President Biden's Infrastructure Plans

[Derec]

Mehdi Hasan on Twitter: "On the @MehdiHasanShow, we found a clip of @Sen_JoeManchin back in January calling for up to **$4 trillion** in new infrastructure spending.

Yeah. Infrastructure spending. The $3.5T bill is not infrastructure. Medicare extension is not infrastructure. Expanded child tax credit is not infrastructure - and it alone accounts for almost half of the cost of the bill! Free childcare is not infrastructure. You know what is actually infrastructure? Pipelines like Enbridge Line 3.

I would like to see a well thought out $4T infrastructure bill. Unfortunately, it is pretty clear that infrastructure is not the Democrats' spending priority - social spending is.

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley on Twitter: "The Senate infrastructure bill does little to address climate change & invest in transportation.

Why don't you take the $1.6T breeding subsidy out and put some actual infrastructure in then?

That's why @RepChuyGarcia, @RepHankJohnson & I want an additional $30B for public transit in the reconciliation bill.

Careful though. Manhattan is an island and any more transit could cause it to tip over and capsize.

Public transit is a public good & we must invest in it as such. (link)" / Twitter[/url]

Agreed. So why is the $3.5T bill dominated by non-infrastructure stuff?

A Republican Rep from western NY State:
Claudia Tenney on Twitter: ".@AOC's district is one of the most affected by Hurricane Ida and rather than focusing on relief money she's spent the week musing about men menstruating and calling people who are pro-life proponents of "rape culture".

Good one Claudia.

Nancy Pelosi takes orders from AOC???

Maybe not formally, but it is amazing how Pelosi folded to the Sergeant Sandy's demand that the infrastructure bill and the $3.5T bill be shackled together.

 

[Derec]

Sahil Kapur on Twitter: "Rep. AOC is a NO on infrastructure without reconciliation.

"Nothing would give me more pleasure than to tank a billionaire, dark money, fossil fuel, Exxon lobbyist-drafted 'energy' infrastructure bill if they come after our child care and climate priorities."

Video via source: (vid link)" / Twitter

In other words, she is trying to hold the bipartisan infrastructure bill hostage in order to push the irresponsible $3,500,000,000,000.00 Spendapalooza.

 

[Derec]

Ilhan Omar on Twitter: "Then start with stopping Line 3. (link)" / Twitter

Why? It is actual infrastructure? Biden asked OPEC+ to pump more oil. So it's ok to get oil from Arabs, Iran and Putin via tanker ships but pipelines moving North American oil must be stopped? What is the logic behind that? Even under best case scenarios we will need oil and gas for a few more decades. And we therefore still need oil and gas infrastructure.
Note also that Line 3 is not a new pipeline, but replacement for an old one. Old pipes are more likely to leak, so this is a very sensible project. Also, the replacement route bypasses an Indian reservation, so I don't know what Indians are so upset about.


Speaking of Indians, I predicted way back (in one of the DAPL threads) that Indian tribes would be against lithium mining and other mining necessary for the decarbonization of the economy. That prediction has now come to pass.

These Tribal Activists Want Biden To Stop A Planned Lithium Mine On Their Sacred Land

"Sacred land" is a BS claim by the way. These tribes cynically designate any land where a mine, pipeline or a telescope is to be built as "sacred". If everything is sacred, then nothing is!

Currently, the US could do a lot, but it's in the $3.5T budget reconciliation bill.

Actually EV charging stations are in the bipartisan infrastructure bill.
The bill that AOC is happy to torpedo if she doesn't get her way on the $3.5T Spendapalooza filled with non-infrastructure tofu like $1.6T breeding subsidies.

Things like a Civilian Climate Corps, modeled on the original New Deal's Civilian Conservation Corps.

What would these "Civilian Climate Corps" do concretely?

But Congress has only recently returned from its recent recess, so it has a lot of work ahead.

First they should pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill. Then they need to debate the rest. Best case scenario would be to break up the Spendapalooza bill, pass the climate-related stuff and scuttle social spending tofu.

 

[Swammerdami]

We don't have a thread for Joe Manchin — (we have one for Kirsten Sinema!) — so I'll post this here, since Manchin is unilaterally thwarting Infrastructure and much of the Democratic agenda.

I just learned that Manchin's daughter apparently committed felonious price-fixing (or such -- IANAL) when she was a Pharma CEO; she acted to prevent competition and thereby ensure a high price for EpiPen.

Apparently greed and contempt for ordinary Americans runs in that family.

