America Didn’t Elect This Joe

Trump and Manchin. Looks like a Junior Prom photo.

I had hoped after I finished my last article on West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin I was done talking about him, just like I had hoped we were all done talking about Donald Trump after November 2020.

But here we/I are, talking about both Joe and Donald still, one for being obstinate and clueless, refusing to let the outdated past go and the other…

Well, for pretty much the same thing.

This weekend Trump gave what had to be the laziest, more low energy speech I’ve ever seen him give, playing the hits for the crowd (stolen election, covid not his fault, Trump good, Biden bad) like a 60s band of on the second to last date of a year long 50th Reunion Tour of dive bars; tired, bored of their own crap, and ready to go back to the greenroom party. Really, I think Trump is a horrible human being, but he can fire up a crowd, and play it like Satan’s golden fiddle. This time, he seemed to be playing Satan’s cousin’s borrowed tambourine. Dead, boring, droning and not wanting to be there. Even Fox News didn’t bother showing it, one of the few times I’ve agreed with Fox.

Trump made no real news, said nothing that wasn’t predicted by nearly everyone, and the biggest takeaway seemed to be that he was wearing something beneath his pants. Maybe an adult diaper, maybe not, but still odd. Can’t say I really care. We’ll see what kind of things he says at the rallies he’s starting to book, to the people who show up to worship His Orangeness. He’s down, but his not out.

Fucking Joe Manchin.

Really, so tired of this man. The world’s most aggravating politician, friend of Donald Trump, shooter of bills he doesn’t like, and almighty Emperor of Bipartisanship, Manchin has now fully come out against the Democrats voting rights reforms, stating he refuses to modify or “weaken” the filibuster, that undemocratic relic that has been used to stop progress for decades. Seriously. Joe Manchin is more interested in protecting the rights of the minority in the Senate, than protecting the rights of minority voters. A bill that protects the voting rights of the American people is too ‘partisan’.

Too partisan.

Making sure people can exercise their right to vote, that states will have to be free and fair in their districting, that they must be answerable to the Constitution, is ‘partisan’? That’s nuts. It makes no sense, unless bowing to the GOP’s screwing of those who dare not vote for them is somehow ‘non-partisan’.

Insanity.

I don’t understand his endgame here. Does he really believe his own crap? Is he really thinking the Republicans are operating in good faith? Where are his ten Republicans, good and true, who are ready to help Biden fix this country?

They aren’t there, and won’t be.  

I’m sure Joe believes he’s the hero here, the one saving democracy from those damn liberals intent on destroying it, hell, we’re all the hero in our own Hollywood screenplay. But the nation did not elect Joe Manchin. For the past ten years, with McConnell in the Senate, (and then Trump in the White House) we have had a minority-ruled government, where people not elected by the majority of Americans, thwart what the majority of American voters want. The minority gets to say ‘no’ to the majority, over and over again. With little to no consequences. They have done this with the filibuster, using this archaic instrument to smash and kill everything not proposed by them.

Long past time for that to change.  

I don’t think Joe’s a stupid person, in fact, I think he’s fairly intelligent. This is all about being a Democrat in a deep red state. If he can stall the popular Biden agenda with silly ‘bipartisan’ nonsense, it gives him cover at election time. Maybe I’m wrong, but I bet I’m not. A political calculation is holding back the necessary reforms needed to keep this ‘American Experiment’ safe and functioning. Much like his Friend Trump, he’s willing to gamble country for reelection.

But if he really wanted to do something about the filibuster, but keep it in place, he easily could.

He could have proposed a ‘talking’ filibuster, as used to be the case (see ‘Mr. Smith Goes to Washington’, no, really, go see it), or he propose could flipping the vote requirements. Right now, the majority has to get 60 votes, but the minority doesn’t have to do anything, nada, squat. Make the minority prove they have the 40 it would take to uphold their filibuster. Make them gather them up for every vote, and then spring votes on them, make them work to keep their filibuster going. My bet is they’re going to get sick of the whole thing pretty quickly and give in.

