(The current stalemate in Congress has much to do with this, no?)
The Nasdaq fell the most among Wall Street indexes on Tuesday as technology heavyweights came under pressure from a surge in bond yields on expectations of higher interest rates and rising inflation. …
The two-year U.S. Treasury yield surged to 18-month highs, weighing on shares of high-growth companies whose values are closely linked to future earnings.
Shares of Apple, Microsoft Corp, Amazon.com Inc and Google-parent Alphabet Inc dropped between 1.5% and 1.8%.
These stocks have benefited from the low-interest rate environment since the start of the pandemic.
Nine of the 11 major S&P sectors declined in early trading. …
The party must keep the government funded, stave off a default, push a $1 trillion infrastructure bill to President Biden and secure the votes for a defining climate change and social policy bill. …
This post is a bit off color from my usual haunts but I’ll throw it here:
Texas, Home of Wag the Dog Politics
The recent news of the Trump sponsored and tax payer funded recount is no surprise to anyone seeing the railing against democracy. No, this has nothing to do with prior elections, more so about the future. Include doubt, civil unrest.
Texas Republicans have always been about the future since Ann Richard’s took them to task and embarrassed them on a national stage. Ever since, gerrymandering districts and fixing voting for their favor has been envogue. Newly elected Bill Clinton’s administration wants to gas and set seige in the Branch Dividians, go ahead, “our next candidate” will be the guy who was supposed to stop all of that nonsense before the ATF and FBI were involved.
The current deputizing citizens to create a culture war between the agnostic and the religious gives the people something to fight over, the reporting website a pinata for national news to hit at while the real work is being done behind the scenes to roll back Roe.
Redistricting maps where there is no longer federal authority? Ritual that had been previously hamstrung by roadblocks, unlocked in such a way that would make a Title VII historian vomit.
We have allowed the minority to wag us into doubtful elections that are harder to vote for, while also attacking case law, upending precedent, and throwing enough Sludge, as Thaler would call it, at the courts so that narrow decisions cannot be made. Whilethe moderate Democrats pompously parading false modesty while the other team engages in Gorilla War, we all watch a very slow creep back into the 1950s.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
Except that back in the 1950’s the US constantly ran a trade surplus and really any man that could work hard in skilled labor could have a job that paid well enough to support a family. No, not everything was peachy for brown, yellow, and red people, but things were different than now. So, we are not going back to anything. We are just screwing up everything like never before. Ask any fish what they think, if you can find any fish in the sea. I guess that fish that can live in plastic bottles are doing fine, particularly if they have a high tolerance for carbonic acid.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
The link was for a good article on black employment in the industrial north about 100 years ago. The text would only copy as image and the image would not post, but doubting Thomas should take the link. In any case blacks down south had choices other than farm work also. Laying asphalt sucked, but did not pay that bad, while laying block paid better and sucked less. Black bricklayers in the early post WWII south were living on Easy Street compared to those that laid asphalt, better work and better pay, but more competition from crackers. Finish has always been the best carpentry to be in, but crackers dominate the high end.
(AP) Two key Democratic senators are expected to meet Tuesday with President Joe Biden at the White House as the party works to narrow his $3.5 trillion legislative package and momentum builds to close the deal with centrist and progressive lawmakers.
Sens. Joe Manchin D-W.Va., and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., are linchpins for the final package — two centrist lawmakers who have balked at the price tag and are now under pressure to show Biden what amount they could live with.
Biden is expected to meet separately with Manchin and Sinema as he works to come up with a final number, according to a person familiar with the meetings and granted anonymity to discuss them.
“In the next day or so we hope to come to a place where we can all move forward on that,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters Tuesday at the Capitol.
Pelosi said she had yet to hear a new topline figure from Manchin or Sinema, but indicated that she expects talks to start moving swiftly toward a conclusion that would enable passage of Biden’s package as well as a companion $1 trillion public works bill.
