No, this is quite wrong. It is well understood in American law that "spend every dollar we give" is exactly what the budget approved by Congress means. It is then the duty of the executive branch to do so in an effective manner.

Laws shouldn't need to go into details on exactly how every last dollar is to be spent, they set the amount and the goals, and the executive exists to handle the details.

The problem is that the Trump administration is ignoring the laws they don't like. They're even trying to ignore a very explicit constitutional amendment (birthright citizenship). Writing more detailed laws would do nothing to make the Trump team follow the law.

CA spends around $11B on the University of California system. The NIH budget is $47B. I haven't done the math, but I would hazard that the total amount of money spent on science by the Federal and the individual state authorities would be comparable.

It's just that historically the Federal government was leading with the fundamental research, but if push comes to shove, states can start spinning up replacement programs.

To your parent comment's point, this varies a lot by state!

Don't get so depressed. The Executive branch in the US does not have a lot of power when it comes to influencing the states.

For example, Trump can't actually force states to change their school athlete programs. It doesn't have any power over individual states (or schools). All his DoE can do, is to threaten to withhold funding. And even that is being contested because the Congress has not authorized it.

However, if he does manage to withdraw the funding, that's just 6% of total spending on schools in CA ( https://lao.ca.gov/Education/EdBudget/Details/900 ) and 8% in NY. The states will just shrug and go on.

The discretionary part of the US Federal budget is not large, on the scale of the country.

> And yet states aren't allowed to form alliances with other states

That's not quite correct. The judicial practice in the US is that the intestate compacts (agreements) require Congressional authorization only if they infringe on the sovereign Federal powers.

One good example for the 2nd Amendment lovers: states are free to make reciprocal agreements with other states for concealed carry permits. It doesn't require any authorization from the Congress.

Another example are the laws for taxation of multi-state corporations that the neighboring states can negotiate together.

> Take a look at the EPA "exception" that California has needed in order to impose more stringent fuel efficiency standards for automobiles.

Yet, WA now has a carbon tax for companies operating within its borders. And it was found constitutional by the SCOTUS.

> Many forms of commerce or communication that are relevant across state lines (net neutrality rules, etc.) are considered a federal prerogative and states have limited ability to control these.

The interstate agreements are allowed as long as they don't infringe on the sovereign Federal power.

And there are plenty of workarounds. For example, CA has these ridiculous agricultural inspection stations on freeways. They are legal because they don't technically deny you the freedom of movement, declining to submit to an inspection simply revokes your driving privilege in CA.

Tell me more.

The Dangerous History Podcast has a very interesting series in Wilson. The host was not a fan.

With a slight pause in the post-watergate era when Jimmy Carter was president.

> No, the agencies were created by congress, and have always been accountable to Congress. But Congress hasn't been doing its job, which is why they seem unaccountable.

If Congress hasn't been doing its job, then they don't just seem unaccountable, they actually are.

> For another example, take the frequent neofascist argument that the federal agencies are "unaccountable" without being under the direct command of the President

It’s not “neofascist” lol, it’s just what the constitution says. The first sentence of article II: “ The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.”

It’s not Congress’s job to hold executive branch employees accountable any more than it’s Congress’s job to hold judicial law clerks in the courts accountable. It’s the President’s job, in whom the executive power is vested.

That’s also reflected in the appointments clause. Anyone with discretionary authority must be either appointed by the president, or report to someone who is: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf/19-1434_ancf.pdf. The whole point is to make the executive branch highly responsive to Presidenfial elections.

Are you arguing that only Republicans have controlled Congress singe Bush Jr was in office? Or that Congress held primary decision making authority behind the number of executive orders signed by presidents since then?

The system has specific, well-defined checks and balances. For example, Congress can limit the executive’s control over spending by enacting specific appropriations bills with concrete line items. But it hasn’t done so for decades. It has done things like appropriate single $1.7 billion line items for USAID, leaving it to the executive’s discretion how to spend it with only the vaguest guidelines. Congress having done that, it’s not for say the courts to “check” that by insisting that the executive can’t exercise all the discretion Congress provided it.

And your point about immunity is misinformed. The Supreme Court held that the President has immunity for official acts. This is a no-brainer. You can’t sue Congressmen for their official acts either, or judges.

If the President didn’t have immunity, Georgia prosecutors would be able to indict and convict Joe Biden in some red county in connection with the murder of Laken Riley, on the theory that Biden recklessly or negligently opened the border leading to her death.

Optimistic.

> In 4 years the people will vote again.

There's legitimate concern that won't be a viable option, and the admin has hinted that will soon be the case.

Democracy isn't what you are, it's something you do. (Timothy Snyder's directly applicable talk on democracy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YY6LCOJbve8)

If you vote, but your votes don't matter, you aren't a democracy. You are a democracy when your votes meaningfully influence policy. In that sense, we aren't even a democracy right now.

It's worth considering that Russia has elections too. They aren't meaningful for many reasons. Real opposition candidates might be assassinated, or a candidate might be run with the same name to confuse voters, etc.

Gerrymandering and unlimited campaign contributions are prime example's of how "It's all about how he comes to power" is correct, but your conclusion is flawed.

