Stuff You Should Know - What's the deal with Executive Orders?

Episode Date: June 28, 2012

Depending on who's in office, they're either a presidential tradition or the acts of a despot. Executive orders are not spelled out in the Constitution, yet every president has issued them. Learn about these controversial edicts with Josh and Chuck. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Flooring contractors agree. When looking for the best to care for hardwood floors, use Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner. The residue-free, fast drying solution is specially designed for hardwood floors, delivering the safe and effective clean you trust. Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner is available at most retailers where floor cleaning products are sold and on Amazon. Also available for your other hard surface floors like Stone, Tile, Laminate, Vinyl, and LVT. For cleaning tips and exclusive offers, visit Bona.com slash Bona Clean. The War on Drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call,

like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid work. Be sure to listen to The War on Drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready, are you? Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, Charles W. Chuck Bryant, warming up, getting ready to carry this jam out to its conclusion. I was literally stretching. I know, as if, you know, I was telling everyone else, not you. Oh, okay. Yeah,

people out there in podcast land. Yeah, who I was just speaking to. Yeah. How is everybody? Great. Oh, man. I need to get used to this. It's been a while. It has been, but it feels good to be back in the saddle. Yeah. My saddle still smells like me. Gross. Yeah, it's pretty gross. Like leather and cheese. Yeah, but I found it has staying power. Nice. Is he doing good? Yes. In the last like six months, nothing big changed. Two weeks. It's been longer than that, hasn't it? A little vacation. Yeah. We don't need to talk about that now. It was great. It's fun. California all the way. Way to go, California. Yeah. California. Isn't that a Bord de Deaths band's song?

I don't know. Jason Schwarzman. Oh yeah, sure. Yeah. Was it Coconut Records? Yeah. He's had a couple of bands. I didn't recognize it when he called it Bord de Deaths. Well, that's his new name. Sure. That's Bord de Death with the haircut. All right, we should get going here. Chuck, yes. Did you know that President Barack Obama is planning to take over virtually the entire U.S. economy and infrastructure? No, I did not know that. Yeah. Well, were you Jim Powell, Cato Senior Fellow and author of the book FDRs Folly Wilson's War, Bully Boy, The Triumph of Liberty? Well, those are other books. Sure. Those are books, not just the book. Yeah.

Yeah. You would have known this already because Jim Powell sent out the alert via the Cato Institute and Forbes magazine, I think, that Barack Obama had created this plan, a 10-page blueprint of for season control of the economy of things like water, usable water, civil transportation, all forms of energy, all commodities and products, health resources like drugs, biological products, et cetera. Under the auspices, there's an extra is in there, of executive order 13603. Is that the we can't wait thing? It's part of it. Okay. And now that you bring it up, the we can't wait thing is basically this idea that Obama is saying, I can't deal with you, Congress, any longer. So I'm just going to start issuing proclamations like that.

Sure. So I get the impression from Jim Powell that he is against executive orders in general. I can't say that that's necessarily the case because he could be a conservative pundit. And if he is, he may just be against Obama's executive order. One of the keys to executive orders is that you're cool with them if you're guys in the White House. But the moment another guy's in the White House and starts issuing them, oh, like the sky's falling and like Nazism is rising again and it's just bad, you know, but it is true. Obama did issue this very sweeping proclamation. Now this isn't just on a Tuesday. It's supposedly a preparedness plan. It's called the National Defense Resources Preparedness Executive Order. So there's an

emergency that has to trigger this and it doesn't even necessarily won't be triggered. But the point is Obama can issue a proclamation like that. And as it stands right now, it is law because it's an executive order and we're about to talk about those. So this whole mystery, this whole mystery intro is going to be explained in the next, what, 20, 30 minutes. Stroke of the pen, law of the land. Kind of cool. Paul Begala said that. He was a Clinton advisor. He was. And that pretty much sums up what the, in a broad stroke, what an executive order is. It's a directive. Miriam Webster defines it. It's not true. Whoever wrote this article defines it as a directive. Dave Roos. Dave Roos. Good one from Dave Roos. Yeah,