“We have to see what comes of the negotiations that are going on — if they are worthy of the commitments we have made,” she said. “We will pass both bills.”
The behind-the-scenes talks come as Republican senators blocked a bill Monday to keep the government operating and allow federal borrowing. Democrats aiming to avert a shutdown pledged to try again — at the same time pressing ahead on Biden’s big plans to reshape government.
The efforts are not necessarily linked, but the fiscal yearend deadline to fund the government past Thursday is bumping up against the Democrats’ desire to make progress on Biden’s expansive $3.5 trillion social spending and climate legislation. …
First off, Manchin & Sinema are two different political animals. Manchin, I think I understand, but Sinema I don’t. But, they are both here and now and you can’t wish them away and ignore reality.
But, the idea that the $3.5T package is all about the price, I think is not the point, yet that seems to be what everyone is focused on. I see it more as political malpractice, on the part of Progressive Democrats if we were to enact legislation like the $3.5T reconciliation package being proposed by Democratic Progressives. This package (S. Con. Res. 14) is nothing more than an allocation of funding to hundreds of unspecified policies and programs that have never been detailed or presented and explained to the public.
While I voted for Joe Biden and I believe in most of the concepts of the Build Back Better agenda, I did not vote for him or the Democratic party to engage in political malpractice. I would expect that each of the diverse components from climate change to child care and many in-between to be developed in a traditional sense with proposals, hearings, expert testimony, debate, discussion, budgets, votes, compromises and public education and finalization.
The current Democratic $3.5T proposal seems to be saying, for example, “we’re going to address climate change and we’re going to spend X billions over 10 years.” Seemingly skipping all the steps in-between. And now we’re talking about a compromise of something less that $3.5T which still would provide nothing in the way of program development or details. Just dollar numbers developed by who knows, with no details. How is that good government?
The bipartisan “hard” infrastructure proposal was developed over time, discussed, detailed, compromised and passed the Senate with 19 Republican votes. It has widespread public support. Pass the damn thing and as Manchin says, “pause” the $3.5T package and develop it properly. Otherwise, keep screwing around and be prepared to lose everything including the 2022 Midterms and all that follows that.
While I’m not a big Manchin fan, I find little that I disagree with in his latest, September 29 statement: https://tinyurl.com/wpvepyu7
Take a pause till 2022 and there is a good chance it will go away. I suspect this is Manchin‘s hope.
On the other side the programs are popular in West Virginia. It took well over a couple of years to get the ACA going and Ted Kennedy died dooming the passage of the Public Option or LTC. The Senator from Aetna was not in favor of either.
To West Virginia, out-of-state drug companies shipped 20.8 million prescription painkillers to two pharmacies four blocks apart in a Southern West Virginia town with 2,900 people, according to a congressional committee investigating the opioid crisis.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee cited the massive shipments of hydrocodone and oxycodone — two powerful painkillers — to the town of Williamson, in Mingo County, amid the panel’s inquiry into the role of drug distributors in the opioid epidemic.
Where is Manchin’s concern over this or the increased price of EpiPens (which his daughter as upper management of Mylan was mostly responsible for also).
The $3.5 trillion bill is not just infrastructure. It includes such things as healthcare also such as lowering the age of Medicare, etc.
I suspect it would take a few years to just detail what is in the bill. Once passed the detail can be fought over, which it will be.
The Treasury secretary, testifying alongside Jerome H. Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, implored Congress to raise or suspend the nation’s borrowing cap before an Oct. 18 deadline.
Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen warned lawmakers on Tuesday of “catastrophic” consequences if Congress failed to raise or suspend the statutory debt limit in less than three weeks, saying inaction could lead to a self-inflicted economic recession and a financial crisis.
At a Senate Banking Committee hearing where she testified alongside the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome H. Powell, Ms. Yellen laid out in explicit terms what she expects to happen if Congress does not deal with the debt limit before Oct. 18, which the Treasury now believes is when the United States will actually face default. In her most public expression of alarm about the matter, she described the standoff within Congress as a self-inflicted wound of enormous proportions.
