Weaknesses Of The President

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Recommended: Presidential system strength and weakness

Chapter 14
The President of the United States is a special office with elements of great strength and also great weakness defined in the constitution. A president is chosen by the people whereas a prime minister is chosen by legislature.
One of the reasons presidents are less powerful than prime ministers is because no sitting member of congress can hold office in an executive branch, where as a person chosen by a prime minister to be in the cabinet are always members of parliament. That is a huge difference because the prime ministers pick all of their cabinet ministers from among parliament. This is a great way to exercise control over the government because if you have people from congress in your cabinet, you will be able to influence more people in the government. Picture it like an outsider trying to fit in to a new club or sport. You have to prove your way in and earn respect of your peers. That is sort of like the President and their cabinet. Sure, some of the people in the president’s cabinet are close friends, campaign aides, representatives and experts on various policy issues but if you already have someone on the inside like how Great Britain does, it makes the job a whole lot easier. And maybe the people of the government are in fact really welcoming and thankful that an outsider is coming in, but when it comes down to policy issues and the insiders do not agree with the president, they will turn on you.
Another huge weakness of the president is that a president’s party often does not have a congressional majority. A prime minister’s party always has a majority in parliament. Does this really mean anything? Yes it does, it creates a divided government that creates huge conflict and disagreement. Aga...

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...roblems, they enable problems. If more bureaucracies were held accountable, it would filter out the bureaucracies that are useless and meaningless.
To whom the bureaucracies are held accountable to remains a question to me. The bureaucracy is just too big and cannot be sustained but they do need to be held accountable for their actions, no doubt about that. Sadly, the bureaucracy is too big for anyone or anything, and it is too big for our own good. I guess there are always going to be downfalls to bureaucracy. According to text, “if a bureaucracy has one master, it often ends up having none”. Instead of one person controlling it, it controls the person. And with a divided bureaucracy like the US, we are seemed as inefficient. We are damned if we do, and damned if we don’t. Same thing with bureaucracy, they are damned if they do and damned if they don’t.

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