The question doesn't really make sense since there's no "power" involved -- the kernel neither has nor lacks power... but if I understand the nature of the ques

The question doesn't really make sense since there's no "power" involved -- the kernel neither has nor lacks power... but if I understand the nature of the question, then the answer is "yes" -- the system goes from not existing to being at a bash prompt in under 0.3s on my laptop.