The ‘21-‘22 Build Back Better Legislative Battle Scorecard

[Satchel 6,949]

Will Nancy finally meet her Waterloo on the legislative battlefield? Perhaps. The human infrastructure package is on the ropes, even as the Progressive caucus remains resolute to see it through. Late this evening, Nancy called off a vote. That can only mean Manchin and Sinema are refusing to abandon their benefactors. This is shaping up to be an all or nothing battle.

[DonkeyCigars 143]

7 hours ago, Satchel said:

Will Nancy finally meet her Waterloo on the legislative battlefield? Perhaps. The human infrastructure package is on the ropes, even as the Progressive caucus remains resolute to see it through. Late this evening, Nancy called off a vote. That can only mean Manchin and Sinema are refusing to abandon their benefactors. This is shaping up to be an all or nothing battle.

I was assured by @David Dennison that a deal will be done and all the posturing and drama was manufactured for television.

[Js1 85,988]

Pelosi wasn’t going to put it on the floor for a vote just to have it fail last night. The White House didn’t want it put to a floor vote in the House until the reconciliation negotiations are done. 

Both will pass. It won’t be a $3.5T reconciliation bill but both will pass at some point. 

[Js1 85,988]

The American news media rushes to make everything a dramatic horse race.  The ARP got held up for 10 hours before passing. Politics is nasty and dirty but also Americans don’t know how to follow or the media how to cover pretty boring congressional negotiations and voting.  

[OneOfTheOutOfFocusGuys 2,132]

9 hours ago, Satchel said:

Will Nancy finally meet her Waterloo on the legislative battlefield? Perhaps. The human infrastructure package is on the ropes, even as the Progressive caucus remains resolute to see it through. Late this evening, Nancy called off a vote. That can only mean Manchin and Sinema are refusing to abandon their benefactors. This is shaping up to be an all or nothing battle.

AND iT'S NOTHING, BY A NOSE!

[DonkeyCigars 143]

12 minutes ago, Js1 said:

The American news media rushes to make everything a dramatic horse race.  The ARP got held up for 10 hours before passing. Politics is nasty and dirty but also Americans don’t know how to follow or the media how to cover pretty boring congressional negotiations and voting.  

CNN is talking all morning about how everyone is frustrated: progressives are frustrated, moderates are frustrated.

[Js1 85,988]

Just now, DonkeyCigars said:

CNN is talking all morning about how everyone is frustrated: progressives are frustrated, moderates are frustrated.

CNN is treating it like a soap opera for ratings? Must be your first time watching cable news

[David Dennison 19,149]

1 hour ago, Js1 said:

Pelosi wasn’t going to put it on the floor for a vote just to have it fail last night. The White House didn’t want it put to a floor vote in the House until the reconciliation negotiations are done. 

Both will pass. It won’t be a $3.5T reconciliation bill but both will pass at some point. 

This is what will happen. 

[DonkeyCigars 143]

1 hour ago, Js1 said:

CNN is treating it like a soap opera for ratings? Must be your first time watching cable news

I’ve kept CNN on in the hotel room; I never watch any cable at home outside of market news. I thought I’d be fair and balanced and listen to cnn during all this because I’ve been told on here that CNN is not propaganda and is fair and real journalism. You are seeming to imply otherwise…

Edited October 1, 2021 by DonkeyCigars

[Incredulity 11,744]

6 minutes ago, DonkeyCigars said:

I thought I’d be fair and balanced

[Incredulity 11,744]

They are going to pass something.  When and what is the question.  Complete failure would be untenable. 

[yoladu 4,172]

39 minutes ago, Incredulity said:

They are going to pass something.  When and what is the question.  Complete failure would be untenable. 

this is the Democrats we are talking about.

[fuggled 576]

2 hours ago, DonkeyCigars said:

I’ve kept CNN on in the hotel room; I never watch any cable at home outside of market news. I thought I’d be fair and balanced and listen to cnn during all this because I’ve been told on here that CNN is not propaganda and is fair and real journalism. You are seeming to imply otherwise…

"Not propaganda" doesn't mean "not sensationalized."  

[Satchel 6,949]

The whole “breaking news” thing on cable news is tedious.

[Satoshi 129]

5 hours ago, Js1 said:

Pelosi wasn’t going to put it on the floor for a vote just to have it fail last night. The White House didn’t want it put to a floor vote in the House until the reconciliation negotiations are done. 

