The Excalibur President

   "I am your king. The Lady of the Lake presented me with the sword Excalibur."
  "King, eh? I didn't vote him. Just because some watery tart launched a scimitar in his general direction is no basis for a system of government." 
-- Monty Python and the Holy Grail

   Legislators answer to voters, not to the chief of state.

   The current president of the United States has been acting as if he holds a magical sword of government, granting him special powers others don't have.
   Threats may work in the private sector or within the Whine House, but there are three co-equal, separate and independent branches of government of the U.S. The Constitution was arranged so that members of Congress would answer to voters, not to a president. And federal judges, members of the judicial branch, have life tenure, so they answer to no one but their consciences as they understand legal issues.
   But that has not stopped the current president from attacking, criticizing and threatening members of the other two branches of government who dare to disagree with him.
   Today, however, that bullying strategy did not work, despite last minute efforts to threaten members of the House of Representatives to support his health care bill "or I'm coming after you."
   After several days of intense pressure on fellow Republicans, both moderate and conservatives who wanted special treatment, the proposed new health care bill was withdrawn. And rather than admit defeat, the president looked for ways to blame others, especially Democrats. "This was not our bill, but their bill," he said.
   No amount of threats to "come after" recalcitrant Republicans worked, because legislators have become increasingly aware of opposition from voters.

   A reporter I know heard a similar telephone threat from a corporate executive, who warned that he would "come after" the journalist if he didn't get the story right -- read: sympathetic to the executive. The reporter's response was to lean over so the threatener could hear the computer keyboard clacking and say, "How do you mean, you'll come after me ?"
   The exec withdrew the threat.
   In the real world of business and journalism, a person answers to the one who signs the paycheck. In politics and government, office holders answer to voters and taxpayers, because they are the ones who sign the paychecks.
   Threatening journalists especially does not work, because they can write down and report exactly what a politician says and exactly how he says it, without cleaning up the grammar to help him sound more credible and competent than he really is.
      That approach is more in use recently, as the current president assails as "fake news," items that contradict his proclamations. But politicians don't sign newsroom paychecks.
   And rather than acknowledge an error on his part -- intentional or accidental -- this president doubles down on his assertions, in the process making his rantings more obviously false.
   Now it seems the would-be imperial president's sword is stuck in a stone of his own making.