 

[Derec]

We don't have a thread for Joe Manchin — (we have one for Kirsten Sinema!) — so I'll post this here, since Manchin is unilaterally thwarting Infrastructure and much of the Democratic agenda.

Manchin supports the infrastructure bill. It is Sanders, AOC et al who are threatening to torpedo the bipartisan infrastructure bill because they are not getting all the cookies they want.

I just learned that Manchin's daughter apparently committed felonious price-fixing (or such -- IANAL)

So what? Should the sins of the daughter be visited upon the parents and grandparents to the 3rd or 4th generations?

Apparently greed and contempt for ordinary Americans runs in that family.

Why do you assume it is greed and not a real concern about spending $3.5T on things like breeding subsidies when the deficit for the first 10 months of fiscal 2021 is already at $2.5T?
U.S. July budget deficit hits $302 billion as spending remains high

 

[Swammerdami]

Packaging agenda together to obtain passage is not a novel and sinister Democratic idea! How far back must I go to show you a precedent? How about when the baboon Oog groomed Ogg so she would share her banana?

Upthread, one poster cited Congressgirl Claudia Tenney denigrating AOC for touting "male menstruation"(?) instead of helping with hurricane relief. Republican lies have moved well beyonf amusing instead of disgusting: AOC has done FAR more than Tenney to help such victims. Just to get an idea of what sort of hypocrites and liars infect Congress today, I Googled Claudia Tenney:

In a radio interview shortly after the February 2018 Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida, Tenney said, "It's interesting that so many of these people that commit the mass murders end up being Democrats".

When reports emerged that Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson's office had ordered a $31,000 dining room table set with taxpayer funds, Tenney blamed the "deep state" for the expenditure, adding, "I know that Ben Carson did not order that table. It has nothing to do with him. He comes from, you know, poverty".

In March 2017, Tenney voted to reverse the FCC privacy rule that blocked ISPs from selling customer browsing history without customers' permission.

Tenney was a co-sponsor of legislation that would substantially eliminate National Firearms Act restrictions on obtaining or possessing gun silencers. After the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, she said she still planned to support the bill.

I'm a centrist opposed to much of AOC's agenda. But if Claudia Tenney is the alternative heroine, thanks but no thanks.

And what's with Silencers?! When the Redcoats show up again and face our well-organized militia, the Redcoats won't know we're shooting at them?

I hope anyone citing Tenney's "thoughts" is ashamed of themselves!

 

[Derec]

... packaging agenda together to obtain passage is not a novel and sinister Democratic idea.

So what if it's not novel? It is sinister though. To hold the infrastructure bill hostage, when we have dire needs in the area of infrastructure, just to pass this $3.5T monstrosity is indeed sinister.

[Upthread, one poster cited Congressgirl Claudia Tenney denigrating AOC for touting "male menstruation"(?) instead of helping with hurricane relief. ]

I do not even know who this woman is, or what her connection to the topic of this thread is. Or why you are derailing this thread with ramblings about furniture and guns.

 

[TV and credit cards]

If he could at least recognize that words [like "infrastructure"] evolve, definitions expand, it would be a step in the right direction. It’s not a great leap to consider human capital as infrastructure. In fact I think it dovetails rather nicely; a well trained, healthy, and ready workforce along with the facilities needed for society to function.

 

[Swammerdami]

[Upthread, one poster cited Congressgirl Claudia Tenney denigrating AOC for touting "male menstruation"(?) instead of helping with hurricane relief. ]

I do not even know who this woman is, or what her connection to the topic of this thread is. Or why you are derailing this thread with ramblings about furniture and guns.

It was YOU who called this MTG-wannabe as an expert witness:

A Republican Rep from western NY State:
Claudia Tenney on Twitter: ".@AOC's district is one of the most affected by Hurricane Ida and rather than focusing on relief money she's spent the week musing about men menstruating and calling people who are pro-life proponents of "rape culture".

Good one Claudia.

I cross-examined the witness to see if she really were an "expert."

And a bit of Googling would show that AOC is doing far more for Hurricane relief than Tenney.

 

[Elixir]

Should the sins of the daughter be visited upon the parents and grandparents to the 3rd or 4th generations?

Only if they are the invented sins of Hunter Biden. Didn't hear you complaining about that...

 

[TV and credit cards]

From Esquire

on Wednesday, three alleged Democrats in the House of Representatives tanked a bill in committee aimed at lowering the cost of prescription drugs—a bill that was already a compromise and a bill for which the three of them already had voted. This bill would have allowed Medicare to negotiate prices with the pharmaceutical companies, which has been an alleged Democratic policy position since 2003. Not only was this a two-faced move on its merits, but it also completely undermines the House’s effort to negotiate a final bill with the Senate, which already has produced a reasonably worthless bill of its own. And not only all of that but, because the prospective savings are vital parts of the funding mechanism for the overall administration infrastructure plan, the sabotage of this bill endangers that whole enterprise.