Voting doesn't make you a democracy. Voting can be ritualized. Voting can be a form of cargo-culting (Feynman speech worth reading): https://calteches.library.caltech.edu/51/2/CargoCult.htm

  "In the South Seas there is a Cargo Cult of people.  During the war they 
  saw airplanes land with lots of good materials, and they want the same 
  thing to happen now.  So they’ve arranged to make things like runways, 
  to put fires along the sides of the runways, to make a wooden hut for a 
  man to sit in, with two wooden pieces on his head like headphones and 
  bars of bamboo sticking out like antennas—he’s the controller—and they 
  wait for the airplanes to land.  They’re doing everything right.  The 
  form is perfect.  It looks exactly the way it looked before.  But it 
  doesn’t work.  No airplanes land.  So I call these things Cargo Cult 
  Science, because they follow all the apparent precepts and forms of 
  scientific investigation, but they’re missing something essential, 
  because the planes don’t land."

America follows the apparent precepts and forms of democracy, but we are missing something essential because votes don't influence policy.

There is much more to the idea of democracy than voting.

Family is an interesting one, given five kids across three marriages, so the 'thought' is admirable and honourable, but he's unable to live up to it - which kind of educates us as to his ability to live up to his word, or his ability to deal with difficult situations calmly and rationally.

And having Musk alongside him entirely destroys the family angle (media-prop children aside).

Voters could not have known that Trump would make a concerted effort to do anything unconstitutional. This is nothing like he did his first term or any other Republican has ever done.

He is going after departments that are conservative darlings like the Defense department. I can’t remember any serious person saying we need to cut spending and fire people at the FAA.

If he had thought that voters wanted Project 2025, why would he disavow it during the campaign?

> everything that is happening was predictable and predicted. Voters knew what they were voting for. Those who are surprised really weren't paying any attention.

The voters were kept away from these predictions. They were too spicy for mainstream media, not mainly because the media are in Trump's pocket (except Fox, OANN -- all the explicit propaganda outfits), but because people shoot the messenger when the messenger delivers bad news. They like hear about bad news afflicting other people. If it afflicts them, if it triggers their anxiety, they think, "You've made me feel bad. This is unpleasant. I'm going to go look at pictures of puppies and kittens."

Except it’s not really democracy. You have gerrymandered districts. You elect a leader not by who gets the most votes, but who wins a system that was designed for the benefit of white slave owners.

And of course, who really believes the election results when you have Trump saying that Musk rigged some voting machines in his favor.

Face it, the US no longer creates its government from the collective will of its citizens. They’ve replaced politicians with corporate backers for the actual corporations themselves.

Folks on the left would do well to remember that the same unelected bureaucracy that declared “resistance” to Trump would destroy an AOC or Sanders presidency too. Ultimately, it’s a good thing if electing the President can effectuate drastic changes in the executive branch, because that’s the only real lever voters have for affecting the largest and these days most powerful branch of government.

> This is well understood, and has been demonstrated over and over recently (think Brexit.)

That is a matter of opinion. Most of what is terrible about Brexit is "the media hate it". Economic outcomes have been in line with comparable EU countries so the promised "project fear" disaster (e.g. the Treasury prediction of a collapse of the economy in the wake of a vote for Brexit - not even on implementation) did not happen.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a80772140f0b...

I don't see how your reply is related to my comment.

I was not defining democracy. I was describing the common real-world usage of the term, which has a more specific meaning than simple majority rule. It is commonly used as a shorthand for "liberal democracy". Some Americans use "republic" for the same concept, but that's misleading in other ways. Partly because some countries that are commonly understood to be liberal democracies are constitutional monarchies. And partly because some actual republics (such as North Korea or the member states of the former USSR) do not match the concept particularly well.

I was also not talking about any specific constitution, but constitutions in general. They all come with implicit and explicit assumptions that must hold, or the system will not work as intended. If some entities are supposed to function as checks and balances to each other, they are expected to remain independent. If they choose to collude instead, nobody is capable of stopping them if they decide to twist the constitution beyond recognition or outright break it.

I said that a constitution on its own is worthless. That means a constitution cannot enforce itself. There must be some people who are capable and willing to enforce it. But if they are capable of enforcing the constitution, they are also capable of breaking it. Which means there must be other people capable and willing to act as checks and balances. And so on. The system may work as long as those people act within the expectations, complying with both the spirit and the letter of the constitution. But if they reject the expectations and start looking for loopholes to take advantage of, they may find some. If that becomes too common, the constitution becomes worthless, because the people who are supposed to enforce it no longer believe in it.

How would you propose rewriting it that wouldn’t just mean “less democracy” and “more control by credentialed elites?”

Do you volunteer for such a massive undertaking?

Sarcasm aside, I'm seeing a lot of wackiness on both sides of the political spectrum lately. The Constitution is fine and provides provisions for changing it via amendments. You guys aren't involved in the political process at all, I caucused and was a delegate so I can tell you the system is fine and working as intended. Don't complain about it if you aren't even involved in the process. That just makes you look silly.

Not sure how a "rewrite" would even work. Our current constitution does not have any provisions for discarding it and starting over. The amendment process requires too many states to agree for any sweeping changes. (We couldn't even get enough states to pass something as simple and seemingly uncontroversial as the equal rights amendment before it expired.)

And I think this is -- at least for now -- actually a good thing. Because if we could rewrite the constitution, I suspect it would be rewritten by the same kind of people who wrote the Project 2025 playbook.

Rewrite? You'll never even get 3/4 of the states to ratify a single constitutional amendment ever again.

I'm not happy with the situation, but I agree with almost all of what you've said.

> Do we need a better system? I'd argue yes. But all the others are worse

I think there's a lot of room for improvement here. Eliminate the senate. Dramatically expand the house. Eliminate the electoral college. Sane district boundaries. Etc.

Perhaps the Democrats should consider letting their voters choose the candidate for once instead of anointing it. Nobody wanted Clinton except the DNC establishment, and then they lied about Biden until he was forced aside for Kamala at the behest of insiders.

So judicial review is out too?