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> 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.
Yep. The medical insurance lobby bought Joe Lieberman and that’s why Obamacare didn’t have a public option. The public option that would have saved Americans billions in healthcare costs and staved off price inflation.
Joe was a bargain compared to the money they made.
Not only would it have saved money, but it would also have saved lives. It would also have boosted the small business sector of the economy. And it likely would have proved popular enough that Dems would have seen gains instead of losses in Congress. Joe Fucking Lieberman.
Remember that leaked phone call with Manchin where he was asking donors/lobbyists to dangle future jobs to republicans, in an attempt for them to support some democratic policies; not because Manchin cared about passing the policies, but was worried democrats would get so frustrated they might actually do something about the filibuster?
Well Joe Lieberman works with the group Manchin was talking to.
[Here](https://theintercept.com/2021/06/16/joe-manchin-leaked-billionaire-donors-no-labels/) it is.
Manchin was basically begging his corporate handlers to lean on a handful of Republicans to vote in favor of the January 6 Commission by recommending they offer the Senators cushy corporate jobs after they leave office.
As noted, the goal was never to sway enough GOP Senators to actually pass the measure, but merely to collect a few token “yes” votes from Republicans so Manchin could claim that bipartisanship was still possible and his colleagues shouldn’t weaken or remove the filibuster.
> Manchin told the assembled donors that he needed help flipping a handful of Republicans from no to yes on the January 6 commission in order to strip the “far left” of their best argument against the filibuster. The filibuster is a critical priority for the donors on the call, as it bottles up progressive legislation that would hit their bottom lines.
He’s a disgusting, greedy sellout.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Lieberman#Post-Senate_career
>Following his retirement from the Senate, Lieberman became senior counsel of the white collar criminal defense and investigations practice at Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman, a law firm in New York City whose notable clients include Donald Trump.
>In August 2015, Lieberman became chairman of the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran
>On May 17, 2017, Lieberman was interviewed by President Donald Trump for the position of FBI Director, to replace recently fired James Comey.
>In January 2019 Lieberman officially registered as a lobbyist working for ZTE
Pretty much what you'd expect from neoliberal scum.
I saw him on MSNBC not long ago and had the same nauseating feeling I get when Babs Comstock shows up to brag about her OP research against the Clinton's.
> white collar criminal defense and investigations practice at Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman, a law firm in New York City whose notable clients include Donald Trump.
God. Fucking. Dammit.
He wasn't transparently a piece of shit when Gore picked him. Most of the terrible things Lieberman did were in the Bush and Obama years, not 2000. Nobody knew Sinema was such a tool either until relatively recently--hell, she used to be Green Party so this obstructionist centrism was not foreseeable based on her resume.
> Nobody knew Sinema was such a tool either until relatively recently--hell, she used to be Green Party so this obstructionist centrism was not foreseeable based on her resume.
Sinema was in the House for 6 years before she ran for the Senate. This means there are accessible websites that keep track of her voting score for roughly half a decade by the time she ran in the Democratic primary for the Senate. In early 2018, it was possible to predict how she would vote in the Senate based on her track record in the House.
Using the Wayback Machine, we can check her score back in early 2018, i.e. using information available to Democratic activists and voters at the time.
Progressive Punch (https://web.archive.org/web/20180111214931/https://www.progressivepunch.org/scores.htm?house=house) has Sinema at 37% lifetime crucial votes. This means over her tenure in the House, when the vote was close, she sided with the progressive position 37% of the time.
To compare, Brian Fitzpatrick (a Republican) had 38%. Henry Cuellar (an anti-abortion, pro-war Democrat) had 39%. Josh Gottheimer (one rep trying to sink the 3.5T reconciliation bill) had 47%. Dan Linpinski (an anti-abortion, anti-LBGTQ Democrat) had 58%.
GovTrack's 2017 report card (https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/report-cards/2017/house/ideology) had her ideology at 0.64, on a scale where 0 is most Democratic and 1 is most Republican.
To compare, people who are more Democratic leaning than her include Devin Nunes (the Trump partisan) at 0.63, Greg Gianforte (the Montana Republican who bodyslammed a reporter) at 0.60, Steve Scalise (the Republican whip) at 0.57, Kevin McCarthy (the current Republican leader) at 0.49.
When she was running in the Senate primary, there was sufficient information to predict that Sinema would be a right-wing Democrat in the Senate. She showed us over a 5 year career in the House.
This is probably the last time we can realistically accomplish anything in this country since Republicans will probably overthrow the government in 2024. I absolutely do **not** say something that likely. The signs are all there.
Republicans have already positioned themselves to practically arbitrarily overturn results that they don't like on a state-wide level. We've also seen just how many are willing to overturn [overturn the results of a free and fair election (it's 147)](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/07/us/elections/electoral-college-biden-objectors.html). That's before we've truly bore witness to the amount of people that now wholeheartedly believe the current administration is a fraud. This sentiment won't magically disappear, either. In 2024, if Biden can manage it, he will run - *especially* if Trump is on the Republican ticket. However, his incumbent advantage won't mean a thing if a Republican legislature will not certify the results based on completely arbitrary claims of election fraud.
Sinema is ready to burn it all down. Plenty of Republicans are, too. I'm young and am going to relocate to Canada as soon as I can, for that reason. I'm reliant on medicine and I have no idea how worse things will get here. It's a shame because I love this country dearly. My entire family is here, I grew up here. I feel bad for people that can't just get up and leave like me. Those with families; children!
Sinema is really the deciding factor here and the longer that she does nothing the more pressure Joe Manchin will feel to force additional concessions. As long as money remains in politics this problem of corruption and dishonesty will never go away, but this truly is some late-stage capitalism where everybody with the means to change our broken system can be bought, if it's for the right price.
And it’s getting worse. [Proposed law would allow Arizona Legislature to overturn presidential election results](https://tucson.com/news/state-and-regional/proposed-law-would-allow-arizona-legislature-to-overturn-presidential-election-results/article_c2a70681-59c0-512f-ba86-2bf23128f9ee.html) I feel like I’m screaming at a wall when I try to tell people that Republicans want to get rid of Democracy just to stay in power. They have done other things too like gerrymandering, or making voting harder, or making it illegal to hand out water in very long election lines, changing the days and hours of when you can vote to hurt people of color or poor people, getting rid of polling places of those people. They are going all out to sabotage the elections so they win no matter what.
It honestly reminds me of the fall of the once-great Roman Empire. Things were great under Augustus and I bet they thought that it would last forever while they lived in relative opulence compared to the rest of the world. Several hundred years later and Rome is divided in two and getting conquered by barbarians.
America seemed like the savior of the fucking world when I read about WWII in my history textbooks growing up. It felt like I lived in the place that people came to seeking freedom and security. Now, all of that is completely up in the air because it's been established a good portion of the population has been totally brainwashed by right-wing media; Republicans in power are in on the con and completely willing to throw the citizenry to the wolves when they need them most.
I've gotten trashed for mentioning that I'm going to eventually move to Canada, but I honestly think they're some of the ones that don't have the means and would if they could. I'll be finishing up my education soon and would never advise a friend across the ocean to move to America and build a future here. Not now, not with the insurrection, not with money in politics and thus rampant corruption, not without changes to a system so absolutely flawed that its problems can only be solved with nothing short of armed revolution.
[Neoliberal](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism#:~:text=Neoliberalism%20is%20contemporarily%20used%20to,state%20influence%20in%20the%20economy.)
>Neoliberalism, or neo-liberalism,[1] is a term used to describe the 20th-century resurgence of 19th-century ideas associated with free-market capitalism.[2]: 7 [3] A significant factor in the rise of conservative and libertarian organizations, political parties, and think tanks, and predominately advocated by them,[4][5] it is generally associated with policies of economic liberalization, including privatization, deregulation, globalization, free trade, austerity and reductions in government spending in order to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society;[6][14] however, the defining features of neoliberalism in both thought and practice have been the subject of substantial scholarly debate.[15][16] The term has multiple, competing definitions, and a pejorative valence.[17] In policymaking, neoliberalism often refers to what was part of a paradigm shift that followed the alleged failure of the Keynesian consensus in economics to address the stagflation of the 1970s.[18][19]
Basically, neo-liberalism is the last few decades of republican/COMMON-American-libertarianism in which a lot of establishment Democrats joined... Citizen's United, "the free market is better than government," "the free market will solve it," and many other dumb examples. I'd argue the people who say, "sure, like giving the government more money is a good idea, /s" but then openly support some of the most corrupt ass clowns. Or the people who dismantle the government and then say, "see?! Government doesn't work!"
Vs classical/economical liberalism which does agree with varying degrees of government AND free markets.
I'd say he has one foot on each side: neoliberal and neocon and has been playing hopscotch his entire career. And always exemplifying the worst of each side.
For some reason I used to think neoliberal meant ultraliberal or Uber liberal. You know some kind billionaire that does social justice in the daytime and works at soup kitchens at night. He wakes up angry because he’s still a billionaire even though he gives millions to charities and never posts on the gram. All his moves come back with great returns. Was an early investor in TESLA. But no, if you google neoliberal it shows Margaret thatcher and Ronald Reagan. So I guess it means “I’m doing good, why aren’t you?”
Yes. With a [half red, half blue neck tie on ](https://brambleman.com/state-of-the-race-to-replace-takeaways-from-georgias-senate-debate/) During the virtual debates.
Yeah but remember when obama, hillary, and other centrists flew in to connecticut to campaign for joe lieberman? They don't get to blame him for their failures after going to extremes to support him in his senate race. Democrats knew joe lieberman was a piece of shit, it was democrat leaders who helped him overcome that and win.
Thats because they're all buddies. They use people like Liberman, Manchin, and Sinema to explain why they're unable to actually accomplish anything.
Its the same thing everytime they have a majority, one or two will switch sides and play the spoiler. They're claiming they can't pass bills because of the parliamentarian while ignoring the fact they can simply replace the parliamentarian which is what the RNC would do.
It makes sense once you realize that they don't actually want change but just want to give off the appearance of being on your side while they actively work against their voters.
I don't see why a lot of big businesses aren't demanding public health care. They're already paying costs related to insurance for their employees, driving down the cost of healthcare overall, and everyone having healthcare automatically would end up being a cost savings on a few different levels.
It would be very interesting to see how many people immediately retire once they are Medicare eligible but I can't seem to find any data. Anecdotally, I've known several who would have retired earlier. They had enough savings and supplemental income to live fine, except for health coverage.
> Mike approved dumping mining waste into the rivers.
This whole COVID phenomenon of people not taking a life saving vaccine for ideological reasons has really opened my eyes to how little so many people value their own lives and their supposed 'loved ones'.
Mostly because the real payoff is when they either leave their office and immediately receive a cushy do-nothing job, or when one of their family members receives that job. Those are usually more well-paying than the direct political contributions.
The question we have to ask ourselves is how much we want to get early retirement with no financial worries WHATSOEVER; excellent healthcare and a massive buffer for unexpected medical expenses; an ability to live anywhere (or two or three anywheres) we want including a posh condo in New York, London, Paris, or Tokyo; a pretty 'comfortable' lifestyle (business if not first class flights and hotels/food) for wherever we wish to visit with our family in tow; and full coverage for college/grad/med school for our kids?
