4 ms·

Passing a bill you know is dead on arrival is pointless. It's virtue signaling, which is what the house did. Suddenly, after the election, Pelosi is fine pass

Passing a bill you know is dead on arrival is pointless. It's virtue signaling, which is what the house did. Suddenly, after the election, Pelosi is fine passing the same amount she opposed before the election as only half what was necessary. This isn't some right-wing talking point -- Bernie Sanders has sad as much. This was a political game. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/fact-check-did-bernie-sanders-blame-democrats-for-stalling-covid-relief/ar-BB1bOL24 https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/fact-check-did-berni...

jacobolus 6y ago
If the GOP had been able to even get their own caucus to agree on a bill, they would have brought it to a vote. But they couldn’t. Putting even the milquetoast HEALS act up for a vote would have put some of their members in a conflicted spot trying to both appear to care about the crisis while still appeasing hard-liner donors/supporters. If the Senate had brought the HEROES Act as passed by the House to the floor, it might well have passed. But McConnell & friends didn’t want to see a relief bill passed, so they were satisfied to leave it off the agenda altogether.
- nostromo 6y ago
  If you think HEALS was milquetoast at $1.1T, you must be pretty upset that Pelosi has now agreed to pass a bill at $0.9T... after months of demanding no less than $3.0T. Gee, I wonder what happened in November for her to change her mind... I'll stop responding now; it's pretty clear a number of folks on HN think that only one party can play political games and this has gotten trite.
  - jacobolus 6y ago
    > you must be pretty upset that Pelosi has now agreed [...] Nancy Pelosi is surely also upset that we can’t do something more aggressive, but anything at all would be better than nothing (and we might still be stuck with nothing this year). We’re in an extraordinarily severe crisis, and people, small businesses, and state/local governments have been in urgent need of relief for months. Even jaded political veterans expected some action from the Senate these past 7 months, under the circumstances. But what we have seen again and again in recent years is that even when we lower the bar down to the floor, they still manage to trip over it.
    - dragonwriter 6y ago
      > But what we have seen again and again in recent years is that even when we lower the bar down to the floor, they still manage to trip over it. Correction: slither under it. They don't get over it, even by tripping.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > If you think HEALS was milquetoast at $1.1T, you must be pretty upset that Pelosi has now agreed to pass a bill at $0.9T... It was milquetoast, but not primarily because of the dollar amount (which is, though, inadequate as anything other than a partial stopgap and bridge), but because of substantive provisions.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> Passing a bill you know is dead on arrival is pointless. Actually, its often a significant part of the political process of building popular and, thereby, legislative support for a solution (which will ultimately often be a compromise from the DOA proposal.) And, in a bicameral legislature, taking up a measure on an issue that is unacceptable in the form the other house passed it in, and amending it to the form that you think is better and sending it back (or to conference to resolve the issues) is a way of moving forward that is generally more effective than sending an alternative bill to die in committee and then ignoring the issue.
- nostromo 6y ago
  I'm curious if you'd say the same about Republicans repealing Obamacare dozens of times, knowing the bills would go nowhere. To me it looks like a bad-faith effort and a waste of everyone's time.
  - jacobolus 6y ago
    The GOP clearly did want to repeal the ACA, and ultimately would have (questionably, via budget reconciliation, requiring only a simple majority in the Senate) except for the last-minute trick of John McCain. McConnell expected him to vote for repeal, and so allowed other subserviant “moderate” GOP Senators Collins and Murkowski to take the token ‘no’ votes. McCain put in his vote against after there was no way for McConnell to get around it, and the GOP was furious. After the successful repeal vote in the House in May 2017, the GOP threw big celebratory parties. You can see pictures of representatives smiling and laughing about the prospect of significant numbers of their own constituents losing coverage. They really relished the idea of taking away millions of people’s healthcare, and were profoundly disappointed when it didn’t work out. As for the dozens of repeal votes while Obama was still in office: those were a quite effective partisan posturing effort. GOP-aligned media spent years on false propaganda about the effects of the ACA, trying to trick a public who largely didn’t understand the law or the healthcare system more generally. (To the point that e.g. in Kentucky people like “Kynect” while “Obamacare” is extremely unpopular, even though they are two names for the same thing.) GOP politicians were electorally very successful campaigning against the ACA while trying to sabotage it in every way they could. Much easier than even pretending to come up with a plan of their own. Since the GOP Congress during Obama’s second term had no constructive agenda, essentially all of their time was spent on stuff like ACA repeal and Benghazi hearings. You are right that it was a bad-faith effort.

