The House Does Not Have Many Manchins
1st October 2021
Steven Hayward at Power Line.
Scott has noted that Sen. Joe Manchin has “named his price point” on the spendapalooza bill: $1.5 trillion. Scott is right that this is still very bad, but it requires the progressives to shrink their wish list by more than half—by a full $2 trillion. I’d love to be a fly on the wall in the House Democratic caucus meetings and sub-meetings right now, because if there is no honor among thieves, imagine how painful it is to the progressive raiders of the treasury when they have to start trading off their once-in-a-generation wish lists.
Will the Progs agree to cut back universal Pre-K, or full Medicare vision and dental coverage? How about the $3 billion for “tree equity” (maybe my favorite part of the bill)? For that matter, how about the main features of the “Green New Deal”?