To a significant degree, we may be governed for the next two years by Manchinism.
Sen. Joe Manchin, Democrat of West Virginia, the most conservative member of the Democratic Senate caucus, has enormous power over everything Democrats might want to accomplish. How he uses this leverage will perhaps make him as consequential, or perhaps more, than Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York.
And Manchin said in a Wednesday interview in the Washington Post that he is all about “bipartisanship,” a word that appears six times in that article. In that interview Manchin stated flatly that he will not go along with the urge among many Democrats to do away with or in any weaken the Senate filibuster rule.
Bipartisanship is nice, as far as it goes. But the current situation strains it to the limits. The Senate is divided 50-50 by party (counting Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King of Maine, both of whom call themselves independents but caucus with the Dems).
But Manchin, a lifelong Democrat but perhaps the most conservative and most independent of them all in the Senate, is not terribly susceptible to pressure from his party, since he is likely the only candidate who can hold that Senate seat for the Democrats in West Virginia, a state in which Trump beat Biden by a staggering 69-30 percent margin.
Schumer, a mainstream liberal and smart strategist, would like as much as possible to pass the programs of President Joe Biden (also a mainstream liberal and also a major expert on how things work in the Senate, where he served for 36 years).
Schumer and Biden will be big figures for at least the next two years, but it’s not hard to argue that Manchin is the third big player on the Democratic side.
The far-left members of the Senate caucus, perhaps personified by Sanders, seem to understand that however much they favor a big, progressive agenda, they may have to settle for whatever the somewhat more moderate Biden favors. But it’s also becoming clear that they need Manchin’s vote for just about anything they want to do.
Assuming – and this seems for the moment to be a widely shared assumption – that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell can hold together his 50-member caucus to block most things Biden might want to do, Manchin’s unwillingness to support a change in the filibuster rule is a big deal.
If we take at face value Manchin’s stance, just reaffirmed, that he will not support weakening the filibuster, it’s completely baffling. Without the filibuster, Manchin will be the essential vote for the majority and will be in a position to obtain almost anything he wishes in exchange for that vote. With the filibuster in place, apart from reconciliation no legislation will pass, period. So Manchin’s vote will be as worthless as that of every other Senator.
Even if one thinks Manchin not to be very bright, assuredly he is not this not-very-bright. So the question is, what is he really thinking.
Maybe he’s thinking of the self-interest of his state and frankly of himself. He’s just taking a longer view of it – beyond the next 2 to 4 years.
I applaud, at least in theory, the desire for bipartisanship. My issue is that you can’t have unilateral bipartisanship. So as long as Republicans are unwilling – even from the minority – to make meaningful compromise there won’t be bipartisanship of any sort.
My puzzlement is based on the assumption that Manchin is driven by self-interest, and WV interest as he understands it. Again, I may be missing something, but it seems obvious that without the filibuster, he’s the deciding vote on all majority legislation, and so can roll the bacon home all day long, barrel after barrel, and be the most popular guy in the state. I can’t think of what a different, long view benefit would be of his ensuring that the Senate can’t act and that he procures no benefit for WV thru his presence in it.
Respectfully, I very much don’t applaud the desire for bipartisanship. First, it’s not credible, given that the Republican party denounced bipartisanship 27 years ago and hasn’t moved an inch since – so Manchin’s expressed desire means either he is deluded, or he is being dishonest as to his motivation. Second, I’m all for bipartisanship between two parties with shared American values and different ideas about how to work toward them. Bipartisanship between one party working toward American values and one that is seeking to tear it all down so that a few very powerful guys can rule over the ruins, that’s kind of different. I’m not sure what half the distance means in that context, but I’m not for it.
Unfortunately, when one has been sold a “culture war” (and bought it hook, line and sinker), I’d guess white reactionaries are not amenable to an old-style pol merely bringing home the bacon, when they have been told 24/7 by Hate Radio that blocking every lib’rul agenda item is the only way to “save the country”.
I agree. The democrats are full stream ahead on destroying American valises.
Stop the war on luggage!
