The United States’ poverty rate experienced its largest one-year jump on record last year, with the rate among children more than doubling from 2021’s historic low of 5.2 percent to 12.4 percent according to new numbers from the US Census Bureau out today. They’re the latest data to reflect the devastating effects following the expiration of nearly all pandemic-era relief programs. That includes the end of Medicaid rules that protected recipients from getting kicked off because of administrative errors, an end to rental assistance policies, and the restart of student loan payments.

These policies might seem like a distant memory at this point. But they’re worth recalling with the arrival of every new report. Each demonstrates what happens when politicians long hostile to caregivers, universal health care, and the welfare state, for a brief moment, acted to create powerful, federally-backed safety net programs aimed at helping everyday Americans. One of the most effective programs to emerge was the expansion of the child tax credit, which provided families monthly checks of up to $300 per child and broadened eligibility rules for qualifying families. In turn, child poverty rates plummeted; the extra income allowed caregivers to quit grueling second and third jobs; parents were able to buy their kids decent clothes and help stop taunting at school. The Census Bureau previously reported that food insecurity dropped dramatically after just the first extended payment, from 10.7 million households reporting they didn’t have enough food to 7.4 million.

But as the pandemic receded, Republicans with the help of West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, who in private remarks reportedly warned that families were using the extra income to buy drugs, appeared to remember the country’s longstanding pre-pandemic hostility. Their opposition ultimately tanked President Biden’s agenda, and along with it, the brief life of the expanded child tax credit. That’s something worth remembering today as the predictable crowd is likely to cry about Democratic-engineered inflation.

  • judgeholden
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    deleted by creator

                • pingveno@lemmy.ml
                  ·
                  10 months ago

                  West Virginia has gotten more and more conservative over time. It used to be more of a blue state. In 2020, Trump got double the votes that Biden did. Manchin is going to struggle to hold the seat if he runs again, let alone some left wing upstart without name recognition who is poorly matched to the state's politics.

                    • pingveno@lemmy.ml
                      ·
                      edit-2
                      9 months ago

                      Joe Manchin is conservative for a Democrat, but he is no Republican. Any replacement will be a right wing Republican that the Democratic Party has no influence over. Manchin highlights his independence from either party. A replacement would highlight their mindless opposition to any proposal by the left or Democrats.

                  • Schadrach@lemmy.sdf.org
                    ·
                    10 months ago

                    West Virginia has gotten more and more conservative over time. It used to be more of a blue state.

                    WV was a blue state because unions. When Dems started attacking the largest union industries in the state, and started emphasizing identity politics over labor that was pretty much it.

                    • Kuori [she/her]
                      ·
                      10 months ago

                      emphasizing identity politics

                      yes. the democrats are so good at protecting marginalized peoples. that is clearly where their effort goes. just ask anyone trans who lives in joe biden's america how much fun they're having~

                      • AOCapitulator [they/them]
                        ·
                        edit-2
                        10 months ago

                        Identity politics are the liberal nothingburger approach to pretending to care about marginalized groups

                        The real version of this is intersectionality. If you hear “identity politics” think worthless liberalism like naming a road after George Floyd

                      • Schadrach@lemmy.sdf.org
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        Never said they were successful at that. What I'm getting at is that there's a shift in Dem rhetoric that happened about 20 years ago where the emphasis stopped being on labor, and started being on identity groups. This is very convenient for their corporate sponsorship, as silly things like worker's rights and labor unions are not things said sponsors want to support, for obvious reasons. By comparison, something like which bathroom trans people shit in is a perfectly fine topic from the perspective of the corporate masterminds, because it doesn't impact their cash flow.

                        This is the same reason why the Dems are comically bad at getting anything done - half their policies are pro-worker ones kept eternally on the back burner only to be brought out in a pre-compromised form and then compromised further on when the calls from the base get too loud, and the rest are ones where they try to keep various minority groups on the edge of existential terror by suggesting that if you don't vote for them then you'll be one step closer to being marched off to the death camps.

