‘We're encouraged … by the accelerated pace of talks,’ White House spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters. ‘It is absolutely pivotal that these pieces of legislation have climate components, and they will.’ https://t.co/AoEAfdKetK pic.twitter.com/yHIaPHtvTc
— Reuters (@Reuters) October 19, 2021
Manchin’s only interested in Joe Manchin, but is there any lever the rest of us can use to convince him that being the guy who took food out of childrens’ mouths for the benefit of Mitch McConnell isn’t really in his best interest?
President Biden still has a chance to salvage much of his once-sweeping $3.5 trillion budget plan. But he needs to bring his party's centrists and its progressives to a middle ground. He meets with lawmakers Tuesday. https://t.co/cVQR9wlXCd
— The Associated Press (@AP) October 19, 2021
Infrastructure bill won’t transform America or help Dems. Big reconciliation will. If we don’t address climate change infrastructure bill will be tiny fracture of what we’ll need. So Dems need to tell Manchin they get a lot of what they want or he doesn’t get a fucking penny https://t.co/Hlj4kVh3ng
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) October 18, 2021
This is a great read from my friends, @MondaireJones and @KatiePorterOC.
Means testing is ineffective, unnecessary, and would weaken the Build Back Better agenda.https://t.co/6fYq3VxuTA
— Pramila Jayapal (@PramilaJayapal) October 17, 2021
Would be interesting to see a straight up vote on the child tax credit alone. Would 42 Rs filibuster?
Broad cuts are the kind of thing that didn't always need reconciliation in the past.
— Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) October 17, 2021
It’s come to my attention thanks to @crampell that the Manchin proposal would make grandparents raising kids orphaned by COVID, opioids, or what have you take jobs to earn the child tax credit — and now, I just want to throw things. https://t.co/Sv1dJ1cY8h
— Greg Greene (@ggreeneva) October 19, 2021
Baud
I get the importance of posturing but this
is quite a stretch on both ends.
Betty Cracker
AP framing continues to suck: “[Biden] needs to bring his party’s centrists and its progressives to a middle ground” distorts rather than clarifies the situation. Maybe a dozen out of around 270 Democrats in both chambers of Congress aren’t on board with Biden’s agenda. They aren’t centrists. Joe Biden is a centrist. Amy Klobuchar is a centrist. Abigail Spanberger is a centrist.
The hold-outs are fringe outliers.
Also, when you’ve lost Dana Houle…
John S.
Now would be a good time for someone to produce some serious oppo research on Manchin and Sinema.
It’s enough with those two assholes.
germy
@Betty Cracker:
Bring a centrist to a middle ground?
Immanentize
I think giving Manchin a win (and fewer current subsidies) on transition from coal is a good if he moves on the rest of the climate stuff. As he himself has noted, coal is dying on its own. It’s impact lessens every day. And if coal transition is his biggest sticking point….
Meanwhile, work requirements are horrible, ineffective, and just lead to further surveillance and criminalization of the lives of poor people. I recommend work requirements for investment income tax breaks.
zhena gogolia
@Immanentize: Good idea!
germy
I saw this reader comment over at LGM (from someone nymed c.p.)
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2021/10/in-shocking-revelation-joe-lieberman-reveals-that-republicans-wanted-him-to-win
It occurred to me today that Sinema actually is the person that Republicans, centrists, and other Serious People have been telling us for three years that AOC was: a shallow, frivolous, and self-absorbed social media princess whose politics begin and end with whatever will get the most people tweeting about her.
Immanentize
@John S.: Those two assholes are the only reason we are even able to talk about our slimmest ability to pass anything in reconciliation.
Betty Cracker
@germy: Yeah, they kind of gave the game away with that framing, huh?
debbie
Don Winslow seems unhappy with Manchin.
Immanentize
@Betty Cracker: But from another perspective, I would be happy to have S&M brought to middle ground between their positions and that of the progressives.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Somebody here said this about the bullshit that is means testing:
Means testing has the effect of excluding many of the people who need help the most — people with limited education, limited time and stressful lives. Also, means testing leads to a narrative that the program is benefiting only Those People, and should therefore be eliminated.
Means testing has always been about excluding “Those People” from any given program that proponents of the concept still want to extent to “our people”, meaning white people.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
In a fashionable favela in Brazil, a Nazi-curious mediocre former lawyer-turned-pundit is destroying a keyboard while pounding a 20,000 word screed about how terrible the Above the Law site is.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
A query – have any pundits made anyone’s lives better at all?
Dorothy A. Winsor
Re the child tax credit, means testing is bad enough because of how it complicates a program and adds costs to it. But a work requirement is infuriatingly bad. If someone is home taking care of a two year old, they’re working already.
Immanentize
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
Are you recommending an edit to Shakespeare’s oft-quoted prescription?
germy
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Don’t computer hackers love means testing, though?
Someone making 58k a year. They’re compelled to upload all sorts of private financial info to a leaky, cobbled-together government online form. And then next thing they know, someone is using their social security number.
germy
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
They’ve made each others’ lives better. Which is all that counts.
Kay
In terms of Biden’s agenda, I think the tax increases are underplayed as far as keeping a Biden promise and good politics for Dems. Biden talks about them constantly and did throughout the campaign and he uses “fair” as the justification.
