From Economics professor J.C. Bradbury,
“If you think about the control that a President might have over the economy, the President is just a third of our government; we [also] have the Legislative and Executive branches. If the two Houses of Congress agree, and the President agrees, we can [make] policy, but it’s very complicated for them all to agree. And so it’s very hard for the President to even have an impact on the economy directly, especially when much of what goes on in the economy is determined by outside market forces.
"So the President sort of serves as a focal point to say how we are doing...and voters sometimes look to blame the President when things aren’t going well, even though there’s not much he could have done about it, or they may try and reward him when things are going well, [though the President] just happened to be riding good times.
“When things are going well we like to attribute it to things that I did: I’ve kept my job, I must be doing a good job at work, but when I lose that job it’s got to be [someone else’s fault], so our self-perception is certainly going to foster that notion of giving credit to ourselves but giving blame to people who are making other decisions.” *
From Constitutional Law professor Bernadette Miler,
“We think of the President as having great power to fix the economy, for example, or fix international conflicts, and to some extent the President has persuasive authority to do things like that, but the President really can’t just turn around and fix the economy within 2 years, for example. It really depends a lot more on Congress because Congress has the power to decide how to raise revenue and also how to allocate those funds. So [the spending power is] a really important power, [but] we think the President can do more than he can.” *
Honestly, I’m glad that the President is not as powerful as the media and generally accepted public opinion make him out to be. We got rid of monarchs for a reason; no one individual should have that much authority. I would like to see individuals begin taking ownership of their own situations and stop blaming the government, the economy, etc.
A final thought to any Bible-believers who end up unhappy with the results of tonight's election. Remember Romans 13:1, “Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God.” In other words, God cast His vote differently than you, but it will be okay.
* http://www.freakonomics.com/2010/11/04/how-much-does-the-president-really-matter-full-transcript/
“If you think about the control that a President might have over the economy, the President is just a third of our government; we [also] have the Legislative and Executive branches. If the two Houses of Congress agree, and the President agrees, we can [make] policy, but it’s very complicated for them all to agree. And so it’s very hard for the President to even have an impact on the economy directly, especially when much of what goes on in the economy is determined by outside market forces.
"So the President sort of serves as a focal point to say how we are doing...and voters sometimes look to blame the President when things aren’t going well, even though there’s not much he could have done about it, or they may try and reward him when things are going well, [though the President] just happened to be riding good times.
“When things are going well we like to attribute it to things that I did: I’ve kept my job, I must be doing a good job at work, but when I lose that job it’s got to be [someone else’s fault], so our self-perception is certainly going to foster that notion of giving credit to ourselves but giving blame to people who are making other decisions.” *
From Constitutional Law professor Bernadette Miler,
“We think of the President as having great power to fix the economy, for example, or fix international conflicts, and to some extent the President has persuasive authority to do things like that, but the President really can’t just turn around and fix the economy within 2 years, for example. It really depends a lot more on Congress because Congress has the power to decide how to raise revenue and also how to allocate those funds. So [the spending power is] a really important power, [but] we think the President can do more than he can.” *
Honestly, I’m glad that the President is not as powerful as the media and generally accepted public opinion make him out to be. We got rid of monarchs for a reason; no one individual should have that much authority. I would like to see individuals begin taking ownership of their own situations and stop blaming the government, the economy, etc.
A final thought to any Bible-believers who end up unhappy with the results of tonight's election. Remember Romans 13:1, “Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God.” In other words, God cast His vote differently than you, but it will be okay.
* http://www.freakonomics.com/2010/11/04/how-much-does-the-president-really-matter-full-transcript/