Some critics of Wayne Root cite his constant insistence on tax cuts rather than spending cuts as a critical flaw in his approach. While this chapter certainly refutes such claims, the idea of constitutional impoundment offers little succor to anyone who may have observed the behavior of the United States government in the last seventy years. 
Root's premise is that as President he'll just not spend the money that Congress has appropriated for various items he deems unconstitutional. Barring any realistic chance of Root actually getting elected POTUS, he seems to lack a fundamental understanding of process and politics. Anyone watching the recent Ken Burns or Micheal Moore documentaries will find an almost slavish devotion to the idea that democracy can equalize economic differences in society. Utilizing FDR all the way.
He makes his fantasy jump with this statement;
"A Libertarian Root administration will exercise a power that is much stronger than a line-item veto. That power provided for in the Constitution is known as impoundment. It is the power of a president to seize funds not authorized by (or in violation of) the Constitution, and return the money to taxpayers (p.162)"
While I would be one of the first LP naysayers to welcome Cokie Roberts eyes pop out of her head at the prospect of such action from an LP president, I doubt Root will ever get a chance to get kudos from George Will on Sunday morning.
Putting aside the obvious outrage and alarm that would follow such an action from 'the people' decrying the dictatorial like decree about expenditures from the democratically elected Congress, the reality is that the modern Presidency guides and presents the budget process more so than any single representative or coalition thereof. The person (or people) holding the Executive Branch know and wield this with deft political instinct. Usually their entire political existence rests on the promises they make directly to supplicants of the potential government teat.
This political reality alone is enough to adequately conclude that Root's own ambition for the Presidency is seriously flawed. Not only from the level of a potential LP candidate, but by any standard measurable, including his own allusions to Perot in recnt Reason TV interviews. While it's conceivable that any LP candidate could promise a litany of solutions
for reducing and curbing government growth. This one is based on a tenuous legalism that is completely unproven and decidedly impractical. And they accuse the radicals of the LP of such things . . .
Root goes on to list almost two pages of Federal Departments that would be eliminated under a Libertarian President. While it may very well be safe to advocate the elimination of the Appalachian Regional Commission and the ATF (it would have been funny if he included a joke about the latter being better suited as a convenience store), by no means do we see Root take a chance by suggesting the CIA or FBI be eliminated. He might have picked up a few votes at the convention in 2012 with that one. He's no Ron Paul, that's for sure. Anyone remember the look on Howard Fineman's face when RP said such a thing in the '08 campaign ?
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