                    • silent_water [she/her]
                      ·
                      10 months ago

                      actually I disagree with the existence of stupidpol and patsoc types

              • Adkml [he/him]
                ·
                edit-2
                10 months ago

                By not conrinuing to support and fund them.

                By doing literally anything.

                But anytime anybody says that we get a lecture on how dems have to keep supporting him otherwise he'd do the exact same things as a republican.

                  • StalinwasaGryffindor [he/him, comrade/them]
                    ·
                    10 months ago

                    Speaking as a non-american, the only way to avoid burgerlands nosedive into fascism would take so much more work and would definitely involve losing the senate. To me, you have to completely remake the Supreme Court and senate, and part of that is to always attack them and their legitimacy. Every democratic spokesperson should be bring up how corrupt and unaccountable these institutions are

                    Like, open up criminal cases against Clarence Thomas and Alito over their corruption. Same with manchin. Every one of these ghouls have done criminal acts. Even if you don’t win the court cases (and you won’t), you’ve dragged these peoples names into the mud and will help expose the flaws in both Congress and the courts. Get a majority of people mad enough that they shut down the country through strikes and demonstrations and you’ll suddenly find the remaining judges and congresspeople a lot more amenable.

                    Now, you’ll have thought up a ton of reasons why this won’t work. So have I, and the major reason to me is that most of the democrats are the same kind of garbage as the republicans, along with Americans being incredibly docile except when they’re murdering each other plus a million other reasons. So fuck both parties, vote or don’t, I don’t really care, but don’t expect me to be impressed by joe Biden

                  • Adkml [he/him]
                    ·
                    10 months ago

                    Ok here's some actual examples.

                    Take him off all committees stop giving him any money or support for relecrions and start closing military bases in his state.

              • redladadriver [none/use name]
                ·
                10 months ago

                Why are Democrats giving money to "Democrats" who won't support their agenda? Why did the DNC support Manchin and Sinema financially, but actually give money to Republicans over Progressive Democrats? You can't be against Fascists, but still financially support them over Social Democrats...An unemotional look at the DNC's behaviour shows that even if you got 70 Senators, the things we want would not get done. The Democrats are closer to the Republicans than any Socialist/ Communist/Anarchist in here..

          • chauncey [he/him]
            ·
            10 months ago

            Did Biden fight tooth and nail to push through his agenda? Nope.

            So it's completely reasonable to say that Biden allowed childhood poverty to double under his watch.

            • ElHexo [comrade/them]
              ·
              10 months ago

              Senators need 60 votes to do just about anything in the Senate but change the rules. That takes only 51 votes.

              What can we do Jack, if we had to change the rules of the senate to allow majority votes then we might be able to do something

              • judgeholden
                ·
                edit-2
                9 months ago

                deleted by creator

                  • BurgerPunk [he/him, comrade/them]
                    ·
                    10 months ago

                    Actually political parties can and should enforce political discipline on their members, and there should be reprisals for going against the party and its leadership.

                    But the reality is, letting Manchin trash this legislation is probably more the plan than an opposition to it

                      • BurgerPunk [he/him, comrade/them]
                        ·
                        edit-2
                        10 months ago

                        If they can't control him then they've already functionally lost a seat (unless of course, they actually like having him block legislation they don't actually want to pass)

                        Parties exert control on their members in this country, they always have, and generally not through violence or torture. Usually its through taking away party support from them and their personal agenda. It could be attacking political pork to West Virginia, close military or other government facilities there, and support challengers/kick him out of the party so he can't run on their ticket. It could possibly include more strong-arm tactics, not violence, not even anything necessarily illegal, that's speculative but possible.

                        What you're asking people to explain, is something that is the norm. You're the one actually making an outrageous claim of how do we expect a political party to control and discipline its members. And pretending that the Democratic Party or the President just have no power in this situation is ludicrous

                          • BurgerPunk [he/him, comrade/them]
                            ·
                            10 months ago

                            I don't think elections hold a lot of promise of fixing anything. I think Manchin and Sinema are exactly where their party wants them. I don't think that this legislation failing is something that the Biden Admin or the DNC are against.