Democrats have made amazing progress chipping away at the Reagan-era rule that pols can never raise taxes- the Trump tax cuts were unpopular – effectively depicted as only benefitting the wealthy – and Biden ran on raising taxes. The infrastructure bill goes in the wrong direction on that- they stripped tax increases out of it to get the GOP votes (which GOP’ers point to, specifically- Portman for one).
We have to get away from the idea that we can have modern infrastructure, good public education, all the things business relies on to make money, and no one has to pay for it because someone DOES have to pay for it- budgets are lists of priorities and not paying for the infrastructure bill means something else slips down the list of priorities.
To get away from Reagan era policies you have to get away from them. You can’t just layer some progressive policies on top of the Right wing economic fundamentals. That’s a shaky foundation and it threatens what you put on top of it.
germy
@debbie:
Manchin’s son and daughter have a hollowed-eyed look I’ve seen before. I remember it from my boss’s offspring.
The son exudes an overfed dumbness. The daughter looks like the well-connected mediocrity she is.
Baud
While I hope there’s a deal soon, I’m not looking forward to the extended discussion on the media and social media over which politicians won and lost, rather than how the bill benefits regular people.
@Kay: Agreed.
Tony Gerace
Joe Manchin is 74 years old. His career plan at this point is probably to retire in luxury in the near future after accumulating as many (legal) bribes from corporate lobbyists as possible. He’s doing what the lobbyists tell him to do. Sinema is only 45, so she must have other career plans. But she is obviously just as corrupt as Manchin.
Betty Cracker
@Immanentize: I sure hope that happens, but it won’t be bringing “centrists” into the fold if it does. The real “centrists” and “moderates” are already on board. Looks like the best case scenario is bringing S&M and the sad House gaggle to the exact middle point between McConnell & McCarthy’s “nothing” and Congressional Democrats’ $3.5 T.
Jeffro
@Kay: Amen. I’m surprised that Dems haven’t campaigned on a simple graph (of the past 40 years) showing current revenues vs what revenues would be without W’s and trumpov’s tax giveaways to the rich.
“See that ever-growing gap, American working families? See ALL THAT MONEY? That money could be making your roads better, providing you with better health care, paying your kids’ teachers more…but instead of doing some good, it’s sitting in a rich guy’s vault doing nothing but MAKING HIM EVEN RICHER.”
Ksmiami
As I’ve said before; tell Manchin, the DOJ is opening an investigation into the Epipen issue, . tell Sinema there will be no Democratic infrastructure support for her and then dare them to sink reconciliation and the BIF. If they want to join the GOP be honest.
Ten Bears
Arizona and West Virginia rank right in there with Mississippi as failed welfare states, that take more out of the system than they put in. Whores that take more than they pay. Close the spigot, dry up the government teat. Turn off the water. They’re just wasting it.
Baud
@germy:
You just made the GOP case for repealing the income tax.
OzarkHillbilly
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I envision a single mother of 2, at least one a toddler, with a dead beat ex. She gets denied the CTC because she can’t work because she can’t afford the child care which was also removed from the bill by “centrists”…
Kay
@Baud:
I don’t want to go backward on the progress with the “amazing free stuff!” approach of the infrastructure bill. The fact is pundits are wrong. Lauding a bill that spends 500 billion but doesn’t raise revenue as fiscally responsible is incorrect. The reconciliation proposals spend more, but they raise revenue.
They have to choose. They can’t oversimplify and depict this as an ordinary budget and then ignore revenue and point to magical Right wing economics for that side of the ledger re: the infrastructure bill and then carp excessively about the spending in reconciliation w/out mentioning revenue.
I would take layering dumb Right wing ideas (work rules) on top of actual progressive economic policy over layering progressive programs on top of Right wing voodoo economics (infrastructure). The foundation matters.
Geminid
The Ohio Senate race came up here last evening, and today I was interested to see a story about 3rd quarter fundraising from the Youngstown, Ohio Vindicator. The article was titled, “Ryan rolls while GOP candidates take loans.” Democrat Tim Ryan raised slightly over $2.5 million in the 3rd quarter, while four Republican Senate contenders lent their own campaigns a combined $6.35 million.
Reboot
@Betty Cracker: ‘Bring centrists to a middle ground’ reminds me of this phrase I read long ago in an article about a crime ring: “band of intransigent loners.”
Kay
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
Why don’t the substackers take a portion of their (claimed) incredible revenue and start a legal nonprofit? They can go after 6th grade teachers who are too “woke” (rather than just getting them fired) and the ACLU can choose their own cases? Hire a lawyer, Glenn. The ACLU lawyers aren’t your personal attorney. Start your own legal nonprofit.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@germy:
Speaking of social security numbers and creaky government, somebody in Missouri embedded the SSNs of 100,000 teachers into the source code of the open website. A journalist discovered it via right click, held the story long enough for the glitch to be fixed. True to form, the RWNJ MO governor wants the journalist who had the audacity to make him look bad prosecuted for “hacking”.
https://www.npr.org/2021/10/14/1046124278/missouri-newspaper-security-flaws-hacking-investigation-gov-mike-parson
Kay
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
They all love the magical “gig” economy so they can just take individual cases. The they don’t have to actually work with anyone else or pay salaries or benefits. Just the anti-woke substackers alone should be able to fund a high profile case where they sue a school board for too many books about Martin Luther King. You just know some douchebag fancy lawyer would love that case- they could probably get one for free.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone ???
