue folks are going ahead with plans to put the measure on the ballot in D.C. and South Dakota.
One hopes they’ll have better answers for questions about implementation and consequences, other than to respond with shouts of “Big Pharma Bad!!” (which was their standard ploy in Ohio).
It strikes me that Issue 2 is unconstitutional. It strips the executive office in charge of enforcing the statute, in this case ths state attorney general, of its duty and vests power over the AG in outside lawyers who are not subject to any control.