it takes good. It's fresh too, man. Oh, is it? It's pretty new. Oh, he's citing stuff from like March. It is fresh. Wow. Yeah. Directive handed down directly from a president or governor, because it's going to happen on the state level without input from the legislative or judicial branches. And that's basically it. It's like, I'm the president and for whatever reason, I want to sign something into law and not ask anybody else. Right. And usually the reason why is because either there's an emergency and Congress is say out of not in session. Yeah. Yeah. Or Congress would not necessarily agree with it. Yeah. Or or just is taking inaction period. Sure. Right. But that's where we get to the ticklish part about executive orders is

there is a very clear flow of responsibility in the in the federal government. Congress is elected to make the laws and the executive branch is there to carry out the laws. That's right. With an executive order, the executive branch is making the law. Yeah. And presidents do this even though the Constitution doesn't say you can make it even more ticklish. Well, yeah, but they sort of hide behind the Constitution under the following statements from article two. Executive power shall be vested in a president of the United States. Okay. So they're saying like, Hey, dude, can't see the Constitution. I got power. He's got power. I don't have power. He or she, depending on when you're listening to this podcast. This could be the future. The president

shall be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States. He or she could say, Well, how am I supposed to do anything as commander in chief of the Army and Navy, but can't even sign a law? Right. Well, plus also you use that because they use executive orders to direct the movements of the military sometimes. Yeah. Well, times of war. It's when it's heavily used. Okay. And then finally, he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Obviously, that should be he or she. Well, it is under our ideas of, yeah, but we didn't write the Constitution. No, we wrote a Constitution. Somebody needs to get in and just do in those little arrows. So that's pretty much the long and short of it. And that's why it's allowed to go on since George

Washington since numero uno every single president. That's the thing with executive orders. You don't like executive orders. Just wait because eventually a president that you like is going to start issuing them every single president that we've ever had has issued executive orders. I think George Washington's, um, I think he issued eight total to start it out slow. Now we're up like presidents issued the thousands FDR who had the, you know, the three term presidency. He issued like 3,000, something like 3,200, 3,600, 3,522, 3,522. That's a lot. But every single president has issued them. Yeah. I guess in Washington's case, if we want to go over a little history here, in April 1793, almost in 1973, that would have been a pretty hip George Washington.

That would have been Nixon. Yeah. Which was a very hip George Washington. Well, everybody referred to Nixon as like the direct heir of George Washington. He was probably, he's, they too were tied for first as our greatest president. Nixon says that at least. Yeah. Um, he, uh, yeah, he instructed officers, federal officers to, uh, prosecute anyone getting in the way of the war with France. He's like, you can't do that. If you're getting in the way, uh, Congress is out of session. Let me just go ahead and make this a law. That, well, that was the war between England and France. He was saying, do not get involved. I would say US and France. Well, just the war with France. Yeah. But yeah, it was between England and France and like, you know, hey, America's not

getting involved. And if you do go to jail. It's on your head. Yeah, exactly. Uh, and then Lincoln followed, um, Congress is out of session again. So it sounds like it began early on in a more like legitimate form. Yeah. It was also a time where like Congress got to the job by behind a horse. Right. So things took time. Congress isn't here yet. Right. Exactly. Yeah. Congress is on the way. But there's a big problem. So, you know, right. And in Lincoln's case, one of his problems was, uh, on the eve of the civil war, um, these militias were getting out of control. One of them, uh, was run by a guy named John Merriman. And he said, you know what, lock that guy up. Well, he's dangerous. Right. He, they were state militias. Well, militias that were supposedly

like, well, we're from the Carolina. So we're the Carolina militia. But really, they were militias. Sure. Um, generally Confederate militias were attacking federal troops and Merriman was like probably the biggest rebel leader at the time. Yeah. So he locked him up and Merriman's lawyers were like, Hey, dude, have you ever heard of habeas corpus? And Lincoln goes, you know what, that's sticky. How can I get around that? Oh yeah. I'm suspending John Merriman's right to habeas corpus. And I'm Abraham Lincoln. If you haven't noticed, yeah, check out the beard. I'm a vampire hunter. I'm Daniel Day Lewis. I can't wait to see that movie. Yeah, me too. Um, it was funny, the preview came on the other night and Emily thought it was the, uh, Daniel Day Lewis Spielberg

project. And then it started breaking out into vampire stuff. She's like, what is going on? It took a really strange turn. Um, which is the idea, I think. Yeah. So he suspended habeas corpus, um, explained it to Congress and they said, you know what, that's probably a pretty good idea in certain cases. So let's pass a habeas corpus act to allow you to do this. Yeah, which is a big deal. And didn't it, it took years and years before anybody ever went back and repealed it, right? I don't know. It seemed like it was a while. We talked about it before in our habeas corpus podcast. Yeah. I can't remember which one it was. Maybe pardons, presidential pardons. And that actually, so that was not the first executive order, but that is executive order one.

