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Comment by 9dev | Hacker News Reader

This notion of "the government" is the wrong premise. The US government is (supposed to be, I should say) an elaborate system of checks and balances to enable self-correction mechanisms. The Trump administration has turned that into a travesty, obviously, but the system itself is explicitly set up to be split into three branches that keep each other in check, and thus supervising itself.

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Congress abdicated the majority of their authority to the executive over time by creating executive agencies. Now everybody is upset because the executive is actually using the power that Congress gave to it. The primary check on government growth is the three branches contending for power. No branch wants another branch to become more powerful and make their branch irrelevant. So, to fix the current issue, Congress can remove the power it has given to the executive and restore balance.

> The primary check on government growth

Disagree. The primary check on the government is consequences for violating the law and the constitution. That's just all gone out the window.

Power without oversight, no matter how distributed, will tend towards either complete chaos or tyranny (or both, if such a thing is possible). Giving three mutually distrustful criminals guns will not cause law and order to spring out of nothing.

An informed, angry and unforgiving citizenry is the only check on government, and we ain't go that.

These checks and balances failed long before Trump started abusing the system

Not to this extent!

Yes, sadly, several decades ago, one of the parties started running on the platform of "the government is broken" and to help the electability of said platform, they kept breaking the government.

Look, I vote blue too, but you can't ignore that the Democrats have also pushed the slider further and further toward executive power every chance they get. Well, I guess I can't tell you what to do, so I suppose you can.

I don't "vote blue." I vote for whichever candidate offers the most realistic solutions to the problem at hand. At times this may be "blue" but not necessarily. I have also voted 3rd party and skipped voting for a specific role alotgether.

Also, not even sure what you are talking about. My point specifically was about the congress, where the Republicans have stonewalled legislation, stolen SCOTUS seats, and shut down the government the vast majority of shutdowns since it became a "legitimate"(?) tactic.

> Democrats have also pushed the slider further and further toward executive power every chance they get

for example...?

Okay, you can scroll back up and see that the thread is about the erosion of checks and balances. After that, you can do a web search to read either about the Clinton administration's increased partisan direction of federal agencies, or Obama's increase in both scope and number of executive orders.

Presidential powers have been ratcheting up for at lest thirty years. And neither party seems particularly interested in turning the dial back once they're in power.

indeed.

cause the problem then complain the problem exists. that’s been their intentional platform for years and years.

You misspelled "self-corruption"

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