Shadow1980 said:
radishhead said:
From what I can tell (outsider perspective, I know) - Barack Obama did nothing particularly wrong; he just couldn't get anything done in the country because Republicans in Congress always completely refused to agree to anything he suggested, and refused to compromise. |
You're pretty much spot-on. Despite often being thought of as the most powerful person in the country, the President actually can't create any laws, and there's very little he can do unilaterally. He can say "I'll promise you X, Y, and Z," but regardless of whoever is President they can't fulfill their promises even if they wanted to unless the Congress actually puts a bill on his desk that he can sign into law, and the way Congress is right now they're extremely unproductive as a legislative body. In fact, this is perhaps the least productive Congress in history due to all the gridlock. It's always easiest to blame the President because he's the most high-profile politician in the country, but Congress bears perhaps the most blame. The President's powers are delineated in Article II of the U.S. Constitution, and as you'll see most of what he can do requires the approval of Congress. If Obama is guilty of anything, it's doing what most politicians do: promising things that they can't possibly fulfill on their own, if at all.
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Finally, someone who knows exactly what they're talking about.
Thank you good sir, for both the bolded & unbolded.