Oh, really? Yeah. In the 1900s, the state department started numbering them retroactively and they went back to Lincoln's habeas corpus and that was Washington. I don't know if they knew it was the first one. I don't know. But then I think in then the 60s, 1962, they, these things started being published in the federal register, the daily publication of new laws and office goings on around Washington. And now it's like once it's published in the federal register, it's law. Gotcha. And they're numbered. Teddy Roosevelt, he was big on them. He was the first one that really kind of went haywire. He was the first one to crack a thousand. That's right. Those Roosevelt's loved big government. They did. They weren't related though.

Yeah, they were. Were they? They were like eighth cousins. Oh, I don't think I knew that. Yeah. Wow. Look at you teaching me. Presidential history. It's like my forte. Is it? Okay, because it's certainly not mine. So yeah, Teddy Roosevelt was pretty, he wielded a heavy stick and then FDR just went berserker in World War I and II. Yeah. Teddy spoke softly but carried a big stick. Yeah, that's the term. Or was the FDR that said that? I didn't mean wielded a big, heavy stick was the term. I was just saying, I was making a play on that. No, I know. Okay. But I can't remember if it was Teddy or FDR that said that. I think it was Teddy. Okay. Yeah. Walk tall and carry a big stick. Speak softly. Speak softly. You're thinking of Joe Don Baker.

Yeah, and they can do that without any drugs on the table. They can do that. Any drugs. Of course, yes, they can do that. And I'm the prime example. Okay. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil answer for it. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast.

Where were you in 92? Were you bouncing your butt to Sir Mix-A-Lot? Wondering if you, like Billy Ray Cyrus, could pull off a mullet? Yes. 1992 was a crazier for music and a crazy time to be alive. And now iHeart has a podcast all about it. I'm Jason Launfier. And on my new show, Where Were You in 92, we take a ride through the major hits, One Hit Wonders, and irresistible scandals that shape what might be the wildest, most controversial 12 months in music and pop culture history. They were angry at me. They thought I was uncontrollable and wild. I wanted to burst open. The president came after me. Everybody's I'm Warner with madness. Imagine trying to put a record like that out right now. We'd be canceled before it made it to

the post office. Featuring interviews and special guests like Sir Mix-A-Lot, Ice-T, Tori Amos, and Vanessa Williams, this podcast poses the question, what was it about 1992 that made it so groundbreaking and so absolutely fabulous? So buckle up and tune into Where Were You in 92. New episodes drop every Wednesday. Listen and follow on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. All right, moving on. Yeah, where are we now? We are in World War I and World War II. When Congress said, you know what, it's okay, FDR, because there's a lot going on. Well, not just that. Between World, from World War I, the depression,

and World War II, it was like, it was boogie fever on executive orders. Yeah, he, I had no idea. On his first day in office, he closed the banks for four days. Yeah, which is actually pretty cool considering that he platformed on this new deal. Sure. And the first thing he did was issue an executive order starting the new deal. It's like hitting the ground running. Yeah. For three terms. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. That's off to him. Agreed. So that was the first of 3600, 3552, you said? Yeah. And the reason why FDR was able to issue so many are, well, there's several reasons. He was popular. He had a lot of crises to deal with. Sure. And, well, that's pretty much it. Yeah. So he was definitely a believer in centralized power. But again, that kind of flies in the face of

the division of power in federal government as sketched out by the Constitution, right? Yes. Yes. So not all executive orders are happy, happily received or even grudgingly received. Some are just outright rejected. Well, and some presidents weren't as popular, which might have had a little something to do with that. Exactly. So you've got Roosevelt setting this president 3552 executive orders. They stand, he was doing things like seizing control of mines, of industries. He set up like cartels for everything from like garment industries to the theater industry. He created the works projects administration, which is like, we have 2500 murals around the country and a bunch of orchestras and a lot of parks and everything

