I think the best thing that has come out of the election of Donald Trump is that many people are now excited about the idea of constitutionally limiting the power of the executive branch. That idea seemed to have been forgotten for the past few administrations. Even when I agreed with Obama or Bush, I was very disappointed when they would use innovative methods to single-handedly override the will of congress or the judiciary.
Not really. Remember that whole, "Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes" thing.. Yet instead of actually doing this, they continue to essentially outsource their power, and responsibility to the administrative state. I mean DT almost blatantly came out and said, well these new tariffs aren't exactly because of national security..
Don't kid yourself, both parties are essentially the same, who feeds them just look different. On top of that, Congress continues to cede more powers to the administrative state.. It becomes all about control really..
The primary reason no one should have been worried when DT got elected is that for a great many years, the system was designed that no matter who is driving the ship, they won't sink it because they don't have that power (same goes for BO & GWB). But for years we've been pushing for more centralized authority with power resting at the figurehead, that really ramped up after '01, and later BO put it on steroids.
As private institutions fall away for newer generations, the govt becomes "something we all do together", and the primary solution for having someone else take care of societal problems for us, after all, it's what we pay taxes for...
Congress keeps outsourcing it's responsibilities to the president, no matter what letter, R or D is behind the name on the office door. Tariffs, wars, weaponized govt agencies, privacy rights, drone strikes, surveillance, and on and on...
This isn't a problem of the system, it's merely a symptom of the current state of our society and I personally don't think whether it's tariffs or privacy, little will change in a direction that we would like. The people want easy solutions, they want someone to take care of problems for them. That's exactly what we are getting.
I wasn’t. If Congress is being obstructionist and petty, as they undoubtedly were during the Obama years, the executive branch still needs to do its job, which is to lead the country forward.
That said, I agree with the spirit of your post, which is that every now and then we should scale that power back.
