Tag: separation of powers
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Carbon Tax Bill to be Presented to Australian Parliament
Oz provides an excuse for some comparative politics.
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Do Legislators Make Bad Presidents?
Let’s see if there is evidence to support the assertion.
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Madison and States v. the Central Government
Madison went to Philadelphia wanting to increase the power of the central government over the states (quite a bit, in fact).
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Madison, the Philadelphia Convention, and Presidentialism
The US came a lot closer to something resembling a parliamentary system than most people think.
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Would America Be Better Off With A Parliamentary Government?
Is America’s political system to blame for our current problems?
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11th Circuit Strikes Down Individual Mandate
The Eleventh Circuit has struck down the individual mandate as exceeding Congress’ enumerated powers under the Commerce Clause.
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On Presidential Power (and More Musings on our System)
Presidents are not a powerful as they seem (and a return to the “are things broken?” theme).
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Veto Players and Governance
A political science-y response to the question of whether the system is broken.
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Is the System Broken?
Did the debt ceiling debate reveal dysfunctional government?
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Speaking of Fidelity to the Constitution….
The constitutional purists in the Tea Party apparently do not understand either bicameralism nor separation of powers.
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White House Asks Court To Keep Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell In Place
The Obama Administration is asking the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to reinstate the stay on the order striking down Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, even though the policy is already well on the road to repeal: The Obama administration asked a federal appeals court late Thursday to suspend its decision last week ordering an end…
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CA Controller to Withhold Pay of Legislators over Budget
CA’s budget battles continue.
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Ten Congressmen Sue President Obama Over Libya Mission, War Powers Act
Dennis Kucinich and nine other Members of Congress are suing the President. They won’t get very far.
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Obama Killed The War Powers Act? No, Congress Did
Once again, Congressional abdication has led to an Executive Branch power grab.
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Authorization For Libyan War Set To Expire Next Week, Don’t Expect Anyone To Do Anything About It
The 60 day deadline for Presidential discretion under the War Powers Act will expire next week. Congress won’t do anything about it.
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More Musings on the Health Care Debate
An attempt at explaining where I am coming from on in the health care discussion.
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Everybody Hates Congress
Contempt for Congress is an old American tradition. Unfortunately.
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Obama’s Signing Statement On Presidential Czars And The Constitution
President Obama’s signing statement on the allocation of funds to Presidential “czars” sets a potentially dangerous Constitutional precedent.
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Candidate Obama vs. President Obama On Presidential Signing Statements
Once again, President Obama has ignored Candidate Obama’s promises to reign in the Presidential powers assumed by George W. Bush.
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Then Veto the Bill (Signing Statements)
Via Jake Tapper at ABC: President Obama Issues “Signing Statement” Indicating He Won’t Abide by Provision in Budget Bill Last week the White House and congressional Democrats and Republicans were involved in intense negotiations over not only the size of the budget for the remainder of the FY2011 budget, and spending cuts within that budget,…
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Copious Quantities of Casuistry
Judge Sumi’s TROs arise from a veritable cornucopia of error.
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Congress, The President, And War Powers Under The Constitution
Operation Odyssey Dawn has resurrected the eternal battle over what limits there are, and should be, on the President’s ability to use military force without Congressional authorization.
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Elections Have Consequences
Republicans won the right to govern Wisconsin. What does that mean for Democrats?
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The 17th Amendment, Federalism, And Reversing History
Would returning to indirect election of Senators really have a significant impact on the growth of the Federal Government? Probably not.
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What The Framers Meant
Is our Federal system a mere political compromise? Or were the Founding Fathers visionaries with a plan?
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Against the Electoral College II: Not As Framers Intended
In the first entry in this series we looked at a basic question of democratic theory. In this one, we look at whether the EC ever worked as the Framers intended.
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Why American Kids Don’t Know History
A lot of Americans don’t know that the US gained its independence from Great Britain. How can this be? Is it a liberal conspiracy?
