Crimson847 wrote:
Beyond that, how would he get this through Congress? Obama couldn't whip up enough support for a public option among Democrats to get it passed, and he was a Democrat himself who was massively popular within the party. Trump will get a much frostier hearing from Democrats than Obama would have, and Democrats no longer hold the majority anyway, so he'd have to get support for a far more radical policy from a few dozen GOP Representatives and at least three or four GOP Senators, not to mention convince Ryan and McConnell to hold votes on the issue.
Getting the GOP base to merely go along with the idea of single-payer wouldn't be enough to accomplish this--he won't be able to convince GOP Congresscritters to go along with the idea as a matter of principle, so he would need to convince them that the base will rise up and boot them out of office if they don't play ball. To do that, he'd need to make support for single-payer the big issue for the GOP base, like immigration is currently. I don't see how he could plausibly make that happen given how much of the GOP base distrusts him.
The checks and balances at work. Unfortunately, the folks who built the structure counted on people elected to Congress and POTUS working for the betterment of the country, or at least the majority of them, with caveats. It was to the point that Ben Franklin leaned toward a presidential council, rather than a single person, fearing the POTUS position becoming monarchical (or, at least, I read that somewhere, maybe NYT, so probably sad, failing lies, sad jewel!).
Imagine if POTUS were a 3, 5, or 7 member council?
The focus was making sure no single person or small group could lord over the masses. That was natural since they were trying to find a system which would be idiot-proof, compared to you-know-who's parliamentary system (and I don't mean Canada, because our system is flawed, but generally pretty good).
However, the architects of America were working within their time. They figured the cream would rise to the top, and the majority of reasonable, rational, some might even say intellectual, leaders would carry the day over radical power-grabs and the like. Obstructionism was included, along with distribution of powers and an electoral college, to (in some ways) counter the tyranny of the majority (which, today, would see California, Texas, Florida, and New York running the show).
A lot has changed since the American experiment began. For example, term limits weren't a thing, because who the hell would figure this was possible:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_t ... sentativeshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... of_service"Really, guys, let's face it, by the time somebody is old and wise enough to get elected, they could do what - like twenty years, at most. Death, I declare, is the ultimate check upon power."
- Probably Ben Franklin
"Shaddup, you old fart, and sign the bloody thing before you croak so we can Facebook it!"
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Probably everyone elseThe way things play-out now, my snarky comment about Trump a few posts ago, or Crim's thoughts, could easily be transformed into a blog post about president-elect Bernie Sanders. The checks and balances will, for better or for worse, keep Trump under control so far as what he is able to push. The reality is that today, each and every check and balance is exploited far beyond their original intention.
For example, several senators indicated before the election that if Clinton won, they would continue to refuse to confirm any Clinton nomination to the SCOTUS (as they did with Obama's nomination to replace Antonin Scalia). Ted Cruz, as an example, is advertised as being a 'constitutional conservative',
yet he implied he would block the function of government because... reasons. The constitution was created to describe how government should work, yadda yadda, while Cruz
et al were using it as a way to enforce how the government should work
for their ideals barring which they would grind the whole show to a halt, because, reasons.
"I firmly admire how our constitutional democracy works, especially because it allows someone like me to make it not work for everyone and anyone, on behalf of me, when I don't get my way, and therefore, I cannot, in good conscience, confirm this choice."
- Probably Ted Cruz at the age of five when told it would be fish for dinner
No matter where you plant yourself on the political spectrum, government leaders who refuse to work within the spirit of the system, and are willing to see it all burn rather than concede, are an unanticipated problem.
There are parallels throughout the Western world. Folks like Trump, Marine Le Pen, Nigel Farage, or Bernie Sanders tell their supporters that the system
will change for the better, and everything will be great again, while throwing wrenches into the works. Yet they are working in different political systems with very different political mechanisms than they sell. They (including Trump) see the election of Trump as an end. In the American system, as with most democracies, it's a beginning.
The founding folks likely didn't anticipate the impact of money and mass media, let alone social networks and online pseudo-media channels. They had no way to anticipate the requirement to raise massive amounts of money to pay for media, super-PACs, deal with lobbyists, and all the rest of the bullshit that comes-down to dollars multiplying votes.
I think they'd be shocked to see the state of things. I can imagine Franklin's ghost pulling-out a kite and handing it to Cruz, then pulling-out a stubby pencil while muttering, "Back from the dead to fix this crap... thought all ya'll would be enlightened... or at least get the gist of it... and not even a single hoverboard that isn't bullshit... the entirety of human knowledge at your fingertips, the structure of government that we slaved over, and you idiots... why I oughta... focus, Ben... serenity now... okay, so, guns - what the fuck? *scratch* Second, organizations are as liable as individuals, but they do not have all the same rights as individuals, because they fucking are not individuals... good lord, how is that not obvious? *scratch* Moving-on... What? Tell Ted he isn't shocked enough, and he can tie a key on it... a key... a metal object which conducts electricity... I said electricity... I see here he supports the death penalty, how is this message not connecting? So help me, I will go back to being dead.... serenity now... YOU OUTLAWED WEED? I give-up, you dumb shits are on your own."
A quantum state of signature may or may not be here... you just ruined it.