I really wish the US would separate the Presidency into two positions

[korn469]

I think part of the reason we have such a difficult time selecting a president in the US (besides the horrible electoral college system that really needs to change) is that the position is so complicated there is a good reason to disqualify any candidate. A president currently has to be able to

-Command one of the most fearsome militaries ever
-To be a great diplomat
-To manage regulators covering everything from methane levels in underground mines to internet practices
-Manage massive infrastructure projects
-Administer large retirement funds
-Work with congress on laws and political appoints
-Serve as the nation's director of diplomacy
-Try to keep one of the most advanced, complicated and largest economy's in history running smoothing
-Plus so much more

To ease the burden and lessen the impact of an imperial presidency, I think the office should split in two. The current president's responsibilities would go to two new positions. Commander in Chief and President.

The Commander in Chief would inherit the following organizations. The State Department. The Department of Defense. The Department of Homeland Security. The Department of Veterans Affairs. The Department of Energy. The CIA. The NSA. The NRO. NASA. Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence from the Treasury Department, and all overseas assets of the DEA and FBI.

The new office of President would keep everything else.

Elections would be in different years, but we could keep the same 2 four year term structure. So if we elected the President in 2016, we would elect a Command in Chief in 2018, then back to Presidential elections in 2020 and so on.

The of the two offices should have completely separate budgets. I think this would allow voters to be much better to evaluate leaders on what they are brining to the office, and may also make some of the short coming meaningless or truly disqualifying.

[Ben Kenobi]

Germany is a country which does this, btw. The problem is that the office needs to have stuff stripped out of it, not multiplied.

[Dauphin]

Would it not be easier to have each party have all executive positions selected (by whichever mechanism they wish) and offered to the people as a package, rather than elect a president who then picks his team? Responsibilities would be more pooled and all parties have electoral accountability.

[grumbler]

France is much closer to this. Germany's president has little power. France's president is essentially the external president while the PM has the internal responsibilities.

[The Mad Monk]

We were supposed to have an external President.

[Lorizael]

Yeah, let's split up the all powerful executive. That worked out soooo well for Rome.

[kentonio]

In Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72, HST suggested changing to a prime minister type position to avoid a lot of the problems you have with basically handing one person a wildly powerful, yet impossible to actually perform, role. I think he was probably right.

[Dauphin]

Some would argue politically powerful roles work best when you can't actually do anything. Checks and balances.

[The Mad Monk]

In Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72, HST suggested changing to a prime minister type position to avoid a lot of the problems you have with basically handing one person a wildly powerful, yet impossible to actually perform, role. I think he was probably right.

Was that before or after his trip through Bat Country?

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Two roles would end up infighting all the time so the rest of the system (or establishment) would end up playing one against the other.

US problem is not the presidential system, but mainly voting duopoly, followed by electoral college. The good aspect of the system was the historically the presidential office was so powerful that it could shake up "the system" and make it better. The system (or the establishment) is getting better however at presenting their two candidates as the only choices, all the time now, and that is a real problem.

Also the main reason why Trump is better than Hillary this time around, no matter his all his faults, he is first in half-century non-establishment candidate to be able to come forward to be on the ballot for president. Opportunity that should be used, warts and all.

[kentonio]

Was that before or after his trip through Bat Country?

After. In between his insane drug episodes though, he was a really sharp political commentator.

[BeBMan]

Being in election/campaign mode every two years instead of every four doesn't seem a good idea to me.

Edit: Otoh you could have a daily change of command like Rome had during the early Punic Wars with one of the two consuls commanding the army one day then give command to the other on the next day etc.etc. That turned out well at Cannae.

[korn469]

BeBro

The US federal government already has a 2 year election cycle. Every 2 years 100% of the house of representatives and approximately 33% of the senate comes up for reelection. During Presidential election cycles, US voter turn out is usually between 55-60%. In the cycles that only congress is up for reelection, voter turn out is usually around 40%. This could boost voter turn out during those election cycles.

[korn469]

One other thing is that there seem to be 4 or 5 foreign policy factions in the US

Actual hawks. Believe war is hell but are still willing to fight. So it at times it look like they think every war is a good war. This is an extremely small faction.

Chicken hawks. Believes any one sided conflict is a good war. Even better when it is somebody else doing the fighting. This is the largest faction in the US government. Will cut and run at the first sign of quagmire, unless they blame somebody else for the failure.

The three monkeys. They hear no evil. See no evil and speak no evil. Want US foreign policy to go back to the neutrality of the mind 1930s. Another extremely small faction.

The domesticated turkeys. A rather common faction in peaceful, prosperous urbane centers of culture throughout the US. Every war is a bad war. If only America wasn't so evil, the world would basically be a utopia. Often belong to Code Pink or similar organizations.