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by sampo 18 days ago
(1) Replace US president with a Commission of Presidents. One from each state (well, EU only has 27 member states). Each Commissioner is appointed by state legislature, not elected. No more presidential elections. This is the EU Commission.

(2) Replace US senate with a meeting of secretaries, or heads of departments from each state. Only one relevant representative from each state. But the senate composition is not fixed. When the senate discusses e.g. agricultural policy, each state sends their secretary of agriculture, of head of their department of agriculture. No more senate elections. This is the EU Council of Ministers (a.k.a. Council of the European Union or just "The Council").

(3) The house is the EU Parliament.

Take the right of legislative initiative away from the congress, and give it to the Commission of Presidents. The Commission writes the bills, and the senate and the house can only approve or disapprove (with comments).

(4) Change the states to follow the European model: The governor is not elected, but appointed by the state legislature, and is called "prime minister". (Except France has a presidential model.)

(5) The president / Commission is like a CEO. To supervise the CEO, we need a board. The heads of states (governors) meet 4 times per year to discuss and set broad and long term goals. This is the European Council.

2 comments

Thank you! I think that's all correct except (1), unless I'm misunderstanding something you wrote. My understanding is that the European Council appoints a Commission President-elect. The President-elect and the Council of Ministers then prepare a proposed slate of the other Commissioners, on suggestion from the members states. Then the European Parliament can vote on the entire slate thumbs-up or thumbs-down: https://commission.europa.eu/about/organisation/how-commissi....

To analogize to the U.S., it would be like if the National Governor's Association selected a Head President. Then you had a Senate of Secretaries made up of the secretaries of various executive departments in the 50 states. Then the Head President and Senate of Secretaries put together a slate for the Commission of Presidents. And Congress would then approve the slate up or down.

It is a great analogy even for someone from Europe.

In (4), though, I do not get the French exception. There are many countries in Europe with a president and a prime minister

> There are many countries in Europe with a president and a prime minister

In most of those countries, the role of the president is mostly ceremonial and/or has to do with foreign policy outside of EU.

Out of my head: Poland, Checkia, Cyprus, Portugal, Romania -- all these have real presidents.

Germany and Italy are exceptions, not the rule

You are correct that Czechia, Cyprus and Romania (and France, and Lithuania) send their president to the European Council. But Poland and Portugal, and all other countries, send their prime minister.

22 countries: Prime minister

5 countries: President

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Council#Members

> But Poland and Portugal, and all other countries, send their prime minister

Yes, but what does it have to do with the original point about countries with real power presidents?