Biden infrastructure/tax increase megathread

[roxas11]

Thank you Mr. Bezos!
https://twitter.com/msnbc/status/1379555275049463816?s=21

This is a big deal and a Huge Blow to the GOP because now that Bezos is publicly backing a corporate a tax increase to pay for infrastructure I suspect we will see more corporations come out in support

Now lets be very clear about this Bezos is probably only doing this to get Berinie and the Unions off his back lol

In the end His support is still a huge boost to Biden and the Dems because It clearly shows the American people that even one of the richest man on the planet does not think that Biden increasing corporate taxes in order to rebuild our crumbling roads and bridges is a bad idea nor does he think that it will have a negative impact on his Buiessness at all

[roxas11]

From a PR standpoint, if this passes, Biden is nearly 1/5 of the way there of major legislation and executive action he needs to get re-elected; immigration reform, citizenship for Dreamers, another round of stimulus till 2022, statehood for DC and PR, some sort of major foreign policy victory (his own peace deal? Iran?). The first 4 seem most likely to be doable by 2022.

The bill at hand is mainly just for preventing the poor from falling into starvation and mass eviction along with positive macroeconomic trends for the next three years. So far this country is getting back its footing, but I don’t believe Biden has the will or means now to go further and attempt to bring the pre-pandemic economy back, legislation wise and the fact that many businesses are now either bankrupt or pushed into being zombie corporations surviving on debt and occasional bailouts. The very minute fiscal policy isn’t working in tandem with the Fed, well then the stock market crash is gonna wipe away most of the jobs in this country. Oh well, here’s hoping it can be adverted at least a few years longer than 2030.

1. Immigration reform, citizenship for Dreamers
There Is Zero chance Biden is getting any Major immigration reform. If he is lucky, maybe he can get something for the dreamers, but beyond that The GOP will never vote for any immigration Bill he supports

2. Another round of stimulus till 2022



Any hope for another stimulus died the moment moderate dems like Joe Manchin saw this

Joe Manchin is never going to vote for another Huge Stimulus bill again. He really does not even support the current extension to employment benefits and he was almost close to voting with the GOP to make sure the unemployment benefit expire in July rather than September. There is no chance he will vote to extend them any further

3. Statehood for DC and PR
I cant see this happening unless kyrsten sinema and joe manchin vote to kill the filbuster

4. Some sort of major foreign policy victory
The Majority of American people don't care about foreign policy that much and as long as he keeps the US out of Wars he will be fine. If he gets a major foreign policy victory that is cool, but nobody is going to hold it against him if he does not especially if the economy is Booming.

[roxas11]

https://twitter.com/Politics_Polls/status/1382023333672316932

The big takaway from this is that the disapproval for Biden infrastructure bill is still only at 27 percent

That's very different from 2009 because by this point support for healthcare reform was already starting to get dragged down because people were starting to disapprove of Obama handling of the economy



That pubic had started to sour on healthcare reform and the disapproval would even be close to 50 percent by July 2009

[roxas11]

What is the point of this? Republicans have made it clear their ceiling on spending is nowhere near the Democrats, and their method of paying for it, to the extent they even have one (because the modern GOP largely doesn't pay for its policies), is the polar opposite of what the Democratic Party promised to do.

And even if you put aside these policy disagreements, you still have the fact that the last time Democrats tried to work with Republicans from a position of power, Senate Republicans just dragged out negotiations, watered the legislation down, and finally, when it went to the floor, they voted against it even when many of their amendments passed. Once you engage in this level of bad faith lawmaking, there is really no way to trust you again, particularly when the same Republican who is responsible for that scorched earth strategy still leads their caucus!

This is just the dumbest, most nonsensical charade we could have, all so we can placate one or two Democratic Senators who care more about their own image than actually making law.

Joe Manchin has all the dems tap dancing for him lol

[roxas11]

A major bipartisan victory like this is hard to come by, so I'm not sure why Democrats want to imperil its chances by tying it to a much more partisan package. They should just pass it now and worry about everything else later.

