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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Excellent Links / Sunday Night Open Thread: Party Hearty, WV Style

Sunday Night Open Thread: Party Hearty, WV Style

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The Washington Post‘s Ben Tetris (remember Aaron Schock?) does his needle-ninja work:

Generally speaking, the first rule of visiting Joe Manchin III’s houseboat is don’t talk about Joe Manchin’s houseboat.

Last week, however, when Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) tested positive for the coronavirus after attending a weekend cruise on Almost Heaven — named after the opening line of John Denver’s elegy to West Virginia, “Take Me Home, Country Roads” — it’s all anyone in Washington wanted to discuss…

So far, nobody beyond Graham has reported a positive test. But the notion that Almost Heaven might become the Diamond Princess of the Potomac put a spotlight on what has become a crucial destination for members of Official Washington.

At the ideological center of a 50-50 Senate, Manchin, a Democrat, has found himself in the captain’s seat for much of what gets done, or doesn’t get done, in Washington. This means that the Room Where it Happens is often a large pleasure craft/domicile floating on the capital waterways. At least three Biden Cabinet secretaries have spent time on Almost Heaven, as have the White House chief of staff and dozens of senators…

This is the promise of Almost Heaven: Anyone who scores an invite can loosen up for a few hours in a Washington precinct with no candid cameras or nagging aides or nosy reporters, and maybe get to see their colleagues as real people. It’s a place for Hawaiian shirts and shorts (Manchin’s go-to boat attire) instead of suits and ties, where senators dine on pizza from Harris Teeter or pasta platters from Nostra Cocina. Moonshine is available for drinking, and if the gatherings go late you can be sure there will be dancing and singing — and not just patriotic hymns from the likes of Murkowski. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), an Almost Heaven regular, has regaled fellow passengers with “American Pie.” Manchin, who declined to be interviewed for this story, has been known to crank the music and sing along to “SOB,” by Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats, whose chorus begins: “Son of a b—-, give me a drink!”

Stay late enough and you might even catch Manchin cheerfully cleaning up after everyone. “He’s a neat-freak,” said a guest who has been on the boat many times. “You could eat off that floor.”…

Sounds like someone who used to post around here!

Reader Interactions

70Comments

  2. 2.

    Ivan X

    How do I score an invite? All tease, but we plebes are on the outside of the velvet rope. Maybe it’s one of the new Amex Platinum benefits.

  3. 3.

    Padraig

    Entirely unimportant but, having literally been aware of SoB for two days at most, this humanises Manchin.

    it’s a damn good song.

  4. 4.

    karen marie

    I’m understanding from this story that Manchin’s senate career is to give him cover to pretend he has friends.  Seems pretty fucking juvenile to me.

  5. 5.

    Revrick

    You could eat off the floor in our house, too… Cheezits, Cheerios, cashews, an occasional cherry or raisin.

  7. 7.

    ronno2018

    Ok, I have a wet suit, I have cordless waterproof drill. I know how to swim. (FBI please note this is joke!).

  8. 8.

    Another Scott

    @karen marie:  Washingtonian (from February):

    […]

    Here are a few facts about the apparent flagship of the centrist Navy:

    1. It’s not a yacht. Republicans tried to paint Manchin as yacht-owning “Washington Joe” during his 2018 reelection campaign. Mmmm, not quite: “The vessel is listed as ‘recreational’ on documents,” PolitiFact wrote in a fact-check. “However, a less confrontational—but similarly accurate—description could be ‘houseboat,’ since it is Manchin’s residence in Washington.”

    2. Its value is relatively modest for a DC residence. Manchin bought the boat at a fire-sale price of $220,000 but insured it for $700,000, PolitiFact reported. Assuming it’s still insured for around that amount, Manchin’s got one heck of a deal: The median sales price for single-family homes in DC passed $1 million last year.

    3. Manchin lives on a boat because he doesn’t like living here. Yawn to performative Washington-hating, but chagrin about where he’s docked seems to be part of Manchin’s shtick: “‘My worst day as governor was better than my best day as senator,’ ” he told GQ in 2018. He fantasized to reporter Jason Zengerle about the possibility of sailing home on Almost Heaven, though he conceded that would take several weeks. (It’s about a 5 1/2-hour car trip.)

    4. Senators like to party on Almost Heaven. Pizza, beer, and merlot are often served on the boat, Time reported in 2014: “Manchin routinely invites Senators from both parties out for evening cruises. ‘Like a Tom Harkin and a Ted Cruz—when would you ever get them together in a room, O.K.?’” Better optics than Cruz’s last vacation, too. Chuck Schumer “thinks it’s his boat,” Manchin told Time.

    5. “Almost Heaven” is a Washington reference—sorry, Joe Manchin. While the song “Take Me Home, Country Roads” is one of West Virginia’s four state songs, its roots are here in DC. The inspiration for Bill Danoff and Taffy Nivert’s anthem was a road trip to…Gaithersburg.

    Heh.

    Another story says its anchored around 8 miles south of the Capitol, so it probably isn’t too hard to find if people want to.

    FWIW.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  9. 9.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    and not just patriotic hymns from the likes of Murkowski. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), an Almost Heaven regular, has regaled fellow passengers with “American Pie.”

    I don’t know which of these would make me want to shove sharpened pencils in my ears more

    “patriotic hymns”….

