Whew!
With U.S. 2021 inflation already spiking to a near four-decade record high 6.8%, one very stalwart party holdout stands strong against passage of a Democrat-controlled White House and Congress Build Back Broke (BBB) spending bill scored by the CBO to increase the national debt by $3 trillion over the next decade.
That steadfast West Virginia Democrat, Sen. Joe Manchin, deserves notable top-level distinction for high ground heroism in his principled resistance to relentless BBB support pressures.
Despite previous warnings stating "This is a 'no' on this legislation," Manchin's angry party colleagues launched a bullying campaign intended to push him by all means possible to a breaking point.
As the senator explained during a West Virginia radio show: "They just never realized it, because they figured, 'Surely, dear God, we can move one person ... surely, we can badger and beat one person up, surely, we can get enough protesters to make that person uncomfortable enough [that] they'll just say ... I'll go for anything. Just quit."'
Such intimidation and recrimination tactics have become relatively commonplace in radical progressive politics. BBB activists tormented Arizona Democrat Sen. Kyrsten Sinema in a Phoenix bathroom stall, and Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and his wife, Heidi, were driven from a restaurant by a group called Smash Racism DC, which said: "You are not safe. We will find you."
Also recall the hostile Democrat Senate confirmation inquisition of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, a candidate who Joe Manchin supported on merit. Then flash back again to the similarly egregious 1991 Supreme Court confirmation treatment of Justice Clarence Thomas which was overseen by then-Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del.
Sen. Manchin reported to Fox News Sunday that he told President Joe Biden multiple times that he couldn't "get there" to explain a "yes" vote on the BBB legislation to the people he represents in West Virginia.
Manchin said during the Fox interview that "I have tried everything."
Democrats, he urged, should focus on funding a smaller number of programs for longer: "So if you're going to do something and do it — pick what our prized priorities are, like most people do in their families or their businesses, and you fund them for 10 years, and you make sure they deliver the services for 10 years."
In both his Fox News appearance and a written statement, Manchin reiterated many of the concerns he has expressed about the bill, including its possible effect on inflation and how the much larger true cost was intentionally miscalculated.
Sen. Manchin has repeatedly stated his opposition to budget gimmicks in the legislation as drafted, such as phony phaseout timetables which will be extended in future bills to disguise real and unacceptable costs.
Bright red state Sen. Manchin insists that any BBB legislation he votes for through a simple Senate majority requirement must be paid for, and that he won't "support a reconciliation package that expands social programs and irresponsibly adds to our nearly $29 trillion in national debt."
A major target of Joe Manchin's spending opposition is his party's roughly $2 trillion education, healthcare and climate package, the centerpiece of the Biden administration's economic agenda which passed the House this year.
Proposed new budget items include a universal prekindergarten program, subsidized childcare costs, and tax credits for reducing carbon emissions ... all while raising taxes on corporations and very high earners.
Mr. Manchin has stated that to get his support, the BBB legislation must add currently unincluded work requirements for the child tax credit, with eligibility limited to families making $60,000 or less. The senator also opposes paid family leave which presently remains in the bill.
New programs, Manchin says, must be "needs based with means testing" (they aren't), and there must be "no additional handouts or transfer payments" (there are many).
Sen. Manchin rejects an extra subsidy provided in the bill for cars built in union plants, and he wants "fuel neutral" climate policies focused on "innovation, not elimination" of hydrocarbons ... the opposite of proposed legislation.
Democrats have been fighting tooth and nail, hammer and tong, to get the mammoth BBB monstrosity passed before their big progressive spending agendas collapse — along with loss of House majority — as broadly predicted in this year's congressional midterm elections.
Some of those battles have required budget-trimming compromises imposed as voting conditions by other more centrist party members.
To reduce internal resistance to the House bill's original $3.5 trillion heft, Democrat negotiators abandoned a free community college proposal, a plan for a 12-week paid leave benefit, and a program pushing utilities to rely on costly "clean energy."
A planned increase in top tax rates opposed by Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D., Ariz., was also dropped.
Were normal logic to prevail (but don't necessarily count on this being the case), Democrat Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and other ardent BBB backers will have learned the futility of once again attempting to bludgeon the senator into submission.
As Joe Manchin recently put it, the left mistakenly attempted to rush BBB into law without policy debate or compromise by beating "the living crap" out of him. Doing so again may drive him away from their party altogether.
Manchin can turn the tables by crafting amendments to the bill barring climate programs and gutting the bill's tax hikes — some of which would likely gain full Republican support — just as Republicans might draft amendments that would prove difficult for him to vote against.
Sen. Manchin previously sided with Republicans on August dry run vote-a-rama test amendments involving energy, fracking, abortion, critical race theory and taxes. He may well do so again, only this time with binding terms.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., let it be known that Manchin has a home in his party's caucus if he wants one, telling conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt: "If he were to join us, he would be joining a lot of folks who have similar views on a whole range of issues."
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., told Fox News that Republicans would "welcome [Manchin] with open arms," while Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said that he had recently pitched Manchin on switching parties, telling him that, "Look, one of the two parties actually likes you."
Manchin previously told The Hill that whereas he did not intend to leave the Democratic Party, he had told his colleagues that if it was "embarrassing" for them for him to be a Democrat he would switch his party affiliation to independent.
In any case, Sen. Joe Manchin richly deserves recognition as an independent thinker who cares deeply about the future of America and is willing to fight for it.
His willingness to say "yes" to principles, and "no" to intimidation warrants very special respect that transcends partisan categories.
Larry Bell is an endowed professor of space architecture at the University of Houston where he founded Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture and the graduate space architecture program. His latest of 11 books, "Beyond Flagpoles and Footprints: Pioneering the Space Frontier" co-authored with Buzz Aldrin (2021), is available on Amazon along with all others. Read Larry Bell's Reports — More Here.
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