Executive-legislative Balance

Can you prove what your saying is true?

And let's just say, for the sake of discussion, that I agree ... considering that Congress has abnegated their responsibility, who do you suggest runs the government if they aren't doing a bloody thing except obstructing proposed legislation?

What I'm trying to figure out is in what ways the power has shifted in the presidents favor when it comes to implications with congress. I cannot give an answer because I myself have no idea.

Is this a homework assignment?

Wow, if that's how the homework question was worded you need another school.

Sequester, no gun control, Guantanamo still open, states gerrymandered to the hilt. Yep Obama is calling all the shots....

Just because he misses a lot doesn't mean he doesn't call the shots. He just misfires sometimes.

I see no reason to assume the premise is true. Neither Mr. Obama now, nor his predecessor Mr. Bush were in a position to dictate to the Congress. Presidents can attempt to lead, but Congress cannot be driven. An allegation such as this is tailor-made for members of Congress who want to bewail the decay of principles while continuing to pursue their own personal agendas. It's good propaganda to take on the stump at election time. That doesn't mean it's true. At the "worst" Congress and the President must each dicker to get what they want. That's how the system was intended to work.

Compromise?

Negotiation and compromise are the skills which politicians need to be successful in the long term. What you see in fora such as these, all the time, is conservatives whining because there is not a pure, conservative agenda being pursued, and liberals whining because there is not a pure, liberal agenda being pursued. But that's not how politics work, anywhere, anywhen. Politicians, for all that we scorn them, are the necessary agents of negotiation and compromise who, when they are not on the grandstand, when they are not in the spotlight, work with other politicians to attempt to get as much of their program as they can, but giving up parts of their hard line so that their political opponents can get as much of their program as they can.

It's easy to see what happens when you have fanatical political hardliners like the teabaggers demanding that their party members compromise on nothing. You get the kind of obstruction that can paralyze the Congress. That does no one any good, because although the hated, vilified "libruls" won't get what they want, neither will the teabaggers. Any teabag candidate who is not able to learn this simple lesson, not able to negotiate and compromise, will not have a very long political career.

Use code words like 'teabag' or 'teabaggers' as Setanta has and you will confirm your ignorance as Setanta did.

All the extreme politicians on both sides have to do is appeal to the lowest common denominator among voters to be successful. I dont see many tea party pols being removed from office. And the libs in congress are a minority even among democrats.

Democrats, Progressives and Liberals own America's lowest common
denominator voters, they are known as the under informed dumbmasses.
Democrats are more than happy to take full advantage of this segment of
our population and they work hard to keep them on the democrat plantation.

Sure, there'll always be a lunatic fringe.

And let's not forget our military intervention in Libya without even the window dressing of a congressional resolution.