What does it take to be an effective president

[Got Stripers]

Originally Posted by detbuch

Congress is in charge of the budget.

My point in citing Presidents who had opposing views yet thought (in my opinion) that they were doing the best for all of the people, is that without an agreed upon standard, "best" is subjective. The only official political standard of what is best, that should apply to all politicians, is preserving, protecting, and defending the U.S. Constitution. All other "bests" are matters of opinion.

Duh, yeah, but the president with control can certainly blow up the budget and we have yet to see what each years submission is going to include, but I'm guessing balancing the budget isn't in the cards during this administration.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Got Stripers

Duh, yeah, but the president with control can certainly blow up the budget

Duh, no, the President does not have the power to force congress to spend money or balance a budget. He may propose a budget, or veto one, but it is entirely up to Congress to spend the money. And no, Bill Clinton did not balance the budget: https://www.cato.org/publications/co...balance-budget

and we have yet to see what each years submission is going to include, but I'm guessing balancing the budget isn't in the cards during this administration.

There have been few budgets to balance since the Gingrich one. It's been mostly continuing resolutions. In any case, the national debt, a far more important metric, has continuously risen, even when Gingrich's Congress balanced the budget. And it will continue to rise under Trump. The last Presidential administration to lower the debt was Calvin Coolidge's