                            I think they're happy about it, and thats why there's no discipline exerted on either of them. That's what i meant by you making an extraordinary claim about party discipline. Theres no party discilple or reprisals because the party doesn't care about this legislation. They like having these scapegoats. The Democratic Party leadership does not share your view, that these people shouldn't be there. That's why elections in this system will not fix it

                          • jack [he/him, comrade/them]
                            ·
                            10 months ago

                            a democracy that can be taken over by two greedy assholes

                            That ain't a democracy chief

                      • SpookyGenderCommunist [they/them]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        I'm gonna put on my political scientist hat, and point out that almost every political party on this planet enforces internal discipline in a multitilude of ways, a handful of which have been mentioned in this discussion thread already.

                        The idea that parties are these big tents where you can't possibly enforce any kind of internal discipline is both a uniquely America-brained take, and also not entirely true.

                        Like, there are literally people called "Party Whips" who's job it is to pressure the party members vote along party lines.

                      • ElHexo [comrade/them]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        There's literally positions in Congress for party members called a whip for enforcing party discipline

                      • Ram_The_Manparts [he/him]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        Manchin can simply become a Republican or independent and run on how he "blocked Bowen's agenda" and lose the Democrats a seat

                        What difference would that make when the guy is already voting like a republican?

                        • Adkml [he/him]
                          ·
                          10 months ago

                          He'd be using republican money for re-election instead of taking money from potential progressive politicians before getting elected and voting against the dems entire platform.

                  • Rom [he/him]
                    ·
                    10 months ago

                    LMAO How?? You force them with a gun? Lol

                    idk but the GOP seems to have no problem getting their entire party to vote as a single bloc so it can't be that hard.

                    • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
                      hexagon
                      ·
                      10 months ago

                      Sure. Democrats just have to become a party of rigid ideological purity instead of the big tent party they've been for a hundred years.

                      If you think Republicans can sustain that behavior, I invite you to pay attention to the way they're eating each other in the House right now.

                      • ToxicDivinity [comrade/them]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        I guess it's good that Biden didn't really try to get leverage on manchin then. Its good that Biden saw all the damage manchin was doing and said "well I guess I gotta give up now"

                        People who really care will try everything even if it might not work. Biden didn't try shit because he doesn't care

                        • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
                          hexagon
                          ·
                          10 months ago

                          So Democrats should turn into Republicans. Yup, that'll really fix the problem! Clearly I was mistaken that the goal here was good governance instead of seizing and holding power.

                          • btbt [he/him]
                            ·
                            10 months ago

                            Good governance is when you let your country fall apart because you’re too scared of getting your hands dirty to reign in rogue senators who are putting your country’s population at risk of starvation

                            • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
                              hexagon
                              ·
                              10 months ago

                              Having different ideas of what constitutes being a good public servant and how to do the job doesn't make them the enemy. Neither is following the rule of law. We can agree that more needs to be done and Biden's not doing everything right, but not that he's the bad guy because he's not doing everything we want him to do.

                              • StalinwasaGryffindor [he/him, comrade/them]
                                ·
                                10 months ago

                                The rule of law is a dumb concept and should be ignored. The laws we are talking about were written by monsters and no one with a soul should respect them

                          • ToxicDivinity [comrade/them]
                            ·
                            10 months ago

                            Republicans get things done and Democrats don't. I don't want dems to pick up Republican social ideals but I do want them to pick up Republican political strategies that actually produce results. Why do you want the party of the "good guys" to be so feckless? Isn't it a HUGE problem when the "good guys" are weak and the bad guys are strong?