Both will pass. It won’t be a $3.5T reconciliation bill but both will pass at some point. 

So Manchin has said $1.5T is his max. Progressives want $3.5T. Split the difference?

[DonkeyCigars 143]

27 minutes ago, Satoshi said:

So Manchin has said $1.5T is his max. Progressives want $3.5T. Split the difference?

Progressives want $6T

[Satchel 6,949]

28 minutes ago, Satoshi said:

So Manchin has said $1.5T is his max. Progressives want $3.5T. Split the difference?

I respect the way the Progressive Caucus has played this so far. They’ve insisted on 3.5 being the floor while privately acknowledging there’s wiggle room in that number

[Js1 85,988]

57 minutes ago, Satoshi said:

So Manchin has said $1.5T is his max. Progressives want $3.5T. Split the difference?

That’s not his max. You’re misinformed, as usual. 

[Satoshi 129]

14 minutes ago, Js1 said:

That’s not his max. You’re misinformed, as usual. 

I’m just going off this. Posturing I’m guessing but what he’s stating. 

 

[Incredulity 11,744]

A leftist wishcasting.  No Wai!!!!

[Satchel 6,949]

He’s right and I think that will happen during the next election cycle.

[Satoshi 129]

 

[Incredulity 11,744]

well, this horse race is getting interesting.

I am still in the something gets done camp, but each hour changes that significantly. At this point someone is going home PISSED.

 

[Incredulity 11,744]

...infrastructure week...next week?

[Satoshi 129]

42 minutes ago, Incredulity said:

...infrastructure week...next week?

Nothing is happening until next week 

[Satchel 6,949]

3 hours ago, Incredulity said:

well, this horse race is getting interesting.

I am still in the something gets done camp, but each hour changes that significantly. At this point someone is going home PISSED.

 

I’m guessing both will be signed into law with the human infrastructure bill topping out at around 2 trillion. That’s a win-win if all of the provisions remain in the bill.

[Js1 85,988]

43 minutes ago, Satchel said:

I’m guessing both will be signed into law with the human infrastructure bill topping out at around 2 trillion. That’s a win-win if all of the provisions remain in the bill.

$1.7 to $2T probably over 5 years instead of 10

[Satoshi 129]

Looks like we’ll have to circle back 

[Satchel 6,949]

Pelosi may have been born long before the earth’s crust cooled, but she won’t stop until she’s beaten the younger legislators into submission.

[Satchel 6,949]

WASHINGTON — Progressive Democrats in Congress, who have long promoted a bold, liberal agenda but often shied away from using hardball tactics to achieve it, did something unusual this week: They dug in.

The nearly 100-member caucus refused to support a $1 trillion infrastructure bill that is a major piece of President Biden’s agenda, seeking leverage for a bigger fight.

Their stance forced Speaker Nancy Pelosi to delay a planned voteon the measure and ultimately prompted Mr. Biden to side with them in saying that there could be no vote on the infrastructure legislation until agreement on a far broader, multitrillion-dollar social policy and climate measure.

The maneuver drew plaudits from liberal activists who had watched with dismay in the past as their allies in Congress caved to pressure from Democratic leaders and surrendered in policy fights. And it signaled that the progressives enjoyed newfound influence, including the backing of a president long associated with his party’s moderates

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/01/us/politics/progressive-democrats-infrastructure.html

[Satoshi 129]

Progressives in Arizona pursuing the Taylor Hamm method of persuasion. Bold move, Cotton. 
 

 

[Neonmoon 38,130]

Well they didn’t have the money for a private meeting 

[Js1 85,988]

You should never follow someone into the bathroom to harass them. That’s weird.  Wait for her outside the door and keep going then. 

[washparkhorn 9,952]

Who has sold out (not-Repubs - they sold out a long long time ago):

It sounds bizarre, but a $1,117.40 summer internship at a vineyard in the heart of California wine country may prove the ultimate saga in how Big Money has permanently broken American politics. It was as seen on TV this past week in Washington, where squabbling Democrats and an obstructionist GOP is showing the middle class why we can’t have nice things.

The eager worker who showed up during the coronavirus summer of 2020 was no ordinary summer intern, but a then-44-year-old United States senator: Democrat Kyrsten Sinema. That Sinema (who makes $174,000 a year at her day job) would spend a week picking and maybe stomping on grapes in Napa Valley for some pocket change actually isn’t totally shocking for the Senate’s most iconoclastic member — atheist and bisexual with a defiant openness, and a marathoner with a Ph.D. in justice.

