NPR’s Steve Inskeep Baited Coons Into Sounding Like a Goddam Idiot
The reasonable answer to the question, “Are Republicans serious about making an agreement with you?” is – Fuck No.
And yet, in spite of everything we know about Republicans, Coons thinks they will come around.
INSKEEP: Are Republicans serious about making an agreement with you?
COONS: I think we’ll find out today because there’s been a series of back-and-forth negotiations and proposals. Today, Senators Capito of West Virginia, Wicker of Mississippi are going to unveil their trillion-dollar counteroffer to the last negotiating session they held with President Biden. I remain hopeful that we can come together around significant investments in hard infrastructure – in bridges and tunnels and airports and ports – in revitalizing the things that help us move people and products and make our country more competitive.
I’ll remind you, last month we actually passed a $35 billion water and wastewater infrastructure bill. Literally, today the Public Works Committee is marking up an authorizing bill that I think will go through on a bipartisan basis. And this week we are debating – and I think we’ll finally pass – $120 billion bill for making our country more competitive with manufacturing and innovation.
INSKEEP: Senator, I’m…
COONS: There is progress on other fronts.
INSKEEP: Senator, I’m listening closely to what you’re saying there. And we’ll just remind people – the president asked for a couple billion dollars in infrastructure. You said they’re coming back with something that may be more like a trillion, and you are optimistic there can be an agreement on what sounds to me like traditional infrastructure, like roads and bridges. Do you think that’s going to be the shape of this? Some of the other, more creative parts of this bill will go out?
” $120 billion bill for making our country more competitive with manufacturing and innovation.”
What the hell is this?
“the president asked for a couple billion dollars in infrastructure. You said they’re coming back with something that may be more like a trillion”
Doesn’t Inskeep have this backwards here? or maybe it’s Coons?
Biden’s latest proposal is for $1.7 trillion in spending. The GOP plan has been boosted from $586 billion to $1 trillion but won’t raise taxes, so I guarantee it’s a non-starter for real Democrats. Coons will love it.
The Republican offer also robs funding for infrastructure from the already-passed COVID relief, which should also be a Dem red line, but which Coons seems entirely too eager to accept.
Biden is not negotiating with Republicans. He is negotiating with turncoat Dems like Coons who are fronting for Republicans.
I read the transcript of this interview, and I’ll give Coons a morsel of credit. He is carefully trying to avoid generating a “Coons gives up on bipartisanship” headline, which would be off-message for the current Biden strategy of Kabuki negotiations with Republicans. And out of character for Coons.
When/if Dems decide to try to pass the bill with Dems only, I hope they revert it back to Biden’s original offer. But I’m expecting that they will go back to the watered-down version that includes all the compromise concessions to Republicans.
Hold on. You need to bait Coons to look like an idiot?
Coons has mastered the art of sounding superficially reasonable while actually fronting for Republicans.
The Biden administration is backing the Trump administration’s decision to drill for oil on Alaska’s North Slope.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/26/climate/biden-alaska-drilling.html?smtyp=cur&smid=fb-nytimes