Pelosi, McConnell

Power is derived from the governed, but the governed are not themselves powerful.  The people project their need for the powerful onto whom they choose (though they often do not admit they chose).  Then some, only some, of those chosen, show the capacity to reflect and shape that power back onto the people.  Those are the powerful, and their power takes many shapes.  Some are powerful without being obvious, like McConnell or Pelosi, others are old-school, dick-swinging mensch like LBJ or Robert Moses.  On the contemporary political stage, Merkel is the prime example of this old-school, untrammeled version of power - good, bad and indifferent.