What’s more noteworthy is who was hosting Sinema and paying her four-figure intern salary during that wine-soaked summer: Billionaire Bill Price, who not only owns the Three Sticks winery in Sonoma but also co-founded one of America’s most lucrative private-equity funds, TPG Capital. At the end of her internship, Price did something worth more than his intern’s modest paycheck: He hosted a $5,000-a-ticket fundraiser that benefited both the Arizona senator’s campaign but also a PAC that supports a gaggle of centrist — i.e., anti-progressive — Democrats on Capitol Hill. The Intercept reported that the vineyard fundraiser was a key stop on a Sinema summer 2020 tour that netted campaign cash from Price, his TPG Capital associates, and Silicon Valley legends like billionaire Bill Gates.

Flash forward to the politically fraught autumn of 2021, and Sinema’s opaque obstructionism has become the grapes of wrath for President Biden and their fellow Democrats seeking to invest $350 billion a year to continue child tax credits for the middle class, expand child care, fight climate change and offer free community college. The plan is foundering largely because of vague but obstinate opposition from Sinema and her money-soaked doppelganger Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, when Democrats need all 50 of their senators onboard. Advocates believe the real problem is how Biden and his allies want to pay for this: Largely by raising taxes on Sinema’s filthy rich patrons such as Price and Gates.

 

Spoiler

This week, with both Biden’s $3.5-trillion-over-10-years “human infrastructure” plan and a smaller but important traditional infrastructure bill (roads, bridges, broadband, etc.) on the brink of possible collapse, activists — including Arizona’s progressives who elected Sinema in 2018 and now regularly protest outside her Phoenix office — desperately wanted to ask their senator what’s going on. Instead, they learned she was at an undisclosed location holding another fundraiser with five business groups that oppose the middle-class boosting legislation.

I’m writing this on the last day of September — once the Democrats’ self-imposed deadline for passing Biden’s ambitious economic agenda — and anything still can happen, maybe even by the time you’re reading this. It’s possible that a deal for a smaller package — one that goes easier on Simema’s private-equity donors or on the planet-destroying coal industry that’s made Manchin a houseboat/yacht sailing millionaire — will be struck. But it’s just as likely, perhaps more so, that this anti-dynamic duo are essentially political suicide bombers waging a jihad for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, blowing up Biden’s presidency, any chance for a Democratic Congress after 2022, and likely even their own careers.

Why?

As the Democratic agenda verges on unraveling, thousands of trees have been slaughtered to write lengthy analyses about the mind of the Democratic “moderate” — a mislabeling of these political extremists who do the bidding of 1 Percent millionaires and billionaires over the middle-class voters who elected them. I’ve read tortured explanations of the political strategy behind Sinema’s stranger-than-fiction, lifelong evolution from Green Party anti-capitalist radical to Napa Valley hedge-fund hobnobber. She now sees herself as an independent “maverick” like her home state’s Republican legend, the late Sen. John McCain.

But the reality is that Simema seems to be acting on a political death wish: The Democrats who once supported her are looking to primary her out of office in 2024, and even if she survives that, Republicans who now applaud her anti-progress stance are sure to vote for whatever Trump-fried wackadoodle comes down the pike in the general election. Sinema’s relentless rise to a place where she can single-handedly blow up the nation’s politics seems explained by an easy willingness to chuck any principles for rank, careerist narcissism — and that narcissism is now drawn like the proverbial vampire squid to Big Money.

 

I think the political pundit class is really overthinking what’s going down in Washington this week. The story of Team Biden’s shrinking ambition in 2021 is the story of American politics since the 1980s: Very rich people and their corporations’ ability to buy off prominent politicians to promote inequality at the expense of a shrinking middle class. It’s taken decades of hard work for progressive-minded activists to knock on millions of doors or raise dollars in $27 chunks from working people to finally assemble a coalition on the brink of 218 House votes and 50 senators plus a vice president to restore some balance for the 99 Percent. But the incumbent plutocrats only need to peel off just one or two votes to keep their warped status quo — which is what they’re doing now.