As is too often the case in our system, Manchin represents a small, rural state with a population smaller than that of the Twin Cities metro, yet finds himself in a position to exert tremendous leverage on national policy, both foreign and domestic. He will likely use that leverage as much as he can. Offhand, I can’t recall any elected political figures in this country who, when given the sort of leverage and opportunity (read: power) that Manchin has inherited, has politely said, “No, thank you. I’d much rather be obscure and follow someone else’s lead.”
Manchins are why Democrats lose. Catostrophic outcomes caused by their policies is why Republicans. It seems unfair somehow.
Manchin makes “bipartisanship” sound like some sort of great noble moral principle. The heyday of “bipartisanship” was also the heyday of “earmarking” or what some call “pork barrel spending.” At some level, it is probably a form of corruption or bribery. But how many of the worthwhile laws that exist today would have been passed without it? Who knows what Manchin really wants but, as they say, everyone has a price. And he is a politician. I suspect what Manchin really wants besides attention is a few appropriations for nice projects in the home state that can be named after him. Make him an “offer he can’t refuse” in the big voting rights bill and see if he doesn’t change his tune about filibusters.
Right!
His election margins have steadily been shrinking. His last election he barely squeaked by.
So he definitely needs the pork to convince the Republicans who elect him to stay with him.
Can you say DINO?
Its a weird legacy that Manchin is after. The guy who said no to some really big, important things.
If I was at the end of my career (he’ll be 76 when his term ends) I’d go out big.
By Senate standards 76 is young.
Fair enough.
Politically, Manchin’s position is much like Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson’s from a few years ago. Like Manchin, Nelson was a remnant and a relic of a time when the Democratic Party was much more of a force in state politics. This happens to senators whose six year terms means that their constituencies have time to completely change since their previous run for office.
Manchin is old, and if he does run for reelection, it will be as a member of a party that has virtually ceased to exist in his state. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if at some point he switched party as the current governor of his state at least nominally did. If he is to survive politically as a Democrat, Manchin seems to believe he has to follow the same model as Nelson, presenting himself as a “conservative” Democrat, obstructing Democratic policies, and opposing the occasional vulnerable Democratic nominee. It didn’t really work for Nelson who didn’t run for reelection, and who was replaced by a Republican, but the real risk for the party generally is that it might be seen caving in for political reasons to a marginal figure. Nelson’s cornhusker payoffs were a real problem for Democrats in national elections for a while even after the man himself departed the political scene.
Can’t Angus King convince Susan Collins to join him as an Independent?
During the Recovery Act debate, waffling Manchin used infrastructure as an example of something he would go big on.
W VA has a long history of getting way more than they give and in the end bringing home the bacon will override any principles Manchin may claim to have
I believe I heard it on the PBS Newshour last evening, finally: When Senator Manchin, famous champion of some by-gone “bi-partisanship” in the Senate, can go out and round up ten or a dozen Republican Senators to vote for something, ANYthing, then he can advocate for bi–partisanship. He should be required to put his own money where his mouth is. Problem is? He can’t. There are NO GOP votes for legislation.
When Manchin says now, that he will not abide even a modification of the filibuster rule (like requiring that Senators actually get on the Senate floor and speak to their opposition to something), he is precluding any legislation from passing this Congress. Not a bill will get by this one guy.
And we thought Mitch McConnell’s one-man rule was bad!
A recent piece on Manchin explained he’s really just poll driven. He’s voted for so much of the Biden agenda so far because it’s polled well in WV. This implies the way to get him to support filibuster reform is to get it to poll well in WV.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/03/what-drives-joe-manchin/618208/
That Atlantic piece was perceptive:
==With no filibuster, Manchin might have the 50th-vote power that commentators are so eager to assign to him, but he would also be on the spot for every bill. With the filibuster still nominally in force, the GOP can do all the work on his right flank while he appeals for consensus.
…
when bills have popular appeal, whether they are sponsored by Republicans or Democrats, I expect Manchin to throw his weight behind them==
Interesting. It also explains his reluctance to support voting rights as West Virginia tries to reform voting laws to discourage early voting and drivers license registration. Being for voting rights might (ironically) cost him his next election.
https://wvmetronews.com/2021/04/05/west-virginia-elections-bill-debate-focuses-on-early-voting-dates-purging-period-and-dmv-opt-in/
Manchin will probably get aboard the infrastructure bill after some adjustments are made, and then it will pass via budget reconciliation. The voting rights act won’t get to Biden’s desk through that process.
