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Trump has even more extremely demonstrated that the US has insufficient checks on a president. Both parties are equally upset by the threat of a President from

Trump has even more extremely demonstrated that the US has insufficient checks on a president. Both parties are equally upset by the threat of a President from the other party. Why would any future president not claim victory in an election he lost after this debacle? Why would any president not commit crimes to hold power and then need to keep it within his allies to prevent his prosecution? Structurally the US is dysfunctional. But whichever party thinks it has 4-8years of control will block reform.

pjc50 6y ago
I suspect the logical outcome of this is a Parliamentary system where the President requires the explicit approval of both houses. If the two houses go one way and the presidency the other, the president will be impeached and removed. The Clinton presidency was the dry run for this.
- learc83 6y ago
  Removal requires 2/3 of the Senate. It’s unlikely that every member of a party would vote for removal without a clear, major violation. So the only way your scenario works out is if the Senate has 70 or so members from the party opposing the President. A split like that is very unlikely.
loceng 6y ago
The system is working relatively well - though there can be tweaks; if Biden didn't win then we'd be in a lot more trouble. Trump in fact has allowed the swamp to be cleared as he promised, as we can see the treasonous Republican senators who allowed all of this behaviour to continue by not removing Trump - the House impeached him, then it was the Senate"s job to confirm. Trump exposed the rot, how far they're willing to go, showed us all their true colours that Trump's a wannabe tyrant and the Republican senators are happy to fall in line with that. He's also exposed the flaws in systems that allowed him and others to manipulate Americans for decades. Thankfully Biden won and I believe full out civil war can be avoided now, so long as these systems including the duopoly and mainstream media's ability to lie, to only tell one narrative; the Fairness Doctrine should be reinstated as review recommended by Andrew Yang, along with his core policy proposals will adequately counter these problems.
krapp 6y ago
>Why would any president not commit crimes to hold power and then need to keep it within his allies to prevent his prosecution? It hasn't worked. Trump's chances of holding power would have been greater working within the system. He had his 9/11 moment with COVID and chose to squander it. I do agree that the executive office has too much power. For a nation that prides itself on having spilled blood to avoid monarchy, The US seems to really want their President to be King/CEO In Chief of the entire government, rather than simply being the head of one of three equal branches of government. The Presidency simply should not be as important as it is. I think that I would prefer the President have a single six year term, after which they can never hold the office of President or Vice President again. Then at least they would have to spend half of their first term campaigning for a second term. Presidential pardons and executive orders should also either be done away with or should require Congressional approval. That said, it is surprising how many checks have worked. Most of the chaos Trump has really wreaked has been outside the system, with a band of loyalists willing to help him undermine it. But he's been stopped within the system numerous times, from repealing DACA to getting his wall built to forcing American companies to to his bidding to sending the military in to Portland. He couldn't even get the Supreme Court to rule in his favor over his election lawsuits, and he specifically stacked it for that purpose. So yes, it's not the best possible timeline, but it's also not the worst, and let's not forget that Trump is a symptom, not the disease. If they had managed to drag Nancy Pelosi bound and, no doubt beaten, out to the gallows and hanged her for whatever imaginary treason, the whole crowd would have cheered it on. That's the bigger issue American needs to deal with, the effect of two centuries of glorifying and romanticizing the archetypes of the stateless cowboy and revolutionary patriot, and normalizing the pretense of the white American right wing being the just inheritors and righteous executioners of American culture and liberty. And no, I don't believe that and America's desire for Presidential strongmen are at all unrelated. Many, many people have pointed out the stark difference between the government's response to BLM protests in Washington and the Capitol riots. That's also not unrelated. The real checks and balances we need to work on are societal and cultural. Government is an expression of culture. We got Trump because we wanted Trump. We got chaos and dysfunction because we wanted to throw a brick through the window of the establishment. We got violence because the tree of liberty must from time to time be refreshed with the blood of tyrants or whatever. We fear BLM more than we fear neo-nazis because the former threatens the status quo far more than the latter. We'd hate Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton less than we would if they were men. Maybe at some point we should stop looking for faults in the stars and start looking at ourselves?

pjc50 6y ago

I suspect the logical outcome of this is a Parliamentary system where the President requires the explicit approval of both houses. If the two houses go one way and the presidency the other, the president will be impeached and removed. The Clinton presidency was the dry run for this.

learc83 6y ago
Removal requires 2/3 of the Senate. It’s unlikely that every member of a party would vote for removal without a clear, major violation. So the only way your scenario works out is if the Senate has 70 or so members from the party opposing the President. A split like that is very unlikely.

loceng 6y ago

The system is working relatively well - though there can be tweaks; if Biden didn't win then we'd be in a lot more trouble. Trump in fact has allowed the swamp to be cleared as he promised, as we can see the treasonous Republican senators who allowed all of this behaviour to continue by not removing Trump - the House impeached him, then it was the Senate"s job to confirm. Trump exposed the rot, how far they're willing to go, showed us all their true colours that Trump's a wannabe tyrant and the Republican senators are happy to fall in line with that. He's also exposed the flaws in systems that allowed him and others to manipulate Americans for decades. Thankfully Biden won and I believe full out civil war can be avoided now, so long as these systems including the duopoly and mainstream media's ability to lie, to only tell one narrative; the Fairness Doctrine should be reinstated as review recommended by Andrew Yang, along with his core policy proposals will adequately counter these problems.

krapp 6y ago

>Why would any president not commit crimes to hold power and then need to keep it within his allies to prevent his prosecution? It hasn't worked. Trump's chances of holding power would have been greater working within the system. He had his 9/11 moment with COVID and chose to squander it. I do agree that the executive office has too much power. For a nation that prides itself on having spilled blood to avoid monarchy, The US seems to really want their President to be King/CEO In Chief of the entire government, rather than simply being the head of one of three equal branches of government. The Presidency simply should not be as important as it is. I think that I would prefer the President have a single six year term, after which they can never hold the office of President or Vice President again. Then at least they would have to spend half of their first term campaigning for a second term. Presidential pardons and executive orders should also either be done away with or should require Congressional approval. That said, it is surprising how many checks have worked. Most of the chaos Trump has really wreaked has been outside the system, with a band of loyalists willing to help him undermine it. But he's been stopped within the system numerous times, from repealing DACA to getting his wall built to forcing American companies to to his bidding to sending the military in to Portland. He couldn't even get the Supreme Court to rule in his favor over his election lawsuits, and he specifically stacked it for that purpose. So yes, it's not the best possible timeline, but it's also not the worst, and let's not forget that Trump is a symptom, not the disease. If they had managed to drag Nancy Pelosi bound and, no doubt beaten, out to the gallows and hanged her for whatever imaginary treason, the whole crowd would have cheered it on. That's the bigger issue American needs to deal with, the effect of two centuries of glorifying and romanticizing the archetypes of the stateless cowboy and revolutionary patriot, and normalizing the pretense of the white American right wing being the just inheritors and righteous executioners of American culture and liberty. And no, I don't believe that and America's desire for Presidential strongmen are at all unrelated. Many, many people have pointed out the stark difference between the government's response to BLM protests in Washington and the Capitol riots. That's also not unrelated. The real checks and balances we need to work on are societal and cultural. Government is an expression of culture. We got Trump because we wanted Trump. We got chaos and dysfunction because we wanted to throw a brick through the window of the establishment. We got violence because the tree of liberty must from time to time be refreshed with the blood of tyrants or whatever. We fear BLM more than we fear neo-nazis because the former threatens the status quo far more than the latter. We'd hate Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton less than we would if they were men. Maybe at some point we should stop looking for faults in the stars and start looking at ourselves?