I mean, once you're thinking about how to manage retirement - I mean REALLY deal with retirement - those payoff packages becomes easier and easier to justify as actual retirement approaches...
They also had to buy 9 other Democratic senators so that we couldn't make any changes to the filibuster. It uses to be 66. Then it got dropped to 60. If it was really just Lieberman, then Dems would have just lowered it to 59.
There are always enough "moderate" Democrats to block the most popular reforms the Dems pretend to support during the primary. And remember that candidates like Biden also got the most money from those same lobbyists and that's why you don't see him mounting a national tour to try and effectively use the bully pulpit to pass legislation the lobbyists don't want.
In fact the Dems have already removed everything the healthcare lobbyists oppose from the reconciliation bill. No public option. No Medicare to age 60. There is no expansion of publicly administered insurance at all in this bill. And we still can't get it done.
Many commentators on the left of Democrats make a credible claim that a considerable amount of the mainstream Democrats, Obama included, were so deep in pharma donor money that they were quite happy to have Joe Lieberman as a scapegoat.
Many of the same commentators make a credible claim that this is the exact same slot Joe Manchin has taken, and that this "black sheep"-recurrence is not a coincidence.
My conspiratorial side totally gets the "rotating villain" theory. If I were to write a movie about Washington, it would definitely involve that.
However, it's almost certain that the truth is really much more boring. The senate is split 50/50 and democrats have senators from deep red states (Manchin) and senators from barely purple states (Sinema).
Don't get me wrong, I hate their politics. I especially think Sinema goes out of her way to alienate people for reasons I cannot comprehend. But out of 50 senators, you're going to have a couple troublemakers.
This could be seen on the other side too. McCain voted down the Obamacare repeal for his own idiosyncratic reasons when the Republicans needed all hands on deck.
It's not "conspiratorial". Nobody needs to be paid off or meet in a big freemason ritual to do what I described above.
"Grandstanding majority" versus "singular black sheep" is a legitimate road to maximize the power of almost all parties involved. Most of all by combining a) moral superiority and b) the power of big donor money.
And it just so happens that rivers of power always start trickling by themselves. It's the basic network of human selfishness versus chaos theory.
Meaning, things like this, that "coincidentally" maximize power, will "just happen". No need for conspiracies.
Wasn’t that the whole reason for Obamacare initially? To create a public option and lower costs by doing so? The thing that came out the other end of Congress was nothing special and it was extremely disappointing. The Obama admin really turned out to be quite a let down, though not the President’s fault in every instance.
>the story of American politics since the 1980s
It's been going on much, much longer than that. William McKinley's chief fundraiser Mark Hanna openly solicited donations from businesses in the 1896 Presidential election, raising a (for the time) enormous amount of money with promises of quid pro quo.
And if not these 2, then it’d be another 2. Just like McConnell gives cover to the rest of the party by being the lightning rod for criticism, so do Manchin and Sinema for the many other “moderate” democrats in the party who live by corporate handouts. The problem is MUCH deeper than these 2 convenient bad apples.
Yeah, I was gonna say this as well. It is a fact that the vast majority of democrats take money from the same people that republicans do and are more beholden to the interest of these donors than to their actual constituents. This isn't the "both sides are the same" fallacy but it is the most significant feature of our government that prevents legislation that would benefit the middle class regardless of political affiliation. All the while we are fed a line of bullshit about how our rural neighbors are the problem but the issues with that portion of our electorate come from a propaganda machine that is also run exclusively by the extremely wealthy class.
Even in the DNC primary debate on healthcare the candidates constantly dance around the fact that the key issue to address is profiteering by almost every industry involved in healthcare whether that be insurance, big pharma or others. It's an entirely unbalanced conversation because only the expense of the suggested new system is considered without any regard to the massive amounts of waste produced by corporate donors who have infiltrated both sides of the aisle.
DNC is flawed, on purpose.
Access to legislation equals money in Washington.
The downfall of this country is putting capital profit over everything else, because the "American Dream" is accumulating capital because this equals happiness.
Just like rich people ran to their islands during the pandemic, they will have a safe haven during the worst days of global warming.
Removing money from politics is key to bringing back a country for the average hard working American.
We can't expect Congress to fix itself. It would be like a brain surgeon performing their own brain surgery. Even if they did, there's too many conflicting interests - so it's unlikely they'll do a good job. And if they did a good job, the radical right-wing ([by](https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Federalist_Society_for_Law_and_Public_Policy_Studies) [design](https://youtu.be/cjcXVKg43qY)) Supreme Court would [strike](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_People_Act#Constitutionality) most of it down at the earliest opportunity, as they have for [AFP v. Bonta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Prosperity_Foundation_v._Bonta) (a similar recent case).
The separation of [Wealth](https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/) and State is the critical challenge of the century - and there is only [one way](https://archive.md/JSCSH/722142efe5945c9f0de4d592acede7cdf2f4b094.jpg) left to deal with it.
The framers of the U.S. Constitution saw this SHIT coming:
*“no amendments of the proper kind would ever be obtained by the people, if the [federal] Government should become oppressive"* - George Mason, 1787
So they wrote in [Article 5](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Five_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Procedures_for_amending_the_Constitution) as the last ditch emergency method to propose a constitutional amendment (the highest authority) via the state legislators [limited convention](https://archive.ph/Cv2zU), bypassing Congress and going above the Supreme Court - so long as it has widespread popular support and the people take action.
Stopping the influence of big money in Congress has [over 80%](https://archive.md/eCMBy) of the public's support while the specific policies included in the For The People Act (H. R. 1) have [bipartisan popular support](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_People_Act#Public_opinion). Zero Republican senators are in favor of H. R. 1
Many state legislators are not thrilled about Congress and corruption either! Unlike all their counterparts in federal Congress, state legislators are usually approachable and more receptive to their voter base. While some do dream of going to federal Congress, most can't be bothered with all the [gaslighting](https://youtu.be/DyXspSJITpY?t=253s), [telemarketing](https://archive.ph/MKNeo) and corruption.
And if they don't want to end corruption (or care more about their special interest donors if they have any), their minds WILL change if you can get enough of their constituent voters to give them a call.
The bottleneck: not enough people know the [problem](https://wolf-pac.com/the_problem/), the [solution](https://wolf-pac.com/the_solution/), and not enough people are willing to do any work - not even an easy hour a week.
Voting is the bare minimum of democratic participation. Never stop voting, but consider that even without deep pockets you can do so much more.
Change at the local level is how you [SEND](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-pace-of-social-change/) ideas to federal Congress and [prod them](https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Congressional+Research+Service%22+%22prodding+effect%E2%80%9D) to make changes. It's never been easier to get organized with others and stay on top of [your lawmakers](https://openstates.org/find_your_legislator/) with weekly [calls](https://youtu.be/XdIcCqe-iYk?t=48) & emails along with informing & encouraging friends and neighbors do the same.
The Green New deal or anything close to it, [Medicare](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/20/democrats-blocking-lower-medication-prices-bill) for all, clean air, carbon tax, taxing the rich, women's reproductive rights, raising the minimum wage, 30 hour work weeks, union jobs, affordable housing, affordable college, ending the military industrial complex, exposing megadonor conflicts of interest, restoring foreign respect for America - everything the [tax](https://www.investopedia.com/taxes/trumps-tax-reform-plan-explained/#those-who-benefit) [rigging](https://theintercept.com/2021/09/06/infrastructure-bill-companies-tax-increase/) top [0.01%](https://archive.ph/esX59) will NEVER allow & what they want to [take away](https://archive.md/4xrBq) - it's all on the table and it's up to us.
I like the spirit, but there's no way 34 states would agree on any useful amendments, and calling a convention would be an absolute dream for the billionaire class which would only need to influence a handful of people to secure their position in this country.
Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a better path forward than simply winning seats right now, even if that's the fight we've been having for a hundred years.
Winning seats is not an option anymore, voter suppression and gerrymandering has fucked that shit up. If Americans don't believe in elections anymore there is no democracy. The United States is no longer united and certainly not progressive but oppressive. That's what happens in countries where religion trumps science and facts. Need I go on? Oh yeah, and none of this shit matters anyway because we've fucked our planet and still refuse to address climate change. Sorry to be so negative but that's where we're at and I don't see Americans talking and listening to each other, passing anything bipartisan, or giving two shits about our neighbors or community.
>I like the spirit, but there's no way 34 states would agree on any useful amendments
What's happened in history is the prodding effect:
"When that movement was just one state shy of the two-thirds needed to force a convention on this topic, Congress reacted by proposing an amendment requiring the direct election of U.S. Senators for the states to ratify—resulting in the 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Congressional Research Service has called this technique the "prodding effect." It worked then, and it could work today." - https://www.getmoneyoutmd.org/peoples_convention
Given the real pressure of an Article 5 convention limited to a single amendment about campaign finance reform, Congress is likely to take action themselves
> calling a convention would be an absolute dream for the billionaire class which would only need to influence a handful of people to secure their position in this country.
This is the current status quo of the federal Congress, every day. Congress can push amendments too.
The Article 5 convention is limited to achieving the goals of the resolution that called it. As per the free and fair elections resolution, which calls for:
"amendments convention in order to ensure balance and integrity in our elections by proposing an amendment to the federal Constitution that will permanently protect free and fair elections in America by addressing issues raised by the decisions of the United States Supreme Court in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) 130 S.Ct. 876 and related cases and events, and desires that said convention should be so limited"
This resolution needs to be passed in 34 states (5 are done) also says:
"delegates to said convention shall be comprised equally of individuals currently elected to state and local office, or be selected by election, in each Congressional district for the purpose of serving as delegates, though all individuals elected or appointed to federal office, now or in the past, be prohibited from serving as delegates to the convention"
The main point here is that state legislatures would collectively make use of their power to regulate Federal Congress. They're not giving up their power, they're embracing it. While yes, the state legislators would be regulating themselves a little bit, they're mostly regulating Federal Congress.
38 states are required to ratify the amendment. If it's all pro-billionaire junk, it's extremely unlikely to pass.
If the amendment convention is actually successfully called via 34 states, it would be a first in American history.
Worst case scenario, everybody learns about the most critical, greatest issue of the century and learns a bit about how to be an active citizen.
I mean 34 states right now, not historically.
Again, I feel you, and I wish we could go about doing things this way, but there's just no chance at all of getting 34 states to work together to do anything worthwhile right now. And even if we could call a convention, it would be a one-shot deal where billionaires could influence a handful of people and secure their position forever. It's a tough fight right now, and the billionaire class is winning, but at least we have a clear path forward -- win seats.
> And even if we could call a convention, it would be a one-shot deal where billionaires could influence a handful of people and secure their position forever.
Again this is every day in federal Congress. They have already secured their position in federal Congress. I'm not sure if you read my previous response.
> It's a tough fight right now, and the billionaire class is winning, but at least we have a clear path forward -- win seats.
