A huge win, and a good omen

This week's passage of the $1.9 trillion covid-19 relief bill is a major accomplishment, achieved under dauntingly unfavorable conditions.  A long list of positive agenda items passed, less than two months into the new government's term in power, despite razor-thin majorities in both houses and unified Republican obstruction and a couple of fractious senators.  Biden, Pelosi, Schumer, and the party are definitely showing they can get things done.

We didn't get everything we wanted (it's politics -- nobody ever gets everything they want).  The failure to bring our minimum wage into line with what most developed countries have is a disappointment, and that effort will need to be revisited.  But look at what we did get.  A new round of stimulus checks.  An extension of the federal addition to unemployment benefits.  An expansion of the child tax credit which is expected to substantially reduce poverty.  A reform of ACA premium subsidies which will make health insurance affordable for millions.  Billions in aid for schools, hospitals, renters, small businesses, vaccine development and distribution, and state and local governments.  No wonder Republicans are whining that this is a wish list of liberal agenda items.  Yes, that's exactly what it is, and that's grounds for celebration, even gloating.

That so much was accomplished, in such a short time, despite such obstacles, bodes well for the future.

I said back in October that Biden's kumbaya talk about bipartisanship and working with Republicans was just a necessity of the campaign, and that he knew full well from his time as Obama's vice president that Republicans would never cooperate:

Biden is a lot smarter than most people give him credit for. He's running this campaign on multiple levels. He gives the naïve the unity-and-reconciliation talk they want to hear, while signalling to those of us who live in the real world that he, too, lives there. As president he'll probably make a genuine effort to work with the residual Republican minorities in the House and Senate, and when they spit in his face and pledge their undying hatred and obstructionism as they did with Obama, he can say that he gave it an honest try -- and then he'll get down to doing what needs to be done.

I'd say that's exactly what we've just seen.  Biden made it clear that he wanted Republicans on board -- but also that the train was leaving on time with or without them.  Democrats this time didn't waste months negotiating with Republicans who clearly just wanted to kill or cripple the bill.  And now the Republicans have shown their true colors.  If they unanimously refused to cooperate on a bill which was supported by the vast majority of the public and even a majority of Republican voters, then they aren’t going to cooperate on anything.

Which brings us to the filibuster problem.  The next big issue on the table is renewed federal protection for voting rights, which Democrats cannot allow to be stymied by the filibuster.  Yet Republicans will be more motivated to block this than almost anything else -- in much of the country, vote suppression is the only way they can win.  It's the irresistible force of victory or defeat on an absolutely critical goal, against the (supposedly) immovable object of Manchin's and Sinema's dogged support for an antediluvian relic of Senate procedure.  Manchin has already signaled willingness to make the filibuster much harder to use, even if not abolish it outright.  Manchin and Biden are apparently engaging in a bit of political kabuki theater on the issue.  There will be movement on the filibuster.  Not all the way, not immediately, but there will be movement.

And then, we'll have more winning to look forward to.