Obama now blames the Framers (and the Constitution) for his lack of leadership

You responded to my post which was about the claim in the OP.

If you wanted to talk about a different subject then post away but if you are responding to my post the assumption is you are addressing the point I made.

 

I responded to tell you what Obama meant by that and you came back and said that's possible. I also came back and said what Hoosier said, could mean what he said in a round about way.

 

you want a dictator, the founders prevented that... congress writes the bills.. Presidents sign them into law

 

What is a lack of leadership? Isn't it the inability to get your programs through? Isn't Obama blaming our framers for the way they appointed Senators, for his lack of getting his programs through?

 

Sorry, we have a King wannabe that does not care to lead Congress but rule by executive order by passing the law and Congress.

 

the voters lead congress, not the president... the president can recommend things to congress it can not dictate to them...

 

Evidently Obama sycophants don't know much about leadership either.

 

The design of Congress made sense back when our nation began.

It is rather outdated compared to many of our peers' systems, however.

America has the odd combination of being a young country with an old government. A lot of our peers have gone through massive changes in their governmental structures over the last 200 years. Not all of these changes have been positive in a representational sense, but many of them have.

Many European countries have proportional representation that is based more around population than around the significance of subnational units. Things like single transferable votes also enable a wider variety of political parties to engage the electorate, so that the public isn't stuck with just 2 choices.

So, when it comes to the Senate, it is true that rural areas are given far more of a vote than urban areas. Again, it makes sense historically how this came to pass, but nowadays, it seems to be rather outdated.

 

If the voters led Congress the way it was meant to be, but don't. With almost 90% of the voters for background checks to buy guns, we would have them by now. But we don't have it. Our representatives don't represent our views as it was meant to be. Only if they think they will be thrown out of office do they listen to voters. The rest of the time it's money.

 

If you want only the largest cities deciding elections for the whole country then sure, change the system we have.

BTW, this cannot be a young country with an old Constitution since it is the first of it's kind that is as old as the country.

 

very true, I did not say voters always vote smart, only that it was up to them... not the president... to fix congress

 

I have no problem with the way they set it up, it's when we adapted the Party system that things went to hell. If our representatives were able to vote their own mind and not follow the Party line, you would see a very different voting pattern.

 

you can't lead those who don't want to the lead... republicans want to destroy the government, that is their #1 goal...

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executive orders are part of the presidents powers, to not do everything in his power when we have a broken Congress would be the sign of a bad President, has not been a President in our lifetime that has not used executive orders

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Well, it depends on whether you prefer the notion of one man = one vote or the notion of each state being equally worth representing.

America places a higher emphasis on states than on individuals, which is unusual for most representative democracies. Granted, there are other countries that follow this design.

I'm not sure what you mean by this.

There are several countries that have very old governments and are also old countries to begin with. Iceland is a good example.

I'm considering America a young country, because it essentially started in 1787 (or 1776, depending on how you look at it). Compare this to countries like France and Germany, and yes, America is quite young.

On the flipside, France and Germany have much younger governments than ours.

 

I can agree with that. The irony is that Madison warned against the creation of political parties and yet was responsible for encouraging their rise.

 

Come on FreshAir. I am a Republican. Do you think I want to destroy the government? Do you think I would belong to an organization that wants to destroy the government. I want to see a smaller government. I want to see a government that tries to live within their means. I want to see a government that will do everything under the sun to create jobs, because it's jobs that will lift people out of poverty.

 

If people would only think back at what this government has done and not done, you would realize it is the government that put us in the position we're in today. They haven't helped us. They have hurt us tremendously down through the years.That's why I can't believe Democrats want to put all their faith in government to get us out of the very mess they got us into.

 

I think the goal is more to change government in order to make it more helpful (or at least less dangerous).

Each party has its own ideas of how to achieve that.

Unfortunately, when both parties agree on something, it's usually the most destructive.

 

If this is true it means the President of the United States has no idea at all why each state is represented this way or he wouldn't have ever said it. He is more clueless and inept than even I thought. If there was any doubt this guy is the worst failure of a President that ever disgraced the Presidency, there shouldn't be now.

 

Yes they do have their own ideas and both Parties are to blame for what has happened.

Back in the 1960's we allowed Japan full access to our markets and we set back and let them close their markets to us. Which is one reason we lost the television industry and several others. Another reason we couldn't sell cars in Japan. Those stupid moves gave Japan a big foothold in our markets while our biggest export to them is the same as it is with China now. Scrap newspapers and cardboard. Can you believe that?

Then we pushed banks to make home loans to people who couldn't afford them, causing most of the problems with the banks and Fannie Mae going under. We started up NAFTA and Free Trade and made it such a one way agreement, China is about to pass us as the richest economy and did it in just 13 years, while we have to borrow money off of them to pay our bills. We complain about jobs not paying anything and blame business for it. Who fixed it so business could leave and take millions of good paying jobs with them? It's our own government that has been screwing us for years and I don't trust either Party.

 

I wouldn't say opening up trade in and of itself is a problem, but it should always be a two-way street.

More than anything, trade should be reciprocal. If we open up a specific market, our trading partners should be equally as open from their side. If not, then we should penalize them exactly as much as they restrict us.

 

I have been both a Democrat and a Republican. Only once did I vote as an Independent and here is why. How I wish he would have won.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQ7kn2-GEmM

 

Ha, I still have a Ross Perot campaign button.

 

funny, the constitution has worked fine up until THIS moron has been in office. What a loon.

 

Those trade agreements were so one way. Before it happened, China was getting around on bikes and rickshaws. They now are the biggest auto producer in the world.They will soon pass us as the richest nation on earth. We had trade surpluses with all these countries before Free Trade and NAFTA. Now we have deficits with them. We lost millions of good paying factory jobs that made the middle class in this country. But if not for China, Japan would be right there where China is now. We let them screw us big time.