The three conservative Democratic millstones were Kurt Schrader of Oregon, Scott Peters of California, and Kathleen Rice of New York. In what I am sure was pure coincidence, both Schrader and Peters have received boatloads of campaign money from various Big Pharma sources. (Schrader’s personal fortune is derived from an inheritance from his grandfather, who was a top executive at…wait for it…Pfizer.) This is not true of Rice, who apparently believes that pharmaceutical companies may soon be holding bake sales to make ends meet.

 

[lpetrich]

Statement on Ways and Means Committee Vote on Budget Package | Indivisible

We were initially excited that Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee intended to incorporate many progressive priorities in its portion of the House Budget Reconciliation package. The inclusion of paid family and medical leave, home health, and a much needed expansion of Medicare benefits are crucial to creating a full care economy and a fair recovery. That's why it is extremely disappointing to see Chairmen Neal pass a bill today that does not meet the urgency and need of today.

The Chairman chose to weaken the proposal to expand Medicare benefits and coverage to millions of uninsured and underinsured older adults. The legislation includes an unacceptably slow phase-in for the dental benefit, where folks won’t be able to get the care they need until 2028. Additionally, the proposed cost-sharing to actually use the benefit is overwhelmingly high and completely unaffordable for the same low-income folks who already can’t afford essential dental, vision, and hearing services. The bill also leaves out the 23 million older adults who would gain healthcare coverage through lowering the Medicare eligibility age to at least 60 years of age.

Rep. Katie Porter:

MSNBC on Twitter: ""With regard to Sen. Manchin, others who want to talk about the price tag about this ... If something costs A, you have 2 options. You can negotiate down from A, or you can find the find the money, we have revenue options on the table," Rep. Porter says on $3.5T spending bill. (vid link)" / Twitter

Sahil Kapur on Twitter: ".@RepKatiePorter: "It's dead on fiscally irresponsible for Sen. Manchin to refuse to raise revenue and at the same time—out of the other side of his mouth...that he uses to talk to his corporate donors—complain we can't pay for the things that American families desperately need." (pic link)" / Twitter

Sort of like killing one's parents and then begging for mercy because one is an orphan.

 

[lpetrich]

Ryan Grim on Twitter: "Something extremely important went down ..." / Twitter

Something extremely important went down at the House Education and Labor Committee on Friday, when a group of progressives teamed up with centrists in vulnerable districts to threaten to take down their portion of the reconciliation bill. Here's what happened.

The bill included means-tested subsidies for child care that could be claimed only by people making up to 150% of the median area income. Typical Dem crap. Progressives, as they do, argued it should be universal. But this time they had two things they didn't have before.

First, they had big numbers, and were willing to vote as a bloc. But second, frontline Democrats on the committee *also* wanted the program to be universal. They collectively lobbied Pelosi and Chair Bobby Scott, and threatened to take it down without it.

Ryan Grim on Twitter: "Pelosi offered 200%, but the group pushed back, and eventually won. Story here with @SaraLSirota (link)" / Twitter

Unusual Democrat Alliance Wins Universal Child Care Subsidy

A surprising coalition in the House of Representatives muscled a robust child care subsidy past skeptical deficit hawks in the Education and Labor Committee last week in the first significant demonstration of power of a budding alliance between vulnerable Democrats who represent suburban swing districts and outspoken progressives. The change eliminates means-testing to the subsidy, which will be included in the party’s $3.5 trillion reconciliation package.

Over the past generation, Democrats in swing seats — known in Congress as “front-liners” or “majority-makers” — have consistently voted significantly to the right of progressives, hoping that a moderate voting record would appeal to their divided districts. Often, those Democrats represented rural, culturally conservative districts in which federal spending was coded as federal help for Black and brown people.

The shifting terrain of American politics has upended that calculation, as vulnerable Democrats are now more likely to represent suburban districts where federal spending is weighed on its own merits, rather than pressed through the sieve of American race relations. The suburbs themselves are a creation of redlining, subsidies geared toward white families in the wake of World War II, and white flight following desegregation and the civil rights movement. But the suburbs have become more integrated, and many white suburban voters seem to consciously support racial justice movements, opening up new potential for a realigned politics.

