US Politics: Don't Manchin the war...

[DMC]

4 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I'm living on the planet where the headlines average people are seeing is "Progressives threaten to tank the bill." You have to view it through what low information citizens are likely to see

...you think low information voters are going to care about who's to blame in an intraparty squabble?  IF they even care about the infrastructure bill getting delayed/killed (if it is, guess we're still waiting), their blame isn't going to go to a specific wing of the party.  And even if it did, the MCs that will bear the brunt of the backlash are moderates, so what does it even matter?   Regardless, acting like the fact neither the media nor the party are blaming the progressives is changing the goalposts.

9 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I understand it. My position has always been that it's a really fucking dumb negotiating strategy, and once again progressives have made the mistake of overpromising, which is always going to leave their supporters feeling like they got screwed. It's way better to just say you're going to fight for every inch of that, not promise that you're going to hold the line.

No, you don't.  You continue to act as if the progressives pulled the $3.5 trillion number out of their ass instead of it being agreed to by the Senate budget committee and the framework being supported by Manchin and Sinema.  Not to mention the repeated public understanding that the two bills would be passed together.  It's a pathetically warped reality you live in.

13 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Cynically I'm sure it was kept rather quit because Manchema wanted to secure to infrastructure bill before going to the mat on the reconciliation bill. 

Yes!  And this is the definition of negotiating in bad faith. 

[ants]

20 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I don’t see how progressives will regret it; they either get what they want, or they get rid of the biggest thorn in their side, which allows the Democratic Party to recalibrate their tactics.

So can you please explain how Democrats can get 50 senate seats in the next 10 years in a world where they cut people like Manchin and Sinemena out? What is the game plan, and why will it succeed? 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

22 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

I agree, but it is fair to point out you cannot also make promises you know you probably can't deliver on. I still think Manchin should have taken the deal from the start, but he didn't and you can't really be surprised by it. The need to dig in on the total cost rather than what you can get in it has been frustrating though. 

I'm still deeply concerned that this will all collapse, and as I've maintained for more than a month, that cannot happen. I wish they could just split the difference, handle the rest of what they need to do in 2021, take a breather, and then see how they can make the best of 2022. I think that's really the only way to get meaningful legislation passed that both sides can live with while doing there best to prevent significant losses in the next elections. Pride and the desire to stick it to one another cannot get in the way of the greater good.

It has to happen--if the progressives don't shut down the bipartisan bill and the infrastructure bill doesn't pass, then there is no progressive coalition. They will shut it down though, and rightly so. With Democrats holding the House, Senate, and White House, if all they can deliver is the bipartisan bill, then it becomes very apparent that the Republicans are still calling the fucking shots. The bipartisan bill has to fail, or Dems or fucked. And the bipartisan bill doesn't deal with climate change, healthcare--it is really a gesture toward less than the minimum of what our government should be providing. If Dems suddenly find themselves trying to sell this as a win, it's a big fucking loss, and that, more than anything some alarmists around here claim, will lead to a Republican takeover in 2024.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

10 hours ago, Fez said:

If this is true, and Manchin has simply been ignored until the past few weeks, it's political malpractice by Schumer:

If you want to change his mind, fine. But if he told you his red lines and you moved forward under the assumption that he didn't really mean it, that's absurd.

ETA:

ETA2: and here's the document: https://static.politico.com/1e/ef/159cabd547868585f9b1a8f06388/july-28-2021.pdf 

Schumer's side of this is he was pretty clear, "That's great, Manchin, but I'm not signing onto this." So, Manchin acting like this is revelatory is BS. He put out a ridiculous "compromise" and Schumer, rightfully, told him to fuck off.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

47 minutes ago, ants said:

So can you please explain how Democrats can get 50 senate seats in the next 10 years in a world where they cut people like Manchin and Sinemena out? What is the game plan, and why will it succeed? 

Manchin and Sinema aren't democrats--they've allowed Republicans to continue to get a say when Dems hold the House, Senate, and the White House. With friends like those two, you're never winning shit.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

58 minutes ago, DMC said:

...you think low information voters are going to care about who's to blame in an intraparty squabble?  IF they even care about the infrastructure bill getting delayed/killed (if it is, guess we're still waiting), their blame isn't going to go to a specific wing of the party.  And even if it did, the MCs that will bear the brunt of the backlash are moderates, so what does it even matter?   

They're going to see and hear that it was progressive Democrats that killed a bipartisan deal. With such a surface level understanding of the subject, yes, they will at least be able to figure out that much. And on who it will hurt most, that's TBD. Manchin will probably be just fine, Sinema not so much. Beyond that it's going to hurt people in tight races more than what their ideology is. That's why it's kind of shitty for people in safe seats to shame their colleagues into taking tough votes when they don't have any skin in the game.

