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Loren Christopher's avatar

Structurally, this kind of end run around Congress seems very unlikely to end up in a better place than the current system. Greatly increased Presidential power + competitive elections + polarization is an unstable state, potential wild swings in policy and public administration every 4 years is not tenable for long. It will collapse into some new equilibrium. Could turn out that the overheated "democracy is on the ballot" rhetoric was not so hyperbolic after all.

Supporting such a destabilizing change to a highly successful system, because it helps advance one's views on mundane issues of spending priorities, is ... myopic may be the kindest way to put it. I hope - and expect - that there is still enough wisdom in the judiciary to reject that path and insist that Congress continue its historical role as a stabilizing deliberative body. Over the objections of the current Congressmen themselves, if necessary.

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Twilight Patriot's avatar

Interesting thoughts. It may well be that we're moving away from the post-1960s system of unlimited judicial power and a strong, left-wing civil service, and towards a more Latin-American-style system of freewheeling executive power (accompanied by widespread corruption and rapid swings in policy ever time there's a new president).

Granted, the old system needed to go - it was in my opinion largely responsible for America's economic decline over the last 50 years (due to too much regulation and litigation making it unprofitable to build physical stuff and especially infrastructure) and also the extreme political polarization amd hatreds that you naturally get when one side so often feels cheated (as conservatives felt when radical policies on abortion, bussing, etc. were forced on them without their opponents winning any elections.)

Still, I am far from convinced that the Latin-American-style system with a powerful, unpredictable, and corrupt executive offers a stable way out. What we really need is just a much stronger national legislature with the mability to rein in abuses of power by both the executive and the judiciary. This is clearly what the Founders thoughts they were creating as evidenced by the Federalist Papers... and yet I don't think our country is really capable of genuine self-government (by which I mean the elected legislature being the most powerful organ of government) in this day and age.

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