There are ways to fix it and still keep it, lords knows why.

But Manchin has proposed nothing. Nothing. He made a couple feints at the beginning of congress, sounding almost reasonable, and but just wants to stamp his foot and hold his breath. If this were a terrible sitcom, we’d have a shot of Manchin, arms crossed and shaking his head, saying “You can’t make me, you can’t make me!” and then cut to him voting ‘yes’ on the bills.

But this isn’t ‘Gilligan’s Isle’, and we’re all the worse for it. At least Gilligan listened to his Skipper.

Manchin has proposed nothing but hope. He ‘hopes’ he can get more of his bipartisan, Republican pals to come to his party, over time, but until then he’s going to keep the rec-room lights on, the punchbowl filled, the chips and dip laid out, and Buck Owens on the turntable. And he’ll sit in that old recliner (with the handle on the side), just waiting for his buddies to leave the frat and show up.

Like we have all the time in the world to save democracy.  

What the F**k, Joe Manchin?!!!

WV Senator Joe Manchin, contemplating how he’s going to screw the Democrats.

I don’t get it.

Seriously, I really don’t.

Senator Joe Manchin just announced for Biden’s Infrastructure bill to pass, it has to be ‘bipartisan’. Yes, you saw that, ‘bipartisan’. Joe seems to think the GOP is ready and willing to pass anything that might help average Americans, and thus maybe reflect well on President Joe Biden. No, Joe, that won’t happen, ever, not if the Republicans can help it. And Hey! With the help of their buddy Manchin, they can help it!

Joe Manchin is helping to kill the very popular agenda of a Democratic president, a member of Manchin’s very own party. This is a bill that would greatly benefit his own constituents, the very people who elected him to help them!!!

I…It’s just that... It’s like…

I got nothing.

It’s just fucking insane.

I’ve been buying this ‘man of the Senate’ crap, at least for a while. I gave him some line... Let it play it out... Thinking, ‘Well, maybe he’s sincere about this’ but now… gotta cut that line. He’s not interested in actually helping people, even those back in his home state. He seems to care more about burnishing his own brand than helping his voters. He’s playing to his base, without actually delivering for that base. He’s David Copperfield, preforming the illusion of legislating while actually just waving his hands and throwing up smoke.  

In other words, he’s a Republican.

He was already in cement up to his knees with the ‘no tampering with the filibuster’ pledge, now he’s up to his neck, dead set on killing the infrastructure bill, hell, the whole Biden agenda, unless ten Republicans sign on.

I don’t understand what his game is here, unless he’s playing a re-election game with the people of West Virginia, polishing his ‘bipartisan, man-in-the-middle’ image at the expense of, well, our democracy. Kyrsten Sinema’s game is more transparent and pretty damn disgusting, but comes down the same thing, but with more “maverick” trimmings ala the rep John McCain was supposed to have during his senate tenure. Could it really be that openly callous? Or is he actually that clueless as to who and what the current bunch of radical Republicans are? They’re not conservatives and haven’t been since Reagan; they’re insurgents, radicals pretending to be ‘conservative’ but unable to define what they are for, only what they are against. And what they are against is allowing Democrats air to breathe… literally.

Senator, we need to talk.

———————————————-

Dear Joe, old buddy, ‘ol building-and-loan-pal,

Well, Joe, where are they? Where are the Magical Republicans, ready and eager to sign on to help save the crumbling physical and mental infrastructure of America? Where are the ten brave GOP souls who want to bust out of Mr. Mitch’s Reform School for Trumpaholics (secret cure, more Trump), step into the sun and proclaim they want to help Americans?

Yes… that is the sound of crickets, and not the cool Buddy Holly kind.

Joe, if you want this bill to be bipartisan, why don’t you and Kyrsten get out there and convince those ten to step forward and vote with you? Frankly, because you can’t. I do believe if the filibuster weren’t in play (though it always is, isn’t it?) you just might get those votes. But, since this is the party of Trump, and especially the Senate of Mitch McConnell, (Minority Leader be damned) you won’t get them. You know it.

