"I do not think anyone with a D next to their name has any intention of outright killing it."
I honestly don't have enough trust left to believe this but if one does have trust I can see decoupling the bills not being a big deal.
"Meanwhile, time to save our democracy is running out. If we can't get an anti-gerrimandering bill in place before the end of the year, we'll be locked in to another decade of Republican-tilted house races. We are not prioritizing."
That goes right to that trust issue. I agree we aren't prioritizing well. Our democracy is the bedrock upon which everything else including the infra bill rests, so why didn't we do that first. Oh right, conservative Dems scuttled that idea too.
I would probably feel different about this if it didn't seem that they are overplaying their hand. It isn't like they're bargaining with something only the other side wants. They will be hurt by the scuttling of the bipartisan bill, and coming away with nothing feels like it would hurt worse for the people who want the most. Of course, these are people who come from safe districts, so maybe I'm undervaluing their bargaining position.
Still, this couldn't come at a worse time for the Biden administration, and that's what irritates me the most. Because right now, as we seem to agree, the Biden administration really needs some good press, and this is making the Democrats seem as dysfunctional as the Republicans when they controlled Congress. Granted, it's better to do this now than a year from now. Maybe in the end we'll get good legislation out of this that the Democrats can run on, but so far they don't seem to be getting credit for what they already did with the American Rescue bill, so I'm skeptical about that. And when politically, we so clearly need the support of moderate conservatives to stave off the threat of Trump, making it seem as though the Democrats are captive to the whims of their left wing seems to imperil our political future.
"I do not think anyone with a D next to their name has any intention of outright killing it."
I honestly don't have enough trust left to believe this but if one does have trust I can see decoupling the bills not being a big deal.
"Meanwhile, time to save our democracy is running out. If we can't get an anti-gerrimandering bill in place before the end of the year, we'll be locked in to another decade of Republican-tilted house races. We are not prioritizing."
That goes right to that trust issue. I agree we aren't prioritizing well. Our democracy is the bedrock upon which everything else including the infra bill rests, so why didn't we do that first. Oh right, conservative Dems scuttled that idea too.
I would probably feel different about this if it didn't seem that they are overplaying their hand. It isn't like they're bargaining with something only the other side wants. They will be hurt by the scuttling of the bipartisan bill, and coming away with nothing feels like it would hurt worse for the people who want the most. Of course, these are people who come from safe districts, so maybe I'm undervaluing their bargaining position.
Still, this couldn't come at a worse time for the Biden administration, and that's what irritates me the most. Because right now, as we seem to agree, the Biden administration really needs some good press, and this is making the Democrats seem as dysfunctional as the Republicans when they controlled Congress. Granted, it's better to do this now than a year from now. Maybe in the end we'll get good legislation out of this that the Democrats can run on, but so far they don't seem to be getting credit for what they already did with the American Rescue bill, so I'm skeptical about that. And when politically, we so clearly need the support of moderate conservatives to stave off the threat of Trump, making it seem as though the Democrats are captive to the whims of their left wing seems to imperil our political future.