Comment by pclmulqdq 2 days ago
The real check here is for congress to write laws that are actually specific in their text. That is hard, though, so they instead write laws that empower parts of the executive branch to do some broadly-defined thing, including the power to make the relevant rules. When you get an executive who doesn't play your game, those poorly-written laws come back to bite you.
> You're effectively says Congress should mandate every detail of every regulation. Even in areas where knowledge is changing (level of chemicals that are toxic, which medicines are useful and safe, etc).
The scientific advisors who currently make rules at the EPA (to name one example) probably should have been giving advice to congress to make laws instead. Congress can pass an annual bill of "here's the new science." They already pass laws of unimaginable length and complexity, so I see no reason why Congress can't pass a huge omnibus "these chemicals are bad" bill every year, even if that bill is 5000-10000 pages.
By the way, speaking of the EPA, there's a lot of whiplash in that arm of government based on which party holds the presidency. If the EPA's rules were actual laws, they would need a much stronger mandate from the people to change. IMO this would be better for both environmental protection (since you don't have the party of "drill baby drill" arbitrarily changing things whenever they want) and for business because there is more certainty.
> The whole premise of our system is that the people within the system operate in good faith.
The whole premise of the American system of government is that power corrupts and a functioning government needs a series of working checks and balances. One arm of America's tripartite government has ceded most of its real power to another arm. This mostly works because the people who get into that other branch (presidents) want to play an iterated game, where burning things to the ground doesn't benefit them. We are seeing what happens when you have someone in power who is playing to win this round without regard for the iterated game.
The scientific advisors who currently make rules at the EPA (to name one example) probably should have been giving advice to congress to make laws instead. Congress can pass an annual bill of "here's the new science."
All that would do is transfer power from bureaucrats within the executive to bureaucrats within the legislature. No Congressperson is fully knowledgeable on all the areas on which they pass laws. Maybe it is a better approach than what we have today, but I'm unconvinced. At least with the system we have today, the bureaucrats are generally experts within their areas. Congressional staffers have no such experience and generally rely on lobbyists.
The transfer of where the bureaucrats work is exactly what I am proposing, and has very significant differences in terms of the mechanics of government. A law has much more binding power over the executive branch than a rule made by the executive branch, and if the last month hasn't convinced you of that, I don't know what will. Laws can also establish private causes of action that require no intervention from a bad-faith executive to enforce. Congress today already has no knowledge of the laws they pass, anyway.
> The whole premise of our system is that the people within the system operate in good faith.
It very much is not.
It is, however, that the people will not simultaneously elect sufficent majorities in both houses of Congress and a President who all fail to do so, such that the systems by which the political branches check eachother continue to function in a way which constrains those actors in either that do act in bad faith.
> I would posit that no amount of legislation will be able to stop bad-faith actors from screwing up the system,
Electoral reforms to the legislative branch that could be done through statute could go a long way to reducing the probability of a sufficient concentration of bad faith actors to overwhelm the system, and electoral and structural reforms to the executive branch to make it less unitary, which would take a Constitutional amendment, could increase the necessary concentration to achieve a total breakdown.
>And that's worked for most of 200+ years. I would posit that no amount of legislation will be able to stop bad-faith actors from screwing up the system,
This doesn't even require bad faith actors for it to become a clusterfuck. It's a scaling issue. Things that used to work at smaller scales accumulate cruft and other issues, until things ultimately fall apart. 200 years is of course a good run, but it wasn't going to last forever. Actually 200 years is such a long run, one doesn't have to bring "bad faith actors" into the equation at all to reach this conclusion, but I guess when things start to fall apart some people need someone to blame. Ask yourself this though... if the system was doing so great, how would it have allowed someone like Trump to ever win in the first place (let alone in the second place, as he did in 2024)? That's not a healthy system. Too many were disillusioned, and that's not their fault.
>~50% of the voting popular that "burn it to the ground" is a reasonable take.
They are disgusted with what they see, and have for a very long time felt powerless to change it. Not really just "felt", but were powerless to change it. Trump ran for office, they saw an opportunity. It's not exactly unreasonable, it's just inconvenient to a class of people who have grown comfortable because they're a little closer to the spigots of graft that pour forth. Being "reasonable" in the way you'd use that word hasn't really ever worked for those people, and they waited quite a long time for it to do the trick.
No, the real check is impeachment of executive officers when they flagrantly violate the law.
The tradgedy of Trump's first term was that the House of Representatives undermined the legitimacy of that check by using it in partisan, ambiguous and non-compelling circumstances, and failing as a result to obtain a conviction. Using the heavy machinery of impeachment ineffectively made it harder to use should the executive take the tremendous steps you're suggesting.
Anyway, Trump just mocked the leader of a foreign ally for refusing to hold elections. Viewed together, his comments sound like an extended troll of the political opposition.
Before 2016, we all thought impeachment was reserved for transgressions that can't be fixed any other way since it is congress overriding the will of the people. It's not a real check on small overreaches. The balance of powers between the branches is a real check (when it works).
>since it is congress overriding the will of the people.
Say what?!
It's Congress keeping the President in check. BTW, the President is not directly elected by the people and doesn't actually [directly] represent them. The President is elected by the state governments (legislatures) and is supposed to be chosen because the States belief the President will faithfully uphold the Constitution and the laws passed by Congress. It may happen the the States use a popular election to choose their electors that elect the President, at least for now, but the President isn't supposed to represent "the mob" (majority or the populace). It's also why the electoral college is used for electing the President rather than straight popular vote.
That's an overly simplistic view of governance.
You're effectively says Congress should mandate every detail of every regulation. Even in areas where knowledge is changing (level of chemicals that are toxic, which medicines are useful and safe, etc).
The whole premise of our system is that the people within the system operate in good faith. And that's worked for most of 200+ years. I would posit that no amount of legislation will be able to stop bad-faith actors from screwing up the system, even more so when they convince ~50% of the voting popular that "burn it to the ground" is a reasonable take.