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Kay
@Geminid:
It’s been nice locally among Democrats- the “quiet build” of interest that in my experience is what successful liberal campaigns in Ohio look like. I think Ryan probably considers the loudmouth Vance and Mandel an asset. It’s an interesting dynamic. They came out early and defined themselves as far Right and he’s remaining undefined. Timing really matters. I have my fingers crossed that they’re re-running 2020 when he’s running 2022. Theirs is the safe strategy. It’s designed to hold, not add.
rikyrah
Quinerly,
I hope that you saw the information about mixing and matching vaccines.
How J and J did so much better with antibodies when getting a MODERNA BOOSTER..
DON’T get a J and J booster.
GET MODERNA!!
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Kay:
I’ve long felt that the ACLU fucked up by taking up the speech causes of Nazis. There’s no shortage of RWNJ asshole lawyers who will take up that shit for free – let them do it. Save the resources for people who aren’t assholes.
Soprano2
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: You’ve discovered that our governor is an idiot who thinks the paper did this to make him look bad! It’s so dumb. I hope the Cole County prosecutor sits on it for awhile and then says “Eh, we can’t prosecute the newspaper. Now, the people who embedded the SSN’s on the other hand…..” Seriously that needs to be looked into – how did that happen, and did someone do it for a nefarious purpose or did they just royally fuck up?
Betty Cracker
Here’s some good news:
So, Manchin and Sinema aren’t 100% useless if they’re voting for Biden’s judicial picks.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Soprano2:
Feels almost intentional, doesn’t it?
“But we got a great contract on that site build that got outsourced with a third party provider out of Manila, and the contractor pocketed the difference. We saved the state A TON of money.
I guess this proves you just can’t trust government…”
OzarkHillbilly
I’ve pointed out in the past that he needs no help in that department.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Soprano2:
Ugh. Looks like Cole County is pure distilled RWNJ with about an R+30 tilt.
jonas
Do Manchin’s polls in WV really show that this kind of hostage-taking is popular? Really?
Soprano2
@OzarkHillbilly: He really is an authentic good ole boy from Bolivar, and just as clueless about how the internet works. I have to wonder if even one person on his staff suggested how stupid this is before he did it. Surely the Cole County people are laughing at him behind his back.
Soprano2
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: That describes the part of the state I live in, too, but I think even the prosecutors here would be shaking their heads over what Parson wants them to do.
Quinerly
@rikyrah: saw it in NYT last night. Thanks for thinking of me.
Off shortly for a hike at Bandelier National Monument. All my years visiting out here never made it over there. Always being here in the winter was mostly the reason.
Have a great day BJers!!
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Soprano2:
Having lived next door in Osage County for 22 years and worked in Cole County the entire time, I can safely say the majority of people there, mostly RWNJs, will consider that manifestation of ignorance a feature, not a bug.
Soprano2
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I agree, but the attorney in them has to know that there is no way to prosecute this as a case of “hacking”. Something anyone with a computer mouse can do by right clicking cannot be considered “hacking” under any definition of the word. I was shocked that Parson’s anger wasn’t directed at the idiots who designed that Web site, then I remembered that for Republicans being against the press always plays well.
Kay
My priorities for reconciliation are :
I never would have done Bernies expansion of Medicare benefits- it’s hugely expensive and it phases in so slowly it isn’t going to help politically and it invests on the wrong end. I’d trade that away in a heartbeat.
So Sinema opposes tax increases and Manchin opposes climate change mitigation, hence my opposition to them. If they were opposing 2 years of community college it’s a disagreement. Opposing tax increases is a dealbreaker. It’s constantly depicted as “liberals want everything” but that’s not true. I’d jettison a lot. They want a good, solid foundation. To build back better you need one. The rest is negotiable.
NotMax
FYI.
Citizen Alan
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Personally, I still haven’t forgiven the the ACLU for their amicus brief in support of citizens United. Anything we do in terms of campaign finance reform, the ACLU will oppose because they bought into scalia’s idiotic “money equals speech” doctrine.
Kay
I do wonder though why progressives expanded Medicare benefits rather than lowering the age. At 55 would be wildly popular and it’s easier to administer. They could then bargain down to 60 which would still be wildly popular. I feel like it’s a Bernie-specific thing so it annoys me. I think he’s making up for the deal he cut on the VA, where he privatized in return for more funding.
Betty Cracker
@Citizen Alan: That’s an excellent example of how absolutism can lead even well-intentioned people and organizations astray. Outcomes matter.
Kay
@Citizen Alan:
That was a real dividing line. It was so incredibly cool at the time to make the liberal argument for speech re: Citizens that the dopes apparently didn’t realize they were gutting campaign finnance regulation. OOOPs! Here comes the massive corruption! Hook, line.
Betty
@John S.: It is being done but not adequately covered by the mainstream media. Both have lots of money riding on their opposition.
Kay
@Citizen Alan:
Fancy liberals hate labor unions so of course they found the Right wing argument that the big, scary labor unions would be countered by the poor, silenced billionaires compelling. They were just evening the playing field! Take off the chains on America’s wealthiest people!
Betty
@Immanentize: Reverend Barber has a great take on how these means tests hurt the poorest. They are Scrooge-ist.
