Almost Classical

US-EPA-Seal-EO11628 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) President Trump's potential unilateral withdrawal from the Paris Accord on Climate should remind all politically engaged Americans that there is a risk when presidents ignore process. Executive orders and executive action can be undone. Had the Paris Accord on Climate been ratified as a treaty, by the Senate, no president could then withdraw unilaterally. The Accord was, unfortunately, not entered into with Senate ratification. The lesson here: executive-only actions are a bad idea. But, Congress is worthless, too. Our government is broken. Badly. In case anyone was wondering. People cheer when "their president" does things without Congress. The problem with executive actions is that they are undone just as easily. We also shouldn't enter into armed conflict without Congressional approval. But, why bother with details of the Constitutional process? Related articles What Is The Paris Climate Agreement?...

English: Donald Trump speaking at CPAC 2011 in Washington, D.C. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Republicans in the House and Senate, especially the leadership of the GOP , must at least symbolically reject the president-elects choices for his inner circle of advisors. Though some of these posts do not require Senate confirmation, the Senate should and must demand that Donald Trump remove some members of his transition team and his "kitchen cabinet" of conspiracy nuts. I never imagined as a libertarian that my worst nightmare might be a Republican president. The following individuals should be nowhere near the White House: Stephen K. Bannon and Frank Gaffney . This should not be open to debate. The Senate should refuse to confirm any cabinet secretary until these two men are shown the door. Yes, I understand that Bannon and Roger Ailes advised and helped control Trump during the campaign. I don't care. These are not the sorts of people with whom the GOP should be as...

United States Senate Seal (Photo credit: DonkeyHotey ) "Senator Kaine espousing the radical, radical notion of majority rule. That is now on tape, sir," Chris Hayes said Thursday night (21 Nov 2013). And he couldn't be more wrong. In theory, the GOP could control the Senate with members elected from states representing less than 25 percent of the nation. The math is simple: win lots of small, rural states, and you have a majority in the Senate, while needing only a minority of American voters.  Can Chris Hayes and numerous other pundits (and politicians) be so dense as to not recognize that a minority of voters nationally, but representing majorities in small aging states, could elect a GOP majority in the Senate? And no, this isn't some gerrymandering trick, since Senators are elected state-wide. It's simply a fact that the rural states could dictate policy for the majority… within two or three election cycles. [See the MSNBC clip at: A ...