Has Joe Biden given up on his misbegotten quest for “bipartisan” governance?
If the liberal president’s recent statements and actions are to be believed, it appears the answer is an emphatic yes. But a good argument could be made that the cognitively faltering default winner from the 2020 Democrat primaries and general election never believed Republicans would ever oppose him in the first place. Biden is that delusional, apparently.
Regardless of his own views, Democrat insiders see a different type of resolve from the embattled bumbling Oval Office occupant these days. Jonathan Lemire reported at Politico the other day:
“...Biden ... believed that after four tumultuous years of Trump, the nation was hungry for unity — and that even some Republicans, horrified by the Jan. 6 riot and weary of the 45th president’s divisive approach to the office, would be willing to spend some time working across the aisle.
“’The thing that will fundamentally change things is with Donald Trump out of the White House. Not a joke,’ said Biden during a 2020 New Hampshire campaign stop. ‘You will see an epiphany occur among many of my Republican friends.’ ...
“[P]rivately, Biden has expressed frustration with media coverage of his administration and believes that the press — and Americans at large — have been too quick to gloss over the damage Trump did to the country. He also has taken to telling aides that he no longer recognizes the GOP, which he now views as an existential threat to the nation’s democracy.”
So, in other words, because career swamp dwelling senile Joe counted on some Republicans rolling over and doing what they’ve always done -- capitulating to the onslaught and slow creep of big government -- that the sledding would be much easier once he won (stole) the election and re-entered Washington DC as a savior reminiscent of one that entered Jerusalem on a donkey about 2000 years ago.
It's the utter naivete of a simple man who’s based his political career on plagiarism, outright lies, destroying the reputations of others, and accusing everyone around him who didn’t agree with his political pitch of being motivated by racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic, bigoted, small minded -- and under the spell of Donald Trump.
Was Biden’s and Kamala Harris’s intense “voter suppression” attack on Republicans in Georgia earlier this year really meant to be an olive branch for peace rather than a call to race-obsessed Democrats to push harder for federal control over elections?
Is it that the Republicans have truly changed, as Biden insists, or is it really just that Democrats have gotten uglier, nastier, more outside the mainstream, more defensive of heinous indefensible practices like abortion, as well as bolder in their attacks on free speech and thought, more “out there” in calling “climate change” an “existential threat” and more in-your-face contemptuous of traditional American culture and values?
What about senile Joe’s own predilection to cover up the obvious to everyone antics of his wayward, bro’s widow snatching, stripper impregnating, crack smoking son Hunter?
If Joe Biden came into office expecting “bipartisan this and bipartisan that” then he truly hasn’t paid attention to what’s happened in American politics the past thirty or so years -- or the meltdown might’ve even begun earlier than that. Conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh hit the national syndicated airwaves in the late 80’s, reaching millions of patriotic Americans in their homes and cars and talking up politics and government as though it were a competitive combat sport rather than merely a civic duty to vote every so often.
Because of the greater availability of information, people got better informed and more intense, motivated and angry. Meanwhile, “moderate” Democrats began disappearing in Washington and at the state level. Ever since the demise of what used to be known as “conservative” Democrats -- like those in the Blue Dog caucus in the House or a token few “conservative” Democrats in the senate (such as former Georgia Senator Sam Nunn) -- there’s no such thing as give and take in Biden’s own party.
Likewise, there were a handful of ultra-RINO Republican senators who subsequently shed their phony skins and made a beeline over to the other caucus to show their real selves. It seems like an eternity ago, but there was Senator Lincoln Chafee from Rhode Island, a man so liberal and obstinate that he was the only GOPer to vote against authorization of the use of force in Iraq after 9/11/01. Lincoln, who took over his father’s senate seat after the elder Chafee passed away in office in 1999, then got onboard the Obama train in 2008 and even served as co-chair of the Democrat’s 2012 reelection campaign.
This isn’t very “bipartisan” to me. Chafee sounds more like a committed Democrat. As a side note, Chafee recently left the Democrats, too, and now calls himself a libertarian.
