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Comment by voisin | Hacker News Reader

Many of those unelected bureaucrats are experts in their fields due to their ability to focus for entire careers.

Is Congress not capable of listening to those experts and then publicly debating which of their suggestions to implement?

Congress writes laws vague enough for the experts to implement the policy. It's always been this way. It will be total chaos if Congress has to explicate the specific.

Have you met our Congress?

They are not. Even if we assume congress wasn't a complete gridlocked mess, they simply do not have the bandwidth. There 535 Members of Congress and they work less than 200 days a year in a typical session.

How many regulatory bodies are there that need rules passed? I can think of the FAA, FTC, EPA, FDA, USDA, and the NRC just off the top of my head. A quick google search shows there are 19 of these rule making agencies. Even with a wide distribution of rule making authority, these agencies struggle to keep up with our rapidly evolving world.

Forcing congress to hear and make a decision on every single regulation these agencies propose would be a bottleneck that brings this country to it's knees.

365 * 5 / 7 = 260.

Removing ~3 weeks vacation gets you down to 245. Eleven federal holidays? 234.

200 days/year sounds like an almost full-time job?

They have no obligation to actually show up. Many miss more votes than they are present for.

Also, most sessions only run a few hours, and many more are pro forms, where the minimum quorum show up (I think this is something like 15 or 20), open the session and then immediately close it.

You're assuming they have a standard five day work week. That's not how legislative sessions work. https://history.house.gov/Institution/Session-Dates/110-Curr...

> There 535 Members of Congress and they work less than 200 days a year in a typical session.

Sure, Congress is in session for about 200 days, and even when it is the elected officials aren't typically on the floor for the full day. But that doesn't mean that when they aren't on the floor they aren't necessarily working. They could be meeting with constituents, with their staff, reading bills, going to committee meetings, just meeting with other reps/senators etc.

You make it sound like they don't do anything.

Congress members bring snowballs to the floor as evidence that climate change isn't real. Some of this behavior is due to personal beliefs, but there are other factors:

https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=E01

So due to the ignorance and corruption among conservative lawmakers regarding climate change and carbon emissions, congress has been in an ideological deadlock on the issue of climate initiatives. The EPA existing somewhat independent of that framework was a benefit.

Congress has the powers to investigate, deliberate, and legislate. Not administrate. That power was explicitly granted to the executive branch.

Even if we had a competent, non-bitterly partisan Congress, no.

Because then you're left with who is better convincing uninformed people; the experts, or paid lobbyists.

1. Dunning-Krueger or, in other words, Congress probably thinks they know better.

2. Politicians, per definition, are elected to represent the interests of their constituents. Many constituents disagree with experts (climate change, for example). QED, there is little motivation for politicians to listen or follow the advice of experts, especially if an expert's conclusion is not popular.

And? It's Congress' job to make policy and pass laws.

They can and should take advice but the whole point of democracy is that the policymakers are democratically accountable.

So they should prepare law novelization for cabinet, cabinet should push it to legislature, and legislature should vote on that. Like in any other country.

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