We all owe him our gratitude
He was West Virginia's Secretary of State from 2001 to 2005, then Governor of the state from 2005 to 2010 and now he is the senior Senator from the state of WV. In every sense of the word he is a moderate. He is what stands between the radical democrats in congress and the structure of the Republic that has served us so well since the nation's birth.
Democrats plan to radically transform America within two years. They have bills such as HR 1, which would nationalize elections to the benefit of democrats, as well as a planned bill to pack the Supreme Court, and dreams of somehow making Puerto Rico & DC states on hold just waiting for the end of the filibuster. They haven't said it yet but they would also like to federalize police departments. In order to advance these extreme measures they need to abolish the filibuster. All that has stopped them, thus far, is the fortitude and integrity of moderate democrats like Senator Joe Manchin and Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema. The democrats tiny majority in the 117th Congress has made them the most influential members of congress.
The less vocal Kyrsten Sinema
Short of ending the filibuster, the Senate democrats have another option. The new Senate Parliamentarian has given them an enormous gift. She has somehow broke ranks with the previous Parliamentarian who once granted Senate Republicans one chance per year at reconciliation. She is granting Shumer & co 4 shots at it in a year's time. Funny how that happened. Most recently, democrats used the budget reconciliation process to pass a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 stimulus package without Republican support. Most of it had nothing to do with covid-19.
Manchin usually votes with the democrats and has been a firm supporter of the Affordable care Act, as well as funding for Planned Parenthood, and voted with his party against the 2017 tax cut. However, when it comes to the idea of fair play and the norms of procedure in the US Senate, Joe Manchin has stood firm:
Ruling out changing the filibuster Manchin said "the time has come to end these political games, and to usher a new era of bipartisanship where we find common ground on the major policy debates facing our nation."
"We will not solve our nation's problems in one Congress if we seek only partisan solutions. Instead of fixating on eliminating the filibuster or shortcutting the legislative process through budget reconciliation, it is time we do our jobs."
History will record another profile in Courage.
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This is everything a Senator should be.
Trump and his supporters are off topic.
I am off topic.
Joe Manchin is my favorite Senator, I do not like the ones we have in Virginia
In reality, Joe Manchin's vote is worth no more or less than any of the other 99 senators. It is ENTIRELY because Congress has gotten away from voting for issues on the merit that Manchin has "power".
The idea that he is valuable because he is willing to vote in service of conservative ideals (as the posted article argues) is absurd. Not only do I not "owe" Joe Manchin anything, I can't even owe him a vote.
From the liberal perspective I could EASILY say that Manchin's vote is worth so much ONLY because not one Republican senator is willing, in most instances of policy issues, to vote with the Democrats.
If there were even 5 Republicans who could be persuaded to vote with the administration on some issues Manchin's vote would be meaningless.
As far as the filibuster goes, I think they will end up carving out exceptions to the filibuster rule that Manchin will ultimately agree to.
Of course there are. Susan Collins is practically a democrat. She'll along with any moderate proposal and her vote is always "gettable". But yeah, she will oppose the extremist stuff Biden is pushing.
No, Collins is bought and paid for by the gop.
I owe him nothing. He's a fool if he thinks republicans will cooperate. A complete fool.
No he’s not and he knows that senate democrats have no leverage on him because if they punish him and he goes Independent they lose control of the senate.