The executive can't bypass the courts with an executive order, unless you've seen something I haven't. The reason Congress doesn't do anything is because it ceased to be a functioning body sometime around the AUMF. Congresspeople realized that doing anything other than what the donors paid for is fraught with risk. Better to watch things being done and complain about it. The UK went the same way, concentrating all power in the current government with even backbenchers being absolutely powerless.

I guess the only thing saving the EU from the same fate is its powerlessness and indecisiveness. The people who run it are certainly insane in the same way as the leaders of the UK and the US. You're both crippled from your lack of federalization and protected by it.

edit: In the US, our real problem is that our executive (including the intelligence agencies) can do whatever it wants without an executive order or a coherent legal rationale, they will simply never be prosecuted. The next executive will proclaim that the illegal acts under the last one will never be tolerated again, pardon everybody who did it, and make those acts legal from now on.