  11. 11.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest
    Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum
    Drink and the devil had done for the rest
    Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.?‍☠️​

  12. 12.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Manu Raju @mkraju 58m

    #Breaking – Clearing the final procedural hurdle in Senate after months of intense talks, senators voted to advance $1.2T infrastructure bill to a final up-or-down vote. Procedural vote was 68-29. A vote on final passage could occur as late as Tuesday morning if not earlier

  17. 17.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

     

    the usual suspects carped “you’re doing it wrong”, “it’s taking too long”, “it’ll never happen this way” and low and behold it’s complete by the August recess, a little over six months into office.

    Touchdown, Biden  (photo)

  26. 26.

    CaseyL

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: 
    The GOP Senators who voted to advance the bill (per Manu Raju) are: Roy Blunt, Richard Burr, Bill Cassidy, Capito, Susan Collins, Cramer, John Hoeven, Mitch McConnell, Lisa Murkowski, Rob Portman,Jim Risch, Romney, Thom Tillis, Deb Fischer, John Cornyn, Roger Wicker, Dan Sullivan, Mike Crapo.

    How many of those have enjoyed evenings on Manchin’s boat?

  32. 32.

    CaseyL

    @Ken: Fine with me if they are (Murkowski’s just about out now, though she clings to her Party membership) – that would reduce the size of their Senate caucus considerably.

    But the fact that they voted to bring the bill to the floor doesn’t mean much, unless they also vote to pass the bill.  I expect a lot of them will vote No then.

  34. 34.

    geg6

    @ronno2018:

    I have a wetsuit and tanks.  And much experience with river diving, what with the low visibility and interesting currents.  I have a drill, too.  Ready to suit up when you are.

  38. 38.

    apocalipstick

    @encephalopath: Yes. “SOB” is right up there with REM’s “The One I Love” in the category of ‘That Song Doesn’t Mean What You Think It Means’.

  39. 39.

    Ken

    @CaseyL:  I expect a lot of them will vote No then.

    And six months later will be photographed with a hardhat and little shovel, at the groundbreaking for some project funded by the bill they voted against.

  41. 41.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @CaseyL:

    Did you hear that Palin was interested in running for Murkowski’s seat? Imagine her in the US Senate. Senator Palin, god help us all. Though if we’re lucky maybe she’ll resign after 3 years ; p

  44. 44.

    Hunter Gathers

    The fact that the future of the country rests on a group of upper-class losers whose genitals haven’t worked since Barney Miller went off the air getting trashed on $300 bottles of wine on a houseboat owned by a sentient chub of ground beef does not exactly fill me with optimism.

  46. 46.

    Brachiator

    At the ideological center of a 50-50 Senate, Manchin, a Democrat, has found himself in the captain’s seat for much of what gets done, or doesn’t get done, in Washington. This means that the Room Where it Happens is often a large pleasure craft/domicile floating on the capital waterways. At least three Biden Cabinet secretaries have spent time on Almost Heaven, as have the White House chief of staff and dozens of senators…

    Sounds as though Manchin is reveling in his role as power broker.  He clearly intends on making the most of it.

    Crass and despicable, but it is useful to see how things really work.

  47. 47.

    frosty

    @dexwood:  Boy, is that the truth. In our house at mealtime with the dogs in the dining room the food didn’t get a chance to hit the floor.

  51. 51.

    Another Scott

    @geg6: He’d have to get around Great Falls and I don’t know if they let house boats actually use those locks.  Otherwise, I assume he’d have to rent a trailer or something…

    Seriously, I don’t know how navigable the river is from where the boat is to where he would need to go in WV.  It’s almost assuredly just posturing.

    It’s a beautiful park, with the usual water-level signs – “3 feet above your head here in 1932” (or whatever).

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  53. 53.

    L85NJGT

    SDPB drop Lawrence Welk Show

    This pull quote is a thing of truth & beauty:

    “I wonder why they’re not going to renew the contract here in South Dakota?” asked Clarence Shoemaker, 82, of Gregory, South Dakota, when told the news earlier this week. “I know some people, especially over in Yankton, still tune in.“

  54. 54.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @James E Powell:

    That’s right up there, too. As music journalist Matty Karas described it (according to Wiki), it is “a quintessential pop album that was also a perfect distillation of the anger and bitterness seething beneath the surface of Reagan-era America.”

    No surprise the lyrics were overlooked by an empty-headed moron like Reagan

  64. 64.

    geg6

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    No, with friends on their boat.  We almost took our boat but theirs was slightly bigger and had more amenities.  A 36 footer with two staterooms and two heads.  A full kitchen and washer/dryer.  It was fun.

  65. 65.

    lowtechcyclist

    I’ll give Manchin points for being familiar with a song as recent as Nathaniel Rateliff’s “S.O.B.” I’m used to people of his generation not being familiar with any songs recorded after 1979.

  70. 70.

    justsomeguy

    @Hunter Gathers: 

    Here is how Biden gets Sinema & Manchin to support huge infrastructure, voting rights/election security, and a huge Reconciliation bill.

    Tell Sinema that in return for her vote, Biden will get her invited onto Manchins boat so that she will be one of the “cool kids”.
    Tell Manchin that in return for his vote, Biden will keep Sinema away from Manchins boat.

    Of course, it would only work once.
    See, plenty of cause for optimism ;-)

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