                      • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        "Not funding the very same fascists you use to scare people into voting for you" = "rigid ideological purity"

                        I for one do not find it difficult or stringent to not work with fascist parties

                  • judgeholden
                    ·
                    edit-2
                    9 months ago

                    deleted by creator

                    • pingveno@lemmy.ml
                      ·
                      10 months ago

                      You've just described grounds for impeachment and removal of the president. The full House and Senate would turn on them at that point.

                      • Rom [he/him]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        We had a president literally try to overturn an election in his favor and the Senate still failed to convict him. 43 Republicans had their lives put in danger by his actions but still voted him not guilty. If that's not enough to remove a president from office then what makes you think this would?

                        • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
                          hexagon
                          ·
                          10 months ago

                          Because they voted that way for tribal reasons. They refused to hold one of their own accountable. Democrats have before and will again. We don't cover for someone's crimes just because they belong to the right party.

                          • Rom [he/him]
                            ·
                            edit-2
                            10 months ago

                            We don't cover for someone's crimes just because they belong to the right party.

                            lmao remind me again the last time a president was tried for war crimes? Obama literally bombed hospitals and the Dems still haven't done a damn thing about it.

                            • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
                              hexagon
                              ·
                              10 months ago

                              https://www.google.com/search?q=obama+hospital+bombing&newwindow=1

                              Just in case your fingers were broken.

                              • btbt [he/him]
                                ·
                                10 months ago

                                Oh shit, a 6000 dollar payout? That’ll surely make up for their innocent relatives being blown up for no reason!

                                • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
                                  hexagon
                                  ·
                                  10 months ago

                                  Way to miss the point about Obama acknowledging the incident and no one finding any evidence that he deliberately ordered the hospital to be bombed. War crimes are deliberate. Better if we're not bombing anyone at all, but his actions didn't rise to the level of criminality which is why even Republicans didn't try to get him on that. It's not like they weren't looking for an excuse to impeach him and put him on trial. They tried really hard with Benghazi, and still couldn't manage it.

                                  • Adkml [he/him]
                                    ·
                                    10 months ago

                                    So if somebody kicks your door in and shoots you in the head then gives your family $50 that's all good as long as the murderer didn't have a handwritten note saying "I know this is an extra judicial killing and don't care" in his jacket?

                      • judgeholden
                        ·
                        edit-2
                        9 months ago

                        deleted by creator

                        • pingveno@lemmy.ml
                          ·
                          10 months ago

                          No thanks. You claim to speak for the people, but really you only want power for your fringe ideology.

                          • judgeholden
                            ·
                            edit-2
                            9 months ago

                            deleted by creator

                                • pingveno@lemmy.ml
                                  ·
                                  10 months ago

                                  Oh, sorry. Every party that is not subservient to the CPC is banned. And those that are left are tiny with no real influence.

                                  • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]
                                    ·
                                    edit-2
                                    10 months ago

                                    During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime's atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn't go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them. If communists in the United States played an important role struggling for the rights of workers, the poor, African-Americans, women, and others, this was only their guileful way of gathering support among disfranchised groups and gaining power for themselves. How one gained power by fighting for the rights of powerless groups was never explained. What we are dealing with is a nonfalsifiable orthodoxy, so assiduously marketed by the ruling interests that it affected people across the entire political spectrum. parenti

                                    If they ban other parties, they're a one-party state. If they don't ban other parties, actually yes they do and it's all a secret scheme to convince us they're not a one-party state.

                                  • ThereRisesARedStar [she/her, they/them]
                                    ·
                                    edit-2
                                    10 months ago

                                    Democracy is when no political party dominates, and the more power doesn't consolidate around a very justifiably popular party the more democratic it is.

                                    If the democrats started doing good things the last time they had concrete control over all three branches and jumped to something like 80 percent popularity and got 80 percent of the vote, that would be undemocratic. Just like how the CPC has an above 90 percent approval rate according to international observers and holds almost all political offices in China.

                      • BelieveRevolt [he/him]
                        ·
                        10 months ago

                        You asked and he answered, sometimes AuThoRiTaRiAnIsM is how you actually get things done.