If they take that approach the rest of Biden agenda will die the second the bipartisan infrastructure bill passes.

Because make no mistake now that the moderates got what the wanted there is now no reason for them to go along with the second part of Biden's agenda. The fact that Joe Manchin or kyrsten sinema has still not thrown thier full support behind the second part of Bidens plan is very telling.

[roxas11]

Well, I guess that's that:

https://twitter.com/elwasson/status/1408478816079646722

What a fool. Either you want something done and actually legislate or not and you're just being an obstructionist/my way or the highway. Republicans just don't negotiate in good faith.

The GOP must have lost their minds if they think threatening Joe Manchin is a good strategy

them walking away from this deal would be smack in the face to Joe Manchin and it would also make a lot of Dems on the left very happy

it would all but guarantee that Dems go it alone on infrastructure and at that point not even Joe Manchin would be willing to stop it since the GOP would be betraying him by walking away from a bipartisan deal that he help negotiate......

[roxas11]

Well, I guess that's that:

https://twitter.com/elwasson/status/1408478816079646722

What a fool. Either you want something done and actually legislate or not and you're just being an obstructionist/my way or the highway. Republicans just don't negotiate in good faith.

The GOP must have lost their minds if they think threatening Joe Manchin is a good strategy

them walking away from this deal would be smack in the face to Joe Manchin and it would also make a lot of Dems on the left very happy

it would all but guarantee that Dems go it alone on infrastructure and at that point not even Joe Manchin would be willing to stop it since the GOP would be betraying him by walking away from a bipartisan deal that he help negotiate......

Pelosi and Biden smacked Manchin in the face by announcing they weren't going to do the deal he worked on without the reconciliation bill first.

you are fooling yourself if you honestly believed that Joe Biden did not already talk to Joe Manchin about that before he spoke about it to the public. manchin knows full well what the Dems plans are and it is silly to claim that he was somehow  smacked in the face because Biden talked about a Reconciliation bill that he already knew was coming lol

the harsh reality for the GOP is if they walk away from this deal, Biden will just pass his original giant infrastructure bill and joe Manchin will no longer stand in his way since has already gotten what he wanted out of this deal....

[roxas11]

Why would Rs agree to a bipartisan infrastructure spending if there is gonna be a Reconciliation Bill later to raise taxes, is PELOSI serious about this.


Bernie wants the 6T infrastructure spending and raise taxes on the rich that's what he really want, Rs premise was to agree to not raise taxes in the first place, so much for your compromise


Warren and Bernie been after a wealth tax from the beginning, they ran for Prez and thought they were gonna get 60 in 2020 to pass this and due to Hunter Biden help seal the closely divided Congress we have now
Again, D's need more D's to pass that sort of bill

republican bill Cassidy himself said on fox news said that even if the Dems went on to do a Reconciliation Bill after the bipartisan deal he still sees it as a big win since the GOP succeeded in cutting both the price and scope of Bidens original infrastructure bill

Plus, I suspect the he knows that moderate Dems are most likely going to also demand a big price cut for the 6 trillion bill Reconciliation Bill that Bernie sanders wants to pass

the bottom line is if the bipartisan pill passes Biden's infrastructure plans will end up costing a lot less than what he originally wanted and if the GOP wants to keep it that way they will be wise not to walk away from the current deal....

[roxas11]

Just to provide some context to why Republicans are so angry with President Biden over explicitly calling for a two-track infrastructure deal, and are backing away from negotiations:

Republicans plot an infrastructure 2-step: Spend more, then kill Biden’s agenda

Senate Republicans are mulling support for a massive amount of new spending on infrastructure — in part because they think it’ll help kill President Joe Biden’s liberal agenda.

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has yet to tip his hand on whether he supports the bipartisan negotiations on Biden's plan for roads and bridges that are being led by Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio). But a growing number of Senate Republicans are betting that if a deal is reached on that sort of physical infrastructure, Democrats won’t have the votes needed to pass the rest of Biden’s “soft infrastructure” priorities, such as child care and clean energy.

