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223 points mindingnever | 3 comments | | HN request time: 0.351s | source
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LeoPanthera ◴[] No.45279813[source]
One of the very few tech companies who have refused to bend the knee to the United States' current dictatorial government.
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FortuneIIIPick ◴[] No.45280588[source]
Dictatorial suggests a "ruler with total power". The US has three branches of government. That hasn't changed, ever.
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vkou ◴[] No.45280643[source]
Two of them jump at the command one the other one, one out of fear (because he has ended the careers of every rep that has crossed him), and the other has been packed with life-time-appointment sycophants who put loyalty to the cut over anything else.

Russia (or literally any other dictatorial tyre pyre) also has three branches of government and a token opposition, for all the good it does.

Just because you have a nice piece of paper that outlines some kind of de jure separation of powers, doesn't mean shit in practice. Russia (and prior to it, the USSR) has no shortage of such pieces of paper.

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FortuneIIIPick ◴[] No.45280704[source]
That's a ridiculous take. Seriously outlandish. The US has always had and continues to have three working branches of government. That is a factual statement because it is indeed a fact.
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otterley ◴[] No.45280769[source]
It’s not a fact, because it depends upon a subjective interpretation of the word “working.” Some might argue, for example, that if the President can cow Congress into subservience, then the three branches of government are no longer in balance with each other, and thus the constitution is no longer “working” as intended.
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1. terminalshort ◴[] No.45281870[source]
Depends on how he cows them into subservience. If he uses the threat of electoral defeat for opposing him, that's totally legitimate. If he uses his position as commander in chief to threaten them with force, that's different.
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2. ◴[] No.45284491[source]
3. otterley ◴[] No.45284543[source]
It does not matter how. The fact that he is able to do it at all illustrates a design weakness. Until recently, Presidents chose (consciously or otherwise) not to exploit that weakness. It doesn’t mean the weakness wasn’t always there.