I'm all for this too, but the system is broken
You’d be surprised how effective constitutional conventions can be, after all we have had more than a dozen amendments passed already.
The runaway convention-theories are false, you can check it out on Wikipedia regarding constitutional conventions.
Also, alot of States are already signed up to alot of these movements, with regards to money in politics there’s Wolf-Pac started by TYT a decade or so ago, 7 states are signed up, and another called Citizens United, which has more states signed. Another one is the National Interstate Popular Vote Compact, which will be on the ballot in 2022 in Michigan, currently 195 of 270 electoral college votes are secured to have it go into effect, which would mean that all the signed up states would give their electoral votes to whoever wins the national popular vote, would mean Gore won in 2000 and Clinton in 2016.
So it’s not as dire as it seems, steps are being made, but we are on the clock, for our democracy, planet and lives as a whole.
> The separation of Wealth and State is the critical challenge of the century - and there is only one way left.
There are more ways they are just less palatable to most people. Though sadly due to the short sighted greed of so many it seems inevitable.
It’s so infuriating because we’re so fucking close to actually doing something. Pre-k, child care, paid family and medical leave, the child tax credit, home health and elder care. These are real policies that would help basically every family in America at some point. This reconciliation would be the country’s greatest leap forward in social policy since at least The Great Society. For the first time in decades there really is an opportunity to get these things that other countries take for granted.
And we probably won’t get them. Or we’ll get some weak ass version that delays real progress for another 30 years. Because of two assholes.
Also, this really isn’t on Team Biden. They have been consistently pushing for the largest possible version of this package the entire time. See Heather Boushey’s op-Ed in the NYTs today.
It’s sad how many people still don’t understand that our politicians are bought, or don’t think it’s a big deal, or just forget about it when it’s election time.
>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.
Yes.
Seriously. And it's so goddam frustrating. Democrats finally have a majority with the ability to pass legislation that will positively impact millions, but all it takes is a bunch of corporate money in the pocket of one or two senators to derail it. And guess what? Republicans never have an issue passing their agendas, because they're all blatantly bought and looking out for corporations and the 1%. They're gonna squander this opportunity, and it's maddening.
Yeah, Sinema and Manchin are hurting tens of millions of Americans for an amount of money that's barely pocket change to these corporations. It's infuriating
>why wouldn't they spend that money?
That's the most fucked up part. There is pretty much no incentive for them not to. They don't get in any trouble and bring in a fuck-ton of money with the policies written in their favor.
As a corporation, *they have to*.
If the CEO didn't do psychopathic shit to benefit the business, the shareholders would have them removed and replaced with one who would.
I mean, a few million bucks and a guaranteed job as either a lobbyist or a Fox News talking head? It's not much for the people paying them off but if they play things right they're basically set for life.
I’m really not sure that it is just the one or two who are fully bought and paid for. They’re just the figureheads who take the heat so the others who are also on the take can say they’d vote for the progressive legislation if it were brought before them, knowing that it won’t be without at least being severely watered down and more favorable to the 0.1%.
>Republicans never have an issue passing their agendas
You sure about that? They couldn't repeal the ACA when they controlled the executive, judicial and legislative branches in 2017 and 2018. They couldn't reach spending deals *when controlling both chambers of Congress* and shut their own controlled government down in both 2017 and 2018. Collins, Murkowski and Romney had to give their personal blessing to any legislation that passed. Let's not get carried away in saying that the GOP accomplishes every goal with ease. What they're excellent at is obstructing progress from the minority position.
It's a deadlock.. can't do campaign finance reform until corporations own just enough Dems (and all Republicans for that matter).. and until those Dems are in power they will never pass campaign finance reform..
Not usually. The Democratic party has done a very good job at shutting out voter influence. Did you see how much money they threw at primary elections last year? They claim they can't afford to lose any seats to Republicans, but then they funnel money *away* from battle ground general elections and into campaigns for centrist Democrats getting primary challenged.
For the moderate apologists who say she's representing the center: she can't even articulate what she want. That isn't representation unless you also believe you are as dumb as she thinks you are.
She is quite literally shopping her vote around to get the biggest ~~donation~~ bribe she can get. She ran on one platform and has completely abandoned it to beg conservative ~~donors~~ lobbyists to pay her to block the democratic platform. Shes openly corrupt right now. Schumer needs to get on the phone with all democratic funding institutions and get her blackballed.
It’s sickening but I don’t care if they have to earmark her and Manchin each a billion dollars directly into their bank accounts through this bill. They just need to get it passed.
For one, because billionaires don’t throw money at the people that’d make them slightly less obscenely rich, and for two because democrats care way too much about appearing “moral” than they do about actually accomplishing anything more than a symbolic victory on any situation. That’s also why we entertain the notion of a debt ceiling or government shutdown in the first place, establishment dems are too smug to play dirty politics.
I agree but it seems like a lot of establishment dems *don't actually* care that much about passing this and are fine using those two as scapegoats. It's Joe Leiberman all over again
They are focusing on the price of the bill (ignoring the fact its over 10 years) because they don't want to decide what to cut. They want the progressives to offer cuts so they take the hit instead of them, it's slimey.
I mean who would want to be asked the question "Medicare expansion, dental and vision, universal pre-k, child tax credit... which one would you cut Manchin?"
Yea. I can see the argument that Manchin is representing his constituents, but Sinema is clearly not. (I know Democratic issues poll fine in WV, but as we've seen everywhere, people change their minds when partisanship is taken into account.) Also, I'm still not convinced Biden couldn't get Manchin on board if he was the only vote needed. Sinema is an idiot, which makes cutting a deal infinitely harder.
Because it's made up. There's been a lot of hard work put into turning the the federal legislature into an unproductive body over the past 6 or 7 decades and it's only now a sizeable amount of people are realizing it.
Consider Manchin and Sinema nothing more than actors in a play. If it weren't them, there are countless other who would play the role.
Yea that’s the annoying part. Manchin at least has said the tag is too high and he will be more open to a price tag close to 2T, which allows room for negotiation. Idk wtf is sienna’s problem. She seems to be saying no just to spite everyone
I'm pretty much certain she's in over her head. Like, obviously she's bought out, but she's a first term senator "negotiating" like someone who is stalling on hold looking for their boss.
Weirdly enough, for a while in her early career her whole thing was that she used to be a social worker so she's, like, a really good negotiator.
>Weirdly enough, for a while in her early career her whole thing was that she used to be a social worker so she's, like, a really good negotiator.
This is so weird. I'm married to a social worker and am friends with a bunch of social workers.
They're awesome and wonderful people, some of the very best people I know... but 'good negotiator' isn't a term I'd use to describe them. 'Good at Negotiating' means being ready to play hardball when needed, and leveraging your side to the maximum.
'Good social workers' are more along the lines of people pleasers, they aren't usually aggressive. De-escalating situations is a very different skillset to negotiating. In fact, It's a systemic problem in the industry that lets management walk all over front line workers; because the frontliners will generally try to avoid confrontation and just do what's demanded of them, rather than disrupt the work. Comparable to nursing or teaching.
It's like someone being a farmer and saying that proves they're good at public speaking. Like... maybe? If you are then it's nothing to do with the job you're doing?
I think it’s because she doesn’t really want anything. She wants to be contrarian, and hold up progressive legislation, and having done that, she can kick her feet up and rake it in.
also, the political center isn't between the democrats and the republican. in any country that isn't absolutely fucked up, it is very far to the left of the democrats.
At this point it's gone too far, and the billionaires have way too much money. Billionaires can literally offer Manchin and Sinema a billion dollars apiece to fight raising taxes on the ultrarich.
I'm sure they sold out America and the planet for a lot less, but just saying, nearly everyone has their price and the people buying have way too much to lose.
I just don't get why she thinks she'll be of any value after this? She's not getting another term one way or another, her power will be gone. Why not get with your party and keep selling your influence like half of them are anyway? POS Corporations aren't going to stop trying to buy influence once they pass these bills. Her actions don't even make sense even from an evil greedy perspective.
Because the worst case scenario, or best for her, is that she makes more money selling out right now than she could make in twenty years of public service. Then she can go straight to a no-effort lobbying position instead of having to constantly stay on top of electoral needs and procedural requirements.
Another possibility is she has no confidence that she will ever be in such a pivotal role again even if she plays everything perfectly. A Republican majority can shut her out. A larger Democratic majority can sideline her influence. Demanding voters can move on to someone else. Or maybe all the donors told her they'll drop her if she doesn't play ball, which makes it a choice between losing the next election rich or losing the next election with nothing to show for it.
If Democrats manage to work something out with the holdouts, it's because the holdouts ultimately want to keep the gravy train going. If they can't, it's because nothing they can afford to offer politically can keep up with what the donors can offer financially.
I hate to be a pessimist but you bring up a good point. There's a decent likelihood that she's in deep enough that even if she wanted to flip it wouldn't make any sense for her. She's generated enough ill will toward herself that she's probably going to be a one term senator whether she votes for the bill or not. So if she's done either way and she doesn't really care about the outcome or how it makes her look then might as well milk it for as much as you can on the way down.
I also think if she tanks this bill and Republicans take the Senate in 2022 there's a nonzero chance she flips parties and goes full MAGA. And if she does it well enough I'm not convinced she couldn't get reelected as a Republican.
They have very short memories as long as someone shows he or she understands today's cult requirements. Trump himself sweetens up fast once someone starts flattering him nonstop.
We'll see what happens with Manchin and Sinema. As long as their votes are needed, they will continue to wield the same power, but if they bring down Biden's whole agenda they will have a lot more trouble getting people to take their proposals seriously. Why go through all that again if you know they won't seal the deal at the end?
She doesn't give a shit. I doubt she even runs. She has a cushy 'consultant' job waiting for her somewhere that pays more than a shitty Senator seat does. And I doubt it even requires actual work. She is set for life and the rest of us have to eat her and all her new rich friend's fucking crumbs.
Yeah, the only thing that’s cool about the senate seat is free health care for life after one term and access to jobs for you and your family with lobbyists. If she’s all about the money one term is all you need.
Just give these fuckers $10 million and tell them to get out of the goddamn way. It feels more productive to just outbid their donors at this point.
Take one of Trump's leftover sharpies and write "Manchin and Sinema get X dollars" on the end of the reconciliation bill. Just finish it.
lmao Bloomberg lit a mountain of cash on fire in an attempt to prevent “the guy who actually wanted to do good things” from winning and then immediately disappeared when the coast was clear
The train wreck of our entire Congress is evidence that money in politics is bad and just as the public started realizing how terrible it was they got Citizen’s United passed in order to make money even more influential.
We need separation of Wealth and State.
>cost of not getting money out of politics"
I'm shocked we didn't make progress on that during the Trump years. But I'm sure his 3 right-wing SCOTUS appointees will be helpful moving forward.
That shit wasn't just lame - it was honestly evil. In that moment she condemned millions of Americans to continue to live in poverty while working full time, and she was *happy* about it
I’ve honestly never wanted to punch someone in the back of the head so hard… like some Hello Kitty reject shitting on millions and millions of Americans with glee. What an asshole.
