The Founding Fathers sure did a poor job with checks and balances against a complete idiot

[Quixote1818]

Trump is showing that there are a lot of holes in our Constitution. What the fuck is with there being unlimited pardon power in one person's hands? Why would that ever be a good idea?

[NRaleighLiberal]

1. clearly, the election of a total monster like dump was beyond their comprehension

[3catwoman3]

5. It is beyond...

...MY comprehension.

[ImpeachTheGOP]

2. The electoral college was supposed to protect us, they failed to do their job.

Hamilton wrote about it in the Federal Papers.

People are easily swayed by con men. That's why we don't have direct democracy. The idea was that if the people were fooled by a demagogue or snake oil salesman that the electoral college would instead assure that a qualified person would be elected president.

That did not happen obviously. Electors are not supposed to be party representatives, they're supposed to be independent people who can judge whether or not a person is deserving of the presidency.

The provisions to stop this madness were there, the directives just weren't followed.

[marybourg]

9. They couldn't anticipate the degree to which

democracy has leveled up the populace, making it impossible for an "elite" group, the electoral college, to overrule the "will of the people" as expressed in the election. We now have the worst aspects of the elitist electoral college scheme, without it being able to yield any benefits.

I think the only workable solution is to go to the popular vote. This will take an enormous effort over decades to achieve. Maybe we should start working toward this now.

[tanyev]

16. Congress is also supposed to protect us. They are failing to do their job.

The Founding Fathers never dreamed all three branches of government would be compromised.

[Takket]

3. they designed around what they considered a worst case scenario.....

unfortunately.... it is now worse than that............ and we the people are left with very little recourse as 1/3 of the country wreaks terror on everyone.

[lpbk2713]

4. They gave future Americans too much credit for good judgment.

They sat around exchanging ideas and agreed "surely they will never be that fucking stupid" .

[flamingdem]

6. "We hold these truths to be self-evident"

Bill Maher addresses this tonight on New Rules.

It was obvious to the ethical and intelligent but now with Trump you have to write it all down in the rule book.

[quickesst]

7. true for shrub then.....

....even more fitting for not my president.


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[uponit7771]

8. Unnn, the speaker of the house and the Senate maj leader aren't supposed to be traitors too

[Barack_America]

10. They couldn't envision the treachery of the modern Republican Party...

...or the stupidity of the voters who repeatedly voted them into office to dismantle the republic.

The constitution is actually largely working; this is specifically the consequence of the will of the voters, election integrity concerns aside (which highlights the need for those concerns to be at the forefront).

[Bluepinky]

11. Actually, it's not the fault of the constitution.

Trump wasn't elected by Americans, the entire election process was corrupted by a foreign power. The Constitution forbids treason, which occurred on so many levels and by so many individuals allowing Trump to claim the office of President. The founding fathers failed to anticipate that an entire political party would cheat, lie and steal on a massive scale to achieve and maintain power, that people in government would put party and power over their country. This didn't start with Trump, it started with Reagan, who encouraged people to dislike and distrust the government.

[unitedwethrive]

12. Adding to all of this is that the repubs have been laying the groundwork for a strongly divided

country for years. They have taken every opportunity to pit citizens against each other and use highly charged wedge issues as cornerstones of their campaigns. Then to top it all off, they have chosen party over country, something the founding fathers never thought would happen. Most repub congress people would rather see the Democrats defeated than to have anything left of the Constitution.

[Angry Dragon]

13. some very fine responses above mine

[Skittles]

14. they didn't consider 63 million fucking idiots, Russia and the FBI

[Rhiannon12866]

15. No one could possibly have imagined Trump...

[Kentonio]

17. Moral naivety given the very different age they lived in.

These days the rules have to be nailed down detail by detail or else people will find immoral loopholes or abuses of power. Things like the presidential pardon desperately need to be curtailed.