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Comment by ctlby | Hacker News Reader

Can you explain how the current president "seized" power? Was there some extra-legal mechanism at work that I'm not aware of?

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I don't know what else you call it when you get supreme executive power despite a majority of the voters not wanting you to have it. I'm aware that it wasn't illegal, but it doesn't mean it's legitimate.

These have been the rules for nearly 250 years. Why are you only up in arms about it now?

Maybe you aren't old enough to remember but plenty of people were up in arms in 2000 as well.

I can't comment on what popular sentiment was in 1888.

> I'm aware that it wasn't illegal, but it doesn't mean it's legitimate.

Mind you, I'm no Trump fan, but "legal" is literally the only relevant definition of legitimacy in this context.

If the process by which Trump was elected was illegitimate, then the process by which all American Presidents have been elected is illegitimate. Americans have had two centuries to change the electoral college, and have not done so, because clearly voters have no problems with it when it benefits their side. Neither the presence nor the absence of a majority vote is, or has ever been, relevant.

We went though this with Obama, and a not-insignificant segment of the population believing him to be illegitimate. Before Obama, people on the left thought George W. Bush stole the election because of the debacle that was Florida.

It's a poisonous precedent to set, particularly in the radicalized atmosphere we find ourselves in, not to recognize the legitimacy of a government just because the "wrong" candidate won under the rules. How many more of these "illegitimate" Presidents are we going to go through before the losing side just decides to start shooting?

I hate Trump as much as any reasonable person, but Americans got exactly what they wanted, and deserved, with him.

Technically speaking the 'majority' of voters didn't vote for any single candidate. In many other places, this would result in a run-off.

Ask yourself who those other votes went for; who do you think they would most likely vote for in the runoff?

I'm a fan of instant-runoffs. That would dramatically change the political landscape.

McConnell blocked the previous president from making his deserved appointment. The current Supreme Court is illegitimate, courtesy of the Senate.

Can you point to the law McConnell violated in doing this? And if not, in what sense is the current court illegitimate? Finally, how does this in any way address my question about the president "seizing" power?

It's the Senate's Constitutional responsibility to advise and consent the President's SCOTUS nominations. What is the procedure when they abdicate that responsibility? Remember, the Senate didn't tell Obama "no, we don't like your nominee." They, meaning McConnell, refused to hold any hearings on at all.

So maybe he didn't violate the law, but he certainly didn't uphold his Constitutional responsibilities, which I believe is part of the Oath of Office he took.

Not sure why you were downvoted. This is the best answer I've ever received to my question.

The Senate is not required to hold hearings on nominees. The Senate did not hold any hearings until 1916.

That is a distinction without a difference in this context, which is about the Senate abdicating their constitutional responsibilities. They didn't hold public hearings before 1916, that is true (the history of why they even started holding public hearings is pretty controversial in itself.) However, they still held yay/nay votes on the floor for the nominees, in order to fulfill their advise and consent role. McConnell refused to hold a vote, therefore he failed in upholding the Senate's constitutional role on the SCOTUS confirmation process.

That's not how the Senate works. They are not required to hold a vote in order to declare "nay" on a nominee. Declining to vote is effectively a "nay". It's no different than declining to hold a vote on a bill which they know will not pass.

This is how Congress and the co-equal branches of government are designed to work. Congress and the President often don't get along. It's a feature, not a bug.

Since the Constitution expressly places the approval of judges into the hands of the Senate, that is a bit of a non-sequitur.

McConnell took a gamble that paid off for his party- if the voters had chosen Hilary there is a very good chance she would have nominated a more leftist judge than Obama had. In the end it was actually a very prominent campaign issue and therefore was directly a choice before the voters, which in my mind would make it more legitimate in a 'democratic' context than the usual.

I disagree. Obama received more votes than Donald Trump ever will. The voters already made a choice in 2012. Forcing reaffirmation for Democratic appointees, but not Republican ones, is a clear attempt to obstruct the power of the President.

I do not base my evaluation of legitimacy on the Constitution, but on the voice of the people.

> Since the Constitution expressly places the approval of judges into the hands of the senate....

> [...] if the voters had chosen Hilary there is a very good chance she would have nominated a more leftist judge than Obama had.

Under your logic, they could have just waited for a Republican to become president before they voted to confirm any judges. Granted, that would have been an even bigger gamble (what if they lose the majority in the Senate in the meantime?), and even more justices could die or retire in the meantime.

How many seats need to be open before you would say the Senate must confirm someone? (1? 2? 5? 9?) How long are they allowed to wait? (6 months? a year? 4 years? 8 years?) . How dysfunctional could our government become before your logic implies the need to act?

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