The main difference between past parliaments and today’s dysfunctional parliaments is how MPs communicate with voters and how voters consume politics.
President Trump has ‘no problem’ informing Congress of Venezuela attack
President Donald Trump said he has “no problem” informing Congress of any future attacks regarding Venezuela.
I often complain that Congress enacts legislation and abdicates its duty to be the driving force behind the federal government. But that’s why I want to write about it today. Why is Congress doing so little?
I have blamed this problem on the existence of an independent body, certain Supreme Court precedents, and overzealous executives.
Certainly, these are factors that should be considered. But the cause of Congress’s decline is much simpler. The rise of social media and direct communication with voters has destroyed incentives for Congress to assert itself.
Our elected leaders clearly have no interest in the prestige of their office, given that they have no interest in reclaiming legitimate war powers, taxing powers, or other powers from the executive branch.
Lawmakers no longer have any incentive to act.
In my opinion, the main difference between past parliaments and today’s dysfunctional parliaments is how MPs communicate with voters and how voters consume politics.
In the past, members of Congress had to actually accomplish something or be involved in something to gain visibility. In the 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s, some topics did not meet the standards for discussion due to limited newspaper space and television time.
The incentive was to increase productivity. Because it gets them in the news and gives them material to take back to the district during re-election campaign time. You can see this by looking at activity levels over the past few years and decades.
Americans now consume politics through social media, where algorithms are used to keep content relevant and prevent it from blending into the background. The way we communicate has changed. There is no longer gatekeeping by existing news sources that limits information about candidates to only important issues.
Now, members of Congress seem more concerned about being glorified as partisan stars on social media.
This is by no means a new phenomenon. Barack Obama pioneered the use of social media during his 2008 presidential campaign, and by the time Donald Trump was first elected, social media use had become widespread. However, the development of hyper-tuned algorithms has further exacerbated this impact on ordinary people.
As a result of this change, members of Congress are constantly campaigning, always focused on how they can get more attention on social media rather than actually doing their jobs. Negative partisanship also increased, as content criticizing the opposition received the most attention.
Congress decided to follow the president’s whims
Now, members of Congress can use their social media accounts to serve as nothing more than glorified pundits. Often this comes across as a partisan cheerleader rather than an individual interested in actually accomplishing something.
For Republicans, this has led the party to descend into a cult of personality around Trump. Members of Congress are more interested in rallying behind the president and protecting him from his enemies than in achieving actual policy outcomes. Their role shifted from legislative to partisan.
Regarding the attack on a Venezuelan drug smuggling ship, members of Congress praise the president’s actions, but ignore the fact that they need to be the ones to authorize the use of force against Venezuela. When it comes to customs authorities, members of Congress had no problem staying silent while President Trump unilaterally changed tariff rates for every country in the world, even though that’s their authority. Regarding the cuts made by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, members of Congress praised the illusion of cutting government waste while doing little to actually solve the problem, even though it is perfect for cutting government waste.
But this is not a purely Republican phenomenon. As for President Joe Biden’s illegal promise to address student debt through cancellation, members of Congress could have pushed for student loan cancellation through legislation. Rather, they had no problem free riding on the backs of Biden’s blatantly illegal plan to cancel student debt and then just watching the courts rightly strike it down.
We Americans are partially responsible for being consumers of this decentralized political landscape. Americans will need to consider the new realm of social media in politics, as the shift in incentives for lawmakers is incredibly harmful and here to stay.
Dace Potas is an opinion columnist for USA TODAY and a graduate of DePaul University with a degree in political science.