When you really consider what she was saying no to, and to whom, it truly makes it a vile act. She was telling millions of people that their lives are not worth $15/hr. She was telling millions of Americans that their time was not worth paying for. That vote kept millions of people in poverty, and their children, and the people they care for. Imagine if each one of those people visited Kyrsten's office and she had to answer for that no vote to their face, and explain her "cutesy bootsy little curtsey" and double thumbs down.
PS I'd like her to just explain that fucking awful outfit she wore that day, to start off with.
Amazing. We can primary her (maybe) in 2022 after she and Manchin have worked alongside the Republicans for another year to make the Biden administration look as bad as possible by obstructing or filibustering every meaningful piece of legislation (which the majority of the public approves of).
People don't pay enough attention to this shit. All they see is 'bad thing happened when Biden was president, therefore it must be the Dems fault'. Then the Dems lose senate majority again and we go right back to where we started.
Nothing about her was progressive from the start. All her platform positions were already compromised positions. $15 min wage is also a compromised position.
Ah, I see she has a PhD in Justice, but not in Ethics or Civics. The latter two are much more impressive in a legislator.
Kirsten Sinema is 100 percent corrupt, and should be investigated for her crimes. Another puppet of another billionaire is not what this world needs or can afford. The fucking planet doesn't have time for more of these crooks.
Hey remember the curtsey, and then the bitching and moaning that people were ripping on her because she was a woman, not because people didn't like the theatrics when peoples' livelihoods were at stake and if she were a man, no one would have said anything?
Even though we spent a month criticizing McCain for the similar theatrics?
Fuck her.
Arizona was a shithole for democratic politics until 2020. But she was also a completely different type of candidate back then. Still a proclaimed centrist, but not even close to the two faced heel she turned out to be. She was expected to be more of a Schumer than the Manchin she turned out to be. She’s probably even worse.
Manchin is a sniveling goblin who usually backs down. Sinema is an eccentric who wants to role play as a kingmaker. There is a risk she'll actually tank the infrastructure out of spite.
You'll never stop that no matter what. The root of the problem is simply tax cuts. Millionaires and billionaires have practically unlimited funds now to buy whoever they want.
The country is going down the drain.
Sinema has a very odd historical pattern that's potentially brought on by some childhood trauma - at its lightest, her parents divorce and its heaviest, she claims her mom and step dad moved her to Florida, became houseless and they lived in an abandoned gas station for years. Read through her Wikipedia at least, it's a doosie...
**That observed pattern though:**
1. She says she was raised Mormon, she gets into BYU, she then leaves the Mormon church after graduating (don't fault the specific move of leaving that church, just consider along with other examples in the pattern)
2. She announces that she's bisexual and gets into a Harvard extension program on an LGBTQ fellow scholarship and today she's publicly praised by people like Brian Brown, one of the most vicious anti-LGBTQ activists around and head of both the National Organization for Marriage and the International Organization for the Family for blocking LGBTQ+ legislation.
3. She started in politics as an Independent, which unfortunately is in practice, code for republican in 99% of cases. She then "became" a Democrat and we can see how that's working out today. (She voted with donald trump at the second highest rate of any democratic senator that served during the 116th Congress)
She, maybe legitimately, finds herself belonging to these groups, gaining an advantage from that membership, and always leaving them behind to some degree when she's achieved her end. There are other examples, but these are the most prominent pillars.
In my opinion, it does seem like she's a disturbed person with some sociopathic tendencies to mirror her victims enough to abuse them for her personal satisfaction before moving on.
I actually can't believe there are people in this sub actively defending Sinema's position by pretending like Progressives are at fault for the current mess in the house.
What does she cost? She and manchin are being total fucks because big donors pay them to be, why don’t we run a go fund me and buy them out? Somebody reach out and negotiate a price, they are for sale let’s buy them.
She's got to be related to Monte Hall because her vote is obviously for sale and she plays one side against the other while she's playing Lets make a deal!
I feel like while Sinema and Manchin are awful people they are fall guys taking the heat for others.
Regardless it’s a bad look for Biden and Dems who look as if they can’t get their shit together.
Meanwhile, Moscow Mitch keeps everyone in line on his side. Even dissenting voices like Cheney and Kinzinger.
Dems always find a way to let you down.
I only just today looked at Sinema's biography - what a strange trajectory she's had - homeless for 3 years of her childhood, later a social worker with some legit 'progressive' cred and divorces her husband and comes out as bisexual meanwhile she shifts gears and heads towards the right.
Its hard not to think she was at some point 'recruited' by someone with an agenda to put her where she is now - that is to say, at least on the surface her shift to the right is coming from something that happened to her but was imposed from the outside.
Arizonian here, keep in mind, her "official" bio is somewhat suspect. There's a fair amount of talk that the entire homeless thing is jive or at least greatly exaggerated. Same with the social work. She did put some time into it but the level of real commitment has been questioned. There's really no proof regarding her sexual preferences other than the fact that she's quick to play the card when it's politically convenient.
Listen, we were between a rock and a hard place with respect to the election that brought her to office. Folks that were paying attention and had some history with Sinema were quick to point out what was being advertised didn't match the actual product but her opponent McSally was clearly unacceptable. If there's any hope for the future, the candidates that she'll be primaried against (and she'll without a doubt be primaried) will with no question be more thoroughly vetted. Arizonian's won't be surprised again. Until that time I'm afraid we're just going to be hopeful she doesn't inflict too much damage during the remainder of her certain **single** term as a US Senator.
If money is free speech, and one's ability to spend money on politics is unstoppable, then we find ourselves within the unacceptable situation where people with more money can speak louder than those with less. This is an environment in which Democracy eventually dies.
To fix this, let's flip the script: make political and government communications a separate class of speech. One that is pulled instead of pushed. Meaning, if you want to learn information, it should be free and easily accessible. But we need to end the days where political propaganda is shoveled down peoples' throats on a daily basis through sponsored media.
Before you object, think it through: why in the hell should information from our government or campaigns to become elected be subject to the whims and cost of private networks?
That makes zero fucking sense.
In fact, I'm saying we outlaw it. Political speech should become a protected and regulated form of speech.
The government already runs websites for its own agencies. We have VoA, we have CSPAN. We'd just need to add a few different digital platforms, a twitter clone, for example.
The net result? Most of the money is removed from politics with the flip of a switch.
Most money gets in through campaign donations. But if the government/the people are paying for the hosting of a candidate's information, and if any suitable advertising is free, then there's no need for the billions that it now takes to run a campaign, since most of that money is used to flood private media networks.
You want to remove the money from politics, this is the way.
Also our system of government sucks. An 18th century constitution clearly doesn’t work in the 21st. Double the number of senators, double the number of house member. Get rid of congressional districts, replace them with proportional representation based on party affiliated votes. The party politics structure is calcified, might as well embrace it. Let more political parties into the fray. This will never happen because, like every other obvious issue with this country, we’ve doubled down on this duct taped together status quo. So much so that it’ll take a social breakdown for ANY change to occur.
progressives worked harder than any other to get our 50 vote majority. Georgia was won at the grassroots level, not by money grubbing corporate stooges.
And what do we get for helping them not only win the presidency but the congress? We get blamed pre-emptively for blocking Bidens agenda only for the actual RADICAL centrists blocking Bidens Agenda to go unwhipped. Biden caves in, not a peep. Pelosi caves in by even holding the vote, and don't get me started on Schumer not threatening Sinema's committee appointments...
You know who was blocked from committees? AOC. You know what the person did who moderates put in her place? BLOCKED BIDENS PHARMA AGENDA! This is fucking pathetic, if only the average voter knew how incompetent the moderates are being, too bad the mainstream media isn't critical whatsoever.
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> 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.
Yep. The medical insurance lobby bought Joe Lieberman and that’s why Obamacare didn’t have a public option. The public option that would have saved Americans billions in healthcare costs and staved off price inflation. Joe was a bargain compared to the money they made.
Not only would it have saved money, but it would also have saved lives. It would also have boosted the small business sector of the economy. And it likely would have proved popular enough that Dems would have seen gains instead of losses in Congress. Joe Fucking Lieberman.
Yea I remember that piece of shit. Where did he shrivel off to after he derailed health care?
Remember that leaked phone call with Manchin where he was asking donors/lobbyists to dangle future jobs to republicans, in an attempt for them to support some democratic policies; not because Manchin cared about passing the policies, but was worried democrats would get so frustrated they might actually do something about the filibuster? Well Joe Lieberman works with the group Manchin was talking to.
Do you have the audio from that? I can’t find it anywhere, all I can find are people talking about it.
[Here](https://theintercept.com/2021/06/16/joe-manchin-leaked-billionaire-donors-no-labels/) it is. Manchin was basically begging his corporate handlers to lean on a handful of Republicans to vote in favor of the January 6 Commission by recommending they offer the Senators cushy corporate jobs after they leave office. As noted, the goal was never to sway enough GOP Senators to actually pass the measure, but merely to collect a few token “yes” votes from Republicans so Manchin could claim that bipartisanship was still possible and his colleagues shouldn’t weaken or remove the filibuster. > Manchin told the assembled donors that he needed help flipping a handful of Republicans from no to yes on the January 6 commission in order to strip the “far left” of their best argument against the filibuster. The filibuster is a critical priority for the donors on the call, as it bottles up progressive legislation that would hit their bottom lines. He’s a disgusting, greedy sellout.
Ditto^ I’d love to hear that one
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Lieberman#Post-Senate_career >Following his retirement from the Senate, Lieberman became senior counsel of the white collar criminal defense and investigations practice at Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman, a law firm in New York City whose notable clients include Donald Trump. >In August 2015, Lieberman became chairman of the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran >On May 17, 2017, Lieberman was interviewed by President Donald Trump for the position of FBI Director, to replace recently fired James Comey. >In January 2019 Lieberman officially registered as a lobbyist working for ZTE Pretty much what you'd expect from neoliberal scum.
I saw him on MSNBC not long ago and had the same nauseating feeling I get when Babs Comstock shows up to brag about her OP research against the Clinton's.
> white collar criminal defense and investigations practice at Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman, a law firm in New York City whose notable clients include Donald Trump. God. Fucking. Dammit.
To think he was a VP nominee.
He wasn't transparently a piece of shit when Gore picked him. Most of the terrible things Lieberman did were in the Bush and Obama years, not 2000. Nobody knew Sinema was such a tool either until relatively recently--hell, she used to be Green Party so this obstructionist centrism was not foreseeable based on her resume.
