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"Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

whitehouse.gov

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Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#921

Post by kelnos »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #256
hayst4ck wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inflation is an extreme handout to the wealthy. Money is by definition zero sum, otherwise the word "inflation" would have no meaning. There are good questions around what an over leveraged loan is, but fundamentally, the supply of money is to some degree fixed at any given moment. The wealthy and powerful keep their money in tax benefited, inflation tracking assets. Many of those assets are stocks, and a major busin…

> Money is by definition zero sum, otherwise the word "inflation" would have no meaning. Not sure that I agree, nor that the one follows from the other. Without having the advantage of an Economics degree, I have witnessed when rising tides have lifted all boats and a majority of U.S. society benefited. Perhaps "wealth" is not a zero sum. And if that is case, talking about "money" is orthogonal. We should talk instea…

Discretionary income, really, not disposable. What we really should care about is the cash people have left over after they've paid for all their essentials, not just what's left over after taxes.

It might seem like it would sound impressive to say that someone has $20k/month of disposable income, but not so much if the housing market has gone crazy and groceries have become scarce and they have to spend $15k/month on a small apartment and barely enough food to feed themselves.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#922

Post by kelnos »

abrichr wrote: post #387
teeray wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

States of emergency should at least go to congress for renewal every 3 months as a measure to be voted on individually (cannot be tied, for example, to budgets). If that's not enough to kill it eventually, it should automatically become a ballot measure on the next Presidential Ballot after some number of renewals.

Emergencies must be renewed annually by the President. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_12170 : > The order was first declared on 14 November 1979 (EO 12170). At least 11 executive orders were based on this emergency state. The emergency, which was renewed in 2023 for the 44th time, is the "oldest existing state of emergency."

That's equivalent to emergencies being permanent and not subject to oversight.

There is very little difference between the president saying "there's an emergency until I say there isn't", and repeating every year, "there's an emergency for the next year".

Though that Wikipedia article does say that Congress is supposed to review emergency orders, but in practice they just let the president do whatever.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#923

Post by Nevermark »

tsimionescu wrote: post #865
refurb wrote: post #803

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Saying that a President’s personal interpretation of Congress’ laws or the courts precedence, completely overrides any individual executive employees good faith understanding and responsibility to the Constitution, laws, and judicial rulings is madness. But it's not madness based on the intended structure of government? The EO isn't saying "ignore Constitutional violations". It wouldn't be valid if it did. If Congr…

Every citizen in a democracy has a duty to understand, respect, and uphold the law and the constitution. Congress defines what the law is, the judiciary adjudicates disputes on how the law should be interpreted, and the president can only execute that law. But all federal employees have their own duty to understand and uphold the law. The president has no special power to interpret the law: the law is what it is, and…

> So not only is it normal that the president defers to agency heads on the interpretation of the applicable law that they are experts in, it is the only way the system can function.

[Emphasis mine.]

Yes, well said. This is the ultimate bottom line argument!

The Constitution might as well not exist if individual actors with expertise the President does not have, are not expected to put their specialized understanding of previous orders, laws and precedent (and reality!!!) ahead of who they report to.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#924

Post by kelnos »

gottorf wrote: post #755
georgemcbay wrote: post #712

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Republicans won a lot of elections A lot of them thanks to the results of blatant gerrymandering.

My candidate winning reflects the legitimate will of the people, and your candidate winning is solely due to gerrymandering. Of course. Both parties[0][1] in fact do engage in gerrymandering. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois%27s_4th_congressional... [1]: https://thefulcrum.us/electoral-reforms/worst-gerrymandered-...

That's a bad-faith argument. Yes, it's true that both parties engage in gerrymandering. But Republicans do it a lot more than Democrats do.

Out of the 25 examples in your second link, it seems like 23 of them are GOP gerrymanders?

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#925

Post by kelnos »

sangnoir wrote: post #292
apexalpha wrote: post #88

>A White House Liaison is to be installed in every independent regulatory agency to enforce direct presidential control Wow. Literally installing political officers in agencies.

How very Soviet; installing political commissars to spy on renegades and ensure everyone on the right side of the Politburo^w President.

Sounds about right. Trump worships Putin, and Putin misses the Soviet Union.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#926

Post by [deleted] »

ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote: post #605
NotYourLawyer wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. Seems fine that the bureaucrats to whom executive power is delegated should be answerable to the executive.

Yeah this is a key tenant of the MAGA 2016 and 2024 campaigns: draining the swamp, fighting the deep state, etc. How else is the executive supposed to align fed bureaucrats to his goals?

[deleted]

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#927

Post by kelnos »

NotYourLawyer wrote: post #472
apexalpha wrote: post #88

>A White House Liaison is to be installed in every independent regulatory agency to enforce direct presidential control Wow. Literally installing political officers in agencies.

> The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. Seems fine that the bureaucrats to whom executive power is delegated should be answerable to the executive.

They already are, via cabinet members and their deputies/undersecretaries. Those people are appointed by the president, but need to be confirmed by the Senate as a check on the president's power.

Trump is doing another end run around the confirmation process with his "liaisons".

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#928

Post by kelnos »

Vegenoid wrote: post #587
nailer wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that politicians are elected whereas bureaucrats are not.

I don't see the point you are making? It isn't politicians that are getting elected to be White House Liaisons, they will almost certainly be appointed.

And these sorts of people should need to be confirmed by the Senate, but of course Trump is not going to do that.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#929

Post by kelnos »

yesiamyourdad wrote: post #770
wilg wrote: post #608

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They put out a whole playbook called Project 2025, developed by a bunch of insane people at the Heritage Foundation. Trump lied and said he didn't know anything about it. Now they're doing it.

Not only did they put out a playbook, they actively recruited and screened people to take government positions. I read a post on Reddit from someone who went through the training. The whole idea was to find ideological supporters. Trump's problem in 2016 was that he wasn't prepared and relied a lot on existing government supporters and established GOP figures, who weren't completely loyal. This time, they were prepar…

This is also why I'm flabbergasted that a lot of people seem to be dismissing all of this with words like "we survived his first term, the second will be no different". It is different! Incredibly different!

It seemed like Trump was genuinely surprised he won the first time. They were completely unprepared. But now they are very, very prepared, and they know exactly who to put in various positions in government, people who will never balk at what Trump wants to do.

Re: "Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies" – Executive Order

#930

Post by kelnos »

Zamaamiro wrote: post #258

This EO, combined with his proclamation that "He who saves the country does not violate any law" paint a very concerning picture. This has, historically speaking, been the language of tyrants. No President is above the law, nor does the President "interpret" the law; that is the domain of the Judiciary. “Wherever law ends, tyranny begins”

I mean, he's been using dictator language for years now. This is certainly concerning, but it's nothing new.
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