...
When middle-class voters feel like their taxes are paying for benefits for others while they struggle themselves, it’s a recipe for economic resentment, which fuels the type of reactionary politics that powered Republicans in the suburbs for years

...
This is at least the second time that progressives have aligned with front-line Democrats in recent memory. During Rep. Josh Gottheimer’s effort to split the infrastructure bill from the reconciliation package, a number of front-line Democrats publicly pushed back against him.

Seems like a political shift in the making. Though for the front-line Reps, they want to seem like they delivered something big to potential voters.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Ryan Grim on Twitter: "Something extremely important went down ..." / Twitter

Something extremely important went down at the House Education and Labor Committee on Friday, when a group of progressives teamed up with centrists in vulnerable districts to threaten to take down their portion of the reconciliation bill. Here's what happened.

The bill included means-tested subsidies for child care that could be claimed only by people making up to 150% of the median area income. Typical Dem crap. Progressives, as they do, argued it should be universal. But this time they had two things they didn't have before.

First, they had big numbers, and were willing to vote as a bloc. But second, frontline Democrats on the committee *also* wanted the program to be universal. They collectively lobbied Pelosi and Chair Bobby Scott, and threatened to take it down without it.

Ryan Grim on Twitter: "Pelosi offered 200%, but the group pushed back, and eventually won. Story here with @SaraLSirota (link)" / Twitter

Unusual Democrat Alliance Wins Universal Child Care Subsidy

A surprising coalition in the House of Representatives muscled a robust child care subsidy past skeptical deficit hawks in the Education and Labor Committee last week in the first significant demonstration of power of a budding alliance between vulnerable Democrats who represent suburban swing districts and outspoken progressives. The change eliminates means-testing to the subsidy, which will be included in the party’s $3.5 trillion reconciliation package.

Over the past generation, Democrats in swing seats — known in Congress as “front-liners” or “majority-makers” — have consistently voted significantly to the right of progressives, hoping that a moderate voting record would appeal to their divided districts. Often, those Democrats represented rural, culturally conservative districts in which federal spending was coded as federal help for Black and brown people.

The shifting terrain of American politics has upended that calculation, as vulnerable Democrats are now more likely to represent suburban districts where federal spending is weighed on its own merits, rather than pressed through the sieve of American race relations. The suburbs themselves are a creation of redlining, subsidies geared toward white families in the wake of World War II, and white flight following desegregation and the civil rights movement. But the suburbs have become more integrated, and many white suburban voters seem to consciously support racial justice movements, opening up new potential for a realigned politics.

...
When middle-class voters feel like their taxes are paying for benefits for others while they struggle themselves, it’s a recipe for economic resentment, which fuels the type of reactionary politics that powered Republicans in the suburbs for years

...
This is at least the second time that progressives have aligned with front-line Democrats in recent memory. During Rep. Josh Gottheimer’s effort to split the infrastructure bill from the reconciliation package, a number of front-line Democrats publicly pushed back against him.

Seems like a political shift in the making. Though for the front-line Reps, they want to seem like they delivered something big to potential voters.

I think if the Labor Force Participation Rate doesn't pick up, this subsidy has a real shot.



Job Vacancies.

 

[Toni]

Yeah. Infrastructure spending. The $3.5T bill is not infrastructure. Medicare extension is not infrastructure. Expanded child tax credit is not infrastructure - and it alone accounts for almost half of the cost of the bill! Free childcare is not infrastructure. You know what is actually infrastructure? Pipelines like Enbridge Line 3.

I would like to see a well thought out $4T infrastructure bill. Unfortunately, it is pretty clear that infrastructure is not the Democrats' spending priority - social spending is.


Why don't you take the $1.6T breeding subsidy out and put some actual infrastructure in then?

That's why @RepChuyGarcia, @RepHankJohnson & I want an additional $30B for public transit in the reconciliation bill.

Careful though. Manhattan is an island and any more transit could cause it to tip over and capsize.

Public transit is a public good & we must invest in it as such. (link)" / Twitter[/url]

Agreed. So why is the $3.5T bill dominated by non-infrastructure stuff?

A Republican Rep from western NY State:
Claudia Tenney on Twitter: ".@AOC's district is one of the most affected by Hurricane Ida and rather than focusing on relief money she's spent the week musing about men menstruating and calling people who are pro-life proponents of "rape culture".

Good one Claudia.
View attachment 35256

Nancy Pelosi takes orders from AOC???

Maybe not formally, but it is amazing how Pelosi folded to the Sergeant Sandy's demand that the infrastructure bill and the $3.5T bill be shackled together.

