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I don't want independent agencies. I want agencies with accountability to the voters through their elected representatives. What you describe is madness. Government bureaucrats that aren't elected, cannot be fired by the people, and... outside the power of the president who is supposed to be in charge of the executive branch? What kind of government is this? Not democracy.

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threeseed 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> What kind of government is this? Not democracy

The Westminster system on which almost all of the world's democracies are based rely on an independent, unelected civil servants who serve the government of the day.

You will never get well-run governments if you require every person involved to be elected and an expert on politics and not on specific subjects e.g. renewable energy policy.

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guhidalg 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

All US government agencies are created through congress, by your elected representatives. It is the executive branch (the president, who is also elected) that is then responsible for carrying out the agency's mission. All the high-level government bureaucrats are confirmed by the senate, all elected officials. If a president dismisses them, the senate has to confirm their replacement.

This kind of government is described in the US constitution.

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danielmarkbruce 13 hours ago | parent [-]

This is a disingenuous take.

The agencies as they currently function (creating rules) isn't "described in the US constitution". We got here via a combination of practice, legislation and court decisions over decades and decades and decades. And recently court cases are swinging back against the power of the agencies.

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threeseed 12 hours ago | parent [-]

It has always been the responsibility of agencies to implement the strategic objectives passed by Congress i.e. create the rules.

It is not reasonable nor sensible for Congress to shift towards defining in minutiae every detail about how the laws should be implemented. Which are then locked in stone until a new bill is passed. Or not passed as in the case with Congress these days.

Because as we've seen time and time again innocent mistakes will be made and you want them rectified as quickly and easily as possible.

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danielmarkbruce 11 hours ago | parent [-]

Regulatory agencies weren't even a thing until the ICC in 1887. People aren't talking about the post office when they complain about regulatory agencies. Now we have all kinds of regulatory agencies making stuff up as they go. Nothing in the constitution talks about congress passing "strategic objectives" nor a vast apparatus of administrative law making entities like the the current regulatory agencies.

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threeseed 11 hours ago | parent [-]

This is simply wrong.

Regulatory agencies are constrained by the laws that Congress passes.

Where there is ambiguity (of which there is an infinite supply) the precedent was to leave up to agencies to interpret it. As opposed to requiring endless new bills to be passed.

	▲	danielmarkbruce 11 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Nope, it's right, every single part. Right now there are over 100,000 rules in the code of federal regulations across 50 volumes: https://www.govinfo.gov/app/collection/CFR Here is another link for you: https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43056/9?utm_s... Search for "major rules". Think about those. They are constrained only by what is nowadays extremely broadly written legislation. Just read anything like dodd-frank, written by incompetent fools who left it so broad that it said both nothing and everything (no constraints in practice) - and is now the source of 100s of rules across various agencies. Yes, precedent, part of my point. The constitution says nothing about it. The first regulatory agency came about 100 years after the constitution - that isn't by chance. It hasn't always been like this. It wasn't envisaged.