                          • BelieveRevolt [he/him]
                            ·
                            edit-2
                            10 months ago

                            Enjoy your democratic child poverty 👍

                            Also the US is not a democracy

                              • BelieveRevolt [he/him]
                                ·
                                10 months ago

                                lol, I bet you think killing Nazis is bad too and there's some kind of rule that states you have to have reactionaries in your politics instead of just getting rid of them.

                                  • Melonius [he/him]
                                    ·
                                    10 months ago

                                    you think you can just force elected representatives to do what you like.

                                    Imagine having elected officials doing what you like. Instead they do whatever corporate donors pay them to.

                                    Best to let capital sort it out - wouldn't want to enforce the will of the people or anything.

                                    • Flinch [he/him]
                                      ·
                                      edit-2
                                      10 months ago

                                      In freedom democracy burgerland, the average citizen has 0 influence on their elected officials decision making, and must resort to hoping they do something effectual. This is good and rational.

                                      In authoritarian, freedom-hating China, a recall vote can be initiated against a politician at literally any time by their constituents if they feel the will of the people is not being enacted. This is horrible and bad.

                                      parenti-hands

                                  • Kuori [she/her]
                                    ·
                                    10 months ago

                                    force elected representatives to do what you like.

                                    why should it take force when their power allegedly comes from the people? i thought this was a democracy!

                                  • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]
                                    ·
                                    10 months ago

                                    Crylaugh emojis are not the flawless cover for being flustered that you seem to think they are.

                          • SovietyWoomy [any]
                            ·
                            10 months ago

                            You live in a democracy? When is the last time you and everyone else in your workplace got together to make a decision democratically instead of that decision being made unilaterally?

                              • combat_brandonism [they/them]
                                ·
                                10 months ago

                                we literally have the largest per-capita incaceration rate in the history of the modern world what the fuck are you talking about ACTUAL dictatorships

                                • Ram_The_Manparts [he/him]
                                  ·
                                  edit-2
                                  10 months ago

                                  What's even worse is that the person we're replying to is likely fully aware of how the US has been sending its military and intelligence forces all over the world for the last 70-80 years to violently crush any movement that ever so slightly opposes its hegemony, and yet they still believe that the US is somehow not "authoritarian"

                                  These people live in a fantasy world.

                              • Ram_The_Manparts [he/him]
                                ·
                                edit-2
                                10 months ago

                                At this point someone should probably dig up that research paper that shows that what the US public wants has no influence on what is actually carried out by the US state.

                                • Alaskaball [comrade/them]
                                  ·
                                  10 months ago

                                  bud, you could literally rub their noses in the most solid evidence and they won't accept it in the same way you can drag a mule to water but you can't make the jackass drink

                          • DoiDoi [comrade/them, he/him]
                            ·
                            edit-2
                            10 months ago

                            You live in the US which has the world's largest prison population by both total numbers and percent of the population. Is this the non-authoritarian democracy you're talking about here? We have so many people in a cycle of poverty, bad health, and prison because we all got together and decided that this is how we want to allocate resources? Billionaires, private prisons, private healthcare, unaffordable housing, and child poverty?

                          • AntiOutsideAktion [he/him]
                            ·
                            10 months ago

                            Okay so address the point without latching onto the most extreme conceit they made. God forbid anything happen to a coal baron senator.

                            With all of the power of the executive branch, the democratic party apparatus, and the leadership of the body they are members of, you can excuse zero attempts to coerce their votes?

              • chauncey [he/him]
                ·
                edit-2
                10 months ago

                Easy. Threaten them. Remove them from committees. Cut their funding from DNC. Many many things could have been done.

                You would learn more if instead of asking "what could they have done" but instead asking "why didn't they do anything".

                They didn't do anything.

