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The Legislature is meant to be the conservative aspect of the government. It is supposed to codify things that last, because it is very difficult to get a majority vote on something. This is why congress is supposed to ratify things like treaties. If we want stability, it needs to be explicitly enshrined in Congress.
The Executive is meant to be dynamic. It responds to events as they arise and is supposed to be under the control of the elected President. It should work this way. The new President comes in, representing the will of the entire American people, and determines governmental policy not codified in Law. What the executive does should change every time the President takes control.
A lot of things that are "regulations" should be laws, if they are something Congress can agree on. If Congress cannot agree on them, how is it reflective of our Republic to put unelected, unaccountable people in charge of making them and nothing the American people can do to stop them?
Yes, this is exactly my point. This executive order shifts power from the conservative to the-- as you call it-- "dynamic" aspect of the government. And conservatives are happy about this? What?
And your solution to this is to put all that rulemaking power in the hands of the president?
Yes, I am happy with more accountability in government. I'd be happier with the Legislature passing actual laws instead of delegating regulations to the Executive. The Legislature should never give an executive department (department implementing laws) the authority to make regulations that they are unwilling to have change every presidency.
The president doesn't have to enforce laws he doesn't want to, and removing the independence of independent agencies removes one of the levers by which to make a president want to enforce laws.
While there is some discretion, I would not go that far. I actually really hate it when a president deliberately refuses to enforce a law. There is a problem of enforcement - the president cannot dedicate 100% of resources to enforce 100% of laws 100% of the time. But a president explicitly setting a policy where they refuse to enforce a law should be an impeachable offense.
What is an Independent Agency? What does the word Independent mean? Does it mean something like, "Not accountable to civilian-appointed leaders?" If so, what makes it desirable? People use the word "independent" like it should have positive connotations, instead of horrific ones.
The justification is typically that Independent means non-partisan, but that is naivete. Everyone who makes policy has a side they prefer, a side that gives them more power or makes policies that align more with their own preferences.
There are Judicial Agencies. There are Legislative Agencies. These exist with direct oversight of the bodies that control them. If Congress wants to make another Legislative Agency, that's fine to do so. If Congress wanted to put the rule-making portion of the FCC's scope under themselves, assign a committee to do so and make laws that way, they are free to do so. I would welcome it. As they refuse, we are instead left with a dysfunctional and unbalanced government.
Impeachment is worthless without removal. Given the immunity ruling, the president has the unilateral power to do whatever they want so long as less than 60 people will vote for their removal.
Democrats are staring down the barrel of that right now and believe me, it is terrifying. You better hope republicans have a plan to rig every future election because otherwise that gun will be turned on you.
If congress wants to not have independent agencies, it's within their power to legislate that. They didn't. Trump seized control of the independent agencies away from them by fiat. If they don't do anything about it... well, for now they'll get some easy policy wins. But in the long term, I don't think they're going to enjoy what happens.
We were staring down the barrel of it previously, and this was the best recourse we could find. I personally would prefer the power not exist; actually using it as we see fit and Progressives resisting where they may is the clearest path to eroding that power that I can see. Under Biden, we already saw state-level defiance to Federal orders. We're seeing more now versus Trump, and we'll see yet more when the Progressives are once more ascendent. Either unified power will break down and durable Federalism emerges from the conflict, or we escalate smoothly to actual civil war.
What you are seeing with MAGA is precisely "I don't think they'll enjoy what happens" for Blue Tribe in general. "I don't think they'll enjoy what happens" wasn't a restraint on Blue ambitions under Obama or Biden (or Clinton or Bush II for that matter). The escalation spiral is a very evident phenomenon. Why expect departure now?
The basic problem is that we can no longer agree on core values, on what the laws should be and how they should be enforced. All the formal structures of our system of government assumed baseline homogeneity of values. Without that, none of this works, and what will happen is what we have seen happening for decades now: irreconcilable values-conflict blowing out one conflict-limiting mechanism after another as the pressure for a resolution one way or the other rises over time. Either someone has to win, or we have to have a divorce. There isn't really a third option.
Republicans control all three branches of government. This was the best recourse you could find? Republicans could easily have looked for a solution that favored the power of the legislative branch (where they have a structural advantage) or the courts (where they'll soon have an incumbency advantage.) Instead, they gave the power to the presidency? Seriously?
This part I agree with. That's why I'm so confused: why are the republicans giving the democrats the ammunition they need to win the divorce?
But Democrats managed to create a fourth, unaccountable, branch aligned largely with themselves. So the first order of business is to tear that branch down and/or put it under Constitutional control.
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