Manchin Is the Thorn in Schumer's Side

Let’s get one thing straight up front: Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV — Trump by 39 points) is no conservative. It’s very unlikely that he’ll switch parties anytime soon, as some hope. If for no other reason, he likes the attention he can generate as the “moderate” Democrat in a 50/50 Senate. All the same, the thought of Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and Bernie Sanders suffering some serious heartburn over Manchin is amusing.

Earlier this week, Manchin called for Congress to “hit the pause button” on the $3.5 trillion Bernie Sanders-written spending bonanza poised to pass both houses. Then he wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed fleshing out his argument and throwing down the gauntlet:

Some in Congress have a strange belief there is an infinite supply of money to deal with any current or future crisis, and that spending trillions upon trillions will have no negative consequence for the future. …

At $28.7 trillion and growing, the nation’s debt has reached record levels. Over the past 18 months, we’ve spent more than $5 trillion responding to the coronavirus pandemic. Now Democratic congressional leaders propose to pass the largest single spending bill in history with no regard to rising inflation, crippling debt or the inevitability of future crises. Ignoring the fiscal consequences of our policy choices will create a disastrous future for the next generation of Americans. …

I, for one, won’t support a $3.5 trillion bill, or anywhere near that level of additional spending, without greater clarity about why Congress chooses to ignore the serious effects inflation and debt have on existing government programs.

Unfortunately, Manchin’s opposition has more to do with the timing and size of the bill than the sweeping socialism of Sanders’s legislation. Yet Manchin also hints at objections on a more fundamental level. “The purpose of the proposed $3.5 trillion in new spending isn’t to solve urgent problems, but to re-envision America’s social policies,” he says. “I believe that spending trillions more dollars not only ignores present economic reality, but makes it certain that America will be fiscally weakened when it faces a future recession or national emergency.”