                • came_apart_at_Kmart [he/him, comrade/them]
                  ·
                  10 months ago

                  you can tell how little attention Democratic Party apologists like this pay attention to the Democrats, because they never seem to see any of the absolutely dirty tricks they pull against popular progressives to enforce discipline, that are somehow never ever deployed against these sineating right-wing assholes like Sinema and Manchin.

          • AntiOutsideAktion [he/him]
            ·
            edit-2
            10 months ago

            like a proper fool who has no idea of what is going on and yet is dead convinced of his own...let's call it "reasons"

            In order to hit the rule of three you included "you still have your opinion even after I called someone else stupid" for your reasons why someone's comment was stupid.

      • zephyreks [none/use name]
        ·
        10 months ago

        The Biden administration has overseen the sharpest rise in child poverty in America in decades. It's the responsibility of the governing party to figure out how to get results, not how to take a feels-good position.

  • SovietyWoomy [any]
    ·
    10 months ago

    There's absolutely nothing the democrats could have to prevent this. It just wasn't possible. If they had dared to try instead of talking about the importance of a strong republican party and the importance of compromise the parliamentarian would have immediately impeached Biden.

    Make sure you vote blue no matter who. They'll definitely do something next time football-lucy

    • usernamesaredifficul [he/him]
      ·
      10 months ago

      the parliamentarian would have immediately impeached Biden

      the parliamentarian doesn't have the authority to do that but still

      • Bnova [he/him]
        ·
        10 months ago

        Are you sure? I'm pretty sure if they roll a 4 or greater they get to be the president, during which time they may impeach the former president and wear their clothes.

      • Adkml [he/him]
        ·
        10 months ago

        The parliamentarian doesn't have the authority to do fucking anything its some unelected beurocrat nobody had ever heard of until liberals needed a fresh excuse to not do anything.

        That's the entire point

  • Thordros [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    edit-2
    10 months ago

    Joe Mansion and Christian Cinema are just this administration's Joe Liberalman. Aw beans, we wanted to do a good thing, but this one guy is gumming up the works! If only there was something we could do...

    ... like kick him off his committees. Pull his funding. Pull his endorsements. Revoke his party membership. Revoke federal contracts and close military bases in his state. Anything. Literally just change the rules! The Senate can do that!

    And that's just moral, ethical, rules-and-order-and-norms stuff they could do. There's plenty of evil (but perfectly legal) shit the President can do. Pull Mansion or Sinema into the back of The Beast, and show them some live footage of a predator drone flying over their houses. Remember, Obama established that you can drone strike US citizens if you're the President!

    • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
      hexagon
      ·
      10 months ago

      Anything. Literally just change the rules! The Senate can do that!

      The Senate can do that with a simple majority of votes. But when they need Manchin and Sinema to achieve that majority and neither of them are interested in helpful changes like fixing the filibuster, no. No they can't do that.

        • spaceghoti@lemmy.one
          hexagon
          ·
          10 months ago

          But Democrats aren't the authoritarians in this country, whatever Republicans try to say.

          • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]
            ·
            edit-2
            10 months ago

            Fucking lol

            Is that why the cops in my very blue city in my very blue state got all these new tanks and robots since the George Floyd protests?

          • came_apart_at_Kmart [he/him, comrade/them]
            ·
            10 months ago

            so you're saying they can't get anything done, because they follow special, unwritten rules against getting things done. because getting a good thing done is bad.

            another ringing endorsement to vote for the Democrats.

              • AOCapitulator [they/them]
                ·
                edit-2
                10 months ago

                Right, it’s my fault the planet is dying because I personally failed to recycle my .0000000001% of plastic waste that I didn’t ask to have produced

                Everything would be fine if people like me just didn’t litter, no more pacific garbage patch!

                Those starving children in Africa are only hungry because I’m neglecting my personal responsibility to donate to charities!

                This historical moment didn’t arise from nowhere. It’s basically a straight fucking line for the last 90 years, the process is this way on purpose, the democrats are this way on purpose

                This is the goal, not an accident

              • autismdragon [he/him, comrade/them]
                ·
                edit-2
                10 months ago

                If we gave them a 52 seat majority, the two most conservative Democrats in the Senate would suddenly become Manchin/Sinemas.