Geminid
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: The ACLU contributed to the disaster that was the Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally when they represented the organizer in his effort to return the rally to downtown Charlottesville (the City had moved it to a large, relatively isolated park a mile away). A federal judge went along, and three days before the event it was again allowed a venue in a cramped urban area that could not even hold the two thousand demonstrators and counterdemonstrators.
Bad as the outcome was, I thought Charlottesville was lucky that day. The ralliers carried a couple hundred firearms, and a dozen or so members of a left wing militia showed up with rifles to “protect” anti-fascist demonstrators. One shot was fired, but thankfully this did not set off a bloodbath. The Maryland Klansman who fired his handgun is serving a 7-8 year prison sentence
Betty
@Tony Gerace: There have been reports that he wasn’t going to run for re-election, then he.might again run for Governor and then thinking he might yet run for re-election (since he started getting so much attention from the press). Maybe if the press turns negative, he will reconsider. Sinema? Who knows?
OzarkHillbilly
@Soprano2: When it comes to computers, I’m a complete idiot and even I know better than this dumbfuck.
Aaron Rodgers Mustache
@John S.: i think both are target rich environments, but the union guys that claimed they would have voted for bernie in 2016 general won’t like what is found on manchin, & the yung guevaristas with santeria altars for the squad won’t like what is found on sinema, so will never happen.
Aaron Rodgers Mustache
@germy: sinema is the ghost of ocasio-cortez future.
Betty
@Kay: I like your priorities and agree about the Medicare expansion. They won’t even talk about taking away the Part B premium which comes out of Social Security benefits,something that would give people more money to use as they need.
Betty
@Citizen Alan: Wow! I didn’t know that. What a blunder!
Cameron
Personally I think Manchin is willing to deal on child tax credits; after all, Mitch McConnell can gut the program somewhere down the road. The climate change items affect his wallet, however, so I think he’s dead serious about them. Especially so with his comment that he didn’t see a deal happening before October 31 – somebody remind me where Joe Biden will be then?
I don’t see either him or Sinema going along with tax increases.
jnfr
And Manchin is still out there today insisting that HE is really in the majority, because after all 50 Republicans don’t want the bill to pass either.
James E Powell
@Betty:
Press/media portray Manchin & Sinema as principled rather than corrupt. Like they did with Lieberman.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Quinerly: Bandelier is great! Been there three times.
Cameron
@NotMax:
“I went to the Saudi book fair
The emirs and sheikhs were there….”
Somebody help me out here.
The Moar You Know
Where’s that two vote margin we need? Oh, we don’t have it. Climate stuff is going to go if we want the rest to pass. And anything Manchin and Sinema don’t want…it’s gonna have to go. This is exactly what happened with the ACA.
This is why turnout is a BFD. Because otherwise one guy really can hold the entire process hostage. The history of the Senate is replete with examples of this. Richard Russell stopped any civil rights bills for 25 years.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Soprano2:
That’s what spooks me. “Hurr durr, we’ll slap a journalist’s ass in jail, reach ‘em a lesson they’ll never forget. Jury’s already to fire off a conviction at a smarty pants journalist, and we have Republican judges all up the line….”
H.E.Wolf
It’s interesting to note the infrequent commenters, usually with attempts at ultra-macho ‘nyms, who pop in to favor us with misogynistic metaphors and pessimistic predictions.
They seem to appear whenever the Democrats in Congress are on the verge of making some incremental progress. I suspect their middle names are all “Tovarisch”. :)
Soprano2
@James E Powell: This makes me crazy! Why do they always assume that more conservative people are coming from a place of principle, rather than personal interest and/or corrupt motives?
Betty
@jnfr: He really is insufferable. Does he believe anything he says?
Betty Cracker
@The Moar You Know: The problem with that strategy is that if Dems strip out all the provisions that address the climate crisis to appease one corrupt senator, it will probably depress turnout, especially among young folks who will be most affected by the unfolding climate catastrophe. I understand the vote margin realities at play here — I’m pretty sure all of us in this discussion do. But the effect of kicking the climate can down the road yet again when time is running out has to be considered too.
The Moar You Know
@Betty Cracker: I wouldn’t even call it a “strategy” and believe me, I understand exactly what this would do to turnout – it would be a repeat of 2010 after the ACA passed and progressives got a whole lot of not much. But like the ACA, if anything’s going to get passed, those two idiots are going to have to sign off on it. Because otherwise we get Mitch McConnell’s offer – nothing. There’s simply no way around those two.
jnfr
@Betty:
I have no idea what stories he tells himself to sleep at night.
Another Scott
@Betty Cracker: There was a radio interview with a woman Prof at UCSD/UCSB, something like that, on NPR/ATC (IIRC) yesterday. She is helping to write the climate provisions of the bill. She said if Manchin won’t accept the power plant provisions then she’ll come up with something else. She’s not giving up.
We shouldn’t either.
Cheers,
Scott.
The Moar You Know
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: This reporter might be fucked. In my limited experience as an expert witness – something I don’t want to do ever again – judges understand fuck-all about computers, probably need to have their goddamn staff turn the machines on because they don’t understand how a power switch works – anyhow, this reporter did something which is technically a crime, namely a violation of the CFAA, the part which states:
I mean, we all do that, right? We do. That reporter did. Public-facing data even. But the law doesn’t delineate that. And the fucked up part is that if a judge buys a prosecutor’s argument of intent, the journalist is looking at:
I got this drilled into me while getting my CEH certification – don’t go diving into a system without written permission first, because if someone decides to fuck you to death in court they can for just hitting a website.