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Regardless, acting like the fact neither the media nor the party are blaming the progressives is changing the goalposts.

The party, not as a whole, but some will. The media, yes. There have been a ton of negative headlines already about them threatening to tank the deal. That's what a lot of people will see. 

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No, you don't.  You continue to act as if the progressives pulled the $3.5 trillion number out of their ass instead of it being agreed to by the Senate budget committee and the framework being supported by Manchin and Sinema.  Not to mention the repeated public understanding that the two bills would be passed together.  It's a pathetically warped reality you live in.

Lol. Neither of them are on that committee, and it's chaired by Sanders who said he wanted a $6T and then negotiated it down without them to $3.5T. Sanders did not work with either of them to come up with that number. And they voted on a procedural vote, but that happened well after Manchin had told Sanders he doesn't support a $3.5T bill. Manchin has also said he both supports and doesn't support a two track process. You know all of this. That's what reality looks like.

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Yes!  And this is the definition of negotiating in bad faith. 

So is making promises you know you can't keep.


I have MSNBC on and it's pretty clear nothing is happening tonight as both Manchin and Sanders are saying they're not agreeing to anything quickly and nothing is happening until all 50 senators are on board. And it's pretty funny watching House Dem after House Dem come on and say what I've said all along, that fixating on the top line is and always has been misguided. So yeah, clearly some in the party are not cool with the CPC being stuck on $3.5T, including Yarmuth. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

16 minutes ago, Centrist Simon Steele said:

It has to happen--if the progressives don't shut down the bipartisan bill and the infrastructure bill doesn't pass, then there is no progressive coalition. They will shut it down though, and rightly so. With Democrats holding the House, Senate, and White House, if all they can deliver is the bipartisan bill, then it becomes very apparent that the Republicans are still calling the fucking shots. The bipartisan bill has to fail, or Dems or fucked. And the bipartisan bill doesn't deal with climate change, healthcare--it is really a gesture toward less than the minimum of what our government should be providing. If Dems suddenly find themselves trying to sell this as a win, it's a big fucking loss, and that, more than anything some alarmists around here claim, will lead to a Republican takeover in 2024.

1. They're also fucked if it does fail. Like really seriously fucked.

2. A total package of $2.7T is still a big win, even if it's a let down from the big prize of $4.7T. That's still a ton of spending on good things, and walking away with nothing is not acceptable and anyone that supports that can never call themselves a progressive again. 

[Fez]

1 hour ago, ThinkerX said:

if only it were possible to flip one or two republican senators on the reconciliation package...maybe offer Murkowski a totally free hand in ANWAR as part of the deal, no oversight or pesky regulations? Is there some similar white elephant that might sway Collins or Romney? And how would such a deal sit with the progressive caucus? 

One of the biggest problems is that this kind of legislating just doesn't happen anymore. If one of them made clear that their vote was available, they'd be able to have an enormous hand in crafting the bill; directing funds to whatever issues are most important to them and securing a bunch of money for their state. It'd be a win-win. But they'd be run out of GOP forever over it, and even someone who shouldn't really care about that, like Romney, still won't do it.

11 minutes ago, Centrist Simon Steele said:

Schumer's side of this is he was pretty clear, "That's great, Manchin, but I'm not signing onto this." So, Manchin acting like this is revelatory is BS. He put out a ridiculous "compromise" and Schumer, rightfully, told him to fuck off.

Except Schumer did sign it. That signature didn't mean he was agreeing to Manchin's terms, but he was agreeing that Manchin wouldn't guarantee his vote if the terms weren't meant. And Manchin's vote is needed, you can't tell him to fuck off. Schumer should've focused entirely on getting Manchin on board before doing anything else, because he knew the vote wasn't there yet. No press statements, no telling Sanders and Wyden to go all out, no raising expectations, or letting every liberal nonprofit shove every pet project of theirs into the bill. All that does is cause everyone to get pissed off later on (and it does make things worse; if you told liberals last December that Democrats would get a $1.9 trillion bill passed, followed by a $1.2 trillion bill and then another $1.5 trillion bill most of them would be thrilled; whereas now it's an utter disappointment).

This is the difference between Republicans and Democrats. When McConnell really wanted something to happen, like the 2017 tax cuts, he got a majority on board before doing anything. Deficit hawks like Corker or moderates like Murkowski could've been problems, but whatever deals or arm twisting needed to happen did happen before anything else.

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Tywin et al. said:

They're going to see and hear that it was progressive Democrats that killed a bipartisan deal.

....No, they're not.  The coverage has primarily focused on the conflict between Manchema and the rest of the party, which is obviously what Manchin wanted by releasing that document today.  Beyond that, they're just gonna read the vote got delayed again.  Low-information non-partisans are overwhelmingly going to vote based on the economy and I guess these days covid.  They are not going to give two shits about an intraparty squabble.  High information voters are the only ones who give a shit about who's to blame, and you've basically admitted if you're paying attention, the progressives are not to blame.