Consider:

— One key element of the Democratic/Biden agenda for aiding the middle class — allowing Medicare programs to use their buying clout to negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs — appears to be blocked by the firm opposition of 10 so-called “moderate” Democrats who, in a remarkable coincidence, seem to have received large donations from Big Pharma executives and its industry PAC in 2021.

— West Virginia’s Manchin — Sinema’s non-identical twin in blocking most progressive legislation — not only profits personally from his family investments in fossil fuels, but reports have chronicled how he meets regularly with business lobbyists to map out strategy. This includes a boast from a key player at the world’s largest oil giant, Exxon/Mobil, who says the company maintains an open line of communication with Manchin’s staff.

— The leading Democratic roadblock to enacting the entire Biden agenda in the House is New Jersey Rep. Josh Gottheimer, who co-chairs the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus which has done nothing but create problems when it comes to economic aid for the middle class. You’ll be shocked, I’m sure, to learn that Gottheimer is also the House’s largest recipient of campaign donations from the private equity industry, with especially close ties to powerful Blackstone Group, a listed client of the lobbying firm that employs Gottheimer’s wife.

None of this is meant to offer a free pass to Republicans, whose pro-business, pro-billionaire policies are embedded in their DNA, and whose burn-it-to-the-ground brand of obstructionism is what forces the Democrats to struggle for the unanimity they need to pass virtually anything. But the fact that narrow, wealthy special interests control a working majority in both houses of Congress is proof that our tolerance for Big Money in American politics is our original sin, and this has been going on for decades now.

In fact, if the two intertwined infrastructure bills implode this autumn, or if the pro-middle-class measure shrinks to the level of triviality, the failure won’t really be on the legislation itself, but rather the failure of Congress to enact a different measure: The For the People Act that aimed to take a whack at money in politics. Although it wouldn’t have eliminated the power of campaign cash altogether, the bill — which narrowly passed the House with only Democratic votes in March — includes several giant steps to clean up our campaign-finance mess, including a ban on untraceable, massive “dark money” donations.

The For the People Act — at least its most progressive, un-neutered version — is going nowhere in the Senate, blocked by a Republican-led filibuster. As a result of this, as well as stalled voting-rights legislation, a growing number of Democrats are willing to break with 200 years of warped precedent and either fully or at least partially kill the filibuster. Again, all 50 Democrats would need to be on board. Again, two of them are rigidly opposed to progress - Joe Manchin, and Kyrsten Sinema.

Whatever happened in that California vineyard, Sinema is clearly still drunk on her own power, and maybe the power of her new best friends in private equity and in Silicon Valley that she now gets to pal around with. The Arizonan is threatening aid to working-class parents, expanded child care, a free shot at community college, and the war on global warming that’s been burning up her home state, all for a solo performance of “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going” that’s 10 times more dramatic than’s Jennifer Holliday’s best work. If Sinema really wants to take her renowned fashion sense to new heights, she should also reach across the aisle to Melania Trump to ask to borrow that stylish jacket: “I really don’t care, do u?”

Will Bunch, Columnist, Philadelphia Inquirer - https://www.inquirer.com/columnists/attytood/kyrsten-sinema-blocks-biden-agenda-money-politics-20210930.html

 

Edited October 4, 2021 by washparkhorn

[Satchel 6,949]

19 hours ago, Js1 said:

You should never follow someone into the bathroom to harass them. That’s weird.  Wait for her outside the door and keep going then. 

She won’t hold town halls or do anything else to meet with constituents who supported her. Protesters gotta do what protesters do.

[Js1 85,988]

2 minutes ago, Satchel said:

She won’t hold town halls or do anything else to meet with constituents who supported her. Protesters gotta do what protesters do.

Sorry, I do not agree.  They could have stood outside the bathroom waiting for her to come back out.  They followed a woman into a bathroom with cameras.  That's fucking disgusting.  Other people could have been in there as well. 

[956 Worldwide 35,026]

Yeah, this is a good test of “has my partisanship made me lose perspective.” 
 

If you can find a universe where it’s ok for say, gun-rights nuts to follow someone into the shitter with cameras on, then go nuts with this one. Otherwise, you’re just ok with it because you agree with them. 

[Satchel 6,949]

2 minutes ago, Js1 said:

Sorry, I do not agree.  They could have stood outside the bathroom waiting for her to come back out.  They followed a woman into a bathroom with cameras.  That's fucking disgusting.  Other people could have been in there as well. 