Even if the guy gets off, and IMHO in a just world he should simply because the law is an awful law and should be overturned, he’s still going to be out of pocket for a fuckton of lawyer fees and probably some expert witness hours as well. That’s not cheap as you know.
cain
@Cameron:
They did the mash? They did the monster mash?
Ksmiami
@Tony Gerace: I don’t care. I Just want them destroyed at this point.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@The Moar You Know:
Immanentize will know aspects of this better than me because I’m rusty on some aspects of criminal law (with us family court people, it’s all “throw words at the wall and ignore statutes and precedent to see what works”), but there may be a little substantive due process safe harbor about holding people criminally responsible over vague statutes.
Geminid
@Betty Cracker: The physical infrastructure bill has funding for charging stations, electric school buses, mass transit and $60 billion for investments in passenger rail. The DOE, Transportation, and Agriculture Departments are reorienting funding towards conservation and clean energy. So the Democrats will have at least some climate change initiatives to go along with efforts on the state level and in the private sector. The clean energy initiatives in the second “infrastructure” bill are badly needed, but even if they are all cut that will not be the last word on federal clean energy action.
And Democrats can make more clean energy legislation an attractive issue next year. In 2018, Representative Michelle Lujan Grisham made clean energy a centerpiece of her run for New Mexico Governor. She won, and the next year the state legislature passed a robust clean power plan.
dmsilev
Vaccine mandates work:
Some really did fall on their swords:
Want to guess which category of employees has the lowest compliance rate? The answer will shock you, and by “shock” I mean “come as completely no surprise whatsoever”:
Ksmiami
@Betty Cracker: cold comfort without filibuster reform. Esp with the current Supreme Court make up.
Kay
@Betty:
Bernie said it’s “non negotiable” which gets on my nerves. Of course it’s negotiable. It’s a HUGE tranche of money dedicated to one group and one program. I don’t like all the ego in these senators. You’re legislators. Stop playing President. They can barely do their own jobs let alone Bidens.
Just get the money, Bernie. The rest is negotiable.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
As opposed to any other thing we cut from the bill to get their votes? It’s not like anyone is out there saying, “Of course you can cut this thing out of Biden’s plan and still get high turnout!”
WaterGirl
@debbie: Nice warning shot to Manchin! You want to be the center of things? We can make you be the center of things in another way, and you and your family are not going to like it.
Can’t wait for Part 2.
Edmund Dantes
https://twitter.com/peteratlantic/status/1449714166441381889?s=21
“ I asked a White House official about those who are frustrated with inaction on voting rights protections. “Every constituency has their issue,” the official said. “If you ask immigration folks, they’ll tell you their issue is a life-or-death issue too.”
This White House official needs to be fired into the sun. The amount of privilege dripping from that immigration line is heinous.
Shalimar
Manchin cares about his popularity in West Virginia. Parts of BBB he opposes are far more popular in West Virginia than he is. It’s time for independent liberal groups to run negative ads against him, and tell the people of West Virginia what he really is.
Just Chuck
Yes, they would. And they will pay absolutely zero consequences for it. Probably get even more votes.
Soprano2
@The Moar You Know: OK, that is absolutely nuts!!! Wow… So how illegal was it for them to put all those SSN’s into the coding of the site in the first place? Almost like someone was trying to help someone else steal those numbers.
Kay
@dmsilev:
The whiniest workforce in the country tells us what they can’t do again. Good. They don’t belong in schools anyway. If you can’t keep order in a school without a cop you need to change your approach.
My paternal grandmother, who was basically a petty criminal and also might have been a communist (so grain of salt) told us never to call the cops. It’s not bad advice, with reasonable exceptions :)
OzarkHillbilly
@jnfr: He reads his bank statements.
Another Scott
@Another Scott:
Here’s the interview with Leah Stokes:
She’s a strong advocate and will get every climate policy provision she can.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
trollhattan
Guessing even up in the hollers of West By-Gawd Virginnie $60k doesn’t get a family too far into the year before real “economic anxiety” hits. He sounds like a standard-issue Friedman-worshipping Republican of the ’80s. How about that multi-trillion buck gift to the rich that congress and Trump passed a scant few years back, if you’re so interested in “fairness” Joe? Kill that off.
Aaron Rodgers Mustache
@H.E.Wolf: like gravity kills, i am guilty as charged.
dmsilev
@Kay: Fortunately, the school district is out of fucks to give, and the broader city and county government aren’t far behind. The city firefighters are, amazingly, probably even whinier than the cops on this particular subject.
Sure Lurkalot
@Betty: @Kay:
Don’t disagree that reducing the age eligibility or eliminate the Part B premium for Medicare would be easier to administer. But it is ridiculous to have exclusions or different insurance sectors for ears eyes and teeth in our shabby health care system.
Lyrebird
OT: does someone know the right URL for a non-profit news site that has a name like reader funded reporting or people powered reporting?
It’s like ProPublica but might do more rapid response news. I saw it the other day and thought, good, another alternative source. My Google fu is weak on this.