Her warnings came as the stock market suffered its worst day since May, as investors fretted over a cocktail of concerns, including the potential for the government to shut down and default on its debt, persistent inflation, the Delta variant and the Fed’s plans to soon withdraw some economic support. The S&P 500 fell 2 percent and yields on government bonds spiked to their highest level since June, reflecting expectations that the Fed will begin to slow its bond purchases as prices rise and the economy heals.
Congress was scrambling to figure out how to resolve its two immediate problems: funding the government past Thursday and raising the debt limit so that the United States can continue borrowing money to pay its bills. …
… After Senate Republicans on Monday blocked an emergency spending bill that would have funded the government through early December and lifted the debt limit, Democrats huddled privately to discuss their options but have not settled on a solution.
In a phone call on Monday, Democratic congressional leaders spoke with President Biden about the possibility of steering around Republican opposition and raising the debt ceiling unilaterally. They could do so by using a fast-track process known as reconciliation that shields fiscal legislation from a filibuster — the same maneuver they are employing to push through their sprawling social policy and climate change bill. But Democrats have publicly resisted that option, which would be complex and time-consuming, and would most likely force them to cast a series of politically tricky votes on an array of issues.
Ms. Yellen warned that the effects of inaction would be felt across the economy: Older adults could see their Social Security payments delayed, soldiers would not know when their paychecks were coming and interest rates on credit cards, car loans and mortgages would rise, making payments more costly, she said. And she suggested that a default would jeopardize the dollar’s status as the international reserve currency, which Democrats argue would be a gift to China.
“It would be disastrous for the American economy, for global financial markets, and for millions of families and workers whose financial security would be jeopardized by delayed payments,” Ms. Yellen said. …
For nearly two decades, lawmakers in Washington have waged an escalating display of brinkmanship over the federal government’s ability to borrow money to pay its bills. They have forced administrations of both parties to take evasive actions, pushing the nation dangerously close to economic calamity. But they have never actually tipped the United States into default.
The dance is repeating this fall, but this time the dynamics are different — and the threat of default is greater than ever.
Republicans in Congress have refused to help raise the nation’s debt limit, even though the need to borrow stems from the bipartisan practice of running large budget deficits. Republicans agree the U.S. must pay its bills, but on Monday they are expected to block a measure in the Senate that would enable the government to do so. Democrats, insistent that Republicans help pay for past decisions to boost spending and cut taxes, have so far refused to use a special process to raise the limit on their own.
Observers inside and outside Washington are worried neither side will budge in time, roiling financial markets and capsizing the economy’s nascent recovery from the pandemic downturn. …
Just to introduce some perspective to the easily convinced, stop-the-steal foolish ones: I would like them to point out where else in the world among rich, modern nations (e.g., France, Australia, Denmark, Canada) elections are being robbed with such frequency and ease. Can they name even one — why us? ???
* * * * * *
Here is my three part proposal to swamp Republican Mussolini tactics with so many votes there is no way Democrats can lose:
Hollywood should make a fictional version of a Republican for-real-steal in the 2024 elections — you know, setting up state legislatures to take away the vote counting from legit mechanisms on purported rationales and giving it to criminally intent co-conspirators. Be a great way to make people understand how Republicans really mean to undermine democracy. Sounds like great material for writers who know how to tell the story — really great material.
Democrats Move to Avert Fiscal Crisis, Separating Debt and Spending Bills
The House was set to move on Wednesday on a bill to increase the debt limit, while the Senate prepared a separate spending bill to keep the government funded past a Thursday deadline.
Democrats in Congress moved on Wednesday to avert a looming fiscal crisis, scheduling a House vote to raise the debt ceiling and preparing a separate spending bill to head off a government shutdown looming at midnight on Thursday.