I disagree: Health care and child care ARE infrastructure in the same way that highways and bridges are infrastructure: Both ensure that people can get to and from work. They are vital to the health of our economy and our society.

 

[lpetrich]

Rep. Pramila Jayapal on Twitter: "
Paid leave is infrastructure.
Child care is infrastructure.
Health care is infrastructure.
Climate action is infrastructure.
Affordable housing is infrastructure.
" / Twitter


Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "How much is too much to spend when we're talking about saving the planet? Honestly, in 50 years, if the planet goes down, are my colleagues really going to be saying "Gee whiz I'm glad we didn't spend too much." Give me a break." / Twitter
noting
Amy Vilela for Congress on Twitter: "Preach!" / Twitter


Mondaire Jones on Twitter: "We don't means test things like roads, bridges, or tunnels - they're basic infrastructure that we all rely on.

So is child care. It's past time we make it universal. (link)" / Twitter
Noting
Treasury says U.S. child care system is a market failure - Marketplace
noting
Treasury Releases Report Showing U.S. Childcare System Overburdens Families and Causes Shortages Due to Inadequate Supply | U.S. Department of the Treasury

 

[Derec]

It was YOU who called this MTG-wannabe as an expert witness:

I did not. It was lpetrich who quoted her tweet (he just LOVES quoting tweets and Insta messages!). I merely commented on it.

And a bit of Googling would show that AOC is doing far more for Hurricane relief than Tenney.

Last I saw of AOC was living it up at the fancy Met Gala wearing a tacky-as-hell designer dress. How is that helping hurricane victims I wonder ...

 

[Derec]

If he could at least recognize that words [like "infrastructure"] evolve, definitions expand, it would be a step in the right direction. It’s not a great leap to consider human capital as infrastructure.

This is not an organic evolution of a term. It's the political party in power cynically trying to redefine the term to use its popularity among the electorate to pass an extremely expensive and irresponsible bill that has nothing to do with actual infrastructure.

In fact I think it dovetails rather nicely; a well trained, healthy, and ready workforce along with the facilities needed for society to function.

Breeding subsidies do not "dovetail" nicely with any idea of infrastructure.

 

[Toni]

It was YOU who called this MTG-wannabe as an expert witness:

I did not. It was lpetrich who quoted her tweet (he just LOVES quoting tweets and Insta messages!). I merely commented on it.

And a bit of Googling would show that AOC is doing far more for Hurricane relief than Tenney.

Last I saw of AOC was living it up at the fancy Met Gala wearing a tacky-as-hell designer dress. How is that helping hurricane victims I wonder ...

For those who are young, talented, energetic and dedicated, it is quite possible to do more than one thing in the course of days, weeks, months. AOC notably has raised millions of dollars in donations for Hurricane relief, has visited areas suffering from hurricane damage and volunteered at food banks. For starters.

MTG.....waves a fake gun around, pretending to be tough and 'advocates' for the rights of all to not be vaccinated or to wear masks but famously has herself been vaccinated and has been photographed wearing masks in airports and on airlines. MTG is genuine only in her idiocy and even she is not as stupid as she pretends to be.

 

[Derec]

For those who are young, talented, energetic and dedicated, it is quite possible to do more than one thing in the course of days, weeks, months.

It's still quite hypocritical when a socialist goes to a 0.1%er gala. Especially when she goes in a tacky designer gown. And the kicker is that the gown has a "tax the rich" message and the designer is a rich tax cheat.

AOC notably has raised millions of dollars in donations for Hurricane relief, has visited areas suffering from hurricane damage and volunteered at food banks. For starters.

Should we give her a medal now?

MTG.....waves a fake gun around, pretending to be tough

Is that about the ad where she blows up the socialism car? Missed opportunity: the car should have been a real car from an actually existing socialist country like the Trabbi.


Seriously, as stunts go, it is no worse than AOCs hideous dress at the 0.1%er Met Gala ...

and 'advocates' for the rights of all to not be vaccinated or to wear masks but famously has herself been vaccinated and has been photographed wearing masks in airports and on airlines.

I wonder what's worse. Advocating for mask mandates and not wearing a mask yourself, like London Breed, or advocating against them and then actually wearing a mask where appropriate?

MTG is genuine only in her idiocy and even she is not as stupid as she pretends to be.

And AOC is not nearly as smart as she pretends to be, so that's a wash. I am not a fan of MTG either, for the record. If we could get both AOC and MTG out of the Congress in 2022, we'd all be much better off. But at least there is no megathread where lpetrich fawningly follows her every move. So that's something.