Life is tough, as the saying goes. And it's tougher when you're stupid.
Which brings us to the Democrats, who can't stop hazing Sen. Joe Manchin, the most moderate Democrat in the Senate.
According to The Week:
In the hours after Manchin declared on Sunday that he won't support the For the People Act, the phrase "He's a Republican" trended on Twitter. A Democratic congressman accused Manchin of voting to preserve Jim Crow. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) similarly proclaimed the senator was standing up for the GOP and voter suppression.
What a bunch of creeps.
Manchin comes from one of the reddest states in the union and probably shouldn't even be in the Senate as a Democrat. He is, so they Democrats get some things from him. Now that he doesn't want to stack the courts, federalize national elections, bring in ballot harvesting, force same-day voting, end the filibuster, or spend like Joe Biden wants to spend on "infrastructure," he's a bad guy to them. As if two couldn't play those games (ballot-harvesting, filibuster, et al) when the shoe is on the other tootsie and Republicans take power.
Which prompted some 'bring it on' warnings from conservative Washington Post columnist Marc Thiessen:
Democrats should be careful; their Senate majority rests in Manchin’s hands. They need to decide: Do they want Manchin to be their party’s John McCain (R-Ariz.) — a maverick who went his own way on issues but stayed within the party fold? Or do they want Manchin to become their party’s Jim Jeffords, the Vermont Republican who became the first senator in history to hand Senate control to the opposition by switching parties?
In May 2001, Jeffords announced he was leaving the GOP to caucus with the Democrats. Then, as now, the Senate was split 50-50 — which meant his defection put Democrats into the majority. “Increasingly, I find myself in disagreement with my party,” he said in explaining his decision. “In order to best represent my state of Vermont, my own conscience and the principles I have stood for my whole life, I will leave the Republican Party and become an independent.” Do Democrats want to hear Manchin utter similar words? Then keep right on attacking him.
And if he did, it would be only right. Right now the Democrats have the slimmest of majorities, yet are being jerked around by the farthest reachest of the far-left, the Chavista wing, so to speak, led by The Squad. That goes as much for the Senate as it does for the House, and it certainly applies to Joe Biden. The House Democrats just yesterday couldn't even work up a no-brainer vote to condemn Squad stalwart Rep. Ilhan Omar for insulting the U.S. military as no different from the Taliban, which is perfectly logical thinking to the rabid left as well as America's enemies. That's not how things usually are. When a majority is thin, the normal thing is to govern from the center. Instead, all we have are crazies calling the shots as if Republicans had lost big and been utterly rejected by voters.
There's a razor-thin majority in the Senate and a GOP Sen. Joe Manchin would hand the whole thing back to Sen. Mitch McConnell, a fine thing if you ask me since I still like the guy, and even if you don't, a fine thing, because true conservative senators, such as Sen. Rand Paul, Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. Tim Scott, and other good Republicans would be calling the shots.
And Thiessen doesn't say so, but there's ample reason for Manchin to do it, politics-wise. Internal polls have panicked Democrats with the news that a red wave is coming in 2022. Typically, when politicians of either party see that happening, some retire, and some jump ship and go to the soon-to-be winning party. Why not be on the winning side all the time and get the good committee seats? Get in early to line up the best ones. Such is the pressure Manchin must be feeling as the red wave heads the Senate's way...
A Manchin defection to the Republicans would put the brakes on Biden early in his extremist plan to "reset" America and continue the Obama agenda to its logical radical left-wing conclusion. No more puppet of Val Jarrett and Susan Rice or Obama himself, Biden would be forced to cut deals with Republicans, or be left twisting in the wind, even as NGOs and right-wing lawyers shutting down his executive orders. He'd have to go back to his basement.
Which would probably be fine for old Joe, being put out to pasture, as nature intended, but we know he likes his new power as an extremist.
In normal times, a razor-thin majority should always be governed from the center. Manchin as a Republican would probably be annoying to the GOP, but his handing of the Senate to Republicans to put some kind of check on runaway Joe would be worth the the cost of admission. Republicans should be showering this guy with candy and flowers, or whatever the heck he wants to bring him into the fold and teach the Democrats a lesson. Democrats seem to think they have a mandate, which makes them feel powerful and able to kick around Manchin, but they're too stupid to survive on this "abuse Manchin" strategy of theirs.
Manchin can now teach them a lesson. It would be nice to see this kind of backbone in a Democrat. But of course, if such a Democrat did have such backbone, he'd be a Republican.
Joe Manchin, come on down.
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