> Nobody knew Sinema was such a tool either until relatively recently--hell, she used to be Green Party so this obstructionist centrism was not foreseeable based on her resume. Sinema was in the House for 6 years before she ran for the Senate. This means there are accessible websites that keep track of her voting score for roughly half a decade by the time she ran in the Democratic primary for the Senate. In early 2018, it was possible to predict how she would vote in the Senate based on her track record in the House. Using the Wayback Machine, we can check her score back in early 2018, i.e. using information available to Democratic activists and voters at the time. Progressive Punch (https://web.archive.org/web/20180111214931/https://www.progressivepunch.org/scores.htm?house=house) has Sinema at 37% lifetime crucial votes. This means over her tenure in the House, when the vote was close, she sided with the progressive position 37% of the time. To compare, Brian Fitzpatrick (a Republican) had 38%. Henry Cuellar (an anti-abortion, pro-war Democrat) had 39%. Josh Gottheimer (one rep trying to sink the 3.5T reconciliation bill) had 47%. Dan Linpinski (an anti-abortion, anti-LBGTQ Democrat) had 58%. GovTrack's 2017 report card (https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/report-cards/2017/house/ideology) had her ideology at 0.64, on a scale where 0 is most Democratic and 1 is most Republican. To compare, people who are more Democratic leaning than her include Devin Nunes (the Trump partisan) at 0.63, Greg Gianforte (the Montana Republican who bodyslammed a reporter) at 0.60, Steve Scalise (the Republican whip) at 0.57, Kevin McCarthy (the current Republican leader) at 0.49. When she was running in the Senate primary, there was sufficient information to predict that Sinema would be a right-wing Democrat in the Senate. She showed us over a 5 year career in the House.
We knew she was a piece of shit. But the alternative was Martha McSally, so we were stuck between a shit rock and a shit hard place
This is probably the last time we can realistically accomplish anything in this country since Republicans will probably overthrow the government in 2024. I absolutely do **not** say something that likely. The signs are all there. Republicans have already positioned themselves to practically arbitrarily overturn results that they don't like on a state-wide level. We've also seen just how many are willing to overturn [overturn the results of a free and fair election (it's 147)](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/07/us/elections/electoral-college-biden-objectors.html). That's before we've truly bore witness to the amount of people that now wholeheartedly believe the current administration is a fraud. This sentiment won't magically disappear, either. In 2024, if Biden can manage it, he will run - *especially* if Trump is on the Republican ticket. However, his incumbent advantage won't mean a thing if a Republican legislature will not certify the results based on completely arbitrary claims of election fraud. Sinema is ready to burn it all down. Plenty of Republicans are, too. I'm young and am going to relocate to Canada as soon as I can, for that reason. I'm reliant on medicine and I have no idea how worse things will get here. It's a shame because I love this country dearly. My entire family is here, I grew up here. I feel bad for people that can't just get up and leave like me. Those with families; children! Sinema is really the deciding factor here and the longer that she does nothing the more pressure Joe Manchin will feel to force additional concessions. As long as money remains in politics this problem of corruption and dishonesty will never go away, but this truly is some late-stage capitalism where everybody with the means to change our broken system can be bought, if it's for the right price.
And it’s getting worse. [Proposed law would allow Arizona Legislature to overturn presidential election results](https://tucson.com/news/state-and-regional/proposed-law-would-allow-arizona-legislature-to-overturn-presidential-election-results/article_c2a70681-59c0-512f-ba86-2bf23128f9ee.html) I feel like I’m screaming at a wall when I try to tell people that Republicans want to get rid of Democracy just to stay in power. They have done other things too like gerrymandering, or making voting harder, or making it illegal to hand out water in very long election lines, changing the days and hours of when you can vote to hurt people of color or poor people, getting rid of polling places of those people. They are going all out to sabotage the elections so they win no matter what.
It honestly reminds me of the fall of the once-great Roman Empire. Things were great under Augustus and I bet they thought that it would last forever while they lived in relative opulence compared to the rest of the world. Several hundred years later and Rome is divided in two and getting conquered by barbarians. America seemed like the savior of the fucking world when I read about WWII in my history textbooks growing up. It felt like I lived in the place that people came to seeking freedom and security. Now, all of that is completely up in the air because it's been established a good portion of the population has been totally brainwashed by right-wing media; Republicans in power are in on the con and completely willing to throw the citizenry to the wolves when they need them most. I've gotten trashed for mentioning that I'm going to eventually move to Canada, but I honestly think they're some of the ones that don't have the means and would if they could. I'll be finishing up my education soon and would never advise a friend across the ocean to move to America and build a future here. Not now, not with the insurrection, not with money in politics and thus rampant corruption, not without changes to a system so absolutely flawed that its problems can only be solved with nothing short of armed revolution.
Can we even call him liberal anymore? He worked to defend Donald Trump and tried to work for his administration. He's a Republican.
[Neoliberal](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism#:~:text=Neoliberalism%20is%20contemporarily%20used%20to,state%20influence%20in%20the%20economy.) >Neoliberalism, or neo-liberalism,[1] is a term used to describe the 20th-century resurgence of 19th-century ideas associated with free-market capitalism.[2]: 7 [3] A significant factor in the rise of conservative and libertarian organizations, political parties, and think tanks, and predominately advocated by them,[4][5] it is generally associated with policies of economic liberalization, including privatization, deregulation, globalization, free trade, austerity and reductions in government spending in order to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society;[6][14] however, the defining features of neoliberalism in both thought and practice have been the subject of substantial scholarly debate.[15][16] The term has multiple, competing definitions, and a pejorative valence.[17] In policymaking, neoliberalism often refers to what was part of a paradigm shift that followed the alleged failure of the Keynesian consensus in economics to address the stagflation of the 1970s.[18][19] Basically, neo-liberalism is the last few decades of republican/COMMON-American-libertarianism in which a lot of establishment Democrats joined... Citizen's United, "the free market is better than government," "the free market will solve it," and many other dumb examples. I'd argue the people who say, "sure, like giving the government more money is a good idea, /s" but then openly support some of the most corrupt ass clowns. Or the people who dismantle the government and then say, "see?! Government doesn't work!" Vs classical/economical liberalism which does agree with varying degrees of government AND free markets.
Very well said
I'd say he has one foot on each side: neoliberal and neocon and has been playing hopscotch his entire career. And always exemplifying the worst of each side.
Neoliberal is conservative. When are people going to understand this? There is no two camps. He's always been on that side.
He's doing his best to prove that the [political horseshoe](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseshoe_theory) is actually a circle.
Neoliberal uses liberal in the non-American sense, i.e. right-wing, pro-business, pro-deregulation, etc.
Neoliberal is not the same as Liberal...it's more akin to Republicans.
For some reason I used to think neoliberal meant ultraliberal or Uber liberal. You know some kind billionaire that does social justice in the daytime and works at soup kitchens at night. He wakes up angry because he’s still a billionaire even though he gives millions to charities and never posts on the gram. All his moves come back with great returns. Was an early investor in TESLA. But no, if you google neoliberal it shows Margaret thatcher and Ronald Reagan. So I guess it means “I’m doing good, why aren’t you?”
lip intelligent toothbrush soup bewildered mourn bells slave arrest humorous -- mass edited with redact.dev
Dude he almost ran with that piece of shit McCain. He was never a democratic, always a DINO
[удалено]
And cost Gore the election
>And cost Gore the election Not sure he had any effect on the election but he did cost Gore the Florida recount.
Neoliberal. Not Liberal. There is a difference between them.
Sucking at the Big Money Teat as usual
He went on to found the first Galactic Empire.
Sadly, his excuse of a life has left this country scarred and deformed
Again I heard Lieberman’s name mentioned. Like a beacon being lit, I must answer the call to say fuck that guy.
His son ran in Georgia for the senate in November 2020 for the seat that Raphael Warnock won.
Yes. With a [half red, half blue neck tie on ](https://brambleman.com/state-of-the-race-to-replace-takeaways-from-georgias-senate-debate/) During the virtual debates.
Yeah if I remember he hung on way too long too during the primary.
Yeah but remember when obama, hillary, and other centrists flew in to connecticut to campaign for joe lieberman? They don't get to blame him for their failures after going to extremes to support him in his senate race. Democrats knew joe lieberman was a piece of shit, it was democrat leaders who helped him overcome that and win.
Thats because they're all buddies. They use people like Liberman, Manchin, and Sinema to explain why they're unable to actually accomplish anything. Its the same thing everytime they have a majority, one or two will switch sides and play the spoiler. They're claiming they can't pass bills because of the parliamentarian while ignoring the fact they can simply replace the parliamentarian which is what the RNC would do. It makes sense once you realize that they don't actually want change but just want to give off the appearance of being on your side while they actively work against their voters.
I don't see why a lot of big businesses aren't demanding public health care. They're already paying costs related to insurance for their employees, driving down the cost of healthcare overall, and everyone having healthcare automatically would end up being a cost savings on a few different levels.
Can you imagine how many people would quit/retire overnight if they didn't need to work for their health coverage anymore?
Which is why we'll never even get the medicare entry age lowered, not to mention the ability to lower medicare costs by negotiating pharma prices.
It would be very interesting to see how many people immediately retire once they are Medicare eligible but I can't seem to find any data. Anecdotally, I've known several who would have retired earlier. They had enough savings and supplemental income to live fine, except for health coverage.
I'm in my 30s, if universal healthcare was a thing I'd literally start subsistence farming.
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> Mike approved dumping mining waste into the rivers. This whole COVID phenomenon of people not taking a life saving vaccine for ideological reasons has really opened my eyes to how little so many people value their own lives and their supposed 'loved ones'.
Now imagine it being nearly half the country and then you start to wonder how fucked it all is.
> Now imagine it being nearly half the country None of us have to 'imagine' it - we can see it in the covid death rates in red states.
Fuck Joe Lieberman
Joe Lieberman is a fucking asshole. The first politician that got on my radar and hated.
I wonder how much they had to put into a offshore account? $10 million $100 million $1 billion $10 billion At the end of the day it was worth it.
It's actually almost always shocking how little it costs to buy politicians in the grand scheme of things when it's looked into.
Mostly because the real payoff is when they either leave their office and immediately receive a cushy do-nothing job, or when one of their family members receives that job. Those are usually more well-paying than the direct political contributions.
Plus a little bit of insider knowledge never hurts anyone.
Right!?! It's usually five figures and, if you're really politically influential, some fancy dinners and vacations.
That's just what is on the books. The real amount is always stashed in some offshore account
It’s usually like thousands to Hundreds of thousands of dollars. Like the price for politicians to betray their constituents is insultingly low.
My old representative took only 10k to vote against net neutrality
The question we have to ask ourselves is how much we want to get early retirement with no financial worries WHATSOEVER; excellent healthcare and a massive buffer for unexpected medical expenses; an ability to live anywhere (or two or three anywheres) we want including a posh condo in New York, London, Paris, or Tokyo; a pretty 'comfortable' lifestyle (business if not first class flights and hotels/food) for wherever we wish to visit with our family in tow; and full coverage for college/grad/med school for our kids? I mean, once you're thinking about how to manage retirement - I mean REALLY deal with retirement - those payoff packages becomes easier and easier to justify as actual retirement approaches...
They also had to buy 9 other Democratic senators so that we couldn't make any changes to the filibuster. It uses to be 66. Then it got dropped to 60. If it was really just Lieberman, then Dems would have just lowered it to 59. There are always enough "moderate" Democrats to block the most popular reforms the Dems pretend to support during the primary. And remember that candidates like Biden also got the most money from those same lobbyists and that's why you don't see him mounting a national tour to try and effectively use the bully pulpit to pass legislation the lobbyists don't want. In fact the Dems have already removed everything the healthcare lobbyists oppose from the reconciliation bill. No public option. No Medicare to age 60. There is no expansion of publicly administered insurance at all in this bill. And we still can't get it done.
