We are learning from Trump that presidents have too much power.We need to establish some limits for future presidents to protect our democracy. To begin with, one person should never be able to launch a nuclear strike.Let’s put three people in charge of our nuclear arsenal. So, if our president insults, or is insulted by, a dictator who has nukes, our president will not be able to go beyond a war of words and put his pudgy little fingers on that big button.
Let’s clarify the emoluments clause and give it some teeth so that future presidents cannot use the office to enrich themselves and their amoral, greedy relations by making backdoor deals that compromise the security of the United States.
Let’s make it a law that presidential candidates must release their tax returns so that we don’t elect someone who spent his entire career avoiding taxes, claiming bankruptcy to avoid paying back loans, and using his own nonprofit foundation as a personal slush fund.
Let’s insist that our presidential nominees pass a physical and psychological exam to ensure they are fit for office physically and mentally. Then at least we will know in advance if we are electing a malignant narcissist who is so lacking in empathy for other human beings that he puts in place a policy of tearing families apart who are seeking asylum and locking them in cages.
Let’s have our justice department fully vet the nominated candidates to make sure they have not been compromised by a foreign power and have not worked with that power to get elected with the aid of a corrupt campaign manager who has close ties to the aforementioned foreign power.
Let’s also make sure our future president has not abused or sexually assaulted or raped women. If he has, that should disqualify him and render him unfit for office. And if any future candidate is guilty of fomenting hate crimes, let’s arrest him or her and put him or her in jail before rather than after he or she is elected.
And if it should ever come up again, let’s not allow a sitting president who is under investigation for conspiring against the United States and obstructing justice, to appoint a judge to the Supreme Court who may in fact rule on the case in favor of the president. Let’s make it absolutely clear that the president is not above the law, does not have the power to pardon himself, or to pardon others who might implicate him in criminal acts.
Once we are rid of Trump and he is in jail where he belongs, we can work on fixing the system that Republicans have rigged in their favor enabling minority rule by a bunch of amoral right wing, greedy sycophants.
Of course, we would have to have a supreme court and a congress that believed in democracy and a balance of powers to accomplish these tasks.