The Senate could vote as early as Wednesday on the spending bill, which is needed to prevent a lapse in government funding when the fiscal year ends on Thursday and also includes emergency disaster aid. Republicans were expected to support it, after Democrats removed a debt-limit increase that the G.O.P. had refused to back.
That left uncertain the fate of the legislation to raise the statutory limit on federal borrowing, which is on track to be breached by Oct. 18 if Congress does not increase it. House Democrats appear to have the votes to pass their bill, which would lift the cap until Dec. 16, 2022, but Senate Republicans have blocked efforts to advance such legislation in their chamber, where 60 votes are needed to move most measures.
Still, the action on Wednesday appeared to pave the way to clearing the most immediate hurdle Congress faced, as Democratic leaders labored to resolve intraparty divisions that are threatening to derail President Biden’s domestic agenda. …
The House and Senate are rushing to vote Thursday on a short-term spending bill that would fund the government into early December, aiming to overcome a series of last-minute political snags that risk the potential for a shutdown.
The tight timeline leaves lawmakers with just hours to spare before funding lapses for key federal agencies and operations, an outcome that Democrats and Republicans have pledged to avoid given the potential for dire consequences during the coronavirus pandemic.
The Senate is set to take the first steps Thursday morning, holding a series of votes on a measure that sustains current spending levels while provisioning billions of dollars to respond to two recent hurricanes and assist Afghan refugees. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., announced the plans late Wednesday, hours after he urged the chamber to act expediently.
“We can approve this measure quickly and send it to the House, so it can reach the president’s desk before funding expires midnight tomorrow,” he said in a speech earlier in the day. “With so many critical issues to address, the last thing the American people need right now is a government shutdown.”
Republicans say they share a desire to stave off a government shutdown, but some party lawmakers raised policy concerns behind the scenes earlier Wednesday that stalled the measure from swift passage. Some aimed to allocate money for Israel and its missile defense system, for example, and others raised issues related to the process for vetting Afghan refugees newly coming to the United States.
In the end, Republicans secured the ability to offer a series of amendments. That includes a proposal from Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., that would prohibit the government from enforcing any federal mandate requiring private employers and employees obtain the coronavirus vaccine. President Joe Biden earlier this month ordered businesses with more than 100 workers to require immunizations or subject them to weekly testing.
The funding stopgap essentially would sustain federal agencies’ existing budgets until Dec. 3. At that point, Congress must either adopt another short-term fix, known as a continuing resolution, or take more decisive action to approve a set of appropriations bills that could boost agencies’ spending into 2022. No matter the course, the vote would only delay another fight between Democrats and Republicans at a moment of great acrimony over federal spending.
In the meantime, lawmakers have found themselves locked in a partisan battle over another fiscal deadline – a need to raise the country’s debt ceiling before Oct. 18. That borrowing limit allows the government to issue debt to pay its bills. Failing to raise the debt limit could plunge the country into default because the government spends so much more money than it brings in through revenue. Experts say a default would cause a financial calamity that could spark a U.S. recession and rattle global markets.
But Senate Republicans have blocked repeated Democratic efforts this week to raise the debt ceiling, including one bill that had coupled it with additional government funding. GOP lawmakers led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky have said they do not intend to shutter federal agencies – but rather seek to oppose Democrats as they pursue roughly $4 trillion in new spending initiatives sought by Biden. …
… Here are three possible scenarios for how to structure a final deal.
A slightly scaled-back plan that uses budget tricks to hold down the cost.
Senator Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent and chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, initially urged his colleagues to embrace spending as much as $6 trillion over 10 years as they began drafting the bill.
To narrow the scope to its current price tag of $3.5 trillion over 10 years, aides said, Mr. Sanders and his colleagues employed budget gimmicks like setting earlier end dates on programs or narrowing their proposed size to lower their cost.
A lowest-common-denominator $900 billion package that extends existing health and child care benefits.
