Joe’s Not Playing Hardball With The Green New Deal
Talk stupidly and carry a limp stick
Hey Joe, where you goin’ with that gun of your hand?
Hey Joe, I said, where you goin’ with that gun in your hand? ~~~ Hey Joe, Hendrix
I just learned that yesterday, Joe Manchin used his chairmanship of the Senate Environment and Energy Committee to hold a hearing on “rising energy prices” (thanks Schumer, for installing Manchin as the Chair of that vitally important Committee!)
Manchin explicitly supported more coal, carbon capture, and natural gas exports, while providing a platform for oil industry interests and Republicans to savage the Biden climate, energy, and “Build Back Better” agenda, based on a manufactured rising energy price crisis.
The Washington Post did not report that extraordinary – and perhaps unprecedented – sabotage by Manchin.
Instead, the WaPo reports that the Biden White House is going on offense on rising energy prices:
President Biden on Wednesday called on the Federal Trade Commission to launch an investigation into oil and gas companies, alleging that their “anti-consumer” behavior has led to higher gas prices.
His attack, which top aides quickly amplified on social media, comes as the White House is attempting to hit back at critics who allege the Biden administration isn’t doing enough to counter GOP allegations that inflation and rising prices are holding back the economy. White House officials counter that the economy is in fact surging despite unease from many Americans.
Meanwhile, the WaPo reported that Biden went to Detroit today to talk about EV manufacturing and jobs. The people’s air and water are poisoned; schools, parks, libraries, and housing suck; the place heats up like a hellscape during summer heat waves and old people drop like flies; and militarized cops kill them with impunity – but Joe knows that all good democrats want to either work in car factories or drive Tesla’s (and all those shade trees, parks, and libraries are for the suburban folks, amirite?)
“Bipartisan Joe” kicked off his infrastructure victory campaign by barnstorming New Hampshire (“Live Free Or Die!”) and talking about such burning local issues as replacing public transit vehicles that had served their useful life and reducing the time for bridge repair by 1 year! Really! I heard Joe actually mouth these hard hitting talking points on NPR! (snark).
If Biden were really going on offense – since Manchin is sandbagging not only his “Build Back Better” initiative but his Presidency – Biden would have gone to West Virginia and talked about a “just transition” and guaranteed every single coal miner and gas industry worker a better job with 100%+ pay and benefits and job security – for life.
He would have done a series of events in poor West Virginia mining towns with local officials and mine union workers.
He would have said he’s ready to allocate billions of federal dollars to local renewable energy projects (wind, solar); energy efficiency projects to lower people’s residential energy bills (home insulation, heat pumps, solar panels, new refrigerator, AC, etc); health benefits to mining caused diseases; new schools, parks, and community healthcare centers; new drinking water treatment facilities; community colleges; affordable housing; and creation of thousands of union jobs (starting at $25/hour) in planting millions of trees and environmental restoration of the mountaintop mining removal and devastation of 100 years of coal and gas industry exploitation.
He would have then said Manchin was blocking all that.
Manchin would fold, believe me.
That’s what a competent White House would do. But Biden is a fraud. He’s not even trying.
Bobby Kennedy showed the way when he went to Appalachia to talk about poverty in 1968.
LBJ knew how to deal with small obstructionist punks like Manchin and Sinema.
But Sleepy Joe somehow missed all that history, while he spent his political life shilling for the banks and credit card companies out of Delaware.