You know it, Joe.

Time to pack it up. You lost this one. Time for the agenda that 80 million people voted for to go forward. Time for you and Senator Sinema to accept the fact you’re being/been played. Time to help the people of West Virginia get their roads, bridges fixed, get the childcare they need, and help with their aging parents. Time to give them the relief promised. Time to be a different kind of hero, Joe, one that gets things done for the people who elected him.

Time to deliver for the people.  

Magical Republicans be damned.

Mitch Has a Message For America

Mitch might be putting up a thumb, but he’s really thinking ‘middle finger’.

There was a time, and I’m not completely crazy here, when politicians actually tried to help people other than themselves. Or at least they helped other people while helping themselves. Something got done, benefits at least trickled out occasionally to ordinary Americans and the country lurched slowly forward.

 Yeah, those were good… times?

All that’s done now, and has been for the last few decades. Helping people had its run, but we’re on to other things now. We’re in the age of announcing, via statements to the DC press, that we’re helping ourselves as policy and acting as if that is a benefit, as if that was what we were elected to do in the first place. Hurting the country and their own voters as if that is what those voters wanted all along. “Please, make sure our lives are harder, our struggles more painful so you win more power!”

“Can do!”

Kentucky Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is always one to put his own power and that of his party before the good of the country. We saw that under Obama with McConnell’s proclamation that his job was to make Obama a ‘one-term president’. Fought everything, from healthcare for the uninsured, to stimulus designed to get us out of a financial disaster presided over by Obama’s Republican predecessor. This opposition lengthened the recovery by years, needlessly causing financial pain to Americans. Now, he’s at it again.

This time McConnell has said “One hundred percent of my focus is on stopping this new administration.” Not on helping the American people, not on getting the country back to sanity after a devastating pandemic that killed well over a half million people, not trying to revive the economy, no. Petty politics is where his head is, preserving his own power at the cost of the country is his goal, but then it always was.

Not only did he try to kill the covid relief bill, now he’s trying to kill infrastructure, voting rights, and a bi-partisan investigation into the origins and happenings of the January 6th insurrection. After the Democrats gave basically everything the GOP was asking for, he proclaims it ‘not enough’. He not only is trying to kill it by allowing a filibuster, he’s also lying about the nature and makeup of the committee itself.  

Why?

He’s worried it could “could hurt the party’s midterm election message,” which is ‘Biden is horrible, he’s done nothing (because we made sure he could do nothing), he’s too ‘woke’, he destroying America, so vote for us’. He’s worried finding out the truth about an attack on the US Capitol would somehow hurt the GOP’s message. Scared of the truth.

Again, why? They claim it was ‘antifa’ and Black Lives Matter supporters, now is their chance to prove it.

Why is the GOP afraid of what a bi-partisan look at the insurrection would find? Well, they must know it was their supporters out there beating police, using the very Trump flags they were flying as blunt weapons to put cops in the hospital, smash windows, and use the shields stripped from the police to break down the doors of the Capitol. Instead of facing up to this fact, and dealing with the fallout and the lies that brought us all to that day and to this, to try to protect themselves and their colleagues from further attacks…

…they filibustered it. Ignore it, and the insurrectionists will just go away.

I hear Joe Manchin is oh so very shocked and disappointed. The very thing that nearly everyone told him would happen, that the GOP would block everything regardless of benefit no matter what, has happened.

And I hear there’s gambling in the back room at Rick’s.

And then McConnell announced opposition to police reform that does away with ‘qualified immunity’, the bizarre rule that lets police get away with civil and criminal acts (like killing people), upending negotiations his own party member Tim Scott is carrying on with the Senate Democrats.  

So, no money for crumbling infrastructure, childcare, elder care, no police reform, no voting reform and protection, no investigation into the threat against our democracy, all because it “could hurt the party’s midterm election message.”

The Republican message seems to be “Fuck You.”

And nothing has stopped them from getting that message out in the last 40+ years.

Are you finally listening, Senators Manchin and Sinema?