The easiest fallback for Democrats might be to extend the generous tax credits and other benefits created for a single year in the $1.9 trillion pandemic relief law, known as the American Rescue Plan. According to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan fiscal watchdog group, that skinny option would total $900 billion, still more than President Barack Obama’s 2009 stimulus plan, which, when it passed, was considered huge.
A middle-ground $1.5 trillion bill that invests huge resources in programs to combat climate change.
Progressive Democrats have indicated that they will not vote for the $1 trillion infrastructure bill without ensuring passage of the social welfare and climate change bill. To pass the former without the latter could actually make global warming worse, they argue.
To answer those concerns, Democrats could include the social welfare components of the lowest-common-denominator option — extending the temporary benefits of the American Rescue Plan — while also going big on climate change.
… Mr. Manchin doubled down on his opposition to the $3.5 trillion package in its current form, issuing a blistering statement late Wednesday in which he criticized the ambitions of the bill as the “definition of fiscal insanity.” He did not rule out supporting a slimmed-down version, suggesting he would be willing to reverse some elements of Republicans’ 2017 tax law and expand some social programs — but only if they were subject to income thresholds to ensure federal aid only went to those most in need.
White House officials declined to discuss the details of meetings and discussions with senators, which have intensified in recent days as some Democrats have grumbled that the president needed to play a bigger role in ensuring the success of his agenda.
Andrew Bates, a spokesman for the White House, rejected the criticism, saying Mr. Biden was doing precisely what he needed to.
“He knows how to make his case, he knows how to count votes, and he knows how to deliver for the American middle class,” Mr. Bates said.
But it was unclear, with Republican leaders urging their members to oppose the bipartisan infrastructure bill, whether that legislation could overcome liberal defections on Thursday.
“The plan is to bring the bill to the floor,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters on Wednesday, returning to Capitol Hill after huddling at the White House with Mr. Biden and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader. Asked whether she was concerned about the votes, she added, “One hour at a time.”
Later Wednesday night, Ms. Pelosi could be seen working the phones from the stands of Nationals Stadium near the Capitol, where Republicans and Democrats were facing off for charity in the annual Congressional Baseball Game. Gesticulating as she spoke into a mobile phone, Ms. Pelosi appeared to be having an intense conversation as she fought to keep the infrastructure measure on track.
Mr. Biden also made an appearance at the game, where he chatted with Ms. Pelosi and Democrats, visited the Republican dugout and handed out ice cream bars.
Racing to avoid a government shutdown at midnight, the Senate on Thursday approved a spending bill to extend federal funding through early December and provide emergency aid to support the resettlement of Afghan refugees and disaster recovery efforts across the country.
The legislation passed 65 to 35, and now heads to the House, where it is also expected to be approved, clearing it for President Biden’s signature before funding lapses. …
The legislation passed (the House) 254 to 175, clearing it for President Biden’s signature before funding lapses. The Senate earlier Thursday passed the legislation on a 65 to 35 margin, with 15 Republicans joining all Democrats in favor. …
acing to avoid a government shutdown at midnight, Congress on Thursday gave final approval to a spending bill that would extend federal funding through early December and provide emergency aid to support the resettlement of Afghan refugees and disaster recovery efforts across the country.
The legislation passed 254 to 175, clearing it for President Biden’s signature before funding lapses. The Senate earlier Thursday passed the legislation on a 65 to 35 margin, with 15 Republicans joining all Democrats in favor.
“This is a good outcome — one I am happy we are getting done,” said Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader, speaking on the Senate floor ahead of the vote. “With so many things happening in Washington, the last thing the American people need is for the government to grind to a halt.”
Lawmakers reached a deal on the spending legislation after Democrats agreed to strip out a provision that would have raised the federal government’s ability to continue borrowing funds through the end of 2022. Senate Republicans blocked an initial funding package on Monday over its inclusion, refusing to give the majority party any of the votes needed to move ahead on a bill to avert a first-ever federal default in the coming weeks.