This is from mid-June.  They only supported the compromise on the presumption that it would kill the rest of Biden's agenda.  Talk about being two-faced.....  

So basically, they wanted to give Biden something so that the rest of his agenda wouldn't have the capital to move forward on.

Biden didn't do himself any good by not having a comprehensive immigration reform bill in agreement for the wall and an energy.policy first before an infrastructure bill that combines Green New Deal along with oil drilling, we haven't had one since Obama administration


We already have Amtrak that Biden gave money to, we don't necessarily need Bullet trains unless we are out of the Pandemic

Wait, you actually think Biden and the Dems should have gotten into a divisive fight over immigration instead of doing something far more popular and less controversial with the American people like infrastructure



good luck getting all the Dems to agree on so called comprehensive immigration reform because make no mistake there is no chance in hell that the GOP would ever support an immigration bill coming from Joe Biden even if the bill included a wall

[roxas11]

Well, I guess that's that:

https://twitter.com/elwasson/status/1408478816079646722

What a fool. Either you want something done and actually legislate or not and you're just being an obstructionist/my way or the highway. Republicans just don't negotiate in good faith.

The GOP must have lost their minds if they think threatening Joe Manchin is a good strategy

them walking away from this deal would be smack in the face to Joe Manchin and it would also make a lot of Dems on the left very happy

it would all but guarantee that Dems go it alone on infrastructure and at that point not even Joe Manchin would be willing to stop it since the GOP would be betraying him by walking away from a bipartisan deal that he help negotiate......

Pelosi and Biden smacked Manchin in the face by announcing they weren't going to do the deal he worked on without the reconciliation bill first.

you are fooling yourself if you honestly believed that Joe Biden did not already talk to Joe Manchin about that before he spoke about it to the public. manchin knows full well what the Dems plans are and it is silly to claim that he was somehow  smacked in the face because Biden talked about a Reconciliation bill that he already knew was coming lol

the harsh reality for the GOP is if they walk away from this deal, Biden will just pass his original giant infrastructure bill and joe Manchin will no longer stand in his way since has already gotten what he wanted out of this deal....

I dunno, sure looks like Biden recognized he goofed it up.  But I guess maybe looking like he goofed up was all part of the plan and Manchin was in on it the whole time.

Biden's so called goof is that he was being too honest with the american people about his plans when clearly some in the GOP would have preferred him to keep quiet about the details of their agreement

But behind the scenes both Joe Manchin and the Republicans who are now pretending to be outraged know full well what Bidens plans are. They all knew about the Reconciliation bill and I don't for 1 second believe that BS about them claiming to surprised by the news

[roxas11]

The Majority of American people want another stimulus check not just infrastructure spending after 1400 and 600 was passed in March Biden right track/wrong track number was 55/45 now it's 39/49% but his policies are extremely popular, that's why he is still at 51/49% Approvals, that tells you right there we need another stimulus I'm October not just for middle class getting advanced payments on EITC

That's a warning in today's poll if D's don't get a wave, they're doomed in the H, they know that that's why they are gonna spend a billion dollarson an unwinnable race in FL to keep D's in power in FL and DeSantis is gonna Redistrct FL to his electoral advantage

DeSantis is up 60/40% and he only barely won in 2018 due to running with Scott, this time he is running with popular Rubio up 60/40% D's are gonna keep the Senate win 278 Govs

and here is what joe manchin and kyrsten sinema thinks about that...

[roxas11]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/joe-manchin-doubles-down-refusing-204539822.html

Manchin rejects Bernie's inflated 3.5T Reconciliation compromise too expensive

This is not what he said at all


Manchin did not reject 3.5T Reconciliation compromise
He told reporters on Tuesday he would only back an infrastructure package that was fully financed by tax revenue

If anything Manchin comments seem to be implying that he is all for whatever the Dems support as long as they use tax increases in order to make sure that the bill is fully payed for

[roxas11]

https://twitter.com/BreitbartNews/status/1419765671475376132

Trump honestly thinks that the Dems are going to just sit around and wait until 2022 for the GOP to regain a strong negotiating stance after they walked away bipartisan infrastructure deal lol

