Politics The Donkey in the room...the Democrats today

Nothing.

If they're cooked properly.

 

Hey. I check at least three of those boxes, so watch it buddy. My mom always said I was special.

 

The more I watch this nonsense on the national level with the intransigence associated with the current packages being debated, along with the positions of Manchin and Sinema - the more I'm pissed off at the entire Democratic Party.

This stalemate should have been largely predictable from the outset. It's no secret that Joe Manchin is bought and paid for by coal and natural gas. We know from relatively recent example involving Joe Lieberman that a single hold out can kill legislation. My understanding is that Sinema ran significantly to the left of her recently paid for positions, but I don't understand how the party wasn't better prepared for this.

Did Manchin and/or Sinema change their positions when it came time to deal, or is the entire thing a bunch of sensationalized bullshit that no one ever I tended to seriously pass?

edit: fixed a small grammar thing. Thank God for the edit power back

 

I get the impression Sinema & Manchin surprised everyone, that they possibly weren't initially aware of the extortion power they had.

There might have been some Democrats with concerns. If yes, did they express those concerns, and to whom?

 

It took all day, but the House just passed the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (with some Republican support) and Biden will sign it into law tomorrow.

The House will wait for the Congressional Budget Office to "score" the $1.9 trillion Build Back Better Act (social programs, health care, climate change) before a vote. That will likely take it to the middle of next week.

 

dc_dux:. What's the deal with how this rolled out? How did the Dems not get the holdouts in line, more or less, prior to this circus? Is the idea to present a vision of what they'd like to do to keep progressives engaged, knowing they'd have to fall back to numbers that would satisfy Manchin? It looks like they spent a long time to end to back where we started...[/B]

 

The challenge for the Democrats in the House is having two voting blocks - progressives and centrists - each with about 100 members in their own respective caucuses.

* Centrist Democrats: Home | New Democrat Coalition

* Progressive Democrats: Congressional Progressive Caucus

They often agree and passed numerous bills earlier this year without any infighting, but these two big ticket ($1+ trillion) programs pit these two caucuses against each other.

The centrist, many of whom are more fiscally conservative,. have issues with the cost of the $1.8 trillion Build Back Better bill (that started at $3.5 trillion) and the progressives refused to vote on the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure bill, even thought they support it, unless the centrists agreed to vote on the BBB bill at the same time.

The loss in Virginia this week was a wake-up call to get these bills done and they spent all day bickering until finally the progressives finally agreed to vote on the Infrastructure bill w/o a vote on the BBB bill, since the Infrastructure bill had already passed the Senate back in August and can go right to Biden.

What remains is a vote on the BBB bill after the Congressional Budget Office does its analysis on the net cost. That is likely to happen next week and it is no done deal that all the centrists will vote for it but Biden will put immense pressure on the holdouts.

Then, the BBB bill must go to the Senate and face the obstruction of Senator Manchin, which means the $1.8 trillion bill will likely be cut again to get Manchin's support. And, if that happens, it will have to go back to the House for another vote.

This is the nature of the two competing caucuses on the House side and the cumbersome and often frustrating political process in the Senate when the party does not have a "working" majority if they lose one (Manchin's ) vote.

 

Redundant and obvious:

The Democrats, all of them, need to do positive and noticeable things for the majority of people if they want to do well in the 2022 mid- term and 2024 elections.

If the Democrats manage to win a comfortable majority in Congress and the Senate (very unlikely before, extremely unlikely now), I hope the leadership gives the Extortionists some serious payback. NOTE: This is a personal knee jerk reaction. I'm aware that politics is a complicated business, and holding grudges can bite you.

 

I do think that they should have passed it in October, but I don't think it would have mattered in regards to the election.

I don't blame the progressives, since with the crazy obstructionist at all cost GOP, this is their only chance at getting anything passed. I'm not sure if they are going to be effective, but at least they are trying. And Biden wants to get the same things passed too, but we will see what survives the Senate and parliamentarian. And it was Pelosi that put back in the family leave stuff. But once it passes the house it is going to be hard to vote it down.

It will be interesting to see what happens and how nasty it will get if it doesn't pass. Would progressives be able to team up with the GOP to do something to harm certain senators?

Biden does have until Nov 18th I think (maybe 17th?) to sign the infrastructure bill (10 days not including Sundays and Veterans Day). Is Biden crazy enough to hold the bill hostage until the BBB one gets passed?

 

I don't have a problem with the progressives position - but I don't understand the strategy (or apparent lack thereof) employed in this latest set of deals. My understanding is that Sinema's obstruction was somewhat unanticipated prior the last year or so - but Joe Manchin has been a clear near-Republican for a long time. Was the idea that if they started the conversation at a Bernie Sanders $6T price tag, that anywhere between $2-4T would seem like a bargain to assuage Manchin and his corporate backers?

It just seems to me that his unwillingness to deal with anything higher than $1.5T or so was well known - so that including the Joe Manchin Clean Coal Institute of Technology NETL extension or something should have been put in to get his support.

I'd like to think he could be primaried out over this bullshit, but looking at his maps in WV he's likely representing his constituents fairly accurately.

Where's the proverbial horse's head when you need it?

 

I think they needed to focus more on what was in the bill that would be beneficial to the people, most of which has high approval ratings. But I do think the administration thought that every Democrat would fall in line once they got a few kickbacks. You would expect the President who spent decades in the Senate to be an expert on how to get things negotiated by now too.

