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[Note: This will not be an anti-Cable-company screed] The American legislative system is bizarre. To begin with, Congress is accorded very little power by the

[Note: This will not be an anti-Cable-company screed] The American legislative system is bizarre. To begin with, Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution, with most of it resting with "We the people" or the states. This however, doesn't pattern match with the amount of power some people (typically progressives) _think_ the Congress or government _ought_ to have, or the amount of power Congress _wants_ to have (as much as possible), so we see BS things like the abuse of the Commerce Clause loophole to justify any Congressional intervention. Now, you'd think that with all this power that they have loopholed their way into, they would actually exercise it, but that doesn't actually happen, because they are permanently gridlocked and can't pass any damn shit unless it's part of a giant 1000-page omnibus bill that has 100 unrelated things clubbed together based on whatever horse-trading they manage to do one day before the govt shutdown deadline. So what actually happens is that the actual rule-making is done by the executive, in the form of these government agencies, which ideally should be enforcing things that the Congress has passed, but effectively are given pseudo-legal power through a variety of judicial interpretations (eg. the Chevron Doctrine) that can be overturned by the next Supreme Court as trivially as they were written in. All in all, you get a massively dysfunctional system where regulatory agencies act as effectively unelected lawmakers, with the actual lawmakers doing jackshit, and the judiciary effectively supporting these shenanigans through capricious rulings. And while doing all this, lawmakers can conveniently ramp on the rhetoric during campaigning because they know they don't actually need to do anything. They didn't even pass abortion-related legislation for 50 whole years, because they could use that division to reap votes every election cycle.

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focusedone 2y ago
That's a fairly accurate assessment of how the whole thing works. Grand, ain't it?
jancsika 2y ago
> Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution, with most of it resting with "We the people" or the states. It's a brilliant way to specify powers to a legislative body, essentially a nation-state equivalent of Linux's "don't break userspace" directive. In both cases objections can bubble up from the bottom to the top, with courts being the equivalent of a mailing list post, "Hey, this new code breaks my use case! Fucking change it back!" In both cases one could argue about the implementation matching the aspirations of the concept. But to find the basic concept itself "bizarre" is to signal to the world that you don't understand one of the basic tenants of the constitution.
- elevatedastalt 2y ago
  We are talking past each other. First off, I am describing the whole scenario as bizarre, not the first sentence of my post. That much should be obvious. Second, I _do_ understand the basic tenets (not tenants, btw) of the constitution, that's why I was able to describe them in my comment. What I am trying to point out is that the Constitution as written is at odds with what a lot of people want (eg. progressives want a more authoritative state, with vaccine mandates as an example), and since they can't change the constitution easily, we have developed a complex web of quasi-legal systems in order to loophole our way around the constitution. The judiciary and legislature are complicit in this. The Commerce Clause has been expanded to basically include everything under the Sun (something that should be bothering you if you understand the basic tenets and the spirit of the constitution), which means there is very little left that the Congress cannot legislate on. However, the Congress then actually legislates on very little, sticking itself in permanent gridlock, and actual policy effectively being created ex-nihilo by federal agencies, which should ideally have only been enforcing them. This was done with the agreement of the courts, but remember they can as easily choose to disagree tomorrow.
advisedwang 2y ago
> Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution Congress doesn't have universal power, but the power it is explicitly listed is actually a lot broader than you make it sound. Some particularly powerful grants of power include: 1. commerce clause gives power to "regulate commerce...among the several states". As always the wording is vague, but it can reasonably be interpreted to be VERY broad. And it generally has been interpreted broadly. Why does the government have the power to criminalize drugs? Because there's an interestate market for drugs, basically. If you can criminalize possesion of a substance under the commerce clause, you can sure as shit regulate shady subscription practices by national chains. 2. The 13th, 14th and 15th amendments guarantee a bunch of rights and then grants congress power generic enforcement power. Enforcing such powerful and varied rights can reach into a lot of things. 3. Congress can raise and then spend money however it wants. So unless it violates a right, congress can basically empower the executive to do ANYTHING that money can buy. 4. The necessary and proper clause gives power to "make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution". This really encourages broad reading of the explicitly listed powers and is used to justify congressional oversight, applying federal law to all kinds of random situation. Moreover when it comes to the agency power, they effectively have the COMBINED power of the executive (which they are part of) and whatever powers the legislature has given them.
SideQuark 2y ago
> Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution No law can be made without them. They have tremendous power. > So what actually happens is that the actual rule-making is done by the executive, in the form of these government agencies The FTC was literally created by an act of Congress, which explicitly gave them the power to enact rules like this. See my other comment on this page where I like the laws. Do people simply hear whatever their favorite politics pundit spews and take that at face value? It's so easy to simply look google such things.

