Comment by pessimizer
1 year ago
> I know this sounds corny, but people are the recourse. We are part of the checks and balances.
By "we" here, it seems you mean bureaucrats. But what if your opinions, as an individual, unelected bureaucrat are bad? I don't care what a mid-level bureaucrat's opinions on what policies are damaging is. He could be a neo-nazi for all I know. Constitutionally, we should go with the opinions of the people who won an election, instead of some random dude. I was taught that was what "democracy" was, not some random person taking advantage of their position to advance their personal goals.
When the guy paid to guard the door starts making his own decisions about who should get to come in, it's not good. It's corruption.
> But what if your opinions, as an individual, unelected bureaucrat are bad?
That’s a slightly silly stance to take. Modern developed countries live and die by the quality of their bureaucracy. Making every bureaucratic role an elected position would be insane.
How on earth would you organise elections for every single DMV employee? Or every single park ranger? Or every single government accountant or secretary? Every single civil servant involved in collecting the data used to drive policy decisions.
To get rid of “unelected bureaucrats” you would basically have to turn every federal role into an elected role. The federal government employees around 3 million people, even if we say that only 10% of them are “real unelected bureaucrats”, that’s still 300,000 elections you would need to hold every X number of years. How on earth would anyone ever manage any of that?
Thats before we get to the insanity which is Musk, the epitome of the “unelected bureaucrat” who seems to be the one leading the charge on many of these “policy decisions”, and publicly lambasting “unelected bureaucrats” as being corrupt and “undemocratic”.
> How on earth would you organise elections for every single DMV employee? Or every single park ranger? Or every single government accountant or secretary? Every single civil servant involved in collecting the data used to drive policy decisions.
You can't. Which is exactly why the civil service is supposed to impartially implement the policies of the elected government rather than making their own judgements.
IMO the increasing partiality of these bureaucrats (who are drawn from the professional-managerial class and have the views of that class, which are increasingly out of step with those of the average citizen, especially on social issues) was one of the big contributors to Trump getting elected.
The policies of the elected government in the United States are decided by the legislative branch, as bills that are passed into law. By ignoring U.S. code, bureaucrats would be violating the U.S. Constitution.
"The Congress shall have 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 in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof" - Article 1, §8, United States Constitution.
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> which are increasingly out of step with those of the average citizen, especially on social issues
They've always been out of touch in the same way they are now. They just used to align more closely with your own political beliefs.
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How about this:
Individuals with appointment power attach appointees to their ticket like vice presidents. You get the option to write in anyone, but the tickets are defaults.
How does that solve the “unelected bureaucrat” problem? You still need bureaucrats to run a civil service, the appointed positions in U.S. institutions are mostly just figureheads, they’re not handling the day-to-day work of keeping a bureaucracy functioning.
Unless you’re suggesting that every bureaucrat role should be an appointment, and part of X years elections, is having people with appointment powers turning up with a list of 300,000-3,000,000 people to fill every bureaucratic role, and somehow the general public are going to scrutinise that in some meaningful manner.
All of that is of course ignoring the problem that comes with throwing away all of your bureaucracies institutional knowledge every X number of years. Do you really want the issuance of driving licences, fishing licenses, gun licenses, international visas, customs enforcement, immigration enforcement, to all grind to a holt every 3-5 years while the new folks figure out how stuff works? You would basically end up with a bureaucracy that fundamentally couldn’t achieve anything, and silly things like the rule-of-law would simply cease to exist in the U.S.
Why would anyone want to trade with, invest in, or ally with, a country that effectively lobotomises its government every few years, and has zero continuity of governance at even the most basic day-to-day items of modern life?
It seems that russians owned the US ideologically this time, by selling both anarchism and authiritarism at the same time.
God bless our world now, as the change is coming and it will not be pretty
I read that as an all-inclusive "we" and not so narrow as "bureaucrats". The examples given are not exhaustive, if you have an imsgination. There are many ways to fight for what you believe in. Look up mutual aid, participatory democracy, and the histories of women's suffrage and the fight in the USA for equal rights for Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (that fight is nowhere near over). Start with loving yourself, extent that to others, and if you feel like you're teetering, lean on others and find your balance again.
If I'm the guy guarding the door (and I have been), I damn well make my own decisions to the best of my ability, to where I would be willing to explain the what and why of my actions.
>Constitutionally, we should go with the opinions of the people who won an election
That’s literally not how the constitution has ever worked.
Which unelected bureaucrats do you consider to have the power and leeway to make policy according to their personal goals, such that making them follow the President rather than the courts' interpretation of the law is the better option?
… oh boy, if you think that mid level bureaucrat might be a neo-nazi I might have some bad news for you about the highest level bureaucrats currently running your country..
You’re right. But if the guy paid to guard the door is told to start letting gangsters in by management, whistleblowing and civil disobedience become championed by the public rather than condemned, that’s “the people’s” check and balance to power. I don’t think we should legally protect the guard’s right to disobey orders, but we MUST protect the guard’s right to protest publicly.
> I don’t think we should legally protect the guard’s right to disobey orders, but we MUST protect the guard’s right to protest publicly.
That's already protected and the executive order doesn't claim otherwise.
>> No employee of the executive branch acting in their official capacity may advance [...]
Ask yourself: what's the difference between the SEC saying, "We declare that Facebook broke a securities law and shall now be fined $1M" and Trump saying, "I decree that the SEC declare that Facebook broke a securities law and shall now be fined $1M"? Either of those could be true or false. Either could be politically motivated. Either could hold up in court or be struck down. So what's the difference?
One[0] answer is, the former was vetted by someone knowledgeable and (at least allegedly) non-partisan who had the power to stop it if it was wrong. That's it. If the president really wants to fine Facebook he can - he can replace the SEC Director with the "My Pillow" guy if he wants, who can replace SEC employees with randomly chosen members MAGA types until the desired fine is eventually issued - but at least going through the bureaucracy confers the possibility of impartial and informed oversight. Vesting the power with the president directly doesn't do that; presidents are biased and partisan by design.
0: Another answer is the SEC has been granted the power to do that by Congress and the president has not; but I get that people on the "unitary executive" train disregard this, and