But I believe Manchin did say that he might be open to restoring the old, “talking” filibuster procedure. With that back in place, it’s conceivable that the Republican might not be wiling to block voting rights by talking for hours, whether for lack of individual physical stamina or out of desire to keep their anti-democratic agenda away from the media spotlight.
Either Manchin thinks that euphemisms like “bipartisanship” are critical to his re-election, or else he wants an excuse for blocking the Dem agenda, because he frankly doesn’t agree with (most of) it. Pat Terry says Manchin will “only” be 76 at the end of his current term (which is a spring chicken in the senate), so he likely has his eye on re-election. And he represents a state of white rural Trumpists (i.e white nationalists), who are only going to get more Trumpist over the next few years as a result of the New Rightwing Noise Machine, the Trumpischer Beobachter.
Manchin IS willing to pass spending/taxation legislation, so Biden’s “Infrastructure” bill may have a good chance of passage in some modified form. Manchin will try to strip out anything that smacks of efforts to ameliorate climate change, of course, but he will only be able to do so much if he wants to remain even nominally a Dem.
The problem, of course, is that this approach means the nation is limited to Government by “Reconciliation”, which is simply a ridiculous contraption that only a failed body like the US senate could have constructed in the first place. If a national problem can’t be shoe-horned into the absurd reconciliation template, such as election reform or voter protection, then it can’t be enacted, period. I don’t think that any informed person really thought our failing federal government could really address the problem of rising white fascism anyway, especially with a 50-50 senate, but by embracing the current form of phony-filibuster, Manchin is basically saying he agrees with the rising anti-democratic movement in the country. That’s what “bipartisan” now means–democratic failure.
It probably also means Democratic failure, but it appears Manchin doesn’t have any real concerns about returning to the minority in 2022 and beyond; most of his WVa constituents don’t want any actual national problem addressed. Indeed, if Manchin didn’t exist, his seat would certainly be held by a crazed “conservative” nut like Margorie Taylor Greene, so one can’t expect too much. The reality of the situation is that, with our failed system, the senate can be easily controlled by around 30% of the population (the white rural minority) and that’s where we are headed: total gridlock, where we will pine for the Golden Era of Reconciliation Budgets…
#1 Manchin is not a moderate Democrat. He doesn’t act like a DEM at all. He and his daughter both seem quite extreme and corrupt. #2 Someone owns him. I’m not sure who or how. I’d have to dig deeper into his past. But he’s not looking to do what’s best for the Dems, or the country. At his age one wouldn’t think it’d be re-election solely anymore. But if he suddenly got….I don’t know, pneumonia or something that required hospitalization for a cpl of weeks the DEMs could get a lot done. Just saying. Lastly, people only garner power & control when others give it to them. So everyone needs to stop this false narrative that Manchin holds all the power now. I’ve read that at least 20 REP senators are making moves to get the party back to R center. What better way to prove that & do that than by voting with the DEMs to pass HR1??? Ensure a fed law that assures all American citizens the right to free and fair elections and blocks the reprehensible treasonous Jim Crow 2021 laws being pushed by REPS in numerous states, the better to control future results?! There’s way too much fraud and corruption in politics now. My support goes to those who work to quash it all now and work to get the country back on level ground. Not to those who grandstand unnecessarily and hold important bills and processes hostage…simply because they can:(
Yes, if I were part of the Democratic Senate leadership, I’d try to make Manchin irrelevant by persuading the few remaining moderate Republicans that it was in their best interest and the best interests of the country to go along with Biden’s plan.
I’m sick to death of unidirectional “bipartisanship” (Democrats caving in to Republican demands) and am ready to see bipartisanship in the other direction.
Republican senators will not support that. Manchin is more liberal than every Republican in the Senate.
He doesn’t act like a DEM at all
If everyone just sort reset their politics, Manchin would undoubtedly be a Republican. Soon enough, he will be replaced by a Republican. But for now, I think it makes sense to regard him, to paraphrase Paul Wellstone, as a representative of the Republican wing of the Democratic Party. That wing used to be quite large. It consisted mostly of leftover Democrats in the south too old and set in their ways to make the switch to the Republican Party in the civil rights era when the parties became more polarized.
