US Politics: Pardon our trespassing and those who have trespassed US

[Fez]

Waking up the first full day of the Biden administration, this is a very frustrating article to see:

https://www.politico.com/newsletters/playbook/2021/01/21/democrats-caught-flat-footed-by-total-control-of-washington-491476

Quote

 

The Democratic takeover of the White House and Congress is complete. But the truth is that the party was caught flat-footed by it: Almost no one expected JON OSSOFF and RAPHAEL WARNOCK to both win in Georgia — let alone planned for how they’d run Washington if it happened.

The lack of preparation is now causing confusion among congressional Democrats about how they should exercise their newfound power in the critical early days of the administration.

Conventional wisdom is that presidents have a small window of opportunity to make their mark with a big legislative achievement or, best case, two. Timing is critical, as is sequencing. But beyond a desire to address the pandemic — unquestionably Biden’s first priority — Democrats seem to be all over the place on what their legislative game plan looks like.

Our Democratic sources say Biden’s two top targets will be a Covid package and a massive infrastructure bill paired with clean energy policies, a nod to climate advocates. But Democrats are also talking about criminal justice and policing reform as well as good governance proposals to clean up elections.

Contrary to two years ago, when the party took the House and leaders articulated a plan for a series of major votes on guns and equality in the first few weeks of the year, no clear agenda has been presented to them by President JOE BIDEN, according to interviews with a half-dozen senior Democrats on Wednesday night.

In fact, Democrats aren’t even on the same page about how to get Biden’s $1.9 trillion Covid package through Congress. Before Biden was sworn in, aides had been hashing out plans to use the fast-track “reconciliation” process to try to jam it through on a party-line vote. But now Democrats are pressing pause because Biden is, as one person called it, “bipartisan-curious” — i.e. he wants to try to win over Republicans first, to the chagrin of many senior Democrats eager to move quickly. (Biden aides reached out to moderate GOP Sen. LISA MURKOWSKI of Alaska this week, and Democratic Sen. JOE MANCHIN of West Virginia says he hopes to talk to them over the weekend.)

Meanwhile, a third idea is percolating in the House: passing a narrower proposal of $1,400 stimulus checks and vaccine-distribution assistance to provide quick relief and notch a win — or, if all else fails, demonstrate to Biden that the GOP isn’t going to play nice. That idea, however, is running into resistance in the Senate. (Heather Caygle, Sarah Ferris and Caitlin Emma have more here.)

The lack of clarity extends to immigration. Many Democrats privately concede that the massive immigration bill Biden introduced on Day One was mostly symbolic — a gesture to advocates that’s unlikely to come to fruition. But on the Senate floor Wednesday, CHUCK SCHUMER — who helped write and pass a sweeping immigration bill in 2013 — said doing so again was a “very high priority” and “one of the most important things a Democratic Congress can do.”

 

I don't care if Democrats thought it was unlikely they'd win both Georgia senate races. It's legislative malpractice if they weren't prepared for the possibility and didn't have initial bill frameworks and sequencing ready to go. Hopefully now that the Biden people don't need to tiptoe around the Trump people to try to make any sort of transition work, they can provide some clear guidance to Congress.

[Ran]

1 hour ago, Spockydog said:

Is nobody at least a little concerned that Biden appears to have been sworn in on the Necronomicon?

It's a Biden family bible dated from 1893, and which Biden and his son Beau used at their respective swearing-ins. Beau carried it up to the inaugural stage in 2013.

Definitely a massive tome, though.

[Ormond]

8 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Did Trump play some 4D chess? Not really, obviously, but apparently in a 1998 People Magazine interview he said if he ran for Pres he'd run as a Republican because they are the dumbest voters, the believe anything Fox news tells them and he can lie about anything and they'll swallow it, his numbers would be great. Everything he said back then is true. They are the dumbest voters on average, most of them do believe whatever Fox news tells them (though now it's OAN / Newsmax), he lied several times a day and he was believed every time by most of them, and his numbers, among Republicans, were great. It's just that he pretty much became the Republican he despised in that interview in the intervening 16 years.

 

Oh, please that false information about People magazine was debunked back in 2015 multiple times. There was never any such interview. There are millions of correct horrible quotes from Trump without bringing up a completely false one again. 

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/1998-trump-people-quote/

P.S. Glad to see multiple others who were reading this during my sleep time already have corrected this.

[DMC]

1 hour ago, Fez said:

I don't care if Democrats thought it was unlikely they'd win both Georgia senate races. It's legislative malpractice if they weren't prepared for the possibility and didn't have initial bill frameworks and sequencing ready to go.

Yeah the root of the problem clearly seems to be Biden genuinely appears to think he can win over Republicans, as if he was equipped with his own form of the LBJ treatment - and as if that form of persuasion magically still worked in this day and age.  Hopefully he is disabused of this fantasy ASAP.  Also agree it's quite disconcerting that at least out here from the cheap seats it definitely looks like Klain, Donilon, and Ricchetti were operating under the assumption they weren't gonna win both Georgia races and did not have much if any contingency plans.  

I like the idea of passing the $1400 check and vaccine aid bill as a layup.  Make the GOP filibuster that.  You definitely want to give the president deference at the beginning, but I really don't know how long the congressional leadership should wait to pull the trigger on something like this.  I'd say two weeks at the most.