Thread by @whstancil

With all due respect to Gillibrand, why are individual senators stuck negotiating individual policies with Manchin? This seems like a huge cause of the catastrophe currently swallowing the Democratic Party's agenda.

https://twitter.com/igorbobic/status/1453067034447785997

The way bargains work is pretty simple: "You give something, you get something."

That's what was supposed to happen with the bipartisan bill: we gave Manchin his bipartisan compromise and a bunch of WV pork, and he was supposed to support the bigger bill in return.

But in order for this to work, you have to do it ALL AT ONCE. If issues are taken up individually, Manchin doesn't have to take the bitter with the sweet. He can dig in his heels each time, making bargains impossible.

And that's what's happened.

Democrats have seemingly internalized the idea that Manchin, as the holdout, has to approve of EACH AND EVERY individual policy, negotiated with him one at a time by different people. It gives him MASSIVE power he wouldn't have otherwise.

This approach has, effectively, given Manchin a kind of line-item veto where he can cut out anything not to his tastes.

And it's been a disaster! He's shredded Build Back Better, bit by bit.

Over and over, Manchin accepts whatever concessions we give him, and then vetoes his own concessions.

The bargain just keeps moving in his favor while he makes zero sacrifices.

Again, this would make sense IF we were passing each BBB policy individually. Each bill would need his individual approval.

But we're not! We're moving one giant bill. That requires way more upfront effort but lets Dems drive a harder bargain when confronted with holdouts.

So what's going on, seemingly through sheer incompetence on behalf of Dem leaders, is that we're getting the worst of both worlds.

We have to strike one giant complicated deal. Except, ALSO, we're also letting Manchin line-item veto stuff as if we're doing it piecemeal.

Why??

tl;dr: it would be a really good time for Democrats to realize that collective bargaining works

Perfect example of how Dems' negotiating strategy is garbage. We have members wasting time trying to convince Manchin to keep policies, with heartstring appeals. But Manchin has no power to veto individual provisions - just the whole bill, all or nothing.

https://twitter.com/eleanor_mueller/status/1453459682224398340

The conceit here is that if the bill is not written EXACTLY to Manchin's specifications, he will kill it. But that's ridiculous! Manchin is not going to kill Biden's agenda because it contains a few policies he is unenthused about, something that is true of EVERY SINGLE MEMBER.

But for some insane reason, we have decided to conduct this negotiation in a way where each individual policy needs Manchin's sign-off, which places him in a unique, privileged, unearned, and unnecessary position of having to accept virtually no compromises at all.

WHY ARE WE LETTING THIS SELF-IMPORTANT JACKASS WEIGH IN ON EVERY INDIVIDUAL POLICY AS THE SUPREME DECIDER????

He has no unique authority to do this! He can just vote “yes” or “no” one time on the whole package like everyone else!!!! Dems are LETTING this happen!!

https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1453468204727250944

This procession of misery, where key Dem legislative priorities are carried in front of Joe Manchin one at a time so he can pronounce the death sentence on them in his best country twang, was not inevitable! We could have forced Manchin to make hard choices!

Dems were never going to get the perfect bill out of this process, but what we’re witnessing now is more like a complete rout, caused by our leaders’ incompetence at any kind of negotiation that requires anything firmer than a backslap and a compliment.