Nothing like having faith in the people you serve, not to mention having faith in human nature to begin with. This latest addition to the growing Legend Of Joe Manchin should have people singing about him on porches for decades to come. Manchin flipped the bird to the rest of the Democratic party yesterday when he killed Build Back Better. And now come to find out, he’s got a worse view of poor people than any Republican. He thinks if they get an extra nickel they’ll squander it, and on drugs and entertainment, no less. He really is in the wrong party, no question there. Huffington Post:
In recent months, Manchin has told several of his fellow Democrats that he thought parents would waste monthly child tax credit payments on drugs instead of providing for their children, according to two sources familiar with the senator’s comments.
Continuing the child tax credit for another year is a core part of the Build Back Better legislation that Democrats had hoped to pass by the end of the year. The policy has already cut child poverty by nearly 30%.
Manchin’s private comments shocked several senators, who saw it as an unfair assault on his own constituents and those struggling to raise children in poverty.
Manchin has also told colleagues he believes that Americans would fraudulently use the proposed paid sick leave policy, specifically saying people would feign being sick and go on hunting trips, a source familiar with his comments told HuffPost. […]
Manchin’s refusal to support the bill likely means December’s child tax credit payment will be the final one for the 36 million households that have been receiving the benefits since July.
Those payments have been a lifeline and a godsend for many people in the country’s poorest state, but no more. Senator Manchin thinks that if you get milk money you’ll go spend it on Mad Dog 2020, evidently.
The concern that some parents would use the benefit for drugs echoes years of conservative talking points on welfare. During Barack Obama’s presidency, Republicans in Congress and state legislatures around the country sought to add drug testing to requirements to nutrition assistance, unemployment benefits and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, which provides monthly cash benefits to poor parents.
More than a dozen states enacted drug testing policies from 2011 through 2017, resulting in less than 1% of applicants actually testing positive for drugs. States lawmakers have generally lost interest in the policy in recent years.
Since West Virginia launched its TANF drug screening program in 2017, just 131 applicants have tested positive for drugs ― a small fraction of the thousands of program beneficiaries. Nevertheless, state lawmakers this spring opted to continue the screening program for another five years. The puny number of welfare recipients kicked off the rolls might not save the state any money, but it sends a message: People on welfare can’t be trusted, and we’re making them prove they deserve help.
The Republican ideology has always been to burn down the social safety net and drive the disadvantaged people into greater disadvantage yet.
“If Mr. Manchin and Republicans and anybody else who thinks struggling working families, who have a hard time raising their kids today, should not be able to continue to get the help — that’s their view — they’ve got to come forward to the American people and say, ‘we don’t think you need help,’” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Thursday
Nice thought, Bernie, but it never will happen.
Having lived in WV for ten (closer to eleven) years I can assure you this will be going over like a lead balloon up there. If ole Joe had thoughts of spending the holidays back with his evil spawn and (equally) corrupt coal buddies in WV I imagine he’s scrambling to make other plans. He’s also gotten one helluva warning shot across the bow – his colleagues leaked what he really thinks about his constituents and but Little Joe ain’t Donald Trump who can get away with all manner of open contempt for his base (except it seems for having gotten both vaccinated and boosted!) but where is he to turn? Sure, the GOP is singing a siren song right now but if he switched over to them he’d be powerless and he knows it. They’d trust him even less than we do, and if he wants to run again to use the power of being a Senator to stave off serious investigation of his business dealings he’d NEVER survive a GOP primary fight. So his fellow Democrats are sending a message, and he’s probably shitting bricks.
“Poor” Joe. He’s probably had to stash his fancy schmancy EYE-talian car somewhere for something less conspicuous when he’s at the marine where he has his boat that he lives on. As I said elsewhere earlier today, I think he might be having a Roy Scheider moment from Jaws – as in “I’m gonna need a bigger boat!”
And the message is crystal clear: “cooperate or else.” Going on Fox News was a stupid stunt in and of itself. But stabbing his party in the back so blatantly? He was trying to panic us into thinking it was over. Funny how it took only a little under twenty four hours for it to bite him in the ass with the force of a bear trap. When you got WV miners (AKA the only constituents who can help keep him in office in Trump Country) throwing down the gauntlet, well…I must defer to William Hurt in A History Of Violence: “How do you f$$$ that up? How…do you f$$$ that up?!”
I was writing my own comment on his having pissed off the coal miners as you were writing yours. Reinforces my belief that “Wild, Wonderful West Virginia” is about the last place he wants to be showing his face right now. Come the first of the year when those Black Lung benefits cut off due to his actions Manchin will have a lot more to fear than progressive Democrats.
Manchin is a cross-eyed crook. He spouts the same crap the fascist have been pushing since Ronny Ray Gun. It is not good to be poor in this country. Warren felt the same way until she researched the issue and learned poor people weren’t poor because they spent all their money on crap. They were poor because they lost jobs or had huge medical bills. But hell, why should facts get in our way?
I forgot something that’s pretty huge. The freaking UNITED MINE WORKERS has gone public criticizing Manchin and urging him to pass BBB! Coal Miners! Their statement cites not only Black Lung funding and other stuff, but money in the bill that would provide coal workers employment in new, modern energy jobs. When even coal miners are on Manchin’s case about his bullshit he’s got to be shitting bricks. Giant ones. Cinder block sized! Mr. Coal is fucking with the heart and soul of WV when he crosses coal miners and they’ve made it clear he needs to get his head unfucked and get back on board with passing BBB and right freaking now. (Thanks to Joe it’s not only the child payments that end at midnight on the 31st, so do Black Lung benefits that Joe touted back home!)
And coal mining is not the major industry it used to be, which Joe should know. He’s protecting his own income.
Wow! He doesn’t think much of his constituents, does he?
So what he’s saying is that his constituents are a bunch of gun-toting drug addicts (and if they’re incapacitated miners, they don’t deserve any compensation)
And he expects them to vote for him????????????
Daihi, my point exactly.
When you are crooked yourself, you naturally assume everyone else is as well.
As for him running again, he has stated that he won’t be running again. He KNOWS his goose is cooked, possible over-cooked.