The Moar You Know
@dmsilev: One might inadvertently come to the conclusion that there’s something mentally wrong with cops.
jnfr
@OzarkHillbilly:
That I am totally sure of.
The Moar You Know
@Soprano2: There is no federal law making it illegal, which means state laws apply. It is a civil offense in CA, not criminal.
610.035 makes it illegal in MO. Probably civil not criminal, but that’s an opinion. However, since the numbers were coded into the site code and not, strictly speaking, public, everyone gets to go to court to define whether site data is “public” or not. I know what the IT end of things would say, but you’re dealing with a judge here, not an IT department. I wish this guy luck because he’s gonna need all of it. Especially in that state.
I do agree with your suspicion as to intent.
NotMax
@jnfr
Well, since you asked….
//
Soprano2
@dmsilev: I heard a blub on NPR this morning where an EMT was talking about how the vaccine mandates would cause EMT shortages, and all I could think was “you whiny shit, just get vaccinated!”. One of my Jazzercise teachers says she has neighbors who are in their early 90’s. The wife got Covid and died, and they think she got it from an EMT who came with the ambulance her husband called because of something else.
cain
@James E Powell:
It’s because the entire press apparatus above the reporters are all sympathetic to the GOP.
Burnspbesq
@Ksmiami:
Just out of idle curiosity, what Federal criminal statute do you allege Manchin’s daughter violated, and what is the factual basis for your allegation?
If you can’t or won’t answer, then kindly STFU about this.
Another Scott
@Lyrebird: Is it https://www.peoplepowermedia.org ?
Nothing else close comes up for me.
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
@Sure Lurkalot:
I agree that the distinction doesn’t make sense, but I would urge liberals to stay focused on a big picture.
The child care piece is a fundamental change- a step forward. It’s a big deal. I’d invest in that.
cain
@The Moar You Know:
What is annoying is that we never had a circumstance where we could finally get our agenda going. For the ACA we had Lieberman, because by all that is holy we lost our senior senator from Massachusetts and of course replaced by a Republican.
One day the stars are going to align and we will have the majority without any punks standing in the way.
jnfr
@NotMax:
Definitely a lullaby for Manchin.
Burnspbesq
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
You’re wrong about the ACLU. I increased my contribution after Skokie. Either everybody has free speech, or nobody has it. An organization like the ACLU either has principles, or it doesn’t.
Kay
@Sure Lurkalot:
They can easily give up the two years of community college. All states will be at high school plus 2 in a decade- it’ll be the norm- just like high school is the norm now. That’s gonna happen anyway.
Sadly, IMO, Manchin and Sinema are not really negotiating on the edges. They’re opposing the must haves, and using the negotiable items to muddy the water. The progressives probably know it, so are not moving on the negotiables thinking they’ll give up a lot and still hit the Manchin/Sinema wall on taxes and climate change. This would be a heck of a lot easier if the conservative D’s would drop all this bullshit and just get to the point. I don’t dislike them because they’re conservative. I dislike them because they won’t tell the truth about what they want.
Chief Oshkosh
@jnfr: Totally self-absorption. He figures that if things come out OK for him, then probably a lot of other people (who are like him) will do OK, too.
Everyone else? Fuck, does anyone else even exist?
Soprano2
@Kay: I wish people understood how much this would help the job market! Lack of child care makes it so much harder for women to work, and that hurts men as well as women. I also agree that I wish men would talk more about how this affects them, because making it happen when it’s seen as a “women’s issue” is an extremely heavy lift. There is still a significant part of the population that thinks we shouldn’t make it easier for white middle-class women to work!
The Thin Black Duke
Wow.
I just pied the dumbass mustache guy and my headache is gone. Amazing.
It’s an option I recommend highly.
Ruckus
What does it cost to make work requirements/means testing actually happen?
Aren’t we spending a lot of money to not spend a bit of money?
Aren’t we looking at a guy who comes from one of the more poor states, who has a lot of money himself from the absolutely filthy business of coal, which has exploited the working people of his state for a lot of decades, telling the rest of the world that we can’t make those actual citizens of his state (and the other 49) better off for once rather than exploiting them for no reason other than because he’s being an ass?
Kay
@Soprano2:
Agree. I also don’t think people know how much it costs. I used child care at the Y and I was mostly happy with it when mine were little and I mentioned that to a younger client who is currently using it. She laughed at loud when I told her what I paid. It’s 3x that now :)
I genuinely believe that if make women the face of it it will fail. You saw the sneering contempt for Mayor Pete – that’s contempt for the work that women traditionally do.
I also love the idea that no adult is required when they’re asleep. Yup. You just shut em off and store them till they wake up. No one has to be there. You can’t be two places at once! Not possible!
Ruckus
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
Possibly their own.
They get paid to put shit on paper or airwaves. The rest of us do this every day, at least the paper part. And that wastes less paper and is actually useful.
Kay
@Soprano2:
“Jason Campbell
@JasonSCampbell
Newsmax host: “Pete Buttigieg is a man and so is his husband. They did not have to have these kids now. They’re not up against any biological clock”
As you know, from the employer side, there is never a good time for employees to have kids. That’s the truth. Purely as a business decision? Bad. So for my part I just don’t fucking MONITOR their child decisions.
Kids are universal too. Not everyone has them but everyone was one.
