Many of the founding fathers feared such things. That's why they attempted to design a government that avoided centralized power. Granted, there were many of the founders that liked the idea of centralized power, it was sometimes a bitter dispute.
In the end, many of their intentions have been ignored or corrupted, even demonized, and many of their decisions have been reversed over the years. It's a matter of debate over whether these changes from the original vision made things better or worse.
One problem is that they had a number of interlocking visions for a civil society, many of which have also not been realized. So then it's less clear what they would do in response.
For example, Jefferson's set of ideals was roughly:
- Decentralized government, so people can rule themselves at a local level.
- Universal literacy and civic knowledge, through free public education, so a civil society would exist and have the knowledge to govern itself wisely.
- Relatively good economic equality, as it was envisioned as primarily a nation of independent individuals who own their own tools and/or land, trading with each other of their own free will: yeoman farmers, tradesmen, shopkeepers, etc. (excluding slaves, it must be said...).
It's not clear what his alternative proposal would be if those conditions didn't all hold. For example on #3, Jefferson viewed the social tensions produced by industrialization in Britain with alarm, but thought the U.S., with its large amount of free land and different culture, could avoid them just by just avoiding centralizing, factory-based industrialization. Instead he hoped machines would be introduced in a more decentralized manner, with farmers and tradesmen owning a few machines here and there, as was the case with the printing presses. That would avoid the problem of poor masses of urban workers and be consistent with the ideal of decentralized free men governing themselves. But of course, he was wrong on that, and the U.S. got mass industrialization anyway, just a bit later than Britain.
"Avoiding centralized power" is a bit too simplistic. The Constitution was the result of people realizing the Articles of Confederation had too little central power in many ways.
I'd say that "checks and balances" were more important to them than the inability for the government to do things in the first place. Unfortunately, the forces described in the OP have compromised many congressional districts to the point where they have to be unthinking, uncompromising ideologues in order to stay in office.
The Constitution was the result of people realizing the Articles of Confederation had too little central power in many ways.
Yeah, because the Articles had the central government at about a 0.4 out of 10 (on the North Korea == 10 scale) and they begrudgingly turned the dial up to about a 1 with the Constitution. They were shooting for the least amount of central government possible that could still maintain a defense from outside aggressors and settle inter-state disputes.
Through inevitable power expansion, it's now at about a 6.
While I agree with the article that the disappearance of the party boss system is a factor, I view the current gridlock as being a voter battle between those who would really like government to be at a 4 vs those who would just love to live in a country that had a government at 8.
So your contention is that compared to 1789, we've moved more than halfway (1->6->10) to where North Korea is?
And that ~45% of the country wants to be more like North Korea?
At 8/10, does that still leave room for private toilet paper manufacture, or are we drawing the line at private lemonade stands? Where do the slave labor camps come in, is that at 7.5 or closer to 9?
Naturally, my 1-10 scale is loose and collapses a number of dimensions into 1... but yeah, I'd say that the government and particularly the federal government is in our everyday lives in bizarre and unnecessary ways. At very least, you could look at government spending over just the last 100 years to see that it's at least 4 times bigger. Add in an extra factor for regulatory burdens and yeah, 6 is about right. The Federal government is a catastrophe and the real shame is that it didn't start out that way.
And that ~45% of the country wants to be more like North Korea?
Unwittingly, yes. They think of it in terms of safety nets, equality of outcomes, security, enforced politeness or political correctness, and government coerced egalitarianism... but to have those things they require strengthened centralized control of the population.
Where do the slave labor camps come in, is that at 7.5 or closer to 9?
You joke, but the recent jackbooted thuggery of the Federal government to shut down parks that have never been a part of any government shutdown (and even some that are privately funded) shows that the Feds are bullies who are high on their power. It demonstrated how vindictive and untouchable they can be when the media helps them. It demonstrated more than ever why we shouldn't allow them to control healthcare more than they already do.
"They think of it in terms of safety nets, equality of outcomes, security, enforced politeness or political correctness, and government coerced egalitarianism..."
Nobody thinks of anything in those terms aside from dreadlocked college communists. Stop listening to talk radio -- we're right here, all around you in this country, you can ask any Obama voter (outnumbering Romney voters) what they think instead of taking Glenn Beck's word for it.
Funny, I listen to NPR and hear those subjects mentioned in those contexts all the time. If the average Obama voter doesn't believe in those things then they voted for the wrong candidate.
In the end, many of their intentions have been ignored or corrupted, even demonized, and many of their decisions have been reversed over the years. It's a matter of debate over whether these changes from the original vision made things better or worse.