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Roberts Not Sure Why Justices at State of Union Address
Chief Justice John Roberts says he’s not sure why the Supreme Court still attends the State of the Union address, indicating that perhaps it was time for that tradition to end. U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts said Tuesday the scene at President Obama’s State of the Union address was “very troubling” and the…
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USA Parliamentary Democracy?
National Journal‘s Ron Brownstein sees the recent bout of gridlock in the United States as a sign of a more fundamental shift in how our government operates. Obama’s first year demonstrated once again that in this deeply polarized political era, big legislative crusades aimed at big national problems produce only big political headaches. President George…
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White House Blocks Congressional Party Crasher Testimony
In yet another example of a change of administrations not leading to a change in behavior, the Obama White House is refusing to allow Congress to question the social secretary on the matter of the “party crashers.” The White House on Wednesday invoked the separation of powers to keep Desiree Rogers, President Obama’s social secretary,…
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Wiretaps Run Amok
Andrew Sullivan is soliciting right-of-center comments on a report by Eric Lichtblau and James Risen that has mostly attracted left-of-center commenters thus far. Here’s the lede: The National Security Agency intercepted private e-mail messages and phone calls of Americans in recent months on a scale that went beyond the broad legal limits established by Congress…
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Spanish Democracy
Matt Yglesias has returned from vacation in Spain where “they have this interesting political system (“democracy”) wherein if your party loses the election, the other party gets to make policy until they lose an election.” Well . . . it’s a wee bit more complicated than that. Leaving aside that the country was run by…
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Team Players
John Cole is furious [UPDATE: merely “disgusted“] at Dianne Feinstein and other Democrats critical of the nomination of Leon Panetta as CIA director, saying it proves that the party are “unparalleled masters at fratricide.” Way to go, team. Feinstein, who had no problem voting yea for Porter Goss, George Tenet, and Michael Hayden, as well…
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Too Many Czars
Mickey Kaus quips, “We need a Czar Czar, to crack the whip on all the czars. … P.S.: Also a federal czar policy. Right now, czar decisions are made on an ad hoc, case-by-case basis, with no attempt at czar harmonization.” I have to agree that we’ve gone czar crazy. We’re, in theory anyway, a representative republic…
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Taking Separation of Powers Seriously
Glenn Greenwald, reacting to reports that Barack Obama has told Harry Reid that Joe Lieberman should not be stripped of his committee chairmanship and thus making it very difficult for him to do so, has written a long and passionate plea for a return to vigorous separation of powers with strong institutional jealousies. [W]hatever the…
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Outrage: Obama Believes in Separation of Powers; Opposes Activist Judiciary
The latest outrage of the day in this campaign cycle, which is being heavily hyped by Drudge, National Review and others, is an old radio interview that Obama gave in 2001. There are about four paragraphs being called out, and I’ll take a look at them one at a time. You know, if you look…
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Obama = Charismatic = Hitler = Armageddon
Arthur Silber is, as am I, fascinated by the cult of personality surrounding Barack Obama. He notes some anecdotal creepy gushing on a local radio show and then Reactions of this kind to Obama are fairly common. No, they are not this extreme much of the time, but such statements are far from unusual. And…
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Question Time for the USA
Christopher Hitchens draws attention to a proposal by John McCain that received scant attention when announced last week: “I will ask Congress,” said the presumptive Republican nominee, “to grant me the privilege of coming before both houses to take questions, and address criticism, much the same as the prime minister of Great Britain appears regularly…
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Jefferson ‘Wins’ Supreme Court Case
Representative William J. Jefferson won his ‘Debate Clause’ case against the FBI but the incriminating evidence against him is still admissible. The Supreme Court on Monday let stand a lower court ruling that the F.B.I. went too far in searching the office of Representative William J. Jefferson, a Louisiana Democrat accused of using his position…