Yeah, well. Protesting can get pretty ugly. And that’s as it should be.
 

[DonkeyCigars 143]

4 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Yeah, this is a good test of “has my partisanship made me lose perspective.” 
 

If you can find a universe where it’s ok for say, gun-rights nuts to follow someone into the shitter with cameras on, then go nuts with this one. Otherwise, you’re just ok with it because you agree with them. 

[Satchel 6,949]

6 minutes ago, DonkeyCigars said:

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Sinema is saying screw you to Dreamers who worked for her. Had she not hidden in the restroom, we wouldn’t be talking about this.

Edited October 4, 2021 by Satchel

[washparkhorn 9,952]

Fuck her. In an earlier cosplay, Sinema protested with Code Pink. Remember them Kyrsten? Karma is a bitch.

 

[DonkeyCigars 143]

So where are we at with the voting and such?

[Bullneck 19,331]

23 hours ago, Satoshi said:

Progressives in Arizona pursuing the Taylor Hamm method of persuasion. Bold move, Cotton. 
 

 

I'd feel bad for her if she weren't so worthless.  But she's bringing it on herself.

[Cacti 191]

5 hours ago, Satchel said:

Had she not hidden in the restroom, we wouldn’t be talking about this.

 

2 hours ago, Bullneck said:

But she's bringing it on herself.

By attempting to hide in the bathroom, Sinema clearly provoked the student.

Walking into a sleazy bar wearing a miniskirt is less provocative than what the Senator did. She was asking for it.

[Bullneck 19,331]

24 minutes ago, Cacti said:

 

By attempting to hide in the bathroom, Sinema clearly provoked the student.

Walking into a sleazy bar wearing a miniskirt is less provocative than what the Senator did. She was asking for it.

Uh, no.  

By running into the arms of the donor class and seemly not having any idea of what she's doing or what she was elected to do and why, we have an impasse.  America has a Krysten problem.  Joe Manchin can at least point to some numbers.  She evades her responsibility. Like someone on this board said, being a Senator was on her bucket list.  

[956 Worldwide 35,026]

This is at least as much about the other people you live in society with as it is about the senator. I know it’s a radical thought but people should be able to use the shitter without a bunch of filming and shouting about politics. Just because Sinema won’t hold a town hall doesn’t mean I have to attend one involuntarily while trying to drop a deuce.

It’s one thing if she’s voting on deportation of Jews to the east or something, but these are freaking spending and infrastructure bills. The nonstop outrage and moral panic that justifies anything has to get turned off, this is the exact mentality of the Fox News junkie. Part of the genius of free, democratic societies is the option and ability to cordon off spaces where political debate doesn’t intrude. The mentality that leads one into a public bathroom to scream about spending bills is totalitarian in the literal sense. 

 

[workswithseed 2,135]

5 hours ago, Bullneck said:

Uh, no.  

By running into the arms of the donor class and seemly not having any idea of what she's doing or what she was elected to do and why, we have an impasse.  America has a Krysten problem.  Joe Manchin can at least point to some numbers.  She evades her responsibility. Like someone on this board said, being a Senator was on her bucket list.  

Yeah, fuck that. Are you one of those that think the personal is political people? 

[Neonmoon 38,130]

I don’t agree they should have followed her into the bathroom, but that doesn’t forgive her for running to the bathroom to avoid her own constituents. She’s a piece of shit. But yes, they should have waited for her outside. Of course, we all know she would have called security to avoid talking to her constituents 

Edited October 5, 2021 by Neonmoon
grammer nazis

[WhatTheBuck 28,854]

*have

*have

*would have

Edited October 5, 2021 by WhatTheBuck

[Mrs Whiggins 13,050]

1 hour ago, Neonmoon said:

I don’t agree they should of followed her into the bathroom, but that doesn’t forgive her for running to the bathroom to avoid her own constituents. She’s a piece of shit. But yes, they should of have waited for her outside. Of course, we all know she would of have called security to avoid talking to her constituents 

 

25 minutes ago, WhatTheBuck said:

*have

*have

*would have

I agree.

She should NOT have been followed into the bathroom.

She should NOT have run away from her constituents by fleeing to the bathroom but could have pre-empted that by saying she would meet with them after powdering her nose.

They should have waited outside for however long it took for her to do so.

The two senators are attempting to have it all ways and are not fulfilling their duties but that could be said for many of the elected officials these days.