                Anyway, its not up to us to .serve the party with our votes. There is no ~doing our part~. Its up to them to earn it by being a useful party.

              • HornyOnMain
                ·
                edit-2
                10 months ago

                Operating within the rules and not pursuing their lust for power is just one of the reasons we ought to be helping them attain that majority

                So you're saying we should support the democrats because when they get into power they won't try to get any the good things they want done done unlike the republicans who will happily stoop however low they can to get all the bad things they want done

                  • BurgerPunk [he/him, comrade/them]
                    ·
                    edit-2
                    10 months ago

                    What good legislation? The Crime bill? Clinton's Welfare Reform? The Telecom deregulation? Repeal of Glass-Stegal? The resolution to invade Iraq? The Patriot Act? The bill Biden backed to keep people from discharging student loans through bankruptcy? Watered down ACA with no public option?

                    They never codified Roe. They never codified Ogerfell. They never did anything about Citizens United.

                    Edit: Wall Street bailouts in 08? Forcing people back to work during Covid? Not sending people the $2,000 they promised? That bill crushing the Railroad strike?

              • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]
                ·
                edit-2
                10 months ago

                Operating within the rules and not pursuing their lust for power is just one of the reasons we ought to be helping them attain that majority.

                Why would I miss a day of work to vote for someone who is going to handicap themselves instead of using the tools at their disposal?

                If dems kicked Mansion and Sinema off all committees, cut all discretionary funds flowing into the state, and Biden's AG indicted Manchin/his family for corruption and Sinema for campaign finance violations, then I could believe they genuinely wanted to pass the policies these people are blocking.

                Instead the dem's actions are no different than if they opposed these policies.

          • Adkml [he/him]
            ·
            10 months ago

            They're authoritarians whenever a minority asks them to stop killing them but when it comes to opposing fascism that's when they slap the handcuffs on themselves and insist them doing nothing is the morally superior choice.

          • rjs001@lemmygrad.ml
            ·
            10 months ago

            Do you think all the women that don’t have access to abortion while Democrats are in power right now think that?

    • bane_killgrind@lemmy.ml
      ·
      10 months ago

      Revoke federal contracts and close military bases in his state.

      These things hurt working class people, and are transparent retribution. They would hurt support for a democrat that decided to do it.

        • AOCapitulator [they/them]
          ·
          10 months ago

          I for one love when my nationwide rail strikes are crushed between daddy bidens big honking hairy legs

      • ToxicDivinity [comrade/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        10 months ago

        So the status quo is good for you? Better than trying to use leverage to force an old piece of shit to do something good for people?

        edit: Actually having a spine would help support for dems in my opinion. But we'll never know if I'm right because the dems will never try that.

      • Adkml [he/him]
        ·
        10 months ago

        Unless there's a contingent of people who would actually support the dems if they adopted the strategy of "literally doing anything at all to oppose fascism"

        Oh no, we don't want it to look like we're retaliating against fascists

      • TC_209 [he/him, comrade/them]
        ·
        10 months ago

        Operating and maintaining the Death Star created hundreds of thousands of jobs for hard-working Imperial citizens.

      • IHaveTwoCows@lemm.ee
        ·
        10 months ago

        oh no nert the jerbs

        (Fun fact: jobs are NEVER an excuse for bad policy or for dodging consequences)

  • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
    ·
    edit-2
    10 months ago

    How about we tar and feather him instead of thanking him?

    I mean, he loves coal so much, let's drench him in it's byproduct.

  • UlyssesT [he/him]
    ·
    10 months ago

    I just continued an exhausting comment chain from a "vote blue no matter who" Bidenite liberal who had nothing else to argue but "harm reduction."

