The President was always able to act without Congress...?

[fadedrose]

Yes, with executive orders, as he saying he's going to use now which is making him a better candidate.

I notice the lack of tea party protests (or coverage of them) which dominate the Congress. The White House knows that fighting the people is not such a good thing, never mind the Congress.

The new protests against Wall Street corruption are the trigger the Pres needed... a few more arrests of brokers and bankers wouldn't hurt either. More investigations needed.

[Lint Head]

1. Could he not have increased the debt limit without Congress?

[dennis4868]

2. he could have tried...

but we would be talking about impeachment hearings in the TP House right now, not jobs.

[msanthrope]

4. Sure. If you want to ignore Article One, Section Eight, and have an impeachment debacle. nt

[Lint Head]

6. Other Presidents have done it many times.

[Inuca]

8. Have doen what? Increase the limit?

No, I don;t think so.

[Lint Head]

9. Yes.

[Lint Head]

10. Here you go. The ceiling is a limit. Hope I didn't confuse you with the semantics

of calling a limit a ceiling.
Kennedy raised the debt ceiling 4 times for a total increase of 5%.

Johnson raised the debt ceiling 7 times for a total increase of 18%.

Nixon raised the debt ceiling 9 times for a total increase of 36%.

Ford raised the debt ceiling 5 times for a total increase of 41%.

Carter raised the debt ceiling 9 times for total increase of 59%.

Reagan raised the debt ceiling 18 times for a total increase of 199%.

George H.W. Bush raised the debt ceiling 9 times for a total increase of 48%.

Clinton raised the debt ceiling 4 times for a total increase of 44%.

[Inuca]

11. But they have NOT done it on their own

which is what I thought you were refering to. They asked for it and COngress approved it, very different.

[SidDithers]

12. In every single one of those cases, Congress voted on, and approved, the increase...

Which is not the same as Obama raising the limit on his own.

Sid

[Cigar11]

13. This isn't other Presidents ...

if you haven't noticed, anything this President dose is under a microscope, so he needs to be more accurate that anyone else. Hell ... even if he implements Republican Ideas ... you get's denied! What other President do you know of that this has happened to?

[LiberalFighter]

7. He wouldn't have been the one increasing the debt limit.

Congress did when they passed the budget. Congress authorized all spending when they passed the legislation and the President signs it.

[WI_DEM]

3. there are some things he can do by executive order but not major things that will have a great

impact on the economy.

[Swede]

5. He can get elements of his plan by bypassing Congress.

But he cannot get his whole jobplan done without it.

[frazzled]

14. Ever heard of Youngstown Sheet Tube Co. v Sawyer?

No, the Supreme Court made quite clear in 1952 that a President can NOT do anything under an executive order. He can't make new law, only act under existing law.

Until the 1950s, there were no rules or guidelines outlining what the president could or could not do through an executive order. However, the Supreme Court ruled in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 US 579 (1952) that Executive Order 10340 from President Harry S. Truman placing all steel mills in the country under federal control was invalid because it attempted to make law, rather than clarify or act to further a law put forth by the Congress or the Constitution. Presidents since this decision have generally been careful to cite which specific laws they are acting under when issuing new executive orders.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_order

The president has a fairly circumscribed set of things he can do either by Executive Order or through the federal agencies he directly controls.