Many movements frame complex social and political issues in strictly binary, moralistic terms—good versus evil, oppressors versus oppressed. This binary view leaves no room for legitimate policy disagreements, as political opponents are viewed as morally corrupt rather than simply having a different perspective.

Instead of a strict separation, the branches share and overlap powers so they must interact and limit one another. For example, Congress passes laws, but the President can veto them, and Congress can override that veto with enough votes. The President nominates judges and officials, but the Senate must confirm them. The courts can declare laws unconstitutional.

In systems where political ideas and platforms must actively fight for support, leaders are forced to remain responsive to diverse societal preferences.

“Authoritarian systems can move faster because they suppress friction. Democracies often appear disorderly because they institutionalize it. But friction is not necessarily weakness. In engineering, friction prevents machines from spinning out of control. In politics, constitutional friction can prevent a powerful country from making an enormous mistake that nobody is permitted to identify.” - Jianli Yang, Make American Democracy Great Again

For the time being, I won’t try to answer “what is too much political power and why is it too much?”. Instead, I’ll look at some ways to measure the political power of billionaires in California and New York, states with extreme levels of wealth inequality.

I'm not interested in reducing complicated policy questions to a matter of rights. The devil's always in the details and that's just way too broad. What does a “right” actually look like in practice? 

Causal attributions matter, because policy matters. Attacking the wrong problem makes for bad policy.