    WHERE IS IT BEING REDUCED? honk

    WHERE? big-honk

  • rubpoll [she/her]
    ·
    10 months ago

    "You're an idiot if you think Democrats can do anything." - Democrats, trying to win us over

  • Flinch [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    10 months ago

    porky-happy Thank you, Joseph Munchkin. Check's in the mail!

  • NotErisma
    ·
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    deleted by creator

    • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]
      ·
      10 months ago

      Both here and in Afghanistan. Never thought I'd live to see a famine that actually was engineered by a guy named Joe, but here we are.

  • tripartitegraph [comrade/them]
    ·
    10 months ago

    You can thank all these dumbfuck democrats. they'll get whatever scapegoat they need to NOT do something good, and then try to guilt you into voting for them again next time around. and the children will still go hungry. jesus fucking christ

  • jabrd [he/him]
    ·
    10 months ago

    God the democrats suck so fucking much

  • dialectical_analysis_of_gock [she/her]
    ·
    10 months ago

    where are my stimulus checks?? the democratic party owes me money

    where is my healthcare?

    where is my loan cancelation?

    why are billions being sent to ukraine?

    why are the kids still in cages on the southern border?

    why did you say covid is over?

      • dialectical_analysis_of_gock [she/her]
        ·
        10 months ago

        who opened the cages? Obama

        who was president during Roe-Wade restriction? Biden

        troll = someone who is left of me and correctly realizes the futility of electoralism.

        Go cry to the others in your liberal echochamber

        Show

        • NotErisma
          ·
          edit-2
          7 months ago

          deleted by creator

      • NotErisma
        ·
        edit-2
        7 months ago

        deleted by creator

  • duderium [he/him]
    ·
    10 months ago

    I forget, is Joe Manchin president, or Joe Biden? Some liberal experts with knowledge of civics and critical thinking, please enlighten me.

    • GBU_28@lemm.ee
      cake
      ·
      edit-2
      10 months ago

      I am not a "liberal expert", but am generally familiar.

      The president can't do anything they want, forever.

      Biden used an executive order to enact a bunch of assistance programs during the end portion of covid. Included in that were things related to this topic.

      Executive orders are temporary, and exist to allow the president to make fast adjustments to hopefully help people out or protect the country, on lots of topics. For example, if the president believes there is an imminent security risk, they can mobilize the military for a short time without Congressional approval.

      If it seems like a topic that should be continued (like this one), Congress takes the issue up for a vote. Only Congress can make longer term budget decisions.

      In this case Joe manchin campaigned on being aligned with this type of issue, and being aligned with Democrats on a variety of core positions. On several occasions in his career he has gone against this alignment at critically painful moments, and sided with republicans. Essentially not acting as he advertised. With Congress being closely split, his vote really matters.

      So bidens temporary appropriations are now ending, and Congress didn't continue them when it was expected they should be able to.

      If Biden tried to just order it again, it would be struck down in courts due to this vote. This is an example of the balance of power between executive, representative, and judicial.

      • duderium [he/him]
        ·
        10 months ago

        How did separation of powers apply in 2008 when Obama was president, 60 democrats were in the senate, and the SCOTUS was “moderate”? Why didn’t the democrats pass universal health care and codify Roe during that time? Oh yeah, because they’re controlled by the same white supremacist bourgeoisie that controls the republicans. Now you’ve learned about the existence of class struggle—congratulations! And you’ve also learned that you’ve taken the side of the global 1% versus the global 99%, so pat yourself on the back!

      • Grimble [he/him,they/them]
        ·
        10 months ago

        Lol fuck your shitty do-nothing government system. You look like a nerd in high suspenders for pretending it can be saved

  • axont [she/her, comrade/them]
    ·
    edit-2
    10 months ago

    Democrats are useless bureaucrats who will never do anything good. Servants of the capitalist class, all of them, including the supposedly good ones like AOC.

    Joe Biden owes me another stimulus check. Joe Biden owes me $20,000 in student debt relief.

    Abolish the American capitalist class and immediately stop their ruthless destruction of lives and planet Earth hammer-sickle