The editors of the Wall Street Journal seem to me to bring the necessary cynicism to explicating the infrastructure “compromise” that is to preface enactment of the related Dem wish list/prospective spending blowout:
Mr. Biden’s statement Saturday changes nothing except the [White House counselor Steven] Ricchetti atmospherics. Mr. Biden spoke the real truth on Thursday. He knows, because Mr. Ricchetti tells him, that Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer plan to jam through as much of the Families Plan as they can on a partisan vote.
They’re telling the political left to go along with the infrastructure bill because it will please Mr. Manchin and reduce the price tag for the Families Plan by including a lot of climate-related spending. The GOP will have left its fingerprints on much of the Democratic spending blowout and its consequences, and it will be helpless to stop the Families Plan. Mr. Manchin is already falling in line.
All of this is hiding in plain sight. Mr. Biden on Thursday merely put his not-so-fine point on it. Republicans who think that passing an infrastructure bill will prevent a partisan Families Plan are fooling themselves—and voters. Don’t listen to what Mr. Ricchetti says. Listen to what Mrs. Pelosi and Mr. Schumer say they’ll do.
The Journal cites the White House statement issued on Saturday to soothe discomfited GOP participants in the alleged “compromise” infrastructure deal (“[m]y comments…created the impression that I was issuing a veto threat on the very plan I had just agreed to, which was certainly not my intent” — “created the impression” because that’s what he said). The White House statement is posted here.
Notice: All comments are subject to moderation. Our comments are intended to be a forum for civil discourse bearing on the subject under discussion. Commenters who stray beyond the bounds of civility or employ what we deem gratuitous vulgarity in a comment — including, but not limited to, “s***,” “f***,” “a*******,” or one of their many variants — will be banned without further notice in the sole discretion of the site moderator.