We hear a lot about bipartisanship from the Washington media and their enablers. It provides a good business model for them. But only one party is interested in bipartisanship and that’s the Democratic Party. And that’s not because of any moral commitment or value judgment, it is simply because in order to get things done, Democrats need support from Republicans. That is a fact of political life. Republicans who don’t really have a political agenda don’t need to be bipartisan support and don’t want it. They just want to break up Democratic efforts to achieve bipartisanship.
Manchin, at the moment, is the key to that. He represents Republicanism ideologically and pragmatically. Republicans can speak through him to Congress in ways that actual Republicans in Congress who are bound by party discipline cannot. If Democrats can get Manchin’s support, and that will never be easy, they will have the bipartisanship they need to get through an agenda. But the clock is running. After the midterms, Republicans will control at least one and possibly both houses of Congress and we will have divided government at least for the rest of this decade.
One longs to have Nancy Pelosi be the Senate Majority Leader, rather than Chuck Schumer, just for a couple of months so Democrats can get something done with all those progressive House bills that are again piling up on the Senate’s docket. Un-dealt-with, while Manchin postures.
Pelosi would never let someone like Manchin hold up the whole parade the way he is. She is probably the most effective House Speaker the Congress has ever had, which is why she’s so feared, and so hated. That, and the fact that she’s a woman being so strong!
As much as one may admire Pelosi, the reason(s) the House bills are piling up in the senate is because there is a 50-50 split, Gravedigger of Democracy McConnell’s Monolithic Naysayers have no interest in advancing a single piece of legislation, and (I suspect) several Dems (not just Manchin) are opposed to altering the absurd rules of the current filibuster. What exactly his (their?) motivation for this stance is a mystery, but it most certainly is not a belief in a new era of dawning “bipartisanship” in the senate, because none of them are that stupid. They only think WE (and the media) are!
Nancy could no more alter this unfortunate reality than Schumer, who has already pushed through a huge progressive spending bill via reconciliation, with Manchin on board, 51-50. But no one has the power (or persuasiveness) to move Manchin if he doesn’t want to move. He seems to have decided that forcing through (for example) the John Lewis Voting Rights Act will harm his re-election chances in a reactionary state that is committed to white rural minority rule. It’s very difficult to persuade someone to be a political hero when they (quite plausibly) think such heroism will end their career…
There is absolutely nothing that Pelosi could do that Schumer hasn’t been doing.
Well folks, what do you think the fine citizens of West Virginia prefer:
40 Billion dollars of partisan infrastructure pork?
or
15 Billion dollars of bipartisan infrastructure pork?
Good old Joe Manchin has seen enough signs that say things like:
“Keep yo’ gummint hands off my Medicare”
That he will not get in the way of the new Joe Manchin Bridge or Joe Manchin Senior High School or the Joe Manchin Causeway.
All enabled through reconciliation. And voting rights? He does not care and the white folks of W VA do not particularly care.
Fortunately, Trump and Trumpism will be the gift that keeps on giving. All these R retiring Senators are not all about working on their golf game or more time with the grand kids: Trump has made their formerly pleasant work life a LOT LESS pleasant and they are leaving. This past weekend’s GOP Unity Rally turned into one more Trump diatribe on stolen elections and stupid, phony Rs like Mitch McConnell. He will do for the 2022 mid terms what he did for the GA Senate run off: mess it up for the Rs.
And then Joe Manchin will be irrelevant: a new 2-3 vote Senate D majority will end the filibuster and Biden will sign all manner of Bills supported by strong majorities of the citizenry and the Rs will convene their next reinvention summit, moderated by Donald Trump from his jail cell.
A guy can dream….
Of course, another way of looking at this is that Dems “need” (independent) Angus King’s vote, too. And Sinema’s. And Warner’s; and the hapless Repub-friendly Feinstein. They need everyone, for anything.
The Dems are simply not the lockstep party that the naysaying Repubs are, for all the futile attempts at courting Collins and Romney….or any House Repub, for that matter! Which Pelosi (wisely) doesn’t waste much time over…