The legislation that passed on Thursday would keep the government fully funded through Dec. 3, giving lawmakers additional time to reach consensus over the dozen annual bills that dictate federal spending. It would provide $6.3 billion to help Afghan refugees resettle in the United States and $28.6 billion to help communities rebuild from hurricanes, wildfires and other recent natural disasters. …
Racing to avoid a government shutdown at midnight, Congress on Thursday gave final approval to a spending bill that would extend federal funding through early December…
Reuters: Wall Street falls as surging bond yields hammer tech shares
(The current stalemate in Congress has much to do with this, no?)
The Nasdaq fell the most among Wall Street indexes on Tuesday as technology heavyweights came under pressure from a surge in bond yields on expectations of higher interest rates and rising inflation. …
The two-year U.S. Treasury yield surged to 18-month highs, weighing on shares of high-growth companies whose values are closely linked to future earnings.
Shares of Apple, Microsoft Corp, Amazon.com Inc and Google-parent Alphabet Inc dropped between 1.5% and 1.8%.
These stocks have benefited from the low-interest rate environment since the start of the pandemic.
Nine of the 11 major S&P sectors declined in early trading. …
NYT: Four Jagged Puzzle Pieces and a Few Weeks for Democrats to Assemble Them
The party must keep the government funded, stave off a default, push a $1 trillion infrastructure bill to President Biden and secure the votes for a defining climate change and social policy bill. …
(Details at the link.)
This post is a bit off color from my usual haunts but I’ll throw it here:
Texas, Home of Wag the Dog Politics
The recent news of the Trump sponsored and tax payer funded recount is no surprise to anyone seeing the railing against democracy. No, this has nothing to do with prior elections, more so about the future. Include doubt, civil unrest.
Texas Republicans have always been about the future since Ann Richard’s took them to task and embarrassed them on a national stage. Ever since, gerrymandering districts and fixing voting for their favor has been envogue. Newly elected Bill Clinton’s administration wants to gas and set seige in the Branch Dividians, go ahead, “our next candidate” will be the guy who was supposed to stop all of that nonsense before the ATF and FBI were involved.
The current deputizing citizens to create a culture war between the agnostic and the religious gives the people something to fight over, the reporting website a pinata for national news to hit at while the real work is being done behind the scenes to roll back Roe.
Redistricting maps where there is no longer federal authority? Ritual that had been previously hamstrung by roadblocks, unlocked in such a way that would make a Title VII historian vomit.
We have allowed the minority to wag us into doubtful elections that are harder to vote for, while also attacking case law, upending precedent, and throwing enough Sludge, as Thaler would call it, at the courts so that narrow decisions cannot be made. Whilethe moderate Democrats pompously parading false modesty while the other team engages in Gorilla War, we all watch a very slow creep back into the 1950s.
Except that back in the 1950’s the US constantly ran a trade surplus and really any man that could work hard in skilled labor could have a job that paid well enough to support a family. No, not everything was peachy for brown, yellow, and red people, but things were different than now. So, we are not going back to anything. We are just screwing up everything like never before. Ask any fish what they think, if you can find any fish in the sea. I guess that fish that can live in plastic bottles are doing fine, particularly if they have a high tolerance for carbonic acid.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2717031
The link was for a good article on black employment in the industrial north about 100 years ago. The text would only copy as image and the image would not post, but doubting Thomas should take the link. In any case blacks down south had choices other than farm work also. Laying asphalt sucked, but did not pay that bad, while laying block paid better and sucked less. Black bricklayers in the early post WWII south were living on Easy Street compared to those that laid asphalt, better work and better pay, but more competition from crackers. Finish has always been the best carpentry to be in, but crackers dominate the high end.
Brickwork laid in black neighborhoods by black masons year ago are still very much in place in Texas. A testimony to the quality of their craft.
