XPost: alt.culture.alaska, alt.society.mental-health, alt.business.insurance   
   XPost: alt.business.accountability   
   From: fuck_woke@nbc.com   
      
   How's that headline grab ya?   
      
   “The president requested more time to continue his negotiations,   
   and so we will keep working with him, hand in hand, to bring   
   this bill over the finish line and deliver on these much-needed   
   provisions,” Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.)   
   declared on Friday.   
      
   Translated, this means: “I don’t have the votes for Build Back   
   Better.”   
      
   Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) was not the Grinch who stole BBB.   
   That would be the Congressional Budget Office, which cast a   
   skeptical eye on the Democrats accounting. Assists go to the   
   consumer price index and the producers price index, both of   
   which recently hit highs not seen in decades, and to the Federal   
   Reserve, clearly spooked by those numbers. A perfect storm of   
   common sense, accountants and economists sunk BBB, which would   
   have been gasoline on inflation’s already burning fire.   
      
   Will a social spending bonanza be refloated in the new year?   
   Count on it. Far too many promises have been made to progressive   
   groups whose help Democrats will need to avoid an almost certain   
   wipeout in the 2022 midterm elections. House Speaker Nancy   
   Pelosi (D-Calif.) hates to lose. Yet she continues to ask   
   moderate Democrats to vote on unpopular measures, and then the   
   party is surprised when it gets clobbered, as it did in 2010,   
   when the Blue Team lost 63 seats. Promising much and delivering   
   little doesn’t make for majorities.   
      
   Manchin spoke clearly enough, saying often in effect “I will   
   support close to another $2 trillion in one-time spending. So,   
   what do you want?” Progressives wouldn’t take that “yes” for an   
   answer. Other Senate Democrats were said to be standing behind   
   him and happy to have him take the heat so they did not have to   
   cast a vote that opponents would say powered double-digit   
   inflation in the summer and fall.   
      
   I’ve spent weeks detailing parts of the House’s version of BBB,   
   an absurd, Frankenstein monster of a bill. The waste and   
   featherbedding and gimmicks grew and grew — as did the price tag   
   — even as Democrats insisted it never crossed $2 trillion.   
   Manchin wasn’t having any of it.   
      
   Who looks smart? Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)   
   months ago advised his colleagues to pass an infrastructure bill   
   of one-time spending on roads and bridges that made sense in   
   many places. McConnell’s strategy was to carve out just enough   
   spending for Manchin to support so he could withstand a barrage   
   of assaults from the left. (It helped that Manchin does not   
   appear to care what blue-state politicians or Twitter socialists   
   say about him.)   
      
   Schumer did not have to fumble this ball. He could have been far   
   more vocal about drawing the line at $1.5 trillion or below.   
   It’s the oldest rule in politics: Take what you can get. Schumer   
   misfired this time. Perhaps he won’t in the New Year.   
      
   Applause for McConnell, meanwhile, and a bell tolling for   
   President Biden. Since the fiasco in Afghanistan this summer   
   that permanently scarred his presidency, error has piled on   
   error and, now, another wave of covid-19 is sweeping the   
   country. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson just got his head   
   handed to him in a by-election last week in which the Tories   
   lost a seat the party had held for nearly 200 years. Johnson is   
   a conservative and Biden is a liberal but both sit atop rumbling   
   volcanoes. Neither man seems to have a plan.   
      
   Elsewhere, it looks as though Russian President Vladimir Putin   
   will invade Ukraine again — he did so the first time while   
   Barack Obama was commander in chief. The Chinese pointedly cut   
   the climate summit. The United Arab Emirates put a hold on   
   buying our F-35s and drones while the revived Iran nuclear talks   
   go sideways.   
      
   It’s a dark winter, and not just for those being stalked by   
   covid. Biden, like Obama before him, had a chance to stake a   
   claim the political center. He’s failed. His “unifier” agenda is   
   on the shelf. Don’t expect it to get dusted off in 2022.   
      
   https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/12/19/bbb-biden-   
   democrats-in-disarray/   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)