If the GOP ends up pulling a stunt like this the Dems will simply pass the bipartisan bill using reconciliation

[roxas11]

I can't believe people are here are actually buying into Sinema BS lol
I don't for 1 second believe that she will vote against the reconciliation bill if even Joe Manchin ends up supporting it in the end

Sinema recently met with Biden and this was just posted on the president twitter account
https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1420500562727088136
There is no chance biden and white house would be pushing the bill this hard if they actually believed Sinema was really aginst the reconciliation bill. I suspect Sinema is going act like she is against it until they throw her bone and cut it down from 3.5 trillion to 3 or 2.9. trillion...

[roxas11]

Watching this process play out makes it painfully obvious that both Trump and Obama whould have really benefited from having more experience before becoming president.

Getting big legislation, though congress is a hard and complex task that requires someone who knows how Congress actually works. There is no question that Biden's experience and past relationships with congress played a big role in getting this bipartisan bill done

For example, when it looked like things were about to fall apart after Biden told the media that he would not sign the bipartisan bill if it came to his desk without the reconciliation bill. Biden was able to call individual Republicans senators and convince them to still stick with the bipartisan infrastructure deal

In the end Republicans senators knew and trusted Biden enough to take his world for it

Now imagine how that same sitution would have played out with Obama or Trump. A junior senator like Obama barely had any relationships with his own party, let alone the Republicans and Trump was basically hands-off when it came to congress and He let other people in his party do all the work since he did not even bother reading any of the details of the bills he was trying to pass lol

If Biden ends up pulling this off I believe the big lesson for both parties should be that experience really does matter. I understand that both sides want an outsider who has not been in Washington for too long, but just look at how that worked out for Trump when he tried to pass his health care bill and immigration reform or even Obama when he struggled to pass anything else after the ACA was signed into law in 2010

[roxas11]

If Biden ends up pulling this off I believe the big lesson for both parties should be that experience really does matter. I understand that both sides want an outsider who has not been in Washington for too long, but just look at how that worked out for Trump when he tried to pass his health care bill and immigration reform or even Obama when he struggled to pass anything else after the ACA was signed into law in 2010

I think there's truth to this. But also remember that ACA happened because Obama kept pushing it through when everyone else had given up after Brown's election.

Had Obama been more experienced he would have never been in that position in the first place and here is a perfect example of what I'm talking about

It did not take Biden very long to realize that his negotiation with Shelley Moore Capito was nothing but a waste of time he shut it down and moved on. Thankfully, it turns out that was other republicans like Rob Portman, who really did want to get something done on infrastructure and actually was willing work with Biden in good faith. None of that would have happened had Biden let Shelley Moore Capito drag him along for a negotiation that she knew full well was going nowhere


Obama on the hand, let Chuck Grassley sucker him into dragging the negotiation for healthcare reform past the August recess and by the time Obama had realised that he had been played the damage was already done

In Obama's memoir he would go on to say this about those pointless negotiation

He asked Grassley whether he'd support a health care reform bill that included all of the changes to the ACA that He wanted to see. "I guess not, Mr. President," Grassley replied.

The GOP used Obama inexperience against him and that was the main reason why he ended up having to to push ACA through when everyone else had given up after Brown's election

[roxas11]

Yeah that's fair.

We'll see what happens. Obama got 2 heavy lifts through during the trifecta, and if Biden gets this it will be 2 heavy lifts as well. We'll see if he can do more.

I still think his agenda is essentially over after this and the probable passing of the reconciliation bill.

If Joe Biden gets the of the reconciliation bill I agree that it will be over, but that is mainly because he actually succeeded in doing, what he set out to do and not because his agenda was cut short like Obama or Trump. He basically would be 1 of the few presidents who largely succeeded in getting most of their agenda through Congress

1. A Covid relief bill that introduced major new polices like the child tax credit

2. A bipartisan bill that is the largest investment in infrastructure since Dwight D. Eisenhower began the interstate highway system.