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focusedone 2y ago

That's a fairly accurate assessment of how the whole thing works. Grand, ain't it?

jancsika 2y ago

> Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution, with most of it resting with "We the people" or the states. It's a brilliant way to specify powers to a legislative body, essentially a nation-state equivalent of Linux's "don't break userspace" directive. In both cases objections can bubble up from the bottom to the top, with courts being the equivalent of a mailing list post, "Hey, this new code breaks my use case! Fucking change it back!" In both cases one could argue about the implementation matching the aspirations of the concept. But to find the basic concept itself "bizarre" is to signal to the world that you don't understand one of the basic tenants of the constitution.

elevatedastalt 2y ago
We are talking past each other. First off, I am describing the whole scenario as bizarre, not the first sentence of my post. That much should be obvious. Second, I _do_ understand the basic tenets (not tenants, btw) of the constitution, that's why I was able to describe them in my comment. What I am trying to point out is that the Constitution as written is at odds with what a lot of people want (eg. progressives want a more authoritative state, with vaccine mandates as an example), and since they can't change the constitution easily, we have developed a complex web of quasi-legal systems in order to loophole our way around the constitution. The judiciary and legislature are complicit in this. The Commerce Clause has been expanded to basically include everything under the Sun (something that should be bothering you if you understand the basic tenets and the spirit of the constitution), which means there is very little left that the Congress cannot legislate on. However, the Congress then actually legislates on very little, sticking itself in permanent gridlock, and actual policy effectively being created ex-nihilo by federal agencies, which should ideally have only been enforcing them. This was done with the agreement of the courts, but remember they can as easily choose to disagree tomorrow.

advisedwang 2y ago

> Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution Congress doesn't have universal power, but the power it is explicitly listed is actually a lot broader than you make it sound. Some particularly powerful grants of power include: 1. commerce clause gives power to "regulate commerce...among the several states". As always the wording is vague, but it can reasonably be interpreted to be VERY broad. And it generally has been interpreted broadly. Why does the government have the power to criminalize drugs? Because there's an interestate market for drugs, basically. If you can criminalize possesion of a substance under the commerce clause, you can sure as shit regulate shady subscription practices by national chains. 2. The 13th, 14th and 15th amendments guarantee a bunch of rights and then grants congress power generic enforcement power. Enforcing such powerful and varied rights can reach into a lot of things. 3. Congress can raise and then spend money however it wants. So unless it violates a right, congress can basically empower the executive to do ANYTHING that money can buy. 4. The necessary and proper clause gives power to "make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution". This really encourages broad reading of the explicitly listed powers and is used to justify congressional oversight, applying federal law to all kinds of random situation. Moreover when it comes to the agency power, they effectively have the COMBINED power of the executive (which they are part of) and whatever powers the legislature has given them.

SideQuark 2y ago

> Congress is accorded very little power by the constitution No law can be made without them. They have tremendous power. > So what actually happens is that the actual rule-making is done by the executive, in the form of these government agencies The FTC was literally created by an act of Congress, which explicitly gave them the power to enact rules like this. See my other comment on this page where I like the laws. Do people simply hear whatever their favorite politics pundit spews and take that at face value? It's so easy to simply look google such things.