11 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

And they voted on a procedural vote, but that happened well after Manchin had told Sanders he doesn't support a $3.5T bill. Manchin has also said he both supports and doesn't support a two track process. You know all of this. That's what reality looks like.

....Yes, reality looks like they didn't pull the 3.5 number out of their ass, and Manchema voted for it.  Thanks for agreeing with me!

12 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

So is making promises you know you can't keep.

The fuck does this even mean?  Not only does it have nothing to do with negotiating in bad faith, it isn't even true.

[ants]

19 minutes ago, Centrist Simon Steele said:

Manchin and Sinema aren't democrats--they've allowed Republicans to continue to get a say when Dems hold the House, Senate, and the White House. With friends like those two, you're never winning shit.

Well, that's all fine but you haven't explained to me how the Dems are then getting 50 senate seats. 

[Kalbear]

Again, we need 10 more senators like Manchin. Maybe not sinema. But Manchin, sure. 10 more people who largely vote democrat and can win in deeply red states. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

46 minutes ago, DMC said:

....No, they're not.  The coverage has primarily focused on the conflict between Manchema and the rest of the party, which is obviously what Manchin wanted by releasing that document today.  Beyond that, they're just gonna read the vote got delayed again.  Low-information non-partisans are overwhelmingly going to vote based on the economy and I guess these days covid.  They are not going to give two shits about an intraparty squabble.  High information voters are the only ones who give a shit about who's to blame, and you've basically admitted if you're paying attention, the progressives are not to blame.

Dude, you are just wrong here. People will see the phrase "progressives tank bipartisan infrastructure bill" over and over again and they'll blame progressives. They probably won't even understand what an intraparty fight really is. They will keep seeing those words linked together though and that's what they'll remember. That's a lot easier to digest than Democrats disagree over the price tag of the bill. 

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....Yes, reality looks like they didn't pull the 3.5 number out of their ass, and Manchema voted for it.  Thanks for agreeing with me!

I didn't agree with you at all. You keep calling it a comprise, and I keep pointing out said "compromise" didn't include consulting with the two people who don't agree, so calling it a comprise is pulling a number out of your ass.

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The fuck does this even mean?  Not only does it have nothing to do with negotiating in bad faith, it isn't even true.

Schumer and Biden knew for months Manchin was never going to agree to the number they kept repeating. So did Pelosi. Others in leadership probably did too and yet they still kept saying that number would happen and it trickled down throughout the caucus. Promising something you know won't happen and have no intention to fulfill it is the definition of bad faith. You just want to only acknowledge that one side is guilty of this. Both have been behaving in incredibly shady ways because they do not trust each other, and rather than fixing that they keep demonstrating that there's no reason to. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

46 minutes ago, ants said:

Well, that's all fine but you haven't explained to me how the Dems are then getting 50 senate seats. 

Purity doesn't want to consider reality.

[DMC]

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Dude, you are just wrong here. People will see the phrase "progressives tank bipartisan infrastructure bill" over and over again and they'll blame progressives.

LOL, no I'm not.  People will see "vote delayed" which is the current headline for WaPo, NYT, CNN, and ABC, CBS, and NBC news.  None of them assign blame to the progressives.  Neither do the headlines for politico, the hill or axios for that matter.  You're empirically, objectively wrong here.

7 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I didn't agree with you at all. You keep calling it a comprise, and I keep pointing out said "compromise" didn't include consulting with the two people who don't agree, so calling it a comprise is pulling a number out of your ass.

Well, no, I never called it a "comprise," because that would be weird.  I did call it a compromise between all the Dem members of the budget committee as well as the framework Manchin and Sinema voted for, because that's what it is.  Which quite obviously means it wasn't pulled out of their ass.

9 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

You just want to only acknowledge that one side is guilty of this. Both have been behaving in incredibly shady ways because they do not trust each other, and rather than fixing that they keep demonstrating that there's no reason to. 

I won't speak to the leadership - that's a whole other deal - but your assertion here was the progressives were negotiating in bad faith, somehow, by making promises they knew they couldn't keep.  And this is just factually wrong.  First, it's pretty clear most in the CPC even knew about Manchin's document before today - that's why he decided to distribute it to them today in the first place.  Second, again, as Jayapal said, standing firm on the 3.5 number was a negotiating position.  It's no more of a "promise" than Manchin's 1.5 position is a "promise."

And not for nothing, but it appeared to work.  I said the Dems shouldn't just acquiesce to Manchin's demand if it's as unreasonable as ~ 1.5 trillion, and they're not.  I said the progressives shouldn't pass the BIF until they get a commitment from Manchema, and they've now delayed the vote twice this week.  I said they wouldn't be blamed for this impasse, and again, the fucking White House backed their play.