3. A reconciliation bill that deals with everything from childcare to climate change

Biden would have accomplished in 1 year what most presidents fail to do in 4 or even 8 years

Normally presidents fail to get a lot of what they want in their first term, so they spend the next election, telling voters if they are reelected they will finally deliver on a lot of what they promise them 4 years ago, but in Biden case he would in the rare position where his accomplishments would actually make a second term seem kind of pointless.

[roxas11]

Yeah that's fair.

We'll see what happens. Obama got 2 heavy lifts through during the trifecta, and if Biden gets this it will be 2 heavy lifts as well. We'll see if he can do more.

I still think his agenda is essentially over after this and the probable passing of the reconciliation bill.

If Joe Biden gets the of the reconciliation bill I agree that it will be over, but that is mainly because he actually succeeded in doing, what he set out to do and not because his agenda was cut short like Obama or Trump. He basically would be 1 of the few presidents who largely succeeded in getting most of their agenda through Congress

1. A Covid relief bill that introduced major new polices like the child tax credit

2. A bipartisan bill that is the largest investment in infrastructure since Dwight D. Eisenhower began the interstate highway system.

3. A reconciliation bill that deals with everything from childcare to climate change

Biden would have accomplished in 1 year what most presidents fail to do in 4 or even 8 years

Normally presidents fail to get a lot of what they want in their first term, so they spend the next election, telling voters if they are reelected they will finally deliver on a lot of what they promise them 4 years ago, but in Biden case he would in the rare position where his accomplishments would actually make a second term seem kind of pointless.

What about the FY 2023 bill? We could pass it before the midterms. Any hope for a public option?

I would be shocked if Dems try to pass anything as big as a public option during an election year

It would turn into a huge partisan fight since we know that not a single Republican will vote for it and the healthcare industry will also be against it. I can't see kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin, supporting something like that next year

Ultimately, whatever charges the Dems want for the healthcare system better be in the current reconciliation bill because there is no chance that is getting done in a FY 2023 bill

[roxas11]

If this passes, Biden goes down as a top 5 President

https://twitter.com/JStein_WaPo/status/1424727128944353283

I'm skeptical that they can actually pass immigration reform using reconciliation because if that was the case, then I guarantee you that Trump and GOP would have put their version of immigration reform in their 2017 reconciliation bill when they were passing their big tax cut

I hope I'm wrong on this, but it would not surprise me at all if immigration ends up not being in the final bill

[roxas11]

This is what a successful presidency looks like, one that follows through on its promises concretely, rather than bloviating on it year after year.

Biden has objectively accomplished a lot in the first 7 months. Hope the American people actually pay attention.

Doesn't help that Cuomo finally decided to resign like 30 minutes after the bill's passing. His resignation is going to get a bulk of coverage.

Nah it just makes the news day better

I agree

Getting rid of a distraction like Cuomo around the same time that they finally passed their infrastructure bill is like icing on the cake lol

[roxas11]

If Biden ends up pulling this off I believe the big lesson for both parties should be that experience really does matter. I understand that both sides want an outsider who has not been in Washington for too long, but just look at how that worked out for Trump when he tried to pass his health care bill and immigration reform or even Obama when he struggled to pass anything else after the ACA was signed into law in 2010.

The lesson that experience matters should have been learned after the Carter presidency.

This is kind of ironic since Carter actually had more experience than Obama and Trump before he became president lol

unilke those 2 Carter was a Georgia state senator (1963–1967) and The Governor of Georgia (1971–1975)

The carter years shows us that this is a very tough job even for someone with a decent amount of experience and that is a big reason why both parties should not be trying to make 1 term junior senators or reality tv show stars the next president of the united states

[roxas11]

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1426147926888361985


Dumb

Nancy would be foolish if she did something like that

The fact is there is not enough votes to pass this bill alone without reconciliation

Progressive Dems will most likely vote against it and it is ridiculous to assume that there are enough Republicans in the house who will be willing to help moderate Democrats pass the bill anyway