Ksmiami
@Burnspbesq: Price gouging, antitrust lapses: here you go… https://sevenpillarsinstitute.org/mylans-epipen-pricing-scandal/
Another Scott
RollCall:
Things are moving pretty quickly now, as one probably should have expected given the “MoU” that Manchin made Schumer sign saying that Manchin wouldn’t start working on it until October 1. 19 days is lightning fast for the Senate!
Cheers,
Scott.
Villago Delenda Est
Manchin is a monster. As much of a monster as TFG.
Lyrebird
@Another Scott:
Thanks! That may be what I was remembering… Much appreciated.
Guess I should also sign up for Boehlert’s newsletter and bother to see what Jay Rosen is up to lately.
I don’t want to give CNN any more clicks.
Ksmiami
@Villago Delenda Est: Thank you. I feel like I’ve been alone on this soapbox for awhile. What a little pissant. We will actually be better off without him and I especially hate him for his BS Hyde posturing.
Kay
@Another Scott:
That’s a big hit though. Ooof. I hope they’re not stupid enough to hit consumers as a replacement for the industry policy. That’s the conservative ideological approach and it’s a political disaster. Let the Right wing put that in. It’s theirs. They shouldn’t take a political hit for a Right wing policy.
The Moar You Know
@Ksmiami: oh boy.
#1 is settled.
#2 is an investigation
#3 is going to fail
#4 is a legit claim and we’ll see how that pans out.
NONE of them involve misconduct by Machin’s daughter personally. This may not matter to you, but it matters to the legal system. And it will matter to the press.
Kay
All I would ask is this. Don’t put in unpopular conservative policy at Manchin’s insistence. Drop the provision before you do that. Saddling Democrats with shitty Right wing policy WHILE eleminating progressive approaches is madness. Don’t lose twice.
No Republicans are voting for this. If Democrats get stuck trying to sell shit that Republicans won’t sell or support you’re just doing their work for them. If it’s a choice between that or “nothing” on climate change, take nothing and move on.
There are worse things than losing part of this. The “worse thing” is letting conservatives direct Democratic policy and then Democrats having to sell it. Republicans don’t do shit. If they want Right wing, unpopular policy they can damn well vote for it.
The Moar You Know
@Ksmiami: explain to me how this nation is better off with Mitch McConnell running the Senate. Because that’s what happens if Manchin goes away.
greenergood
Have scrolled through super-quick through comments so please excuse if already noted, but a commenter at DKos the other day said the gov’t should just buy out the WV coal industry – a $3.5 trillion BBB act is being held up by a comparatively peanuts $20 billion dying ‘industry’. So rescue it: buy the whole shebang – change its priorities – give coalminers new green renewable jobs – thus bailing out Mooch Manchin. I know it’s bribery, but needs must … Then there’s just the drama queen left … And then somehow change the whole voting system – the fact that two idiotic DINO grandstanders can hold an entire country (and planet) to ransom is just ridiculous.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Soprano2:
I’m thinking that if the low bidder subcontracted it out to a developing world vendor, that’s where those numbers were deliberately leaked into the wild and have long been on the open market.
Burnspbesq
@Ksmiami:
If that’s all you’ve got, your case will never make it to a jury. Any competent white-collar defense lawyer will get her a deferred prosecution agreement that is barely a slap on the wrist—or convince an overworked AUSA that there is no case.
lowtechcyclist
@Betty Cracker:
@The Moar You Know:
The problem is, this approach basically says, “we’ll deal with climate change later” when the odds are against any ‘later’ opportunity to deal with it in this decade.
This might could be the only shot we’ve got. We’ve got to try to get what we can re climate change now.
@Another Scott:
It’s good to know the players involved are trying hard to make this shot work. I’m gonna keep on calling my Congresscritters, telling them to keep the climate change provisions strong.
Ksmiami
@Burnspbesq: I’m not saying go to trial but use it as leverage against Manchin… Biden is the President and can turn up the heat.
Another Scott
@greenergood: It won’t work. Manchin’s opposition is mainly ideological, not financial.
JoeManchinWV:
He’s doing what he said he was fighting for when running for office.
There are ways to get him on-board (generous pension benefits for miners and survivors, creating new markets for coal (e.g. instead of burning the stuff, use it for new materials to replace bad plastics, etc.), similarly for gas), and I’m sure that Democrats are working to find them.
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
@lowtechcyclist:
Climate change isn’t just young progressives either. It’s the educated, fairly well-off suburbanites that Democrats need in swing counties. They’re the people who own property (ground) and are going to be paying for it when it burns or floods or blows away. Real estate will become impossible to insure. Really rich people can escape from climate change. Ordinary better off people cannot, and they have a lot of their “wealth” tied up in real estate. Not vast holdings- their main residence and maybe a vacation spot. They know this. The value starts to drop on this property and a lot of people who think they’re “worth” a million dollars between real estate and retirement savings are not. Property value is really important to them.
Burnspbesq
@Ksmiami:
It’s hard to bluff successfully when the other guy can see your cards and knows you’ve got shit.
hueyplong
“She said if Manchin won’t accept the power plant provisions then she’ll come up with something else.”
That’s a great thing to know, but a horrible thing to tell the Senator from WV through the media. Please stop doing so.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ksmiami: Political prosecutions are not a good way to go.