because he put people to work in the depression through government spending. Right. Interesting. Like straight up Keynesian economics. Yeah, yeah. But he did all of this through executive orders. I wonder if the National Park stuff was executive orders from my Teddy. I wonder too. I bet that went through Congress. Maybe. I don't think Teddy liked talking to Congress. He just like that big stick. But the point is Roosevelt, the second FDR, yes, set this huge precedent that made it look like, okay, well, presidents have a lot more power. Apparently America's cool with this. So Harry Truman comes along and finds out the hard way that that's not necessarily the case. Yeah. He sort of pulled a similar move to FDR

as far as wanting to take control of the steel industry during the Korean War. They regulated the price of steel and fixed it at, I guess, a cheap rate to help out, you know, Uncle Sam and McDonnell Douglas and McDonnell Douglas. And then that was great, except for the workers. All of a sudden, weren't getting paid like they normally do. No, because we're going to go and strike. Exactly. And Truman was like, Hey, we're in the middle of a war. And they said, we don't care. And he goes, Oh, yeah, well, let me send in some ringers to see what happens. That's right. And they said, You know what? Talk to these guys, the federal mediation and conciliation service. Maybe you can strike up a bargain and they went screw you guys.

All right. And they said, All right, we'll talk to these guys, the federal wage stabilization board. And they went screw you guys. Yeah. And he went, Well, if you're going to go and strike, why don't I just seize control of your factories on the night before? Yeah. Here's the thing, though. There is a provision in, I guess, federal law called the Taft-Hartley Act. Yeah. That says if there's a big strike that's going to affect like national security, there's like the nation has interest in a strike not happening. The president and or Congress can call, I think maybe just the president can call upon the Taft-Hartley Act that and invoke the 60 day cooling off period where it's like, no, you have to go to work. You have to, you guys have to go back

to the table for 60 days, right? And figure this out and or give us 60 days to figure, get our ducks in a row. He didn't do that. He just sees control and that being combined with the fact that he wasn't very popular led to this executive order of his being overturned by the Supreme Court. Yeah, led to the steel mills basically sued. In the famous case, Youngstown Sheet and Tube, the Sawyer. The Youngstown ruling. And Supreme Court said, Yeah, you know what? You should have done this 60 day cooling off period. That's why it's there. Dummy. Right. I don't think I'm dummy. He didn't. But Hugo Black who is the Chief Justice at the time was apparently worried that he defended Truman. So we invited him over for dinner. Interesting.

And Truman said, quote, Hugo, I don't care for that law of yours. But by golly, this bourbon is good. Did he really say that? Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. By golly. I wonder what they were drinking. Bourbon. Yeah, but I wonder which bourbon. I wonder that myself. Yeah. What do you guess? I don't know. Okay. I don't know what they drank back then. Bourbon wise. So Youngstown was huge, though, because it established some standards as far as the powers of authority that the president and they kind of broke it down into three, right? Yeah, they didn't just say no. They said, Here's some guidelines for you and future presidents. As far as the Supreme Court is concerned. Right. You have the most authority, Mr. President,

or Mrs. President, when you have the express or implied consent of Congress. And you know, I think also I feel like if this thing sticks around, if this digital recording can stick around long enough, maybe we should include gender, gender neutral president as well. Okay. Okay. Okay. Go ahead. Number two, Mr. Mrs. or gender neutral president. Start over with number one. Okay. Just to make sure that there's an inclusion. Number one, Mr. President or Mrs. President or gender neutral president. Yeah. Yeah. You have the most authority when Congress has expressed or implied consent. They've given that to you. Right. They're saying lead away. We're following you.

Number two, you have a little less authority. We'll call it uncertain authority when Congress has not imposed the authority because they're indifferent or they're just not doing anything. Yeah. And they call it a zone of twilight that the president takes advantage of. Yeah. It's like Congress is waffling. The president knows what he, she or whatever gender neutral assignment that the president's picked wants. And I think isn't this probably when they sneak him in at the end? It depends. I think it's also more just like you guys had your chance to act. Right. I acted because you missed your opportunity. Right. So sit down and shut up. And Congress basically says, all right, fine. So is that the we can't wait thing with that