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Huckabee Criticizes Romney For Lack of Executions in Massachusetts
Steve Benen mentions an interesting tidbit about the anti-Romney ad that Mike Huckabee doesn’t have the money to run on TV “refuses to run on principle”. Apparently, the ad criticizes Mitt Romney for the lack of executions in Massachusetts during Romney’s gubernatorial terms. As Benen points out: Apparently, Huckabee — you know, the evangelical, pro-life…
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Domestic Politics Hamstrings Iraq Policy
Public opinion polls showing Americans overwhelmingly frustrated with the war in Iraq and ready to begin withdrawal. Paradoxically, domestic political considerations are making it impossible to move off the status quo. John Murtha blames the Republican primaries: Rep. John Murtha predicted Monday that Democrats will not be able to pass any meaningful legislation to end…
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Federal Judge Overturns Patriot Act Gag Rule
Judge Victor Marrero has again struck down a portion of the USA Patriot Act. A federal judge struck down a key part of the USA Patriot Act on Thursday in a ruling that defended the need for judicial oversight of laws and bashed Congress for passing a law that makes possible “far-reaching invasions of liberty.”…
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FBI Raid on Jefferson’s Office Unconstitutional
A federal judge has ruled that the FBI raid on Rep. William “The Freezer” Jefferson’s office was unconstitutional. AP’s Matt Apuzzo: The FBI violated the Constitution when agents raided U.S. Rep. William Jefferson’s office last year and viewed legislative documents, a federal appeals court ruled Friday. The court ordered the Justice Department to return any…
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Cheney Claims He’s Not Part of Executive Branch
Yesterday afternoon, Justin Rood broke the strange story of Dick Cheney’s claim of Vice Presidential immunity from executive orders. Vice President Dick Cheney has asserted his office is not a part of the executive branch of the U.S. government, and therefore not bound by a presidential order governing the protection of classified information by government…
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Rudy Giuliani’s 12 Commitments
Rudy Giuliani gave a speech this afternoon announcing his “Twelve Commitments to the American people, a bold vision aimed at moving America forward through change and reform, overcoming new challenges and increasing accountability in Washington.” Let’s take them one at a time, shall we? 1. I will keep America on offense in the Terrorists’ War…
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Gates Retreat and Political Reality
The editors of the Wall Street Journal are confused: There’s a rumor going around that Robert Gates is the Secretary of Defense. We’d like to request official confirmation, because based on recent evidence the man running the Pentagon is Democratic Senator Carl Levin of Michigan. For that matter, is George W. Bush still President? The…
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Charles and his King (or the Odd Musings of Krauthammer on the Presidential Nomination Process)
Cross-posted from PoliBlog: Charles Krauthammer has a column in today’s WaPo in praise of what has become a two-year+ campaign for president: Two Years of Humble Pie. He starts the piece with a dig at parliamentary systems wherein snap elections can be called and campaigns are brief. But mostly he moves into the typical argument…
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Fighting Recess Appointments with Fake Sessions
Paul Bedard reports that Senate Democrats will hold bogus “sessions” in order to prevent the use of the recess appointment power. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has a little trick up his sleeve that could spell an end to President Bush’s devilish recess appointments of controversial figures like former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton. We…
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Sullivan: Conservatives are Fascists
Andrew Sullivan quotes, approvingly, from a reader email: What American ‘conservatism’ has become fits closely within the definition of fascism: an intensely nationalist movement intent on defining membership in the ‘nation’ on linguistic, religious, and (increasingly) ethnic/racial criteria, accompanied by an unquestioning loyalty to (male) authority, enshrined in family leaders, business leaders, religious leaders, and…
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Fired U.S. Attorneys, Political Considerations, Etc.
Via Daou Blog Report, I see that Kyle Mantyla, writing for People for the American Way’s Right Wing Watch, reports that two of the fired U.S. Attorneys had written op-eds and otherwise strongly lobbied for the renewal of the PATRIOT Act. Whether this demonstrates that “loyalty was a one-way street” within the Bush Administration is…