The fact that Kevin McCarthy has yet come out in favor of a bipartisan bill that even Mitch McConnell voted for should be a huge warning sign to those 9 idiot Dems who really believe that republicans in the house are going to actually help them pass this bill if a lot of progressive Dems don't vote for it

[roxas11]

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1426147926888361985


Dumb

Nancy would be foolish if she did something like that

The fact is there is not enough votes to pass this bill alone without reconciliation

Progressive Dems will most likely vote against it and it is ridiculous to assume that there are enough Republicans in the house who will be willing to help moderate Democrats pass the bill anyway

The fact that Kevin McCarthy has yet come out in favor of a bipartisan bill that even Mitch McConnell voted for should be a huge warning sign to those 9 idiot Dems who really believe that republicans in the house are going to actually help them pass this bill if a lot of progressive Dems don't vote for it

What makes the 9 moderate Democrats "idiots" and not the so-called "Progressive Dems" who are holding the infrastructure bill hostage right now?

They are idiots because they know full well that they can't pass their bipartisan bill without progressive support. A senior Democratic aide even told CNN "there are not sufficient votes to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill this month

Their entire plan seems to based on idea that this guy is going to come to their rescue and help them pass their bipartisan infrastructure bill if progressive Dems don't vote for it....


Now don't get wrong, it would be one thing if McCarthy had actually said he would be willing to help them pass the bill but in this case not only has he not said anything like that

All indications are that he and most of the house republicans are going to vote against the bipartisan bill..

[roxas11]

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1426147926888361985


Dumb

Nancy would be foolish if she did something like that

The fact is there is not enough votes to pass this bill alone without reconciliation

Progressive Dems will most likely vote against it and it is ridiculous to assume that there are enough Republicans in the house who will be willing to help moderate Democrats pass the bill anyway

The fact that Kevin McCarthy has yet come out in favor of a bipartisan bill that even Mitch McConnell voted for should be a huge warning sign to those 9 idiot Dems who really believe that republicans in the house are going to actually help them pass this bill if a lot of progressive Dems don't vote for it

What makes the 9 moderate Democrats "idiots" and not the so-called "Progressive Dems" who are holding the infrastructure bill hostage right now?

They are idiots because they know full well that they can't pass their bipartisan bill without progressive support. A senior Democratic aide even told CNN "there are not sufficient votes to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill this month

Their entire plan seems to based on idea that this guy is going to come to their rescue and help them pass their bipartisan infrastructure bill if progressive Dems don't vote for it....


Now don't get wrong, it would be one thing if McCarthy had actually said he would be willing to help them pass the bill but in this case not only has he not said anything like that

All indications are that he and most of the house republicans are going to vote against the bipartisan bill..

It works the other way too.

The reconciliation bill can’t pass with out moderates support.

So, by your own logic, those so-called “progressive Democrats” are idiots.

The difference is that progressives are not under any illusion that the GOP in the house are going to help them pass Biden's agenda if moderate Dems don't vote for the reconciliation bill

Moderate Dems on the had seem to be convinced that McCarthy and house Republicans are actually going to help them pass their bipartisan infrastructure bill if progressive Democrats dont vote for it lol

[roxas11]

To be clear, I'm not actually against what the moderate Dems are trying to accomplish

I am all for the idea of wanting to get the infrastructure money to the states as quickly as possible and if they actually had the votes to do it than I would have no problem supporting them, but the reality is moderate Dems don't have the votes and putting this bill on the floor for a vote is not going change that fact. If anything, it would actually damage the prospects of both infrastructure bill and reconciliation bill getting passed if the bipartisan bill fails to get enough votes on the house floor

So for that reason alone, I simply cannot support the moderate Dems on this. Say what you will about Nancy Pelosi, but she is no fool when it comes to the numbers and she knows full well that the numbers are simply not there for a stand alone vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill

If both progressives and moderates stick to together than they both sides can get what they want out of this, but if moderates have it their way the bipartisan bill will die the second Nancy puts it on the floor for a vote and both sides will get nothing in the end