Some of it is that progressives started promoting their wish list items, which doesn't go over so well in WV. The policies might be fine, but the people of WV don't like the politicians that are going to claim the win.

I don't know what is going on with Sinema. Does she want to protect some corporate donor, or is she trying to get a cushy job lined up after her term is up? Is she making a name for herself to get more popular nationwide?

Fun fact, it turns out I probably went to some political events with her almost 20 years ago in Arizona. My college friend who got me into politics posted a few days ago that they were in the same law school classes as her and started off in politics around the same time.

 

After House Republican Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy spent 8-1/2 hours in a non-stop rant on the floor of the House last night/early this morning in order to stall a vote...
(See: Kevin McCarthy breaks record for longest House speech, talking for more than 8 hours to obstruct Biden's social-spending bill)
... the House passed Biden's 'Build Back Better Act' by a vote of 220-213 this morning.

Not one Republican supports...

* extending child care tax credits
* free universal pre-k for all three and four year olds
* lowering the cost of childcare services for working families
* paid family/medical leave for workers
* lowering the cost of prescription drugs
* extending ACA premium tax credits
* strengthening Medicaid and adding coverage to Medicare
* expanding funding for rural development
* expanding clean energy tax credits
* invest in clean energy R&D
* more​

Full details on the provisions of the 'Build Back Better Act here:
Transformative Investments in America’s Families & Economy

Now, it is on to the Senate where Senate Democrat Joe Manchin holds the fate of the bill in his hands. Without his support, Senate Democrats will not have the votes to pass the bill through the "budget reconciliation" process.

 

Gawd forbid should the Republican politicians support anything credited to the Democrats, no matter how beneficial it is to their constituents.

 

Don Young and Lisa Murkowski were two of the 11 Republicans to vote for the infrastructure bill.
When they started getting attacked for it, Don Young told them to fuck off in so many words, pointing out that the bill brought millions of dollars to Alaska and that was his job.
I really dislike Don and Lisa is not my favorite person in the world but they do understand that they represent the state.

 

Some of my political friends were just talking about this yesterday. While Pelosi is doing an effective job at passing bills (some that get slowed down in the senate), this article does a good job at explaining the issues that the Democratic Party brand is going to face in the midterms and if Pelosi could do a better job at promoting new, less controversial leaders to take over her role before Nov 2022? Now there is still the big Progressive/Centrist divide in the party, but this article kind of shut down any further media stories and reporting on "the search" and who people think it should be. Even outlandish suggestions like Obama or Hillary would get people talking.

I didn't have a problem that she won the speakership in the past, and she has been effective, but she does need to do more to unify the Democrats and teach younger members how to be effective as speaker.

Pelosi will stay around to lead House Democrats through the next election -- and perhaps beyond - CNNPolitics

Yet, on the other side, we get news that the last President might become speaker and the news stories and media commentary that comes from that kind of political talk. And what the media isn't talking about is if it happens, the Secret Service's job just became much harder. Because all it would take is for one crazy fan of his to take out the Pres and VP to make him President again in January 2023.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession

 

The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis released a year-end report today....

PART I: THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR A SERIES OF CRITICAL FAILURES THAT UNDERMINED THE NATION’S ABILITY TO RESPOND EFFECTIVELY TO THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

A. The Trump Administration’s Persistent Political Interference in the Pandemic Response Contributed to One of the Worst Failures of Leadership in American History

• Blocked CDC Briefings and Media Appearances
• Sought to Sidestep CDC in Finalizing Guidance
• Purposefully Weakened CDC’s Testing Guidance
• Instructed CDC Career Scientists to Destroy Evidence of Political Interference
• Pressured the Food and Drug Administration to Authorize Ineffective Coronavirus Treatments
• Championed a Dangerous Herd Immunity Strategy
• Neglected the Pandemic Response to Focus on the 2020 Election and the Big Lie

B. The Trump Administration’s Failure to Execute an Early Response Strategy and Address Critical Supply Shortages Exacerbated the Public Health Emergency and Put Countless American Lives at Risk...(much more)

Full Report: https://coronavirus.house.gov/sites...ouse.gov/files/SSCCInterimReportDec2021V1.pdf

The report may be criticized as partisan but still damning at so many levels and there is little doubt that the federal response (or lack of) in the first year likely contributed to several hundred thousand preventable deaths.

-- added (one news report) --

Trump White House made 'deliberate efforts' to undermine Covid response, report says

We should probably expect a statement from Trump soon....."FAKE NEWS"

 

And how is that helpful? Wait until the pandemic is under control. If there was just the alpha variant, which is gone now, sure. But the Biden administration is making plenty of mistakes too and not moving fast enough.

• Failed to get OSHA to require PAPR or P100 respirators for all medical personnel, dentists, nursing home staff, and anyone working with seniors or unvaccinated people indoors.
  
• Didn't pressured the Food and Drug Administration to Authorize effective Coronavirus Treatments fast enough. Where are the pills and treatment plans? Drive thru or by mail.
  
• Haven't done anything to stop the Dangerous Herd Immunity Strategy
• The media strategy has failed to convince enough people to get the vaccines
  
• Missed the July deadline for vaccines for kids, didn't push outdoor activities and outdoor classrooms to reduce the time they need to wear a mask.
• Haven't gone on conservative or alternative media or provided enough data to convince the 16-50 year olds to get vaccinated.
• Aren't doing enough to promote healthy living, exercising outdoors, investigating vitamin D levels, or anything else that might help people if they do get infected.