jacobolus 6y ago

If the GOP had been able to even get their own caucus to agree on a bill, they would have brought it to a vote. But they couldn’t. Putting even the milquetoast HEALS act up for a vote would have put some of their members in a conflicted spot trying to both appear to care about the crisis while still appeasing hard-liner donors/supporters. If the Senate had brought the HEROES Act as passed by the House to the floor, it might well have passed. But McConnell & friends didn’t want to see a relief bill passed, so they were satisfied to leave it off the agenda altogether.

nostromo 6y ago
If you think HEALS was milquetoast at $1.1T, you must be pretty upset that Pelosi has now agreed to pass a bill at $0.9T... after months of demanding no less than $3.0T. Gee, I wonder what happened in November for her to change her mind... I'll stop responding now; it's pretty clear a number of folks on HN think that only one party can play political games and this has gotten trite.
- jacobolus 6y ago
  > you must be pretty upset that Pelosi has now agreed [...] Nancy Pelosi is surely also upset that we can’t do something more aggressive, but anything at all would be better than nothing (and we might still be stuck with nothing this year). We’re in an extraordinarily severe crisis, and people, small businesses, and state/local governments have been in urgent need of relief for months. Even jaded political veterans expected some action from the Senate these past 7 months, under the circumstances. But what we have seen again and again in recent years is that even when we lower the bar down to the floor, they still manage to trip over it.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > But what we have seen again and again in recent years is that even when we lower the bar down to the floor, they still manage to trip over it. Correction: slither under it. They don't get over it, even by tripping.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > If you think HEALS was milquetoast at $1.1T, you must be pretty upset that Pelosi has now agreed to pass a bill at $0.9T... It was milquetoast, but not primarily because of the dollar amount (which is, though, inadequate as anything other than a partial stopgap and bridge), but because of substantive provisions.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> Passing a bill you know is dead on arrival is pointless. Actually, its often a significant part of the political process of building popular and, thereby, legislative support for a solution (which will ultimately often be a compromise from the DOA proposal.) And, in a bicameral legislature, taking up a measure on an issue that is unacceptable in the form the other house passed it in, and amending it to the form that you think is better and sending it back (or to conference to resolve the issues) is a way of moving forward that is generally more effective than sending an alternative bill to die in committee and then ignoring the issue.

nostromo 6y ago
I'm curious if you'd say the same about Republicans repealing Obamacare dozens of times, knowing the bills would go nowhere. To me it looks like a bad-faith effort and a waste of everyone's time.
- jacobolus 6y ago
  The GOP clearly did want to repeal the ACA, and ultimately would have (questionably, via budget reconciliation, requiring only a simple majority in the Senate) except for the last-minute trick of John McCain. McConnell expected him to vote for repeal, and so allowed other subserviant “moderate” GOP Senators Collins and Murkowski to take the token ‘no’ votes. McCain put in his vote against after there was no way for McConnell to get around it, and the GOP was furious. After the successful repeal vote in the House in May 2017, the GOP threw big celebratory parties. You can see pictures of representatives smiling and laughing about the prospect of significant numbers of their own constituents losing coverage. They really relished the idea of taking away millions of people’s healthcare, and were profoundly disappointed when it didn’t work out. As for the dozens of repeal votes while Obama was still in office: those were a quite effective partisan posturing effort. GOP-aligned media spent years on false propaganda about the effects of the ACA, trying to trick a public who largely didn’t understand the law or the healthcare system more generally. (To the point that e.g. in Kentucky people like “Kynect” while “Obamacare” is extremely unpopular, even though they are two names for the same thing.) GOP politicians were electorally very successful campaigning against the ACA while trying to sabotage it in every way they could. Much easier than even pretending to come up with a plan of their own. Since the GOP Congress during Obama’s second term had no constructive agenda, essentially all of their time was spent on stuff like ACA repeal and Benghazi hearings. You are right that it was a bad-faith effort.