Presidential Candidate Amy Klobuchar (D-MN).
Source: Wikipedia
I happened across a friend’s thread on the various Democratic candidates for President, including a test you can take to see which one is most congruent with your policy views. This got me to thinking: how much importance should be credited to that congruence?
I try to keep in mind that the President doesn’t make laws, the Legislature does. Sure, the President has influence and veto power over the lawmaking process – sometimes I wonder if veto power was a wise choice by the Founders – but in the end it’s about the 538 folks in Congress. And the President does make certain appointments of importance, such as those to the Fed.
So when evaluating the candidates for Executive, I tend to think about experience and apparent (alleged?) competency as a governmental executive (no, not corporate executive – different animal, wrong number of paws) in addition to policies – and discount by some percentage those Presidential candidates’ policies which requires a supportive Congress to enact. For example, paging through the web site of Senator Warren (D-MA), it appears from a partial accounting of her plans, roughly 50%[1] will require legislative support. But how does one discount this? The veto power does give a certain potency to those plans; the Congressional ability to override the veto, on the other hand, limits the plans’ potency in a hostile legislative environment. Clearly, those plans which can be accomplished by the Executive should carry more weight with the electorate than those that require a cooperative legislature.
Representative Betsy McCollum (D-MN), lawmaker.
Source: Wikipedia
And, by the same coin, if a candidate’s plans are near and dear to their heart, but require legislative support, does it make sense that they run for the Presidency? Or should be seek or retain their legislative seat? Warren has already shown her abilities in Congress by getting the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau through the legislative process. Do we want that experience and drive to be lost by her moving to the Executive Branch?
I think the reason the question of Presidential policies has become so much more pointed than it was prior to, say, President Lincoln, is that, first, the world has become more complicated and dangerous, and, second, Congress has, infamously, ceded its powers to the Executive. There’s little to do about the former except find ways to wisely manage those problems, and elect wise people to the legislature, rather than the pack of second- and third-raters making up the GOP’s side of the legislature these days; not to suggest the Democrats are entirely top-line personnel, but the Republicans stand out like a supernova in the night sky for the basic intellectual and moral failings these days.
And as far as the latter goes, those cessions of Congressional purview should be retracted. Kill the National Emergency law that President Trump has dictatorially tried to use to fund a southern wall. Ask if we really need such a law. Examine the law books for other such examples.
By doing so, the diffusion of power back to the 538 members will make abuses a little less likely, albeit the determined abuser, such as Senator McCarthy (R-WI), can still cause trouble.
But through such retractions, the position of President will become less of a divisive, hot potato issue.
Getting back to my thoughts, it’s not necessarily the candidate who best agrees with you, but the one most likely to win independent support when faced with a national disaster such as Trump as an opponent.
1 Working from plan titles, and keeping in mind I’m a software engineer, not a political science whiz, I see Senator Warren’s plans falling into these categories:
Requiring legislative support:
Clean Energy for 100% achievement
Farm Economy
Affordable Higher Education For All
Justice Reform
Debt Relief for Puerto Rico
Defend/Create American Jobs
Raising Wages
End Private Prisons (yay)
Ending the Opioid Crisis
Health Care Costs
More or less within the Executive’s domain or in the leadership domain:
Trade
Immigration
Public Schooling
Working Agenda for Black America
Maternal Mortality
Lobbying (?)
Accountable Capitalism
Beats me:
End Wall Street’s Stranglehold on Our Economy
End Washington Corruption
Aaaaaaand … I’ve run out of patience for this task. There’s just too many plans to evaluate in my limited time.