[Kalbear]

I don't know that anyone who matters is going to blame moderates or progressives exactly. They're just going to blame democrats and Biden, and they'll just use this as reasoning to indicate how democrats can't get anything done even when they are supposedly in control. 

The quibbling of who is more to blame seems to miss that everyone will suffer if nothing is passed. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, DMC said:

LOL, no I'm not.  People will see "vote delayed" which is the current headline for WaPo, NYT, CNN, and ABC, CBS, and NBC news.  None of them assign blame to the progressives.  Neither do the headlines for politico, the hill or axios for that matter.  You're empirically, objectively wrong here.

That's literally what just has populated the sites tonight, because nothing happened. Have you missed how all the same sites you've listed have also regularly had headlines in the last few days about progressives threatening to tank the bill? JFC dude. They didn't tank the bill tonight, so how are they going to get blamed for a punt? 

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Well, no, I never called it a "comprise," because that would be weird.  I did call it a compromise between all the Dem members of the budget committee as well as the framework Manchin and Sinema voted for, because that's what it is.  Which quite obviously means it wasn't pulled out of their ass.

Can't speak about Sinema, but Manchin isn't a dick in that narrow process sense. He voted for the framework while also saying he didn't support it. And yes, if you make a deal with your allies before you compromise with the people you actually have to deal with, that is pulling shit out of your ass and calling it a fair deal. I'm sure you feel the same about Manchin starting at nothing, no? 

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I won't speak to the leadership - that's a whole other deal - but your assertion here was the progressives were negotiating in bad faith, somehow, by making promises they knew they couldn't keep.  And this is just factually wrong.  First, it's pretty clear most in the CPC even knew about Manchin's document before today - that's why he decided to distribute it to them today in the first place.  Second, again, as Jayapal said, standing firm on the 3.5 number was a negotiating position.  It's no more of a "promise" than Manchin's 1.5 position is a "promise."

He made comments about it weeks ago. If this is the first they heard about it, doesn't that speak to the bubbles they could be in? So either they were uninformed or informed and ignoring it. And they stood firm on something they had to know would fail. They had to, or they're incompetent. Now Pelosi is negotiating with the progressives, not the moderates, to try and get them on board because that's the only way out.
 

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And not for nothing, but it appeared to work.  I said the Dems shouldn't just acquiesce to Manchin's demand if it's as unreasonable as ~ 1.5 trillion, and they're not.  I said the progressives shouldn't pass the BIF until they get a commitment from Manchema, and they've now delayed the vote twice this week.  I said they wouldn't be blamed for this impasse, and again, the fucking White House backed their play.

It worked? It's being delayed so progressives can try to save some degree of face. 

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Tywin et al. said:

Have you missed how all the same sites you've listed have also regularly had headlines in the last few days about progressives threatening to tank the bill? JFC dude.

...Yes, because those haven't been the headlines.  The focus has clearly been on Manchema.

4 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

And yes, if you make a deal with your allies before you compromise with the people you actually have to deal with, that is pulling shit out of your ass and calling it a fair deal.

Again, this is just the dumbest perspective ever.  3.5 was the compromise among a representative group of the entire party, sans two Senators.  Which means it's not "pulling shit out of your ass" in any way, shape, or form.

6 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

So either they were uninformed or informed and ignoring it. And they stood firm on something they had to know would fail.

They held firm and Pelosi delayed the vote, again.  So why were they wrong to hold firm?

[ants]

Could you two take the back and forth into private chat? You two are just going around and around and around, thread after thread. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

Even if both bills are passed, and Dem MOCs are proud and slapping each other in the backs, we aren't doing anything remotely sufficient on climate change.  The time for these moderated efforts was 30 years ago.  Yes, defintely better than nothing.  Actually doing anything to turn things around?  Not so much.

 

[Fez]

4 hours ago, larrytheimp said:

Even if both bills are passed, and Dem MOCs are proud and slapping each other in the backs, we aren't doing anything remotely sufficient on climate change.  The time for these moderated efforts was 30 years ago.  Yes, defintely better than nothing.  Actually doing anything to turn things around?  Not so much.

 

Eh, even a $20 trillion bill wouldn't actually solve climate change; basically no amount of investment can. Post-industrial populations are not willing to make the sacrifices needed (and it's not stuff like plastic straws, it's stuff like no more global shipping and far lower quality of at home), developing populations aren't willing to give up on their development and remain permanently a tier below other countries, and the technology simply isn't there to painlessly deal with these issues (e.g., affordable, scalable carbon capture).

Something may eventually change, but it won't happen top down from the government. Best we can hope for there is mitigating the absolute worst of the damage and trying to stop things from getting much worse, and at that metric I think the bill is fine.