Republicans are throwing a hissy fit over the apparent deal on climate and economic issues reached over the pending reconciliation budget which Sen. Joe Manchin apparently negotiated privately with (gasp!) his own party’s majority leader. And no one is being hissier than Republican Senator Susan Collins, whose devotion to the rights of others in the face of Republican bigotry and self-dealing obviously and historically knows no bounds.
The fact that Manchin’s and Sen. Schumer’s deal was not disclosed prior to Senate Republicans’ vote with Democrats to increase the manufacture of computer chips in this country apparently sent the Maine senator into a tailspin. After that, she says, how could Republicans be expected to allow gay people to marry by law? The two things are inextricably linked, well, of course.
As reported by Jonathan Nicholson for Huffington Post:
“I just think the timing could not have been worse and it came totally out of the blue,” the Maine senator told HuffPost Thursday about Senate Democrats’ unveiling of their bill to raise taxes on some companies, boost IRS enforcement and spend the resulting money to fund anti-climate change efforts. [...]
Still, Collins warned that the manner in which that victory was secured, where it appeared Democrats kept Manchin and Schumer’s negotiations under wraps until a separate bipartisan computer chip production incentive bill was passed by the Senate, hurt the effort to gather support among Republicans to bring the gay marriage bill to the floor.
“After we just had worked together successfully on gun safety legislation, on the CHIPs bill, it was a very unfortunate move that destroys the many bipartisan efforts that are under way,” she said.
Remember that mammoth tax giveaway to the nation’s wealthiest that was passed with no Democratic input by Republicans in 2017? The one that Susan Collins was so proud to sign on to, without her colleagues ever even showing as much as a piece of paper to Democrats in the process as it was drafted? Ah, memories:
The Republican-controlled Congress passed a largely unpopular tax reform bill along strict party lines in both the House and the Senate; not a single Democrat in either chamber voted “yes.” This, the Democrats say, was because the bill was written behind closed doors by Republicans who did not reach out across the aisle once during the drafting process...[.]
“There was zero outreach from Republicans on this issue,” said Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, during Tuesday’s debate. “Not one moment when Republicans actually shared even a piece of paper or a document about ideas that might bring both sides together.
So let’s just recap here. Republicans collectively betrayed the vast majority of Americans by passing an unnecessary tax cut to reward their donor base, deliberately excluding Democrats from the process. Democrats negotiate a bill in regular order through the only process available to them thanks to the threat of a Republican filibuster, and that somehow means Republicans can renege on promises to pass a law governing peoples’ right to get married?
Here’s an idea for Ms. Collins … try persuading your fellow Republicans to commit to something for once out of basic human decency, rather than looking for bogus reasons to thwart it.
We’ll wait.