fall under that? You think? It depends. So I think that it's like the way that this justice put this that this is how this is the authority, the division, the levels of authority. Yeah. The president has supreme authority to issue an executive order, whether or not it stands up. Sure. Is based on the test of time. Because you can repeal it, right? It just takes a little time. Right. Well, there's some different ways to do it. The first we just saw or not the first, but one of them we just saw was a clear example of judicial review, right? That's what the Supreme Court does. They're like a supposedly an unbiased neutral group of referees where the federal or the legislative branch or the people say, Hey, can we get a judgment call on this law? This seems

wrong. Right. And then the Supreme Court says yay or nay. And then what they say basically is like the final ruling on a law. Yeah. Okay. Executive order, since they have the force of law or the effect of law, they're subject to the same scrutiny judicial review. Well, in Youngstown, the Supreme Court said Truman, you can't do that. So that's one way that an executive order can be overturned. Another way is Congress can say, you know what, we just really disagree with you and we're going to rewrite the legislation that you're talking about, but it has to be ratified by Congress, which means the president has the chance to veto it. Gotcha. So if you have a really angry Congress and a really angry president, really polarized, sure, they may go at it and the

president may be able to override this with the veto. That seems like that's all we have lately. Yeah. Yeah, it's very polarized. So like what Obama's doing now, it's like, we can't wait. He's trying to frame it like it's Congress's fault. And then if Congress is feeling froggy, they may, they may issue legislation that says it. Right. So there's this one where George Bush set up an executive order about fetal tissue stem cell banks. I don't remember exactly what it was. But the Congress, they basically said, quote, the provisions of executive order 12806 shall not have any legal effect. And that was it. Wow. But all that since there's no rules for this Chuck, right, there's no this, this is all interpretation. Bush had the balls is back in Bush's court. So

all it is is legislative tennis. Yeah, between the executive branch and the legislative branch. So ping pong. How far do you want to take it? Yeah, ping pong. And then also one more thing, the legislative branch, Congress can just say, well, that's fine. Use your executive order to create this new position. We have appropriation. So we're just not going to give any money to it. So we'll do that position right because you still got to get the funding if it requires funding. So those are the ways you get around executive orders or a future president can turn around and revoke it. Yeah, which happens all the time. Yeah, or pretty much every time the president takes office. Yeah. Thank you for that. Of course, the discourse by the way, you forgot the one

court above the Supreme Court. What? Star Chamber. What is that? You never saw that movie? No, what is that? That was Michael Douglas. It was a secret group of judges that would get together called the Star Chamber that would carry out vigilante justice. What movie was that? The Star Chamber. Oh, no, I had not heard that. I think it was the 80s. It sounds like 81, 82. I'd say 83, 84. Alright, so the final way is the least authority and the president acts on least authority when he has an executive order that is just incompatible with what Congress wants. Right. Which happens all the time as well. But again, ultimately, how powerful does Congress feel? Like say Congress really hates that, but the people are really in favor of it. Right. Will

Congress act? Who knows? I've lost a lot of faith in the political system, my friend. Yeah. I think they kind of act on what they want to do and not necessarily what the people want. Yeah. Behind the banner of this is what the people want. That's a pretty 21st century view of American politics, it feels like. Yeah. Too much money going on. We're going to do it when on campaign finance. I said it, we're going to do it. Okay. And that'll really tell you how kind of dirty it is these days. Okay. So let's talk about some controversies in modern day executive orders. Right. For instance, Ronald Reagan, if you were a fan of President Reagan, you don't think it's controversial that he really took hold of the economic situation and stripped a lot of the government regulation

that he thought was, uh, hampering growth. People that didn't like President Reagan probably didn't think that was such a good move. No, you know, and he did. It was pretty smart and broad. He purposefully slowed down, um, the federal agencies by making them go through all this like, um, cost benefit analysis, figuring out like how their decisions would, would impact people. Does this kind of hamstrung them? Yeah. Interesting. He was like, Oh, you, you have a pretty easy hunt. No, you don't. Now you have like 80 extra things that you have to do before you can make any rules. Yeah. Here's some forms. Exactly. And a number two pencil. Yeah. Interesting. It was kind of ingenious really to fight what he considered an entrenched bureaucracy by adding more bureaucracy.