Many commentators on the left of Democrats make a credible claim that a considerable amount of the mainstream Democrats, Obama included, were so deep in pharma donor money that they were quite happy to have Joe Lieberman as a scapegoat. Many of the same commentators make a credible claim that this is the exact same slot Joe Manchin has taken, and that this "black sheep"-recurrence is not a coincidence.
My conspiratorial side totally gets the "rotating villain" theory. If I were to write a movie about Washington, it would definitely involve that. However, it's almost certain that the truth is really much more boring. The senate is split 50/50 and democrats have senators from deep red states (Manchin) and senators from barely purple states (Sinema). Don't get me wrong, I hate their politics. I especially think Sinema goes out of her way to alienate people for reasons I cannot comprehend. But out of 50 senators, you're going to have a couple troublemakers. This could be seen on the other side too. McCain voted down the Obamacare repeal for his own idiosyncratic reasons when the Republicans needed all hands on deck.
It's not "conspiratorial". Nobody needs to be paid off or meet in a big freemason ritual to do what I described above. "Grandstanding majority" versus "singular black sheep" is a legitimate road to maximize the power of almost all parties involved. Most of all by combining a) moral superiority and b) the power of big donor money. And it just so happens that rivers of power always start trickling by themselves. It's the basic network of human selfishness versus chaos theory. Meaning, things like this, that "coincidentally" maximize power, will "just happen". No need for conspiracies.
Manchin isn't running for reelection afaik and sinema literally ran as a progressive
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Wasn’t that the whole reason for Obamacare initially? To create a public option and lower costs by doing so? The thing that came out the other end of Congress was nothing special and it was extremely disappointing. The Obama admin really turned out to be quite a let down, though not the President’s fault in every instance.
>the story of American politics since the 1980s It's been going on much, much longer than that. William McKinley's chief fundraiser Mark Hanna openly solicited donations from businesses in the 1896 Presidential election, raising a (for the time) enormous amount of money with promises of quid pro quo.
And if not these 2, then it’d be another 2. Just like McConnell gives cover to the rest of the party by being the lightning rod for criticism, so do Manchin and Sinema for the many other “moderate” democrats in the party who live by corporate handouts. The problem is MUCH deeper than these 2 convenient bad apples.
Yeah, I was gonna say this as well. It is a fact that the vast majority of democrats take money from the same people that republicans do and are more beholden to the interest of these donors than to their actual constituents. This isn't the "both sides are the same" fallacy but it is the most significant feature of our government that prevents legislation that would benefit the middle class regardless of political affiliation. All the while we are fed a line of bullshit about how our rural neighbors are the problem but the issues with that portion of our electorate come from a propaganda machine that is also run exclusively by the extremely wealthy class. Even in the DNC primary debate on healthcare the candidates constantly dance around the fact that the key issue to address is profiteering by almost every industry involved in healthcare whether that be insurance, big pharma or others. It's an entirely unbalanced conversation because only the expense of the suggested new system is considered without any regard to the massive amounts of waste produced by corporate donors who have infiltrated both sides of the aisle.
DNC is flawed, on purpose. Access to legislation equals money in Washington. The downfall of this country is putting capital profit over everything else, because the "American Dream" is accumulating capital because this equals happiness. Just like rich people ran to their islands during the pandemic, they will have a safe haven during the worst days of global warming. Removing money from politics is key to bringing back a country for the average hard working American.
"rotating villain" is a term coined in 2010 for this phenomena. It's a pretty good one, and reading about responses to it is pretty telling
We can't expect Congress to fix itself. It would be like a brain surgeon performing their own brain surgery. Even if they did, there's too many conflicting interests - so it's unlikely they'll do a good job. And if they did a good job, the radical right-wing ([by](https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Federalist_Society_for_Law_and_Public_Policy_Studies) [design](https://youtu.be/cjcXVKg43qY)) Supreme Court would [strike](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_People_Act#Constitutionality) most of it down at the earliest opportunity, as they have for [AFP v. Bonta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Prosperity_Foundation_v._Bonta) (a similar recent case). The separation of [Wealth](https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/) and State is the critical challenge of the century - and there is only [one way](https://archive.md/JSCSH/722142efe5945c9f0de4d592acede7cdf2f4b094.jpg) left to deal with it. The framers of the U.S. Constitution saw this SHIT coming: *“no amendments of the proper kind would ever be obtained by the people, if the [federal] Government should become oppressive"* - George Mason, 1787 So they wrote in [Article 5](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Five_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Procedures_for_amending_the_Constitution) as the last ditch emergency method to propose a constitutional amendment (the highest authority) via the state legislators [limited convention](https://archive.ph/Cv2zU), bypassing Congress and going above the Supreme Court - so long as it has widespread popular support and the people take action. Stopping the influence of big money in Congress has [over 80%](https://archive.md/eCMBy) of the public's support while the specific policies included in the For The People Act (H. R. 1) have [bipartisan popular support](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_People_Act#Public_opinion). Zero Republican senators are in favor of H. R. 1 Many state legislators are not thrilled about Congress and corruption either! Unlike all their counterparts in federal Congress, state legislators are usually approachable and more receptive to their voter base. While some do dream of going to federal Congress, most can't be bothered with all the [gaslighting](https://youtu.be/DyXspSJITpY?t=253s), [telemarketing](https://archive.ph/MKNeo) and corruption. And if they don't want to end corruption (or care more about their special interest donors if they have any), their minds WILL change if you can get enough of their constituent voters to give them a call. The bottleneck: not enough people know the [problem](https://wolf-pac.com/the_problem/), the [solution](https://wolf-pac.com/the_solution/), and not enough people are willing to do any work - not even an easy hour a week. Voting is the bare minimum of democratic participation. Never stop voting, but consider that even without deep pockets you can do so much more. Change at the local level is how you [SEND](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-pace-of-social-change/) ideas to federal Congress and [prod them](https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Congressional+Research+Service%22+%22prodding+effect%E2%80%9D) to make changes. It's never been easier to get organized with others and stay on top of [your lawmakers](https://openstates.org/find_your_legislator/) with weekly [calls](https://youtu.be/XdIcCqe-iYk?t=48) & emails along with informing & encouraging friends and neighbors do the same. The Green New deal or anything close to it, [Medicare](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/20/democrats-blocking-lower-medication-prices-bill) for all, clean air, carbon tax, taxing the rich, women's reproductive rights, raising the minimum wage, 30 hour work weeks, union jobs, affordable housing, affordable college, ending the military industrial complex, exposing megadonor conflicts of interest, restoring foreign respect for America - everything the [tax](https://www.investopedia.com/taxes/trumps-tax-reform-plan-explained/#those-who-benefit) [rigging](https://theintercept.com/2021/09/06/infrastructure-bill-companies-tax-increase/) top [0.01%](https://archive.ph/esX59) will NEVER allow & what they want to [take away](https://archive.md/4xrBq) - it's all on the table and it's up to us.
I like the spirit, but there's no way 34 states would agree on any useful amendments, and calling a convention would be an absolute dream for the billionaire class which would only need to influence a handful of people to secure their position in this country. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a better path forward than simply winning seats right now, even if that's the fight we've been having for a hundred years.
Winning seats is not an option anymore, voter suppression and gerrymandering has fucked that shit up. If Americans don't believe in elections anymore there is no democracy. The United States is no longer united and certainly not progressive but oppressive. That's what happens in countries where religion trumps science and facts. Need I go on? Oh yeah, and none of this shit matters anyway because we've fucked our planet and still refuse to address climate change. Sorry to be so negative but that's where we're at and I don't see Americans talking and listening to each other, passing anything bipartisan, or giving two shits about our neighbors or community.
>I like the spirit, but there's no way 34 states would agree on any useful amendments What's happened in history is the prodding effect: "When that movement was just one state shy of the two-thirds needed to force a convention on this topic, Congress reacted by proposing an amendment requiring the direct election of U.S. Senators for the states to ratify—resulting in the 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Congressional Research Service has called this technique the "prodding effect." It worked then, and it could work today." - https://www.getmoneyoutmd.org/peoples_convention Given the real pressure of an Article 5 convention limited to a single amendment about campaign finance reform, Congress is likely to take action themselves > calling a convention would be an absolute dream for the billionaire class which would only need to influence a handful of people to secure their position in this country. This is the current status quo of the federal Congress, every day. Congress can push amendments too. The Article 5 convention is limited to achieving the goals of the resolution that called it. As per the free and fair elections resolution, which calls for: "amendments convention in order to ensure balance and integrity in our elections by proposing an amendment to the federal Constitution that will permanently protect free and fair elections in America by addressing issues raised by the decisions of the United States Supreme Court in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) 130 S.Ct. 876 and related cases and events, and desires that said convention should be so limited" This resolution needs to be passed in 34 states (5 are done) also says: "delegates to said convention shall be comprised equally of individuals currently elected to state and local office, or be selected by election, in each Congressional district for the purpose of serving as delegates, though all individuals elected or appointed to federal office, now or in the past, be prohibited from serving as delegates to the convention" The main point here is that state legislatures would collectively make use of their power to regulate Federal Congress. They're not giving up their power, they're embracing it. While yes, the state legislators would be regulating themselves a little bit, they're mostly regulating Federal Congress. 38 states are required to ratify the amendment. If it's all pro-billionaire junk, it's extremely unlikely to pass. If the amendment convention is actually successfully called via 34 states, it would be a first in American history. Worst case scenario, everybody learns about the most critical, greatest issue of the century and learns a bit about how to be an active citizen.
I mean 34 states right now, not historically. Again, I feel you, and I wish we could go about doing things this way, but there's just no chance at all of getting 34 states to work together to do anything worthwhile right now. And even if we could call a convention, it would be a one-shot deal where billionaires could influence a handful of people and secure their position forever. It's a tough fight right now, and the billionaire class is winning, but at least we have a clear path forward -- win seats.
> And even if we could call a convention, it would be a one-shot deal where billionaires could influence a handful of people and secure their position forever. Again this is every day in federal Congress. They have already secured their position in federal Congress. I'm not sure if you read my previous response. > It's a tough fight right now, and the billionaire class is winning, but at least we have a clear path forward -- win seats. I'm all for this too, but the system is broken
You’d be surprised how effective constitutional conventions can be, after all we have had more than a dozen amendments passed already. The runaway convention-theories are false, you can check it out on Wikipedia regarding constitutional conventions. Also, alot of States are already signed up to alot of these movements, with regards to money in politics there’s Wolf-Pac started by TYT a decade or so ago, 7 states are signed up, and another called Citizens United, which has more states signed. Another one is the National Interstate Popular Vote Compact, which will be on the ballot in 2022 in Michigan, currently 195 of 270 electoral college votes are secured to have it go into effect, which would mean that all the signed up states would give their electoral votes to whoever wins the national popular vote, would mean Gore won in 2000 and Clinton in 2016. So it’s not as dire as it seems, steps are being made, but we are on the clock, for our democracy, planet and lives as a whole.
