DOJ

-By Frank Salvato

As the campaign cycle progresses we are going to hear a lot about what one candidate or another is going to do about this or that. We will, to the point of weariness, be inundated with campaign promise after campaign promise, albeit, between gratuitous attacks, both political and personal. This is politicking and the American electorate – for better or for worse – has come to accept a certain amount of it from the people in the political class. But expecting grandiose pledges and believing in the unattainable, well, those are two different things. It is the truly foolish who believe half of what a political candidate says he can deliver, and the blame for that foolishness must fall on the shoulders of the individual voter.

While Presidents sign legislation into law, it is Congress – the House and the Senate; the Legislative Branch – that actually crafts and passes legislation. Therefore, any promise made on the campaign trail by a presidential candidate, be it by the incumbent or the challenger (or the field of candidates vying to be the challenger), is subject to the debate and acquiescence of those in the Legislative Branch; in Congress. It is because of this that any promise made by a presidential candidate must be received by the voting public as more of an intention, rather than a promise. To accept a campaign promise as an impending reality is to set oneself up for almost certain disappointment. And to blame a successful candidate for not living up to those campaign promises requires a level of certainty that the promise was actually ignored, not thwarted.

A good example of campaign promises thwarted comes in the form of the Republican TEA Party supported congressional freshman class who, during the 2010 Mid-Term Elections, promised to “repeal or defund Obamacare” and to “bring fiscal responsibility to Washington.” Each of those elected sincerely believed that they would be able to succeed in doing what they promised. In fact, HR2 of the 112th Congress did, in fact, attempt to repeal Obamacare and many of the TEA Party supported members of the House took it straight on the chin during the debt, deficit and budget debates. But for all of their good intentions and actions, the freshmen Republicans of the 112th Congress learned that unless you have a veto-proof majority in the House, a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate and a friendly inhabitant in the White House, absolutes in campaign promises do not exist.

The same must be said about the Executive Branch and the President of the United States, although he has some additional quivers in his pouch where getting his way is concerned: the bully pulpit (self-explanatory) and the Executive Order.

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Promises, Promises: The Reality of Campaign Speak”