Similarly, there was “Jumpin’” Jim Jeffords of Vermont, who unilaterally decided he didn’t want Republicans to have a majority in the senate after the 2000 election and left the GOP to caucus with the other guys in 2001, which switched control of the upper chamber in George W. Bush’s first year. No doubt Jeffords was the type of Republican Biden had in mind when he envisioned “bipartisanship”.
What senile Joe considers “bipartisan” Republicans, voters began seeing as agenda-defeating RINOs. Democrats loved “Maverick” John McCain for his willingness to speak out against traditional GOP standards such as tax cuts or strict immigration enforcement, but they sure changed their tune when the Vietnam veteran ran for president in 2008. Biden certainly didn’t care much for attracting Republican support when he lied through his teeth while attacking Sarah Palin in the vice presidential debate in that year and again in 2012 opposite Paul Ryan. Besides, there’s plenty of “bipartisan” behavior these days. Doesn’t Joe notice?
Arguably the most “bipartisan” member of the current Congress is West Virginia Democrat senator Joe Manchin, who has supported a good portion of Biden’s overall agenda, and nominees, but has held firm against ditching the filibuster along with Arizona Democrat senator Kyrsten Sinema. The filibuster is the most “bipartisan” tool there is, isn’t it? To pass a bill, senators from both parties must combine for 60 votes to end debate.
Wouldn’t senile Joe and his fellow Democrats consider RINO Liz Cheney and her partner in savagery, Adam Kinzinger, “bipartisan” for agreeing to join Nancy Pelosi’s January 6 committee witch hunt? Cheney and Kinzinger openly defied their party’s leadership as well as Donald Trump, the figurehead of the GOP. Yet “bipartisanship” gets no shout out from the president in this instance.
Similarly, didn’t seven Republican senators vote to impeach Trump last year? Isn’t Mitt Romney “bipartisan” at heart? Or does “bipartisanship” only count when it leads to a Republican surrender?
Against the better judgment of all principled conservatives, the Congress passed a “bipartisan” infrastructure bill last year, which will eventually pour another $1.2 trillion into the U.S. economy on top of the strictly partisan $1.9 trillion COVID “relief” package Democrats jammed through without a single GOP vote in either the House or senate.
Biden only cares about “bipartisanship” when he loses, which thanks to a generally united Republican senate caucus, has been frequent. I can’t help but sense it isn’t Mitch McConnell who’s been strangely proficient at shooting down senile Joe’s absurd requests, it’s been Democrats’ unwillingness to concede that most Americans didn’t share his and their drive for “transformation” like he figured they would.
If Biden truly cared about “bipartisanship”, he would be effusive in his praise for Joe Manchin, who is effectively the most powerful legislator in Washington today, with de facto say over whatever gets passed or remains stalled as a figment of Democrats’ wildest fantasies.
It’s cruel reality to Democrats that their most coveted vote for Biden’s agenda stems from a senator who hails from a state that voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump. Manchin himself has repeatedly and consistently said he wouldn’t agree to his party leadership’s schemes until there was significant input from Republicans. And he wouldn’t vote for big boondoggle spending in times of high inflation, either. Yet they still complain about a lack of “bipartisan” cooperation.
Facts matter. Democrat congressional leaders never gave a squat about bipartisanship. Did senile Joe conveniently forget that his and The Big O’s precious Obamacare was pushed through without any Republican votes? Nancy Pelosi famously said the Congress would have to pass the law so people could find out what was in it.
The truth is, Biden didn’t run for president to change the “tone” in the country or to foster “bipartisanship” or to “work” with Republicans. No, he expected that if Trump were returned to the private sector that the GOP would reassume its age-old position as doormat to the never cautious establishment swamp Democrats.
Only a fool like Joe Biden would believe that “bipartisan” cooperation on the Democrats’ transformative agenda would be possible in the current political environment. Did he just forget that Hillary Clinton called conservatives “deplorables” just a few years before? Biden thought his presence alone could steamroll the opposition. That’s no longer possible in the age of Trump.
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