Baud
What I’ve learned from the debate over the last few months is that I can stop worrying about climate change once this bill is done, because this bill is the whole shebang.
The Moar You Know
@Ksmiami: The only thing that matters is if someone can take it to trial. You’ve just had two lawyers with federal experience (Omnes and Burns) tell you that there’s not anything to take to trial.
Find another lever because that one’s not going to move anything.
Baud
Would a progressive lawmaker succumb to threats of prosecution of a family member? If not, what’s the basis for believing that Manchin would?
J R in WV
@Citizen Alan:
Yes, and the ACLU also supported the right of Illinois Nazi Fascists to demonstrate in a Jewish neighborhood/town.
Never-the-less, yesterday when a fund-raiser called to ask us to donate a few dollars more to the ACLU, I instead doubled our monthly donation.
Why do you suppose a progressive socialist retiree like me did that?
Just confused?
Hell, it was worth it just to astonish the fund raiser.
Ruckus
@Kay:
It builds losses that make the next round far easier for the conservatives to strip out benefits.
Not paying for promises is
just aboutthe keynote of conservative policies, including conservative democrats and leads to “Oh my god we have to make cuts!” It is good conservative politics, promise BS and deliver BS. It doesn’t make a country better, although it does seem to enhance the bank accounts of some politicians, often on both sides of the aisle.lowtechcyclist
I would like to think their kids are really important to them.
That’s pretty much where I’m coming from here: I don’t want the world to be a hellhole in 50 years, when my 14 year old is 64.
And it seems absolutely, totally crazy to me that I’m sitting here on tenterhooks, wondering whether we’ll leave him a decent sort of planet. It is just so fucked that this is hanging in the balance right now.
Omnes Omnibus
@The Moar You Know: I don’t know anything about the substance. I object to using the DoJ that way. I didn’t like it when Trump tried and I don’t like it now.
Kay
About time. If I were a centrist I don’t know that I would want Right wing Manchin and Sinema defining my position. The centrists speak!
Ruckus
@greenergood:
I nominate this comment for whatever award is available or that we can make up.
They understand being bought off, hell they seem to be playing the game at the cost of the entire nation. Not sure what KS wants, not sure she knows what she wants, but JM, we know what he wants, his palm greased, along with the palms of the coal barrens that bought him. The only problem I see with this solution is that it’s a one and done deal, he doesn’t get to keep milking coal till the end of his days. And he’s invested in coal, it’s made him wealthy, it’s made him powerful, at least now, and he gets to screw millions, just to make his retirement days a bit wealthier. On the scale of easy wealth, this one is a no brainer. For him.
Kay
@lowtechcyclist:
Oh, sure, them :)
It shouldn’t be, but climate change is an “educated Dem” issue. That’s an important constituency for Democrats in suburbs, hence important to “centrist” D’s too. They’re the swingy voters D’s rely on in midterms because the more educated the more likely to vote.
Ksmiami
@Burnspbesq: then take over the coal companies through eminent domain, claim they’re superfund cleanup sites and tell Manchin you’d be happy to reimburse the state for the costs etc if he signs onto the legislation at hand. But if that doesn’t work end negotiations. Full court press against Manchin and the GOP.
Ksmiami
@The Moar You Know: Playing devil’s advocate- let’s say the Senate is controlled by McConnell, then Biden has an immediate enemy to focus on and to motivate squishy voters to elect more and better Democrats. Not a lot happens But the Republicans would be less averse to raising the debt ceiling as they will shoulder as much or more of the blame if default happens. And there’s more risk in McConnell’s do nothing position since he’ll actually be in a hot seat. But I can say that the longer these negotiations go on, the worse the outcome for everyone
Ben Cisco
@Ksmiami:
Presumes facts not in evidence, either at this time or at any time in the past, and I’ve been watching since the Watergate hearings.
Ksmiami
@Ben Cisco: then burn it to the fucking ground. If the system can get this hung up by one or two people, it no longer is a Democratic system and it’s definitely outlived it’s usefulness in a nation of 330 million plus people
Bill Arnold
@greenergood:
Thank you. We need to start a national (international) conversation about buying out fossil fuel reserves so that they can be kept safely underground (or used for purposes that don’t involve GHG emission).
It’s clear that many here have not fully internalized how dire the global heating[1] crisis will be even in the near couple of decades future. Agriculture will start breaking, with massive crop failures, due to changes in precipitation patterns and temperature increases. Large fisheries will start collapsing. The risk of large scale war, including nuclear war, will increase. Within several decades, some regions near the equator will be uninhabitable by humans without 100 percent reliable air conditioning (including electricity infrastructure), with no lapses longer than a few hours. (Wet Bulb Globe Temperature exceeding human tolerances for extended periods of time).
A basic calculation that assume that the GHG-emissions trajectory we’re on will continue (even without much positive feedback e.g. permafrost melting) and that the resulting heating will end up killing half the global human population gives a figure of about 1 human life lost per 300-350 tons of West Virginia (bituminous) coal burned. (Jigger the numbers by a factor of 2-4 less, and they’re still bad; Holocaust was 10M for numerical perspective.) That makes people like Joe Manchin perpetrators of mass homicide in the fullness of time. They may not think of themselves as evil people (few do), but they are objectively evil.
[1] The Guardian has this right – it is Global Heating, not Climate Change.