West virginia

West Virginia governor Jim Justice announced that he is running for US Senate on stage at the Greenbrier, the swanky hotel owned by his family, yesterday. “I absolutely will promise you to God above that I will do the job, and I will do the job that will make you proud,” said the larger-than-life Justice, with his pet bulldog (and political mascot) Babydog sitting in a red armchair next to him.  The announcement sets up the possibility of an epic showdown between Justice (a former Democrat, now a Republican) and his friend Joe Manchin. The race could be decisive when it comes to control of the Senate after 2024. Manchin is one of three Democratic senators up for reelection who represent states won by Donald Trump in 2020.

When asked whether he will leave the Democratic Party and become an independent at a press conference on Monday, West Virginia senator Joe Manchin said, "I'm not a Washington Democrat, I don't know what to tell you… I have no intention of doing anything right now. Whether I do something later, I can't tell you what the future's going to bring." Simultaneously, Manchin threw a punch at former Senate challenger and current congressman Alex Mooney, stating, "[Governor Jim] Justice is a much better candidate, and he would be doing it for the right reasons. I think Mooney is doing it strictly for his political ambition." While Manchin hasn't yet confirmed a re-election bid, his comments leave the door open for his departure from the Democratic Party.

I, for one, never thought he would do it. I never thought Joe Manchin, who was elected in West Virginia after running an ad in which he literally shot the 2009 cap-and-trade bill, would sign on to Joe Biden's Build Back Better climate agenda. Yet sign on he has. Last night, Manchin announced that after over a year of logjamming Biden's spending plans, he'd struck a deal. The legislation he agreed to weighs in at a ballpark of $700 billion, a sharp climbdown from the $6 trillion Democrats had initially asked for. But it's still a lot of money, and even more importantly, it's a major psychological boost for the left. Now, barring some let-the-world-burn chaos from goth kid Kyrsten Sinema or revolt from House Dems, Build Back Better will be signed into law.

"For too long, we’ve failed to use the most important word when it comes to meeting the climate crisis,” President Biden declared in his presidential address to Congress in April 2020. “Jobs. Jobs. Jobs.” Investments in jobs and infrastructure, the president pleaded, have often had bipartisan support in the past. In November, he got nineteen Republican senators to vote for his $1 trillion infrastructure bill, but the main planks of Biden’s climate plan were in the $2.2 trillion Build Back Better Act. The House passed it in November, only for it to fail in the Senate, thanks to opposition from the most powerful man in Washington, at least when it comes to passing legislation.

Joe Manchin was never going to vote for Build Back Better. Now that he's declared himself a "no" and all but killed President Biden's titanic spending package, it's time for Democrats to admit as much. To be sure, Manchin has played well the role of centrist negotiator. He's furrowed his brow and raised pragmatic concerns over renewable energy and inflation. He's huddled with his fellow Joe at the White House and won plenty of concessions. He's provided chum for bored (and boring) political analysts, as analyzing him and his fellow holdout Kyrsten Sinema became a kind of Kremlinology for the Twitter-addicted. But such breathless parsing forgets one simple fact: all politics is local.

Conservatives view Joe Manchin as an untrustworthy flip-flopper. Liberals see him as a roadblock on their path to Woketopia. But for President Joe Biden, Manchin might be something else — a much-needed excuse. Every party needs a pooper, right? Well, Manchin might be the buzzkill the Democrats’ out-of-control shindig needs. Unlike 'Lunch Bucket' Joe, who has killed thousands of Keystone XL Pipeline jobs and proposed trillions of dollars in spending, Manchin is in-tune with the average American. That isn’t saying much. Joe Biden has spent more time conversing with the members of the Squad and answering questions from YouTube influencers than he has spent reaching out to Republicans. In 2021, it is easier for a politician to fall fully in-line with their respective party.