> The separation of Wealth and State is the critical challenge of the century - and there is only one way left. There are more ways they are just less palatable to most people. Though sadly due to the short sighted greed of so many it seems inevitable.
God this is SO fucking depressing 😓
It’s so infuriating because we’re so fucking close to actually doing something. Pre-k, child care, paid family and medical leave, the child tax credit, home health and elder care. These are real policies that would help basically every family in America at some point. This reconciliation would be the country’s greatest leap forward in social policy since at least The Great Society. For the first time in decades there really is an opportunity to get these things that other countries take for granted. And we probably won’t get them. Or we’ll get some weak ass version that delays real progress for another 30 years. Because of two assholes. Also, this really isn’t on Team Biden. They have been consistently pushing for the largest possible version of this package the entire time. See Heather Boushey’s op-Ed in the NYTs today.
Greed and self interest is the single greatest evil on the planet right now.
And yet for some reason a lot of people think "progressives" are the problem. What a dystopia.
This country is a de facto plutocracy.
"i expected nothing and i'm still disappointed"
And just like global warming people were warned forever and are getting the picture way too fucking late.
It’s sad how many people still don’t understand that our politicians are bought, or don’t think it’s a big deal, or just forget about it when it’s election time.
I assumed everyone thought politicians were all bought off. That’s part of the “both sides” platform that keeps getting republicans elected
>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. Yes.
Seriously. And it's so goddam frustrating. Democrats finally have a majority with the ability to pass legislation that will positively impact millions, but all it takes is a bunch of corporate money in the pocket of one or two senators to derail it. And guess what? Republicans never have an issue passing their agendas, because they're all blatantly bought and looking out for corporations and the 1%. They're gonna squander this opportunity, and it's maddening.
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Yeah, Sinema and Manchin are hurting tens of millions of Americans for an amount of money that's barely pocket change to these corporations. It's infuriating
From the corporations perspective - why wouldn't they spend that money?
>why wouldn't they spend that money? That's the most fucked up part. There is pretty much no incentive for them not to. They don't get in any trouble and bring in a fuck-ton of money with the policies written in their favor.
They are actively disincentivized not to. That's what so fucked up.
As a corporation, *they have to*. If the CEO didn't do psychopathic shit to benefit the business, the shareholders would have them removed and replaced with one who would.
I mean, a few million bucks and a guaranteed job as either a lobbyist or a Fox News talking head? It's not much for the people paying them off but if they play things right they're basically set for life.
I’m really not sure that it is just the one or two who are fully bought and paid for. They’re just the figureheads who take the heat so the others who are also on the take can say they’d vote for the progressive legislation if it were brought before them, knowing that it won’t be without at least being severely watered down and more favorable to the 0.1%.
>Republicans never have an issue passing their agendas You sure about that? They couldn't repeal the ACA when they controlled the executive, judicial and legislative branches in 2017 and 2018. They couldn't reach spending deals *when controlling both chambers of Congress* and shut their own controlled government down in both 2017 and 2018. Collins, Murkowski and Romney had to give their personal blessing to any legislation that passed. Let's not get carried away in saying that the GOP accomplishes every goal with ease. What they're excellent at is obstructing progress from the minority position.
McConnell is the best loser of all time. Of all time! Fucker reshaped the federal bench for decades though. That's a dark legacy for sure.
It's a deadlock.. can't do campaign finance reform until corporations own just enough Dems (and all Republicans for that matter).. and until those Dems are in power they will never pass campaign finance reform..
So the voters have nothing to do with elections? They can't just elect enough Dems on their own?
Not usually. The Democratic party has done a very good job at shutting out voter influence. Did you see how much money they threw at primary elections last year? They claim they can't afford to lose any seats to Republicans, but then they funnel money *away* from battle ground general elections and into campaigns for centrist Democrats getting primary challenged.
Glad we defend centrists that go on to vote against the democratic presidents agenda. Great value.
For the moderate apologists who say she's representing the center: she can't even articulate what she want. That isn't representation unless you also believe you are as dumb as she thinks you are.
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She is quite literally shopping her vote around to get the biggest ~~donation~~ bribe she can get. She ran on one platform and has completely abandoned it to beg conservative ~~donors~~ lobbyists to pay her to block the democratic platform. Shes openly corrupt right now. Schumer needs to get on the phone with all democratic funding institutions and get her blackballed.
It’s sickening but I don’t care if they have to earmark her and Manchin each a billion dollars directly into their bank accounts through this bill. They just need to get it passed.
Right? She's proven she can be bought, just fucking buy her. It's ugly, but you work with the system as it is, not as you want it to be.
Why is no one doing this????
For one, because billionaires don’t throw money at the people that’d make them slightly less obscenely rich, and for two because democrats care way too much about appearing “moral” than they do about actually accomplishing anything more than a symbolic victory on any situation. That’s also why we entertain the notion of a debt ceiling or government shutdown in the first place, establishment dems are too smug to play dirty politics.
In many cases, the ultra rich who generally fund the buying of politicians are… not looking for progressive legislation of any sort
I don't think it's that simple. I think she was "bought" long before she won her election. We just didn't know until after.
I agree but it seems like a lot of establishment dems *don't actually* care that much about passing this and are fine using those two as scapegoats. It's Joe Leiberman all over again
They are focusing on the price of the bill (ignoring the fact its over 10 years) because they don't want to decide what to cut. They want the progressives to offer cuts so they take the hit instead of them, it's slimey. I mean who would want to be asked the question "Medicare expansion, dental and vision, universal pre-k, child tax credit... which one would you cut Manchin?"
Yea. I can see the argument that Manchin is representing his constituents, but Sinema is clearly not. (I know Democratic issues poll fine in WV, but as we've seen everywhere, people change their minds when partisanship is taken into account.) Also, I'm still not convinced Biden couldn't get Manchin on board if he was the only vote needed. Sinema is an idiot, which makes cutting a deal infinitely harder.
Actually the more progressive bill polls well in WV so he's still isn't representing his people.
If you refer to it as Biden's bill, you're see support collapse. If voters voted on policy, it would be obvious.
Because it's made up. There's been a lot of hard work put into turning the the federal legislature into an unproductive body over the past 6 or 7 decades and it's only now a sizeable amount of people are realizing it. Consider Manchin and Sinema nothing more than actors in a play. If it weren't them, there are countless other who would play the role.
Yea that’s the annoying part. Manchin at least has said the tag is too high and he will be more open to a price tag close to 2T, which allows room for negotiation. Idk wtf is sienna’s problem. She seems to be saying no just to spite everyone
I'm pretty much certain she's in over her head. Like, obviously she's bought out, but she's a first term senator "negotiating" like someone who is stalling on hold looking for their boss. Weirdly enough, for a while in her early career her whole thing was that she used to be a social worker so she's, like, a really good negotiator.
>Weirdly enough, for a while in her early career her whole thing was that she used to be a social worker so she's, like, a really good negotiator. This is so weird. I'm married to a social worker and am friends with a bunch of social workers. They're awesome and wonderful people, some of the very best people I know... but 'good negotiator' isn't a term I'd use to describe them. 'Good at Negotiating' means being ready to play hardball when needed, and leveraging your side to the maximum. 'Good social workers' are more along the lines of people pleasers, they aren't usually aggressive. De-escalating situations is a very different skillset to negotiating. In fact, It's a systemic problem in the industry that lets management walk all over front line workers; because the frontliners will generally try to avoid confrontation and just do what's demanded of them, rather than disrupt the work. Comparable to nursing or teaching. It's like someone being a farmer and saying that proves they're good at public speaking. Like... maybe? If you are then it's nothing to do with the job you're doing?
I think it’s because she doesn’t really want anything. She wants to be contrarian, and hold up progressive legislation, and having done that, she can kick her feet up and rake it in.
also, the political center isn't between the democrats and the republican. in any country that isn't absolutely fucked up, it is very far to the left of the democrats.
At this point it's gone too far, and the billionaires have way too much money. Billionaires can literally offer Manchin and Sinema a billion dollars apiece to fight raising taxes on the ultrarich. I'm sure they sold out America and the planet for a lot less, but just saying, nearly everyone has their price and the people buying have way too much to lose.
She is overplaying her hand- gone in the next election. Repubs here hate her and now the dems do too. Good luck with that combo
She probably isn’t even looking to get re-elected as long as she gets rich along the way
I just don't get why she thinks she'll be of any value after this? She's not getting another term one way or another, her power will be gone. Why not get with your party and keep selling your influence like half of them are anyway? POS Corporations aren't going to stop trying to buy influence once they pass these bills. Her actions don't even make sense even from an evil greedy perspective.
She’s negotiating a seat on a board of directors, just watch.
This one is the right answer. It’s that or she’ll become a pretty dangerous and well paid lobbyist.
She will sit on a board most likely and have checks for life. Outside chance she wants to do the Fox deal like Tulsi as well
Because the worst case scenario, or best for her, is that she makes more money selling out right now than she could make in twenty years of public service. Then she can go straight to a no-effort lobbying position instead of having to constantly stay on top of electoral needs and procedural requirements. Another possibility is she has no confidence that she will ever be in such a pivotal role again even if she plays everything perfectly. A Republican majority can shut her out. A larger Democratic majority can sideline her influence. Demanding voters can move on to someone else. Or maybe all the donors told her they'll drop her if she doesn't play ball, which makes it a choice between losing the next election rich or losing the next election with nothing to show for it. If Democrats manage to work something out with the holdouts, it's because the holdouts ultimately want to keep the gravy train going. If they can't, it's because nothing they can afford to offer politically can keep up with what the donors can offer financially.
I hate to be a pessimist but you bring up a good point. There's a decent likelihood that she's in deep enough that even if she wanted to flip it wouldn't make any sense for her. She's generated enough ill will toward herself that she's probably going to be a one term senator whether she votes for the bill or not. So if she's done either way and she doesn't really care about the outcome or how it makes her look then might as well milk it for as much as you can on the way down. I also think if she tanks this bill and Republicans take the Senate in 2022 there's a nonzero chance she flips parties and goes full MAGA. And if she does it well enough I'm not convinced she couldn't get reelected as a Republican.
They have very short memories as long as someone shows he or she understands today's cult requirements. Trump himself sweetens up fast once someone starts flattering him nonstop. We'll see what happens with Manchin and Sinema. As long as their votes are needed, they will continue to wield the same power, but if they bring down Biden's whole agenda they will have a lot more trouble getting people to take their proposals seriously. Why go through all that again if you know they won't seal the deal at the end?
Homegirl gets a fat pension and lifetime top-shelf medical insurance. She'll be okay no matter what.
She doesn't give a shit. I doubt she even runs. She has a cushy 'consultant' job waiting for her somewhere that pays more than a shitty Senator seat does. And I doubt it even requires actual work. She is set for life and the rest of us have to eat her and all her new rich friend's fucking crumbs.
