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I heard a law professor on NPR a few nights back saying how, at the executive level, the rule of law is dead and has been for some time. They cited Jan 6 but r

I heard a law professor on NPR a few nights back saying how, at the executive level, the rule of law is dead and has been for some time. They cited Jan 6 but recognised how politically divisive that example was, so also gave the failure to enforce the TikTok ban as a less partisan example. If you take your hands off the wheel you can go a surprisingly long time before you crash. This hands-free period will have to come to an end at some point.

andruby 9mo ago
I agree. > This hands-free period will have to come to an end at some point What would that mean? Do you expect the government to put their hands back on the wheel, does the US "crash" and become a dictatorship and/or does it lead to WW3?
ardme 9mo ago
I remember a lot of stuff Bush did in the aftermath of 911 that was illegal. Anyone remember Snowden? And Obama did a drone strike on a US citizen. This has been going on a long time but maybe we used to play pretend better.
- sbarre 9mo ago
  > This has been going on a long time This has been going on forever, everywhere. Laws have always applied selectively, particularly when it comes to whatever group is responsible for enforcing them.
- bonsai_spool 9mo ago
  There are very clear differences, so I find your argument disingenuous at best. While the legality can be doubted for the examples you gave, those administrations released their legal rationale. The TikTok rationale essentially came to ‘we want genz voters’
augusto-moura 9mo ago
It might take some time to end though, executive power without laws is very close to dictatorships, and some dictatorships take a long time to dissolve (if they dissolve at all). They might not even have an end. As an example, look at Russia, from an empire to a dictatorship to an oligarchy. It never seemed full democracy and there's no hope of it changing in the next decade. There's a lot of speculation on what will happen at the end of Trumps presidency

andruby 9mo ago

I agree. > This hands-free period will have to come to an end at some point What would that mean? Do you expect the government to put their hands back on the wheel, does the US "crash" and become a dictatorship and/or does it lead to WW3?

ardme 9mo ago

I remember a lot of stuff Bush did in the aftermath of 911 that was illegal. Anyone remember Snowden? And Obama did a drone strike on a US citizen. This has been going on a long time but maybe we used to play pretend better.

sbarre 9mo ago
> This has been going on a long time This has been going on forever, everywhere. Laws have always applied selectively, particularly when it comes to whatever group is responsible for enforcing them.
bonsai_spool 9mo ago
There are very clear differences, so I find your argument disingenuous at best. While the legality can be doubted for the examples you gave, those administrations released their legal rationale. The TikTok rationale essentially came to ‘we want genz voters’

augusto-moura 9mo ago

It might take some time to end though, executive power without laws is very close to dictatorships, and some dictatorships take a long time to dissolve (if they dissolve at all). They might not even have an end. As an example, look at Russia, from an empire to a dictatorship to an oligarchy. It never seemed full democracy and there's no hope of it changing in the next decade. There's a lot of speculation on what will happen at the end of Trumps presidency