Yes, a matter of pride.
Manchin, Sinema to meet with Biden in talks to trim $3.5 trillion bill
First off, Manchin & Sinema are two different political animals. Manchin, I think I understand, but Sinema I don’t. But, they are both here and now and you can’t wish them away and ignore reality.
But, the idea that the $3.5T package is all about the price, I think is not the point, yet that seems to be what everyone is focused on. I see it more as political malpractice, on the part of Progressive Democrats if we were to enact legislation like the $3.5T reconciliation package being proposed by Democratic Progressives. This package (S. Con. Res. 14) is nothing more than an allocation of funding to hundreds of unspecified policies and programs that have never been detailed or presented and explained to the public.
While I voted for Joe Biden and I believe in most of the concepts of the Build Back Better agenda, I did not vote for him or the Democratic party to engage in political malpractice. I would expect that each of the diverse components from climate change to child care and many in-between to be developed in a traditional sense with proposals, hearings, expert testimony, debate, discussion, budgets, votes, compromises and public education and finalization.
The current Democratic $3.5T proposal seems to be saying, for example, “we’re going to address climate change and we’re going to spend X billions over 10 years.” Seemingly skipping all the steps in-between. And now we’re talking about a compromise of something less that $3.5T which still would provide nothing in the way of program development or details. Just dollar numbers developed by who knows, with no details. How is that good government?
The bipartisan “hard” infrastructure proposal was developed over time, discussed, detailed, compromised and passed the Senate with 19 Republican votes. It has widespread public support. Pass the damn thing and as Manchin says, “pause” the $3.5T package and develop it properly. Otherwise, keep screwing around and be prepared to lose everything including the 2022 Midterms and all that follows that.
While I’m not a big Manchin fan, I find little that I disagree with in his latest, September 29 statement: https://tinyurl.com/wpvepyu7
JP
Take a pause till 2022 and there is a good chance it will go away. I suspect this is Manchin‘s hope.
On the other side the programs are popular in West Virginia. It took well over a couple of years to get the ACA going and Ted Kennedy died dooming the passage of the Public Option or LTC. The Senator from Aetna was not in favor of either.
To West Virginia, out-of-state drug companies shipped 20.8 million prescription painkillers to two pharmacies four blocks apart in a Southern West Virginia town with 2,900 people, according to a congressional committee investigating the opioid crisis.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee cited the massive shipments of hydrocodone and oxycodone — two powerful painkillers — to the town of Williamson, in Mingo County, amid the panel’s inquiry into the role of drug distributors in the opioid epidemic.
Where is Manchin’s concern over this or the increased price of EpiPens (which his daughter as upper management of Mylan was mostly responsible for also).
The $3.5 trillion bill is not just infrastructure. It includes such things as healthcare also such as lowering the age of Medicare, etc.
I suspect it would take a few years to just detail what is in the bill. Once passed the detail can be fought over, which it will be.
Yellen Warns of ‘Catastrophic’ Consequences From Debt Limit Breach
America’s Need to Pay Its Bills Has Spawned a Political Game
Just to introduce some perspective to the easily convinced, stop-the-steal foolish ones: I would like them to point out where else in the world among rich, modern nations (e.g., France, Australia, Denmark, Canada) elections are being robbed with such frequency and ease. Can they name even one — why us? ???
* * * * * *
Here is my three part proposal to swamp Republican Mussolini tactics with so many votes there is no way Democrats can lose:
1) https://onlabor.org/why-not-hold-union-representation-elections-on-a-regular-schedule/
2) https://onlabor.org/why-not-hold-union-representation-elections-on-a-regular-schedule/
3) https://onlabor.org/why-not-hold-union-representation-elections-on-a-regular-schedule/
All three be especially exiting for Obama/Trump switchers.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/23/upshot/how-the-obama-coalition-crumbled-leaving-an-opening-for-trump.html
Hollywood should make a fictional version of a Republican for-real-steal in the 2024 elections — you know, setting up state legislatures to take away the vote counting from legit mechanisms on purported rationales and giving it to criminally intent co-conspirators. Be a great way to make people understand how Republicans really mean to undermine democracy. Sounds like great material for writers who know how to tell the story — really great material.