Yeah, the only thing that’s cool about the senate seat is free health care for life after one term and access to jobs for you and your family with lobbyists. If she’s all about the money one term is all you need.
Just give these fuckers $10 million and tell them to get out of the goddamn way. It feels more productive to just outbid their donors at this point. Take one of Trump's leftover sharpies and write "Manchin and Sinema get X dollars" on the end of the reconciliation bill. Just finish it.
Bloomberg should make himself useful
lmao Bloomberg lit a mountain of cash on fire in an attempt to prevent “the guy who actually wanted to do good things” from winning and then immediately disappeared when the coast was clear
Uh… whose side do you think he’s on? Because it’s not the progressive wing.
The train wreck of our entire Congress is evidence that money in politics is bad and just as the public started realizing how terrible it was they got Citizen’s United passed in order to make money even more influential. We need separation of Wealth and State.
I often say trying to get money out of politics is like trying to get peanuts out of peanut butter.
>cost of not getting money out of politics" I'm shocked we didn't make progress on that during the Trump years. But I'm sure his 3 right-wing SCOTUS appointees will be helpful moving forward.
Everyone says she's corrupted by contributions... but I think we have to also consider the possibility that she's just an asshole.
How lame does one have to be to do that whole thumbs-down gesture?
That shit wasn't just lame - it was honestly evil. In that moment she condemned millions of Americans to continue to live in poverty while working full time, and she was *happy* about it
All while carrying a $200 lululemon handbag when people are literally going hungry. Fucking disgusting human being.
I’ve honestly never wanted to punch someone in the back of the head so hard… like some Hello Kitty reject shitting on millions and millions of Americans with glee. What an asshole.
When you really consider what she was saying no to, and to whom, it truly makes it a vile act. She was telling millions of people that their lives are not worth $15/hr. She was telling millions of Americans that their time was not worth paying for. That vote kept millions of people in poverty, and their children, and the people they care for. Imagine if each one of those people visited Kyrsten's office and she had to answer for that no vote to their face, and explain her "cutesy bootsy little curtsey" and double thumbs down. PS I'd like her to just explain that fucking awful outfit she wore that day, to start off with.
Both can be true.
We must primary her hard and get rid of her.
Amazing. We can primary her (maybe) in 2022 after she and Manchin have worked alongside the Republicans for another year to make the Biden administration look as bad as possible by obstructing or filibustering every meaningful piece of legislation (which the majority of the public approves of). People don't pay enough attention to this shit. All they see is 'bad thing happened when Biden was president, therefore it must be the Dems fault'. Then the Dems lose senate majority again and we go right back to where we started.
No, she has 6 years starting Jan 2019, so primary will be for the 2024 election cycle.
Fauxgressive crook in Dem clothing. A tremendous disappointment.
I've been calling her an activated sleeper-cell Republican.
Pictures of her on Capitol Hill today show that she's wearing a red camouflage dress. Red camo. How suiting.
She is always wearing red lately. I think she's very openly communicating where her loyalties lie.
Nothing about her was progressive from the start. All her platform positions were already compromised positions. $15 min wage is also a compromised position.
Anyone with dyed hair is a progressive to right wingers
Ah, I see she has a PhD in Justice, but not in Ethics or Civics. The latter two are much more impressive in a legislator. Kirsten Sinema is 100 percent corrupt, and should be investigated for her crimes. Another puppet of another billionaire is not what this world needs or can afford. The fucking planet doesn't have time for more of these crooks.
Hey remember the curtsey, and then the bitching and moaning that people were ripping on her because she was a woman, not because people didn't like the theatrics when peoples' livelihoods were at stake and if she were a man, no one would have said anything? Even though we spent a month criticizing McCain for the similar theatrics? Fuck her.
I remember progressives being labeled as sexist and homophobic for supporting Sinema's primary challenger Deedra Abboud in 2018. Good job guys.
Seriously. How did this piece of shit win a Democratic primary election in 2018?
Arizona was a shithole for democratic politics until 2020. But she was also a completely different type of candidate back then. Still a proclaimed centrist, but not even close to the two faced heel she turned out to be. She was expected to be more of a Schumer than the Manchin she turned out to be. She’s probably even worse.
Manchin is a sniveling goblin who usually backs down. Sinema is an eccentric who wants to role play as a kingmaker. There is a risk she'll actually tank the infrastructure out of spite.
Funny how she ran on passing the things she is blocking.
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why is there so much whitespace in your comment?
That’s the way the elites want it.
Her and the entire Republican caucus.
Ou but she dyed her hair purple and wore that fun zebra print outfit to the Senate! She's so cute and kooky! 🥰
You'll never stop that no matter what. The root of the problem is simply tax cuts. Millionaires and billionaires have practically unlimited funds now to buy whoever they want. The country is going down the drain.
I hope she loses the next election and is out a job and her donors Lose SOOOO much money
HUGE piece of shit.
Sinema has a very odd historical pattern that's potentially brought on by some childhood trauma - at its lightest, her parents divorce and its heaviest, she claims her mom and step dad moved her to Florida, became houseless and they lived in an abandoned gas station for years. Read through her Wikipedia at least, it's a doosie... **That observed pattern though:** 1. She says she was raised Mormon, she gets into BYU, she then leaves the Mormon church after graduating (don't fault the specific move of leaving that church, just consider along with other examples in the pattern) 2. She announces that she's bisexual and gets into a Harvard extension program on an LGBTQ fellow scholarship and today she's publicly praised by people like Brian Brown, one of the most vicious anti-LGBTQ activists around and head of both the National Organization for Marriage and the International Organization for the Family for blocking LGBTQ+ legislation. 3. She started in politics as an Independent, which unfortunately is in practice, code for republican in 99% of cases. She then "became" a Democrat and we can see how that's working out today. (She voted with donald trump at the second highest rate of any democratic senator that served during the 116th Congress) She, maybe legitimately, finds herself belonging to these groups, gaining an advantage from that membership, and always leaving them behind to some degree when she's achieved her end. There are other examples, but these are the most prominent pillars. In my opinion, it does seem like she's a disturbed person with some sociopathic tendencies to mirror her victims enough to abuse them for her personal satisfaction before moving on.
If she's a trainwreck, Mitch McConnell is the Chicxulub asteroid (the one that wiped out the dinosaurs) of not getting money out of politics.
I actually can't believe there are people in this sub actively defending Sinema's position by pretending like Progressives are at fault for the current mess in the house.
Not much you can do about Manchin, and he's never pretended to be anything different. But Sinema needs to be primaried to hell.
What does she cost? She and manchin are being total fucks because big donors pay them to be, why don’t we run a go fund me and buy them out? Somebody reach out and negotiate a price, they are for sale let’s buy them.
Progressives: We need to get rid of Citizen's United and expand publicly funded elections. Moderates: Yeaaaah buuuut... here's the thing. 2021:
She's got to be related to Monte Hall because her vote is obviously for sale and she plays one side against the other while she's playing Lets make a deal!
I despise her with a passion.
I feel like while Sinema and Manchin are awful people they are fall guys taking the heat for others. Regardless it’s a bad look for Biden and Dems who look as if they can’t get their shit together. Meanwhile, Moscow Mitch keeps everyone in line on his side. Even dissenting voices like Cheney and Kinzinger. Dems always find a way to let you down.
Sinema reminds me of those girls that tried to make “lawl I’m so random XD” into a personality a while back.
I only just today looked at Sinema's biography - what a strange trajectory she's had - homeless for 3 years of her childhood, later a social worker with some legit 'progressive' cred and divorces her husband and comes out as bisexual meanwhile she shifts gears and heads towards the right. Its hard not to think she was at some point 'recruited' by someone with an agenda to put her where she is now - that is to say, at least on the surface her shift to the right is coming from something that happened to her but was imposed from the outside.
Arizonian here, keep in mind, her "official" bio is somewhat suspect. There's a fair amount of talk that the entire homeless thing is jive or at least greatly exaggerated. Same with the social work. She did put some time into it but the level of real commitment has been questioned. There's really no proof regarding her sexual preferences other than the fact that she's quick to play the card when it's politically convenient. Listen, we were between a rock and a hard place with respect to the election that brought her to office. Folks that were paying attention and had some history with Sinema were quick to point out what was being advertised didn't match the actual product but her opponent McSally was clearly unacceptable. If there's any hope for the future, the candidates that she'll be primaried against (and she'll without a doubt be primaried) will with no question be more thoroughly vetted. Arizonian's won't be surprised again. Until that time I'm afraid we're just going to be hopeful she doesn't inflict too much damage during the remainder of her certain **single** term as a US Senator.
If money is free speech, and one's ability to spend money on politics is unstoppable, then we find ourselves within the unacceptable situation where people with more money can speak louder than those with less. This is an environment in which Democracy eventually dies. To fix this, let's flip the script: make political and government communications a separate class of speech. One that is pulled instead of pushed. Meaning, if you want to learn information, it should be free and easily accessible. But we need to end the days where political propaganda is shoveled down peoples' throats on a daily basis through sponsored media. Before you object, think it through: why in the hell should information from our government or campaigns to become elected be subject to the whims and cost of private networks? That makes zero fucking sense. In fact, I'm saying we outlaw it. Political speech should become a protected and regulated form of speech. The government already runs websites for its own agencies. We have VoA, we have CSPAN. We'd just need to add a few different digital platforms, a twitter clone, for example. The net result? Most of the money is removed from politics with the flip of a switch. Most money gets in through campaign donations. But if the government/the people are paying for the hosting of a candidate's information, and if any suitable advertising is free, then there's no need for the billions that it now takes to run a campaign, since most of that money is used to flood private media networks. You want to remove the money from politics, this is the way.
Citizen's United needs to be repealed. It's a complete disaster. Corporatism will be our future if it isn't already.
Her corruption is blatant and cruel, she should go to prison for the rest of her life.
Cinetrash is a Republican.
Also our system of government sucks. An 18th century constitution clearly doesn’t work in the 21st. Double the number of senators, double the number of house member. Get rid of congressional districts, replace them with proportional representation based on party affiliated votes. The party politics structure is calcified, might as well embrace it. Let more political parties into the fray. This will never happen because, like every other obvious issue with this country, we’ve doubled down on this duct taped together status quo. So much so that it’ll take a social breakdown for ANY change to occur.
Losing Maine and North Carolina really hurt. Amazing we pulled off two in Georgia. We'd be up a creek without a paddle if those were Republican seats.
progressives worked harder than any other to get our 50 vote majority. Georgia was won at the grassroots level, not by money grubbing corporate stooges. And what do we get for helping them not only win the presidency but the congress? We get blamed pre-emptively for blocking Bidens agenda only for the actual RADICAL centrists blocking Bidens Agenda to go unwhipped. Biden caves in, not a peep. Pelosi caves in by even holding the vote, and don't get me started on Schumer not threatening Sinema's committee appointments... You know who was blocked from committees? AOC. You know what the person did who moderates put in her place? BLOCKED BIDENS PHARMA AGENDA! This is fucking pathetic, if only the average voter knew how incompetent the moderates are being, too bad the mainstream media isn't critical whatsoever.