If you were president,how would the exercise of your unilateral powers relate to your ability to demonstrate power?Under what conditions might you choose to exercise your unilateral powers to achieve your policy goals? Provide specific examples

What will be an ideal response?

The ideal answer should:
a. Discuss how presidents have been using their unilateral powers with rising frequency but how the exercise of those powers does not demonstrate that presidents are gaining more power or getting more of what they want.
b.Explain how the demonstration of power really hinges on a comparison of the world after the president's action and the one that would have been if the president had not acted at all.
c.Identify how presidents can use unilateral powers when Congress is set to enact sweeping policy changes that the president opposes by preempting the legislative process with more moderate policy shifts. Examples could include Nixon's weak Occupational Safety and Health Administration, Reagan's modest sanctions against South Africa, and George Bush's assignment of an independent commission to investigate intelligence failures on Iraq.
d. Demonstrate how conditions of gridlock provides the president with an opportunity to determine the contours and content of government policies, drawing on examples ofCongress's inaction in the areas of civil rights, intelligence gathering, and terrorism.