(Again, Lucy with the football?)
(There is nothing in this article about why/how ‘Republicans are expected to back’ anything.)
Republicans are expected to back a bill to avert a shutdown after Democrats moved a debt limit increase into a separate bill.
Congress plans Thursday votes to avert shutdown with just hours to spare before deadline
Congress Expected to Avert Shutdown, but Infrastructure Vote Is in Limbo
Here’s the latest…
Paring back the $3.5 trillion social policy bill would be tough, but there are possibilities
… Here are three possible scenarios for how to structure a final deal.
A slightly scaled-back plan that uses budget tricks to hold down the cost. …
A lowest-common-denominator $900 billion package that extends existing health and child care benefits. …
A middle-ground $1.5 trillion bill that invests huge resources in programs to combat climate change. …
Congress races to avert a government shutdown…
… Mr. Manchin doubled down on his opposition to the $3.5 trillion package in its current form, issuing a blistering statement late Wednesday in which he criticized the ambitions of the bill as the “definition of fiscal insanity.” He did not rule out supporting a slimmed-down version, suggesting he would be willing to reverse some elements of Republicans’ 2017 tax law and expand some social programs — but only if they were subject to income thresholds to ensure federal aid only went to those most in need.
White House officials declined to discuss the details of meetings and discussions with senators, which have intensified in recent days as some Democrats have grumbled that the president needed to play a bigger role in ensuring the success of his agenda.
Andrew Bates, a spokesman for the White House, rejected the criticism, saying Mr. Biden was doing precisely what he needed to.
“He knows how to make his case, he knows how to count votes, and he knows how to deliver for the American middle class,” Mr. Bates said.
But it was unclear, with Republican leaders urging their members to oppose the bipartisan infrastructure bill, whether that legislation could overcome liberal defections on Thursday.
“The plan is to bring the bill to the floor,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters on Wednesday, returning to Capitol Hill after huddling at the White House with Mr. Biden and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader. Asked whether she was concerned about the votes, she added, “One hour at a time.”
Later Wednesday night, Ms. Pelosi could be seen working the phones from the stands of Nationals Stadium near the Capitol, where Republicans and Democrats were facing off for charity in the annual Congressional Baseball Game. Gesticulating as she spoke into a mobile phone, Ms. Pelosi appeared to be having an intense conversation as she fought to keep the infrastructure measure on track.
Mr. Biden also made an appearance at the game, where he chatted with Ms. Pelosi and Democrats, visited the Republican dugout and handed out ice cream bars.
Racing to avoid a government shutdown at midnight, the Senate on Thursday approved a spending bill to extend federal funding through early December and provide emergency aid to support the resettlement of Afghan refugees and disaster recovery efforts across the country.
The legislation passed 65 to 35, and now heads to the House, where it is also expected to be approved, clearing it for President Biden’s signature before funding lapses. …
The Senate passes a short-term spending bill to keep the government open. It heads to the House next.
The legislation passed (the House) 254 to 175, clearing it for President Biden’s signature before funding lapses. The Senate earlier Thursday passed the legislation on a 65 to 35 margin, with 15 Republicans joining all Democrats in favor. …
Congress approves a short-term spending bill to keep the government open, sending it to Biden’s desk
Racing to avoid a government shutdown at midnight, Congress on Thursday gave final approval to a spending bill that would extend federal funding through early December…
how can anyone expect the human race to keep nuclear waste safe for 10,000 years if they can’t even keep it safe for 100?
fracking waste earthquakes are busting open the 10,000-year repository for highly toxic radioactive weapons waste…