Yeah. That's pretty funny. Yeah. Adding red tape. Uh, President George W. Bush, um, with a lot of controversy, um, said NSA, you can wiretap private American citizens, telephones in America without them knowing about it. And that wasn't even published. That was a secret one. Yeah. You know, super secret. Yeah. Only the star chamber saw that. That's right. And a lot of, uh, people that are fond of civil rights and, and rights of private citizens said, you know, this, that's not very nice. That's not a cool thing to do. Yeah. And then his supporters said, dude, the 9 11 hijackers and a lot of time in the U S on the phone. That's a tough one, man. Yeah. You want to be able to thwart those, uh, terrorist plots? Yeah, you do. That's a,

that's a quagmire. It is a quagmire. Um, and then, uh, what else? Obama's, uh, basically on day one famously said, I'm closing Guantanamo. Yeah. Uh, no more waterboarding or any of this enhanced interrogation stuff. Right. And then, uh, what was the third one? Let's create a task force for detention policies. Right. And then he signed another executive or two years later saying like, okay, Guantanamo can stay open indefinitely. That was probably not a good idea. Apparently they're sinking like a significant amount of money into the facilities. They're adding a soccer or as the, um, really? Yeah. Football field. Um, they are adding programs like life, life education programs, like balancing your checkbook or getting a hold of your finances or

getting your GED. They're turning it into, into what resembles a very much a state prison. It's, which basically says you're here for a while. Yeah. I guess that part's good. I don't know that I care that these people can play soccer though. Oh yeah. I'm sure there's a lot of people who are like, they don't need to play soccer. Yeah. Sure. I don't know though. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss y'all. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call

civil answer for it. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Where were you in 92? Were you bouncing your butt to surmix a lot? Wondering if you, like Billy Ray Cyrus, could pull off a mullet? Yes. 1992 was a crazier for music and a crazy time to be alive. And now iHeart has a podcast all about it. I'm Jason Launvie, and on my new show, Where Were You in 92, we take a ride through the major hits, One Hit Wonders, and irresistible scandals that shape what might be the wildest, most controversial 12 months in music and pop culture history. They were angry at me. They thought I was uncontrollable and wild.

I wanted to burst open. The president came after me. Everybody, I'm Warner with madness. Imagine trying to put a record like that out right now. We'd be canceled before it made it to the post office. Featuring interviews and special guests like surmix a lot, ice tea, Tori Amos, and Vanessa Williams, this podcast poses the question, what was it about 1992 that made it so groundbreaking and so absolutely fabulous? So buckle up and tune into Where Were You in 92. New episodes drop every Wednesday. Listen and follow on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Play a little soccer. So I would be such a bad president. What do you do? The waffler? Oh, dude, I just waffle over the place.

That's a bad idea. Well, maybe it's a good idea. Well, that's funny that you said that because one of the president's most known for waffling, especially in his first year, Bill Clinton, yeah, was also very famous for his executive orders. Apparently, it was like a president would issue executive orders. And it was like one of these things and everybody would grumble. But Clinton made an art out of it. He waged a war through executive order. Like you remember the Balkan War? Yeah, the U.S. entered it with no declaration of war from Congress. As a matter of fact, Congress had that before them and they voted no, we're not going to declare war. So Clinton just did it himself. He didn't officially declare war, but through an executive order,

he told the Air Force to go join NATO airstrikes in the Balkans. He committed ground troops through executive order to NATO. And he froze the assets of a bunch of Yugoslavian leaders in the U.S., which were like three acts of war that he carried out through executive order. No, I noticed that stuff, though. No, they did. It was huge at the time. We were just too young. No, I mean, people noticed, but it wasn't like when times are great economically, a lot of this stuff is way more apt to slide by, I think. Well, I think also we're looking at it like 10, 15 years on. Yeah, that's true. To where it's like total hindsight. Clinton's like an elder statesman now. He's not like the sleazy scumbag that he used to be, or that's his appearance,

at least. He looks all old now. He does. But he still does that two thing. I saw an interview with him that was recorded five days ago. He's still doing it. Yeah. And it's thinking, and then he gave like this brilliant answer. Yeah. But yeah, he was big on those things as well. And his advisor was the one who said stroke of the pen law of the land. Right. What were the last minute ones called? The midnight? Midnight regulations. Yeah. Okay. That was the one that we talked about, I think. I think so. Habeas Corpus. Boy, we've been around the block at this point. We've done some political stuff. So that's executive orders, huh? Yeah. Look for one coming to a piece of paper near you. Yeah. Especially if Romney wins. I mean, that's like a first day executive order is

a like traditionally now a political way of saying I am totally different from this guy. Right. And here, here and here are three examples. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and they'll they'll trumpet that in the in the campaigns. Yeah, they will. Here's what I'll do right away. Yeah. I declare Kraft cheese awesome. So that's it. If you want to learn more about executive orders, type executive in or orders to the handy search bar, howstuffworks.com. And that will bring up this pretty cool article. And I said search bar is time for listener mail. I'm sorry to do this, Chuck. I know I just said it's time for listener mail. It's actually time for plug fest real quick. It's going to be like the fastest plug fest ever. You ready? Okay. So we have a

horror fiction contest and we're hoping our listeners will write horror fiction that we can read on the Halloween episode. Yep. Go to the blogs at howstuffworks.com. Find the post stuff you should knows horror fiction contest colon, get your official rules right here, read that, and then act accordingly. Yeah, really follow the rules closely because we want you to if you've worked hard for this to be, you know, able to win. Yeah. And look for other mentions in like social media and stuff like that, like Facebook and Twitter. But yeah, go check it out and go write us something. It'll be cool. And then also Comic Con, right? Yep. We are going to San Diego's Comic Con this year for the first time ever. And we're pretty excited about it. Yeah. Look out

Shamu. Yes, right. And we are going as stuff you should know with slash science channel people. Yeah. Exciting. We're doing we're crossover hybrid people. That's right. Like the Toyota Prius. Exactly. We're the PRI of the podcasting world. Yes. So Thursday, July 12th, we will be podcasting live. We don't have the time just yet, but we will announce that on Facebook and Twitter. Yeah. And there will be special guests. There will be dancing. There will be singing. There will be gnashing of teeth and wailing and perhaps even vomiting live on stage. Yeah. By me. That's right. At the very beginning because I won't be able to see straight. I'll be so nervous. Yes. Cool. Okay. That was a quick plug test. We're getting good at this. We should do it every time. No.

No. Okay. Listener mail. Josh, I'm going to call this from from a pastor to us. Nice. Complimenting us. Oh, good. Not from the usual hate mail. Hey, guys and Jerry, I'm a united Methodist pastor and started listening to the podcast a few years ago to pass the time in the long ride between the church. I was ministering in Duke Divinity School where I was finishing up seminary learning about things like cannibalism and Delta Force really helped break up the constant stream of theology and philosophy I was studying, I bet. I really enjoyed the most recent one on whether or not it was possible to rain frogs. A lot of people that I talked to in religious settings that don't shy away from hearing scientific explanations about biblical material. There are plenty of us

out there who love science and aren't afraid of it debunking scripture. It actually excites me to hear those sorts of explanations. You've probably been referred to a time or two in the classes I teach in my current ministry setting. Nice. So you talked about this in class. Nice. A couple of heathens like us. Mainly I'm writing to thank you for a few things. First, thanks for handling matters of faith with tact. Whether you're talking about voodoo or karma, you always handle the subject matter in a gracious way. See, I like this guy's views. I like him a lot. I would argue that we're not always gracious, but I appreciate the compliment. Second, I remember back in the brainwashing episode Chuck said something along the lines of, I'm going to try really hard not to comment about my Baptist

upbringing. Pastures and religious people in general can be pushy, Chuck. Your passing comment has been a constant reminder to me to not be that guy. And third, you guys are the ones who introduced me to Kiva and I now make regular loans and have even gotten some members of the congregation on board. Awesome. It's been great to be a part of it. Keep up good work, Jeff and Jeff. Dude, Pastor Jeff. Pastor Jeff. I would go to your church. Yeah. Thank you for the email. That was awesome. Please keep in touch. We want to know how your religious career goes. Yeah. Yeah. And, and if you think Chuck and I are awesome and gracious and we take criticism well and we get things generally right. Say puppies. Yeah. And we do it all without messing up our hair. Yeah. What do you want to

hear from you? Right, Chuck? Yes. We want you to tweet to us immediately. Go compose a tweet and send it to S Y S K podcast. You can join us on Facebook at facebook.com slash stuff you should know. Or you can send us an email to stuff podcast at discovery dot kids on. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit how stuff works dot com. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you the war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff stuff that'll piss you off the cops. Are they just like looting? They just like pillaging. They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or

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